Firstly, I don't know why Senator Fatima Payman has been singled out in terms of this article.

If we look at Senators, such as Senator Alex Antic from South Australia he has been running a campaign to get more Pentacostal Christians into the Liberal Party. One Liberal Party member in South Australia has also resigned over factions in the SA Liberal Party, with some saying the matter has links to the Pentecostal drive.

http://www.indaily.com.au/news/2021/06/04/the-divine-right-pentecostal-recruitment-drive-divides-sa-libs

https://www.indaily.com.au/news/2023/07/06/dark-forces-liberal-factional-tensions-erupt-as-mp-turns-independent

It must also be noted Senator Fatima Payman has also advised against the setting up of a Muslim political party and has openly said so.

http://theconversation.com/fatima-payman-advises-muslims-dont-establish-a-political-party-234372

"“I can’t speculate what they plan on doing and not doing. But what I can say is, I don’t think it would be wise to have a Muslim party."

I don't know how much clearer Senator Fatima Payman needs to be here, despite the comments from the Author. Yet we have others, for example here with the Liberal Party actively attracting faith-based, church going people to their party who are Pentecostal with the aim of changing and directing policy within the Liberal Party and nothing said. Fatima Payman did no such thing though whilst working as a Labor Senator - and is doing no such thing at present.

Finally, I completely agree with Yuyutsu's earlier comments on this post and on matters around early land in terms of settlement and ownership. It is a complex area in terms of history as you have to rely on early papers, writings, scrolls or things written in caves etc. and you can only go back so far. You then rely on other things, not all reliable or able to be proven as fact.

In terms of Rhian and certain people having an obligation to respect the cultures and values of the societies, as a person in a minority group (vegetarian in Australia) I am under no obligation to respect the cultures and values of people here, the majority I disagree with who consume meat (about 90%), but can accept their way of life.

NathanJ

I agree with many of your points. My point about adhering to core societal values was specifically addressed to migrants, such as myself, who chose to come here. If I chose to move to Iran, I would abide by their dress codes, even though I disagree with them. If I chose to move to Israel, I would accept the obligation to do compulsory military service, even though I disagree with that. When I chose to take Australian citizenship I accepted the obligation to comply with compulsory voting even though I have reservations about it. And though I’m a republican, I swore allegiance to the queen.

While most Australians eat meat, I don’t know anyone who objects to people choosing to be vegan. Nor are there objections to other dietary choices such as following Halal or Kosher rules.

There are many social norms and values on which people can and do disagree and where we can fruitfully have constructive dialogue. I am not vegan but respect the ethics and reasoning of people who are. I suspect you are on the right side of history on this one – future generations will look back with horror on our treatment of animals in the way we now look back on slavery.

But there are some norms – democracy, rule of law, non-violence in pursuit of political change, non-discrimination on the basis of gender, race or religion - that are fundamental to the well-being of our society. Not every Australian accepts these, but most do. It is reasonable to expect people who want to join that society to abide by them.

Dear Rhian,

Yes, some species can be dangerous, so caution is reasonable.
Self-defence is unsaintly, but then we are not saints, so it is something we must accept (though never become proud of).

So when it comes to the ability of societies to act against outside individuals, I draw the line between preservation and greed/ambition:
Thus it is OK for a galactic civilisation to vaporise this planet because humans carry a virus that can infect and destroy a whole galaxy - but it is not OK for a galactic civilisation to annihilate our sun because it stands in the way of constructing a new inter-galactic super-highway...

The problem with modern nation states is not their mutual rights and obligations, which by itself should not be a problem - the problem is that [mainly due to competition between them] they allowed themselves to overpopulate irresponsibly beyond measure, not leaving space for anything else, human or environmental.

As you just observed, it is almost impossible at present to allow the space for parallel other civilisations.

To remedy this, a drastic reduction of population is required, but this takes time and should not exclude the deployment of mitigating second-best solutions in the meanwhile.

Two sets of solutions are:
1) to break existing states into smaller ones, or at least autonomies, where more diversity of lifestyle is possible; and
2) to expand on the concentric rungs of belonging to society.

To explain this second set, even today, citizens have more rights and obligations than permanent residents, permanent-residents more than temporary-residents, temporary-residents more than tourist-visitors, adults more than minors. For example, visitors (or their travel-insurance) must pay their own hospital fees.

So unauthorised migrants, for example, could be assigned to a further rung than tourists, with even less rights and obligations. They might possibly not be eligible not only for hospital treatments but also for legal/court/police support if they are robbed, or they might not be allowed into cities and densely-populated areas without supervision, etc. Details can be worked out, but that would be the spirit - minimal contact with society, minimal obligations, minimal rights.

Dear Yuyutsu

Your post reminds me of research I saw some years ago that suggested Americans were less hostile to unauthorised immigration than Europeans in part because in the USA “undocumented” migrants are not entitled to social security, free health care etc. If such migrants do not impose financial and other burdens on the broader population, it may be people are more welcoming to them. There are downsides to this model, though - it creates an underclass and leaves some sick and unemployed migrants in a terrible position.

US opinions also seem to have changed with the very large numbers of unauthorised entrants across the Mexican border in recent years – an estimated 600,000 in 2023. In December 2023 border patrol “encounters” reached a monthly record of over 300,000, most of whom were expelled. Trump is making huge political capital out of this “crisis”.

Here in Australia, the recent surge in immigration – a record 752,000 in 2023 – seems to have contributed to domestic social and economic problems, especially the housing availability/affordability crisis. I have long been a supporter of Australia’s relatively high migration, but you can have too much of a good thing. Again, perhaps, the touchstone could be that migration enhances, or at least does not detract from, the wellbeing of the pre-existing population. That could apply either to your “concentric rungs” model or Kenan Malick’s proposed approach of embracing diversity and universal citizen rights (though of course the two models are mutually incompatible, either could meet the benchmark).