Steele,

<<It was really sobering to watch Q&A last Monday night when there was a small moment at the end where the four international guests briefly reflected among themselves a sense of surprise at where this nation, so long regarded as a leader in tolerance and human rights, was now headed.>>

ROFLMAO x 100

You mean these guests?
Panellists: Mona Eltahawy, Egyptian author and commentator;
Kenneth Roth, International Director of Human Rights Watch;
Tim Wilson, Human Rights Commissioner;
Ilwad Elman, Somalian peace and human rights activist;and
Lucy Siegle, Ethics columnist The Observer.

Would you expect anything more from the above..

But the really fascinating part is, even now, YOU see nothing untoward in "ÖUR ABC" stacking the decks with such a biased, unrepresentative group!

Dear The Moof SPRQ,

This is exactly why you are a gift that keeps on giving mate.

The Q&A program was called Human Rights or Wrong.

The producers got on an ethics writer, two human rights activists from parts of the world where their kind of activities come at great personal risk, the director of a peak international human rights organisation and Tim Wilson, the most conservative of our own human rights commissioners. And to you it's stacking the panel?

Who do you suggest we get in to correct this obvious bias? Where do you find people against human rights? Lets see...wonder if Mugabe was free...or perhaps Kim Jong-un...or even the Burmese Junta?

I'm not sure I have ever conversed with someone who is against human rights, you continue to surprise us. Perhaps if they run the same topic you would like to stick your hand up.

This was the exchange I spoke of earlier

ILWAD ELMAN: "I think Australia is taking a lot of very horrific positions and putting itself in very difficult situations. They’re cuddling up with Sri Lanka, cutting off the boats and celebrating they haven’t had - they have had 100 days of no boats coming in, talking about how Australians should be bigots. I mean, this whole environment, we - some of the topics that we discussed here today it’s just showing a whole new Australia that I never really thought about before and people are going to be shocked by this new position and this movement. It seems that it’s a very exclusive environment and that it’s not taking on its weight and many people look to Australia as a very privileged, developed nation, that can carry more weight and it’s - it’s a very..."

LUCY SIEGLE: "I agree. It’s sounding pretty toxic."

Unlike you my friend I do care about how my country is perceived overseas. I do mourn our loss of reputation and the fact that we were included with Syria and Sri Lanka in being named by the UN for human rights abuses. I think any Australian worth their salt would.

Hi there STEELEREDUX...

Your comment apropos the way Australia is perceived on matters of Human Rights by other countries around the world...? Come on my friend, compared to almost every other country, we're miles ahead of 'em all ! And that is probably our trouble, we're always worrying what other countries think of us ? Who cares ?

And by what yardstick does that 'lame duck', unscrupulously dishonest organisation, the United Nations judge us ? The UN has failed miserably with ALL major humanitarian operations, since the days of Rwanda ?

I personally know, a former Aussie grunt that did his tour in Rwanda. Besides returning home as a complete human basket case, the only clear impressions of his tour over there, were how the United Nations failed those tens of thousands of men, women and children who were hacked to death with axes and hatchets, all because of the protracted 'dithering' and indecision of the useless UN !

So with respect STEELEREDUX, please don't EVER hold up that morally corrupt organisation the UN, to me as some sort of guardian of world morality ?

Steele,

<<Who do you suggest we get in to correct this obvious bias? Where do you find people against human rights? Lets see...wonder if Mugabe was free...>>

No Mugabe is closer to you in his leanings ...in fact I'd suggest if you and a few of your fellow travellers' had been writing on OLO twenty years ago Mugabe would have been your poster boy!

There are human rights and human rights.To seek to treat all humans fairly and reasonably is commendable.

However, to seek to make Oz bankroll the rest of the world --and accept whoever bribes, bullies or barges their way to our shores with open arms, is a CON, and a multi-billion dollar industry that sustains people like YOUR ABC's panellists.

And it's especially heinous when it is being pushed by the tax payer funded ABC (and SBS) ...(I shudder to think of the effect such intimidation and misrepresentation must have on impressibles like you who have never learnt to think for yourselves!)

It's fascinating that you found no issue with the ABC stacking the decks with such one-eye panellists --but was horrified at the prospects of having a few fringe Christians preach to kids a few hours a week, ay!

Dear o sung wu,

You wrote;

“Come on my friend, compared to almost every other country, we're miles ahead of 'em all ! And that is probably our trouble, we're always worrying what other countries think of us ? Who cares ?”

Well to start with I care, and I think other Australians do too. People certainly take pride in their particular nation for different reasons. For instance the former Soviet block countries went to great lengths to ensure their athletes won sporting glory at the Olympics and World Championships. This was far more important to them than world opinion about their internal restrictions on freedoms. Australia, while certainly seeking sporting success, was far more committed to doing it fairly, without coercion of our athletes and without wholesale drug cheating.

We also prided ourselves on the way we sought a fair go for people in need and were prepared go to the aid of the underdog. When I was younger I certainly felt the reason why we had so little racial or political tension and violence in this country was because we respected our fellow human beings and did not go out of our way to denigrate or harm less fortunate than ourselves. I care about that ethic.

As to us being miles ahead of other countries on human rights perhaps internally we might measure up to some of the other OECD countries but I will need you to tell me which of them transport tens of thousands of those seeking refuge in their countries to what amounts to concentration camps in overseas underdeveloped and under-resourced nations. In fact bugger just the OECD nations, give me one nation world wide who conducts itself in this manner.

Cont...

Cont...

As to the UN. This organisation is made up of the constituent states of the world. In the case of Rwandi Kofi Annan sees his biggest failure as not being able to convince any nations capable of offering assistance to do so. He contacted them all including Australia twice and the door was firmly shut in his face.

I respectfully put this question to you; was Australia right to not get involved in the conflict?

The UN is not without its faults, some of them serious, but unless you can point me in the direction of another, more effective, organisation my only conclusion is they are all we have got and they are most certainly better than nothing.

The lessons learned from Rwanda are stark, they certainly had a deep impact on me and I remember reading a lot of material discussing the genocide, its causes, its toll and particularly the aftermath because it was just so unfathomable an occurrence that it made one question what being human really amounted to. That contemplation certainly continues to inform my perspectives. For me listening Alan Jones during the Cronulla riots brought thoughts of the radio broadcasts in Rwanda calling for the extermination of the 'cockroaches'. A long bow you might think but the echoes were definitely there for me.

Anyhow mate, Rwanda is a conversation that is pretty unpleasant but one I'm am open to having as it should never be forgotten, in fact on the 7th of this month is the UN day of remembrance of the massacres, and as it seems it is just you me and the Big Moof left on this thread. The offer is there if you wanted to take it up.