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The Forum > Article Comments > The big questions - Aussie values, life and death > Comments

The big questions - Aussie values, life and death : Comments

By Mark Christensen, published 15/9/2005

Mark Christensen ponders the big questions of Australian values, the meaning of life, death and terrorism

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Mark, enaj and sneekeepete

Well, I have to disagree guys.

Yes, there are any number of more likely causes of death than terrorism, such as cancer, heart attacks and road deaths.

However terrorist killing (inherently) causes terror. It puts people in fear of their lives (rightly or wrongly) and everyone wants to know about it, especially the media. This is because people are not objective estimators of threats. You’ll notice that rare diseases always get a disproportionately long airing on “A Current Affair” and “Today Tonight”.

Many problems are domestically self inflicted (for example smoking and lung cancer) but terrorism is often an attack from foreign terrorists on your own country. This makes a great deal of difference to the public and politicians.

For these reasons people usually expect the government to do something, or be scene to be doing something about terrorism. “Why didn’t the government foresee this” is always raised after a bomb goes off.

Hence after the London bombings and prior to the Melbourne Commonwealth Games the government would be seen as deficient if it didn’t bring up (or re-invent) new counter terrorism measures.

Whether it comes up with something workable and not counterproductive (for example, alienating Melbourne’s Muslim community) is another question.

But my point is terrorism is an important issue in the public’s (and media’s) eyes regardless of the number of lives lost (to date).
Posted by plantagenet, Thursday, 15 September 2005 2:24:44 PM
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Leigh what I mean is it is neither fair, equitable or just to incarcerate people for days, question them without absolute recourse to counsel and forbid them to discuss the experience or offer any explanation as to why this is happening to them or to their family - because we think they might know a guy who knows a guy who does things - thats where we are now even before any other legislation is shoved down our throats - like an unwelcome brussel sprout.

Look to the latest; an American teacher and activist was deported becuase he was seen by ASIO as a security risk; they will not tell you why - they will not tell his legal representative either - They have however briefed Kim Beazley who is satisfied; but he will not tell us with what. So there you have it. ASIO is happy, Big Kim is satisfied and we havent a bloody clue what is going on!

We can expect more of the same; but it will be Australian citizens next time. Incarcerated questioned, obstructed and observed all becuase the dominant view wrongly assumes we are some how at risk.

You really want to trust your security to these types - those who were sure Sadaam was bristling with WMDs? Them that believed he could sling an airborne WMD over to London in a matter of minutes? The same ytype of guys complicit in turning intelligence streams off to our soldiers in the fields of Timor for reasons yet to be determined - even in capable hands the new security measures are stupid and open to abuse.

We can expect more of the same; but it will be Australian citizens next time. Incarcerated questioned, obstructed and observed all becuase the dominant view wrongly assumes we are some how at risk.

And Plantagenet that is why we write these things - it is becuase member of the public, dim witted politicians and the media distort the facts relating to terror - there needs to be an opposing voice to these extremes:
Posted by sneekeepete, Thursday, 15 September 2005 3:47:04 PM
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sneekeepete

I agree with what you say in your last para. As a little advertisement, please see what I said in the comments (in "How do you know if you are winning a war?" on the OLO site today) regarding Bush's need for a popular public diversion and the war in Iraq.

I think the public being misled about the reasons for the (oil) war in Iraq and WMDs cannot be easily blamed on intelligence agencies. I imagine that when intelligence agencies are ordered by politicians (and their unelected political advisers) to serve up exactly what politicians want to read and make public – results like the the “weapons of mass destruction” (WMD) deceit are produced.

I think this ABC interview http://abc.net.au/am/content/s804540.htm
of a former Office of National Assessments intelligence analyst, Andrew Wilkie, immediately before the invasion of Iraq shows that, at least some of these intelligence types had the guts to resign when they could see that intelligence was becoming distorted be political considerations.
Posted by plantagenet, Thursday, 15 September 2005 6:31:50 PM
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Firstly, can we stop comparing deaths by terrorism with deaths by car accidents? We can choose to drive a car but we cannot control the intentions or actions of the terrorist. There is no such thing as safe terrorism as there is with driving.

Secondly, the best thing John Howard can do towards the anti terrorism compaign right now is to stop the media from hyping it up.
Posted by minuet, Thursday, 15 September 2005 8:49:59 PM
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it is democracy is it not - a 2UE poll suggests that some 80% of Australians want to end 'non-christians' immigration. On the whole of society im sure that would get down to no less than 51%, we have a majority!! yay!! when will a politician have the 'balls' to listen to the makority - is it a democracy or a minority run despotism??
Posted by Thor, Friday, 16 September 2005 12:04:43 AM
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anOTHer profound and mind numbing comment of great depth from Kenny :)

Aussie values ? "don't really think about God much or the meaning of life" ? (paraphrased)... well... who is to blame for that ? was it 'always' like that ?
Not really. Our heritage without question is "Christian" even if it is in the most nominal form. When 150,000 people gathered to hear Billy Graham at the Crusade in 1956 at the MCG... (the largest crowd EVER at MCG) and that without population much smaller than today, it becomes abundantly clear that there was a time when the underlying assumption of European life in Australia included God as our reference point.

I look back on the 60s, through which I lived as a teenager, and I saw it blow by blow, as the values which underpinned our life were eroded.

I watched as Mr Ross, became "Julian" from the mouth of a 5 yr old.
Where students became increasingly emboldened and feel no fear of intimidating a teacher.

While we lost a lot of things we didn't really need to keep, such as certain racial attitudes, we lost so much more that we should have held dear.

Kant, Hegel, Marx, life and death.

Kant showed the folly of Empiricism, Hegel and Marx gave us "the inevitability of history and the dialectic"
But only Christ gives us LIFE, and is the conquerer of death.

"I am the way, the truth and the life, no man comes to the Father, but by me" John 14.6
Posted by BOAZ_David, Friday, 16 September 2005 8:37:23 AM
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