The Cancel Culture – Pros and Cons

I was originally going to do a piece about this on my podcast, but after thinking about it I realised it may take took long so I am doing this blog entry instead.

First – the actual definition of a Cancel Culture is as follows;

“A cultural phenomenon in which some who are deemed to have acted or spoken in an unacceptable manner are ostracised, boycotted, or shunned.”

Now that quote does come from Wikipedia, but it is sourced from four pretty good sources. The Merriam Webster definition limits it to public figures on both sides and that’s not appropriate. That correction is primarily the reason for this blog entry.

So let’s look into it properly and I’m going to start with the cons. The cons are basically discrimination in it’s basic form – the ostracising and shunning of those who step outside what is the socially accepted norm. Now in the old days that definition was applied a lot wider than it is now. It ranges from sex discrimination where females were shut off from all employment except those that were deemed to be women’s work, like nursing and teaching. The latter though had a limitation – once you become a mother, that was your primary function. Stay at home – in other words. That – by definition – is a cancel culture.

It also applied to the LGBTIQ+ community. There were even laws against them existing – at one point it was classified as a mental disorder in order to enforce that social identification. And don’t even start me on the skin colour and the amount of ostracising and shunning that took place there! It was even applied to religion!

Then of course we come to the cancel culture in the disabled community – which of course I can talk about through experience. The restraints placed on us by society are a form of ostracising and shunning. Penalising us for being different (either physically or not). Insisting on stairs instead of ramps for those in wheelchairs is the most obvious example of a cancel culture. Social ostracising and shunning is the most most common issue for the Autistic community, and this leads to the inability to obtain or maintain a job.

The whole base of the cancel culture is in behaviour, and trying to dictate it and push it in a particular direction. Some directions are totally wrong and need to be shut off or adjusted as the case may be. And it’s for that reason that we now have discrimination laws in order to enforce that. They aren’t perfect however, as proven by the continuing issues in all areas even if they aren’t as pronounced as they used to be.

But it’s here that we come to the pros of the cancel culture. It comes in two forms – misinformation, and reverse discrimination.

Misinformation is the better example in terms of it’s simplicity. It’s why for example the government in Australia looked to slap restrictions on it in social media. The trouble was it was misunderstood and the result was that it was seen as a basic restraint on freedom of speech. The reality was that it was adding responsibility to it, but not enough people were listening. They basically demanded the right to lie, which is wrong. What is right is being called out on it and being ostracised and shunned as a result. Now in this case that is the right thing to do – unless the liar actually has something to prove that they aren’t lying. Honestly – I think the lack of that option is the reason why the proposed legislation fell down. I hope it will be attempted again at some point in the future.

The worst form of misinformation is political. I fight this constantly – the right wing of politics engages in a lot of the old cancel culture, and I get into it pointing out it’s faults as one should. It’s called political banter. It’s all one can do because there are many who can’t see their nose despite their face and won’t adjust where it can be done reasonably.

But there is also the most dangerous form of misinformation – health. I don’t call it the worst because the political side involves the important decision making in law. Health misinformation doesn’t. But it can cost lives and that’s why it’s more dangerous – especially when it comes to vaccines, whether it be the COVID-19 vaccine in particular or vaccines in general. It is even recognised by the law – section 48 of the Disability Discrimination Act where the unvaccinated can be discriminated against. Now I take the latter personally because one of the most blatant pieces of misinformation there lies in the claim that vaccines cause Autism. That is BS and there are 121 studies (last I checked and it was awhile ago now) that prove it. There may be a way to deal with that through a particular law change that I hope will be taken on and added this year. I am going to use it if so.

There is an aspect that takes in both combined – and that goes to the lockdowns during the COVID-19 pandemic. This is partly what inspired me to talk about this on my podcast originally before bringing it here. The reason is a review on a forum of an interview that I was aware of but hadn’t bother to listen to myself – this was because of the two people involved; Vince Russo and Kellyanne Salter. Now most readers will say “Who?”. The ones who are pro wrestling fans will know the first name – a former writer and booker for WWE (WWF then), WCW and TNA. No one in the industry respects him because he didn’t really understand the business. He fluked a couple of things and got them right, but mostly he got it wrong and doesn’t have the guts to admit it. He is a bitter and twisted person. The other party is lesser known unless you follow the Australian scene. I know her because of my involvement and we used to be good friends – until I found out she was against the lockdowns, and consequently also supported the anti vaxxers specifically about COVID-19. She might not have opposed the vaccine herself, but by supporting those who were against it – that makes her a part of the problem anyway.

She went off about the cancel culture in her interview – this was about the loss of an offered contract with American promotion Ring of Honor prior to it being bought out at the end of 2021. Now I don’t know this for sure, but what I am about to say makes sense. The whole problem was Salter’s inability to get a green card in the US. That’s why immigration wouldn’t let her in. Ring of Honor tried to fight it, but gave up. I suspect I know why – American immigration knew about her online rhetoric about the responses to the pandemic and didn’t want another potential troublemaker in their country. And I say fair enough. They had enough problems in states like Michigan for example where they locked down and there were violent protests against it in 2020.

She tarnished her reputation with that and it’s why no one was listening when she made other allegations that may have got her support in any other circumstances, especially when it came to how females were treated in Australian wrestling. She brought that on herself and she retired from pro wrestling as a result. I have no sympathy.

Equally I have no sympathy for those who engage in reverse discrimination – taking discrimination rights well beyond the realms of equality. They cop it from the cancel culture and again it’s quite right. I even cancelled something myself as a result of it – Spectrum Labor. It is not right and goes against equal rights. I am of the view that reverse discrimination is the key to the hold backs in real equality and why it is taking so long to achieve it in all respects. I spoke about this on my podcast awhile back.

One of the battle plans of people in this battle on both sides is bullying. When one can’t shut down the other side, they bully instead. Now again there are two sides to this. The ones who bully originally are in the wrong. However the ones who bully in response to the bullying are not in the wrong – and I admit it. I’ve done it myself. I’m not proud of it of course, but there are times when one doesn’t have a choice – especially when there are no other options and that’s a problem in itself. I can avoid it if the line is crossed into defamation, and I’ve been successful in that area in terms of vindication in general. It hasn’t been perfect though and I could at this point give a very personal example, but I won’t because I don’t want to start it all over again – even though I didn’t start it to begin with.

Bullying happens usually when the law isn’t up to it when it comes to resolving the issue at hand in better ways. This is where the cancel culture shows it’s face on both sides – the right and the wrong. And it leads to an angry society. The balance isn’t there and only law can resolve that.

But this is something that popped up that I saw in social media – a saying that sums it all up pretty well.

“Human beings are born with different capacities. If they are free, they are not equal. And if they are equal, they are not free.”

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn said that. Freedom and equality can’t mix – and he was right. So as a consequence, total freedom is impossible. Those who are on the wrong side of the cancel culture want to cancel equality because it restrains the freedom they want. But the right side demands equality to provide more freedom than they would otherwise have. As I said – the balance isn’t there, and as long as the wrong side of the cancel culture continues on we’ll never get it.

So we need to fight the wrong side of the cancel culture and support the right side. The side of the fair go for all.

Who’s in?

Vaping – It is not a forever solution

Lately I have been having mighty arguments on Twitter over the rise of vaping as an alternative to smoking. For myself I see absolutely no difference between the two. All that has changed is the content, and even that is not fully understood as vaping has only been around for maybe a decade. Smoking has been around for centuries and it has only been noted within the last 100 years of that as to how dangerous it is to one’s health. But we have that background of information on smoking. We don’t have anything long term on vaping.

The tobacco industry is seeing this happening and they are jumping on board, adding nicotine to vapes they produce – knowing for some time now that the scientific consensus is that nicotine is a drug of addition. I remember awhile back how tobacco executives stating to a man (there was no female there) that they didn’t believe nicotine was addictive. This undermined any attempt to charge them with perjury. And now they are doing it again.

I went into a meeting earlier tonight with that 100 percent thought line in place. Vaping has no medicinal benefit whatsoever. However some others at the meeting begged to differ claiming that vaping is better than smoking. This is consistent with some (not all) of the stuff I’d been seeing on Twitter. But this is the thing – where is the proof? Hear say – as it is in a court room – isn’t enough. One person linked me to a letter sent to Federal Health Minister opposing the ban when it was originally proposed in October last year. Lots of impressive names, but no proof. Now I suspect there was material missing (the letter mentioned page 38 when the letter only had five pages) but this is the point. We need proof that vaping at least works as a treatment for smoking and helps get people off it.

But even then – is vaping safe as a long term alternative to smoking? This is the problem. What effect is the content of vapes having on the human body? One fool on Twitter compared vapes to the sort of smoke used in discos back in the 1970’s. Smoke machines if you like. You don’t inhale that stuff!

Statistics have been presented. I don’t buy statistics because as the old saying goes – you can make statistics prove anything you want to. Pure numbers are harder to reject on the other hand. Percentages are very much a fail waiting to happen. Take for example one claim from Twitter that the UK College of Physicians claimed that vaping was 95 percent safer than smoking. Now I demanded to see that study and no one delivered – my thought line is that it doesn’t exist, although it is possible that the percentage may have been limited to medicinal use (that is getting smokers off the habit) and not general use as the person who told me about it was imputing. Even so – I find that percentage hard to believe.

The bottom line is this. Vaping as a medicinal treatment is not confirmed as safe – yet. And it is certainly not something to replace smoking going forward. Big Tobacco is getting children addicted to vaping. That is just plain wrong and it has to be stopped. Vaping in it’s original use (by a non smoker) has to be prevented as well. This is why the ban was put in place to begin with. It is also the case that every place that has banned smoking is also banning vaping. Now that wouldn’t be happening if there was anything to this claim to general comparative safety. So if anyone can prove to me with peer reviewed and accepted studies that vaping helps stop a person smoking – fine. But the jury is still out on it’s long term effects and safety and until then we have to restrict it severely at minimum. This is not about vaccines. This is something brand new and we need to really control it and control it harshly. Eventually, smoking will be banned and treated the same way hard drugs are – as it should be. It’s a filthy disgusting habit. And speaking for myself, I regard vaping as the same thing in line with the bans from public transport, hospitals et al.

It is not a forever replacement for smoking. It can’t stay – and it won’t. Once we get everyone to stop smoking, the black market will disappear in both respects because of zero demand. The only remaining threat may be Big Tobacco taking bans to court and spending hundreds of thousands of dollars to over turn them. Money should never be a dictating factor in proper justice. It should be down to the facts – not hear say and certainly not jobs as Big Tobacco like to argue. The sooner they are labelled criminal drug cartels the better!

Australia Day is January 1 – for now

This isn’t a formal proclamation of course – I don’t have that power and nor should I. But the reality is that in the strictest terms, January 26 is NOT Australia Day.

The base is laid in the Federation of Australia and I put this in one of the articles on the World Events Fandom;
https://world-events.fandom.com/wiki/Federation_of_Australia

At no stage in this article did I refer to Australia as a country before the beginning of 1901. The opening sentence makes the truth clear.

It is historical fact that when the British colonists arrived in Sydney Cove on January 26, 1788, the continent was still called New Holland. And it remained that way beyond that point. The colony itself proclaimed the region around it New South Wales. Not Australia. There was a term “Terra Australis” – but that ultimately referred to the great southern continent that many felt existed and Captain James Cook was looking for before he navigated the east coast of what he called – you guessed it – New Holland. Terra Australis in fact was talking about what we know today as Antarctica.

New Holland first appeared as a name in 1644 – the Dutch were obviously responsible for that. The name was given by Abel Tasman. He was also the man who named Van Diemens Land (now of course Tasmania). The English were already aware of the west coast thanks to William Dampier. But the continent wasn’t claimed as British until Cook’s visit in 1770. And it stayed British as ultimate control of the continent was placed with the Houses of Parliament in London at Westminster.

It should be noted that Dampier was the first Englishman to encounter the indigenous population. He called them “miserabilist” and “differing little from brutes” – a very offensive and racist description common for that time. He may as well have called them “primitive” (that’s a whack at the 18th century thinking of Andrew Bolt!). Cook of course also encountered the indigenous population – so the British were aware of their presence and were ready for it when the First Fleet arrived.

The name Australia did not exist in 1788. It didn’t exist for 29 years. It would be in 1817, after the Rum Rebellion, that the name was first used by New South Wales Governor Lachlan Macquarie. Now one must remember that New South Wales was still the only region proclaimed at this time. He was talking about the continent being renamed from New Holland. It wasn’t a country. They were still a part of Britain. Heck – the western border of New South Wales was way further west than it is now. Not to mention the fact that outside of Sydney and the nearby coastline to the north and to the south, the only other colony that had been established was on Van Diemen’s Land in 1803 – and New South Wales controlled that. It was only four years before Macquarie’s name change that the Blue Mountains were crossed. As a note – Westminster also included New Zealand in this controlling group. That did change later.

This is the thing – until 1827 there was only New South Wales. There was no Australian government. There was no Victoria, Queensland, South Australia, Western Australia or Tasmania. It was WA first in 1827 and it was also a British colony like New South Wales. All the others were the same. Each region – called states at some point – had a Governor who was appointed directly by Westminster and had nothing to do with the local population. Britain remained in ultimate control. Australia was nothing more than a name that in the sense of governance meant absolutely nothing.

This was true division. Six states doing their own thing – running up tariffs when trading with other colonies like they were separate countries. This is why – for example – when rail transport arrived New South Wales were the only ones to use standard gauge. Victoria and South Australia went with the Irish broad gauge while Queensland, Western Australia and Tasmania went with narrow gauge. This would not have happened if all had worked together. This is further proof that there was no Australia. It’s a price we are still paying today. There is a movement in Victoria that is seeking that we convert from broad gauge to standard gauge rail. A hard task.

This is why Federation is the pivotal point in our history – way more important to the concept of “One Nation” (ugh did I just type that) than the arrival of the First Fleet ever could. And when did Federation happen? January 1, 1901. There was finally an Australian government. We even had a Governor General and a Constitution that had been approved by Westminster. Our connection to Britain had been trimmed back to the extent that the only connection that remained was Royal Assent to the laws we set ourselves, regal appointment of the Governor General and the influence of the Privy Council. We were now Australian.

Some may retroactively claim to be Australian from the time before. That is manifestly wrong if their ancestry goes back to another country. The only true Australians are our indigenous brothers and sisters. I may have been born here, but the Gluyas name goes back to Cornwall as I understand it and my surname is of Welsh descent apparently. There is British ancestry in the other three surnames in my background – Thompson, Fitzgerald and Collings. The Collings name I understand has connections to the First Fleet. I have been meaning to check that.

There is one more point that needs to be made – and it does admittedly bring January 26 back into consideration. Until January 26, 1948, we didn’t even have Australian citizenship. We were British subjects. That changed with a law that identified citizenship and it was given Royal Assent on the date I just gave. But there is a caveat – there was a massive exception to that change. The indigenous population. Remember – the Constitution at the time still had that exception that didn’t count the indigenous population and didn’t include them in special laws. That was prohibited for the federal government. So the indigenous population weren’t Australian citizens until May 27, 1967 when that racist nonsense was removed from the Constitution by referendum.

The core point is this. We can not have a true Australia Day until the division that still exists in this country is eliminated entirely. The closest we have to that is not on January 26. It is on January 1, the anniversary of Federation. We don’t have it now – our best chance went by the wayside thanks to the still prevailing and irrational fear of the indigenous population that has no base in fact. That was on October 14 last year of course.

Today I will stand beside my indigenous brothers and sisters at Victory Park in Castlemaine. I can’t go to Treasury Gardens for the main protest rally in Victoria as the meeting time is too early for me to get there without having to hang around for over an hour and a half. It’s not practical. But I am there in spirit at least.

We need to change the date. We need to talk about it – in practical historical fact and not in racial or political terms.

Trump has to be stopped, America!

I am sitting here on the other side of the Pacific Ocean, watching events in the United States and thinking to myself – “The country that is supposed to lead the world is going to hell in a hand basket”.

The cause is clear – the demands for freedom are getting out of control and going well beyond reasonable lines. When it crosses those lines, freedom is lost because those who are perceived as weak lose said freedom – unless they follow the new rules; or rather the lack of them (and can’t).

That forms part of the Aryan Race mantra. Destroy the weak and let the strong survive.

And this is the sort of freedom supported by Donald Trump.

It was also the sort of freedom supported by someone else. Adolf Hitler.

Don’t laugh. Hitler called his mantra “socialism”. He lied. All he wanted was power and bought people’s loyalty through propaganda to do it. No money. Just a whole lot of promises. And that is exactly what Trump is doing. He’s not using the word socialism though – because he doesn’t need to. Socialism in fact is a dirty word across America because many in the US can’t tell the difference between socialism and communism.

But after being focused on communism basically since the end of World War 2, and heaping a rightful lack of trust in communist countries like China and North Korea, fascism has been forgotten. True, a few fascist pieces of American society were being fought – based in gender and including the right to an abortion, and in race. But that isn’t the whole picture – it’s only part of it. And the right to abortion was more recently boxed away by the Supreme Court of the United States. Not only that, the SCOTUS also got rid of efforts at affirmative action. That is – quotas. The SCOTUS declared that unconstitutional. It exposed a major weakness in the US Constitution when it comes to true freedom for all.

This all plays right into the hands of Donald Trump.

He is a proven racist. He showed that in the most blatant terms when he claimed that immigrants were “poisoning the country’s blood”. That is nonsense. A true land of the free and the home of the brave would welcome these people. That’s why that phrase appears at the conclusion of America’s National Anthem. Trump is also a proven misogynist. And he is not politically or diplomatically aware. He is a reckless uncaring fool who will create America in his image if he gets another term. Hitler did the same with Germany. Trump will get rid of his political opponents. Hitler did that as well. Jailing all over the place, allowing Trump to get enough control of not just Congress but also the state legislatures. For example, he would get anyone who opposed his changes arrested and charged with treason – leading to a new election for that person’s seat in Congress or a fresh state election. He would only need 38 of the 50 states to get that done as well as only 67 Senators and 291 Members of the House. That is downright scary.

Another thing that will become the norm under Trump is something that is happening now – death threats by supporters. This is another Hitler tactic.

The other side of the coin is the perceived loss of freedom as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic and the inflation issues that resulted from trying to keep economies going. This goes to a previous entry I did on this blog; Is History Repeating Itself. I am hoping we have learned from that and we will avoid a depression. But I’m not convinced America have. It was after all the crash of Wall Street that sent shock waves throughout the world through the economies. Trump would have no idea how to avoid that – he’ll just let things slide his way. As he is far from economically aware (he has been bankrupt in the past) this can only be massive trouble.

Now as much as things are going against him at present in the courts, we don’t have that final solution yet. I believe the big one is the case in Washington DC – Trump’s involvement in the Capitol Hill Riot. We need that completed and a conviction set for causing an insurrection in effect (the actual charges all point in that direction). That decision will set a precedent and activate in full the provision in the 14th Amendment that will prohibit Trump from appearing on the ballot paper. The question is how long will it take for that to get to that point – and of course the inevitable appeal ultimately to the SCOTUS. There is a related factor there – Presidential immunity. I refuse to believe this can stand up because it would make no sense in a democracy.

As we know, Colorado and Maine have already acted. Michigan however have refused. There is an action in progress in Illinois and I just read Massachusetts may be headed that way too. This is to keep Trump off the ballot paper in the primaries for the Republican party – to try and force the party to elect someone else as the Presidential candidate.

So one has to assume the worst. Trump will be in position to be elected through getting enough electoral college votes as he did in 2016. So there is only really one way to stop it. And that is to vote Democrat. They did it in 2020. It needs to be done again. Americans who vote need to understand that as much as they don’t like Joe Biden, he is a far better option. Biden is not evil. He’s not perfect. No US President in history can claim to be perfect. But he is way better as an option for the Whitehouse than Donald Trump.

Trump will destroy democracy. Trump will destroy the world’s economy. Trump will cause a depression that will make the Great Depression look like a teddy bear’s picnic. And worst of all Trump will cause World War 3 as the world tries to fight back against this fascist.

Just like the world fought back against Hitler.

But this can be avoided.

America – register to vote as you did in 2020. Commit not to giving Joe Biden anther term, but to keeping Trump out of the Whitehouse. That, by default, will given Biden a second term (or maybe someone else if the Democrats go that way and they might). And that is best for the country that is supposed to be the leader of the free world. Under Biden or another Democrat – it will be so. Under Trump it will sink into the mire of fascism and take the world with it.

Is history repeating itself?

I couldn’t find it again when I went looking for it, but someone on Twitter this morning claimed that the Misinformation Bill that I put in a submission for is a step towards fascism in effect. What a load of nonsense! But the same person also referred to similar things happening after the last big pandemic – the Spanish Flu just after World War 1. Knowing that we are fighting inflation worldwide and there were predictions of a massive depression coming had me looking at history.

There is something to this claim – and the sooner we notice this and take proper action the better.

It was of course true about the Spanish flu. It did also lead to inflation issues at the time, and ongoing issues went on until Wall Street crashed. At the time the rich were rich and being spoiled brats. The trouble was we were recovering from the war so a proper reaction wasn’t possible. And our economic awareness was skewed and badly. We didn’t understand the concept of spending on infrastructure and the importance of Gross Domestic Product (GDP). Even the US didn’t understand it – heck, in 1919 they slapped on prohibition of alcohol without seeing it’s benefits to employment and said GDP as well as the advent of the criminal element that if anything pulled down productivity and revenue. I could argue that repealing that amendment in 1933 helped the US get out of the their share of the Great Depression. Now I’m not saying alcohol should be freely available. It needs to be regulated, and that’s what ended up happening with the matter returned to the states.

English history shows that they had issues with low consumption not following over production. Farm incomes there fell by nearly half from the end of WW1 to the end of the 1920’s and their debts sky rocketed.

But the worst comparison comes from the right. Germany saw this and tried to ban fascism and send the believers to prison. This included Hitler. The trouble was the rehabilitation process was next to non existent and the attempt to eliminate it from the get go was totally flawed. It inflamed Hitler and his Nazi friends, and they took advantage of the volatile German political system (which had been severely undermined by World War 1) by hiding in the fringes until they were able to take control through false promises to support socialism (he called it National Socialism) and undermine the true meaning of both socialism and communism. That backdrop and a raft of promises of freedom and related things that were never kept helped Hitler gain the control he got in 1933. The rest is history.

The right is gaining steam again now. Demands of freedom in the face of the lockdowns here in Australia (and where they had them in other countries) during the COVID pandemic. These demands include the right to spread their own opinions when said opinions are misinformation and paranoid – like the idea of globalism without sovereignty, a New World Order, the World Economic Forum controlling countries, the United Nations controlling countries and so on. And people are believing it because freedoms have been restricted – ignoring the fact that the restrictions were needed. I have constantly wondered what their attitude would be to restrictions and orders out of a bushfire or a flood emergency. It’s the same situation. Freedom is being demanded and instead the claim is out of control to the point that we have to negate it somehow.

We are already seeing a country’s political system threatened. That’s the US. We have a fascist waiting in the wings. Donald Trump. He has already demanded the sorts of freedoms that cause trouble – not keeping things secret when they should be and not respecting this. He has already threatened his political opponents with jail (Hitler did that as well) and one hopes the law catches up with him as it should.

In Australia, the right had a win with the No vote in the referendum. They ran up a massive misinformation campaign, and enough people believed it. The content was different of course, but it was the sort of propaganda in general that Hitler put out. The split in the situation in the Middle East is also relevant – the right is supporting Israel for a change (this is different to fascist Germany) and attacking Palestine. The problem with that is two fold. One – the issue on the Palestinian side is exclusively Hamas. Two – the right is totally ignoring Israel’s over reaction. You don’t respond to 10 rockets with 10,000 rockets (speaking metaphorically). It would be reasonable to respond with 10 rockets although it would be better to respond in a different non violent way. Hamas shouldn’t have attacked to start with. But I digress.

The worst part about this is that people are putting Hamas in the same packet as the government of the Ukraine. What a load of rubbish! All because of supposed opposition to the Jewish and Russia (ie the lines of Nazi Germany). That piece of misinformation is a total fail of understanding in politics and how things have changed over the years. Fascism is extreme right. Communism is extreme left. Neither are appropriate – extreme ANYTHING is inappropriate.

And yet we went to extremes after the Spanish Flu.

Are we going to extremes again after COVID-19?

We need to put a stop to it pronto, or World War 3 will be inevitable. Acceptance of human difference must take priority and those who oppose it should be punished for it. It starts with proper laws, and more importantly rehabilitation. And if rehab is impossible, it has to be jail for life – the message that should have been sent in Germany in the 1920’s. Freedom isn’t automatic. It needs to be earned. You don’t do it by fighting for the put downs of the less fortunate. That’s fascism and it is repugnant no matter which way you look at it.

We have to fix this. We need to run the extreme right out of politics. We need to vote the UAP, One Nation and the other extreme right parties out of office and pull them into line telling them they are wrong. And the way to do that is to get them before the courts as traitors if possible. Or put them in a psych ward once it is established that their connection to the real world is hanging by a thread.

History must not repeat itself. Let’s prove that we have advanced after all.

Or are we truly as backward as we were 100 years ago?

A blatant liar about the Voice etc

Being back on Twitter has brought out the nasties in the No camp, and I’m focussed on one idiot who calls himself Mike Brady (not the legend who gave us Up There Cazaly). And this one is a hypocrite because he is a Trump hater it appears. This is because the false information from Trump supporters is a match for the false information put out by No voters.

It started thus;

Twitter has a character limit even though it’s bigger than it was. There are NO general advisory bodies. There are specific ones (land councils for example focus on land rights – Mabo, Wik et al). And what there is in the specifics do not have any power at all. I had to put it like this within the character limit;

And all he could come with were these two notes;

The first one was put out by the Coalition government so straight away it is suspect. Or it reflects on poor distribution which goes 100 percent to the core of this thing. Not listening. On top of that we also have the more general issue of poor health spending by the same government AND the pandemic slamming the brakes on everything. So in fact the stats he has presented her are misleading at best and a blatant lie at worst.

The second one is the perfect reflection on what is wrong with the system. The only stats that make sense there are the Age pension and the Youth Allowance. The rest reflect on the discrimination that is going on that a Voice will put the brakes on. The DSP stat is absolutely disgraceful for a start! Why is it low? BECAUSE WE AREN’T LISTENING!!

And this tops it off. The removal he speaks of has a simple explanation. They are wrong – so they should be removed. Spending isn’t enough as it stands, but it also has to be directed correctly. And that will only be achieved by LISTENING. Funding without listening is wrong – and more importantly the listening must be done by everyone and as a compulsory factor and not a choice.

This is racist. He is saying that the election of the Voice should be done by all 25 million Australians. That goes totally against the Voice’s intent. It has to be elected by the indigenous community alone – because this is about them and only them. We should have no say it. To demand a say in it is to enforce what we have now which is not good enough. The fact is this moron is scared of the indigenous community. That’s the base of racism – and there is nothing to be afraid of. What is worth being afraid of is intentional discrimination – which the No vote will confirm as what said voters want. The Racial Discrimination Act presently has no power to prevent that, and that is part of the problem.

Put down complete. I will be linking this to this nitwit and he can reply here. But only if he sticks to debate. If he starts getting racist in reply his comments will hit the bin.

Vote Yes to the Voice

It has been hard to come up with blog entries here as my podcast has been my point of commentary. But this subject requires more detail than my podcast gives time for.

I will make this clear at the top – when the referendum comes, I am voting YES. And the core reason is the status quo (the way things are now) is not acceptable.

Let’s face facts. The indigenous community has been treated like dirt since 1788. Very few people in the new communities treated the Aborigines like fellow human beings. They treated them like savages – or slaves. Convicts were slaves too, but even they were treated better than the indigenous population. It was the old “if you aren’t like me you are inferior to me” type of thinking that has no place in a truly just society. We are better than that now – or rather we should be. The old days are gone – or they should be.

In 1901 the discrimination was set in stone when the Constitution was first drawn up – including section 127 which read;

In reckoning the numbers of the people of the Commonwealth, or of a State or other part of the Commonwealth, aboriginal natives shall not be counted.

This in theory (and it was never tested in the High Court and I still say it should have) prohibited the Commonwealth government from doing anything for the indigenous community. Anything that relied on numbers of people didn’t take the Aborigines into account. Indeed, there was another part of the Constitution which backed this up – section 51(xxvi) which read originally;

The people of any race, other than the aboriginal race in any State, for whom it is deemed necessary to make special laws

This stopped any legal assistance from the Commonwealth for the indigenous population. Of course – with this restriction, there was an allowance for the States to act instead. But their ability to act was not as strong and was contained within their borders. And one has to remember that the Northern Territory – where a lot of the indigenous population lives – for a long time was under federal control. Until 1911 it was part of South Australia, but from then until 1978 all the decisions were Commonwealth decisions and made in Canberra. That meant that if you were an Indigenous Australian and you lived in the Northern Territory (or the Australian Capital Territory for the record) you had no rights at all.

That all changed on May 27, 1967, when by referendum section 127 was removed completely and the words “other than the aboriginal race in any State” were removed from section 51(xxvi). For the first time in 179 years – the indigenous population were Constitutional equals to everyone else in Australia.

But that didn’t mean the problem was solved just like that. There was still a lot of work to do. The Commonwealth were now in a position to merge what was already in place from the States and help the indigenous community. But there was push back as the old discrimination lines had been set into Australia’s social mentality. Gough Whitlam – in one of his best known moves – led the charge for the Racial Discrimination Act in 1975. This was a law that could not have been possible before 1967 due to section 51(xxvi) in it’s original form. This over ruled any remnants of discriminatory regulations or laws that still existed in the States that clashed with it.

Of course by this time the Tent Embassy was established across the road from Old Parliament House – and remains today.

We have come a long way since – especially with land rights thanks to the High Court’s Mabo and Wik decisions. It is such a shame Eddie Mabo never lived to see the decision in his name made (he passed away a few months before). This was opposed by the racists and claims were made of impeding disaster – that never happened. This is a key point because there are the same disaster predictions being made today over this change to the Constitution. It’s all about co-existence.

The other point that needs to be made is how this compares to women’s rights. There was a time when women had as many rights in society as the indigenous population. Yes – a long time ago, but the same predictions of doom and gloom were still made. And what happened? Nothing!

Further – we already have a lot of stuff similar to the Voice happening right now in Victoria. This is how the Voice will work – the same way Victoria’s First Peoples’ Assembly works. It hasn’t had much chance to really take hold – mainly because of the pandemic (the Assembly was first elected in 2019, meeting for the first time late in the year) but where is the doom and gloom? Nowhere to be seen as indeed the Premier Daniel Andrews reflected at State Conference last month. This is where to look – the most progressive state in the country. And the Prime Minister Anthony Albanese knows it.

Let’s make a few statements of fact;

1. 83 percent of indigenous Australians support the Voice
2. The Uluru Statement from the Heart was led by indigenous Australians
3. The Voice does not confer special rights on anyone
4. Six countries – including the United States – provide Constitutional recognition of indigenous people
5. Eight out of 11 indigenous leaders support the Voice
6. This will close the gap
7. This change only ensures that Voice can’t be removed by any given government no matter what persuasion – and nothing else

These are all positives. There is no Apartheid in this – that is scaremongering without foundation. The only division is being created by those who oppose this and want the status quo to stay. And then there are the reverse racists who say this isn’t enough (that is the other 17 percent of the indigenous population). What they don’t realise is that they will get everything they want with the Voice, except for one thing – sovereignty. That is not possible because it would completely undermine Mabo and Wik – especially the latter. Again – refer to the First Peoples’ Assembly for proof.

Voting Yes is a forward move for Australia as a country – the country that is supposed to be about a fair go for all. We are supposed to be holding no one back and leaving no one behind. And the first ones to be held back and left behind were the Aborigines. It’s past time we made up for that, and in the process set the precedent for everyone else who has been held back and left behind – and that’s where it gets personal for me as I have been held back and left behind. But I also know that the first Australians are first in the queue as they should be. No other community can claim they were held back and left behind legally for 179 years – and that is a fact.

Vote YES for the Voice to Parliament. Our indigenous brothers – our fellow human beings – deserve it, needs it and should get it.

The growing cult of conspiracy

I started typing this entry while I was in Canberra, inspired by a British moron on the Treefort forums who calls himself Likahamadoolihan. I have no clue what that means, but in another way it makes sense – in that this person is totally confused and deluded. He is probably the most deluded conspiracy believer I have ever seen, and that’s saying something given the utterings of the likes of John Best, Solihin Millin and the anti vaccine movement.

Over on the Covidiots blog I did an entry about this fool alongside Mustard Tiger – an Australian who is more of a mocker than a full blown conspiracy nutcase. It was all about the conspiracies associated with the COVID-19 vaccines, believing them to be killing people. Best believes that one as well, but he’s off on a different tangent. LHD (my abbreviation for Likahamadoolihan) is worse in that he won’t be shifted into the real world. Best at least has some connection.

Let’s back track. This is what happens when authorities in their various forms don’t do anything to stop the lies. Governments just leave it be, thinking it will blow over. It’s the same with the scientists and the health community. Education is falling apart and allowing gaps to be created where this nonsense can slip through.

The first party that has to take some blame is Google – the leading search engine. This fuels the lack of education leading to the sledge of “Google University” against actual universities. People who aren’t educated can’t tell the difference and conspiracy theorists gain traction as a result. It wasn’t the only reason but this was one reason why I stopped doing anything with Google back in 2010 when I left Blogger and You Tube in particular and was determined to avoid Google totally. For awhile I managed it, but nowadays I do use Google Maps. And I have to use Google search when I need certain settings. I am looking for a replacement for a search engine and I’m leaning at present to Duck Duck Go. I digress.

The second party is Donald Trump. He is loaded with conspiracy nonsense and has no control valve on his mouth on top of it. The Republicans should have kicked him to the curb a long time ago, even before 2016. Comparisons have been made between him and Adolf Hitler (an accusation that led him to sue for defamation – no chance of that in the US because there is too much evidence to back up the view). He’s a control freak and it went to his head. His reaction to the 2020 election result was typical of someone who didn’t understand the process and didn’t want to such is his delusion. The leader of the cult of conspiracy.

The third party – and it’s not a person or organisation that nevertheless had an effect on the world. COVID-19. It tore the world apart in the social and economic sense and it gave extra impetus to a number of conspiracy theories. It was something that should have brought the world together because battling it required a community response. Conspiracy theorists are anti community – selfish, as Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews put it (and was subjected to a conspiracy moron himself called Peta Credlin – nuff said there).

The trigger for this entry while I was in Canberra was when LHD mentioned Cultural Marxism. This was after he spoke of Marxism on it’s own. The reason I delayed this entry is because I am a member of Treefort, under the user name Goat. I hadn’t yet publicly acknowledged that for separate reasons. I have since. At the time I told him to be more specific as the history of Marxism had become so convoluted in definition that an adjective was needed. He provided it.

Cultural Marxism is a variation of Cultural Bolshevism that has roots in antisemitism, but in the 1990’s gained traction in another direction as political correctness started to have an effect. Now I for one think in some instances political correctness has gone too far (getting rid of Merry Christmas in favour of Happy Holidays is one example and changing aspects of classic children’s books being another). It’s a reflection on the lack of education I spoke of. Proper education would allow for such things to be overlooked out of pure smarts. It’s not important – anyone who says otherwise is being precious and opposing real equality in the process. This is the key – opposing true equality. The calling card of the far right. They are antisemitic – but they are also white supremacists, sexists, misogynists, racists and anti human diversity. This means they oppose Autism (which makes them a personal enemy of mine being a proud Autistic) and they oppose the LGBTIQ+ community.

LHD reflects the following conspiracy nonsense;

virtue signalling, SJW flag waver that is a shill for billionaire pharma and corrupt dystopian governments , puppets to the WEF , new world order

Likahamadoolihan on the Treefort Forums on December 6, 2022 at 7:21am AEDST

Virtue signalling is using morality to promote good character. Those of genuine good character don’t need to do that, unless they are being unfairly attacked. For example when I’ve been defamed I go the moral route mainly because it’s all I have being Autistic. It has worked in law as I have reputational protection as a result, in particular with my football rep. But it doesn’t mean it’s right. It’s a tool that depends on how it is used. But it is not a negative either unless it is used to hide bad character. That is in fact what the right would do, not the left and I’m not even pure left. I’m centre left.

Which brings me to the SJW line – social justice warrior. I’m one of those. Autism rights is very much out of that ilk. I have also taken a knee in support of the Black Lives Matter movement just before a T20 cricket match in early 2021 at the MCG (a shame the cameras never caught it – I was in a bad spot for that). I also support the LGBTIQ+ community in their battles – voting Yes to the plebiscite for same sex marriage in Australia. And I certainly support women’s rights. There is nothing wrong with any of that.

The issue comes up with the next word – a shill. I am yet to meet a Social Justice Warrior who is paid to be one. We do what we do because it’s not about money, and that drives the right mad because as far as they are concerned it is ALL about money. I don’t get one cent from anyone for doing the things I do, especially from the pharmaceutical companies. Now this is an area I know plenty about – because of the hate speech uttered against the Autistic community; the claim the vaccines cause Autism. It’s junk. When it comes to vaccines alone, the pharmaceutical companies make no profits at all. They are expensive to research and develop, and create as well. It is not a simple technology. The only way vaccines are free in instances is because of government support for the important work they do – certainly in Australia. The United States relies more on philanthropists like Bill Gates but government does provide. Pharma does make huge profits – but they come from other areas of medicine, in particular pain killers. That’s the area where some people in pharmaceutical companies can become idiots – this has happened and has been punished.

Corrupt dystopian governments – they do exist. In the present as well as in the past. Hitler was the leader of one. Japan pre World War 2 was another. Then there was the old Soviet Union. Today it’s China, Russia and North Korea. LHD will have you believe it’s Biden led USA. Wrong. I don’t know how much LHD knows about matters in Australia but if he does he’ll target Daniel Andrews. There is no proof Daniel is getting any money out of his governance and he did what he did to protect us from COVID-19. Stop blaming the government for that. We had a disease about that was lethal.

But that’s where this crosses over into Covidiocy in the case of LHD. I’ll leave that there because this is not my Covidiots blog.

Puppets to the WEF (World Economic Forum). Puppets? The WEF has ZERO influence themselves on anything! All they do is provide a platform for governments to meet and discuss economics with big business representatives, something that had never been done before. The idea is that governments – especially socialist ones – bring the issues of their country to big business so that they can help do something about them as appropriate. There is no puppetry involved. The WEF itself just provide the means to meet, and then just stand back.

New World Order – oh boy. One of the top conspiracy BS talking points. Australian Senator Pauline Hanson even tried to press the idea in a motion on the floor of the Senate, and it was tossed out. It doesn’t exist and never will exist. The closest we will get to a world government already exists. It’s called the United Nations. The sovereignty of a country is sacrosanct – except when said country interferes with the sovereignty of another (eg Russia in the Ukraine). That will never change, especially in countries that are democracies. Totalitarianism will never be tolerated anywhere.

But this is where conspiracy cults lead. They break down democracies. Democracy is already in trouble in the United States, thanks to the events of January 6, 2021. It appears to be fighting back – the lack of red wave in the mid terms shows that and hopefully for the sake of the world, let alone the US, Donald Trump is not the Republican nominee for the Presidency in 2024. There are other candidates who have serious issues with reality (Ron DeSantis springs to mind) but even they aren’t as bad as Trump.

And LHD kept going;

Cultural Marxism is a conspiracy theory, there are no Nazis in Ukraine, the jabs are safe and effective

Likahamadoolihan on the Treefort Forums on December 6, 2022 at 5:32pm AEDST

This is all sarcastic. It is proven that cultural Marxism is a conspiracy theory. There are Nazis in every country, not just the Ukraine and again – I’m not touching the COVID vaccines because that is for the Covidiots blog.

LHD also showed that he is transphobic – another common trait in the cult of conspiracy;

The state should have more say over a child than its parents?
Gender dysphoria is a mental condition encouraged and groomed on children by leftwaffa nutcases
Transphphobic(sic) parents , proven GP ?
[beep!] sake, dystopian state controlled madness.

Likahamadoolihan on the Treefort Forums on December 8, 2022 at 7:51am AEDST

If the parents are not acting in the best interests of the child, absolutely the state should have more say. It has been that way for a long time. It’s called neglectful parenting. The second sentence is total BS – gender dysphoria is there from birth if it exists in a given child and is not subject to any encouragement or grooming. It’s black and white. Said second sentence denies the existence of gender dysphoria as a human difference.

Guess the state should be able to over rule a parents wishes on whether their child has toxic blood in a transfusion or not.
Guess that the state , should remove and isolate kids from the family in case of wrong think and educate kids in the states valies(sic) (or lack of)

Likahamadoolihan on the Treefort Forums on December 8, 2022 at 8:01am AEDST

This is about a rightful decision in the Auckland High Court over a couple of parents who refused to allow any blood transfusion for their sick baby if said blood was from a person who had been vaccinated against COVID-19. The baby’s health needs come first before anything like that, and as the bub needed heart surgery the parents were absolutely in the wrong. They have NOT lost custody. Medical guardianship has been taken off them only, and temporarily until the surgery is completed. The cult nearly killed a baby. The law thankfully corrected the error before it was fatal.

The cult has to be broken down and destroyed. They threaten our freedom. They think they are pro freedom – they are not. The Labor government here in Victoria called the micro parties that pushed freedom Nazis. This was valid because their version of freedom is similar to that of a fascist regime. Putting the power in the hands of the bullies in the community to destroy the needy. The Aryan Race mantra in other words. The labelled weak are destroyed. We need regulation to prevent that. We need protective measures – and that includes the sorts of restrictions used in the pandemic before the vaccines were developed. Social media is fighting back – although Elon Musk’s takeover of Twitter has put the nonsense back online. This is the key – private enterprise need to take the whip hand because this cult is harming their ability to do business and provide jobs. Governments are hamstrung somewhat, especially in the US with their First Amendment. Most Western countries follow the Freedom of Speech mantra, but the US is the only country where it is constitutionally protected.

The most important part of private enterprise has to be website providers. They need to tighten their rules so they can take down these sites for TOS violations. Countries need a strong mental health legislative structure that allows for conspiracy junk to be worthy of a mental health evaluation. Education needs to improve, and there needs to be transparency as those who are being accused of wrong doing to eliminate the foolish ideas.

The cult believes the world is in danger. They are right – but they are not the informers. They are the proud perpetrators, and traitors to democracy, true freedom and humanity itself.

An extra reason why Victoria must stick with Labor

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-09-21/cathrine-burnett-wake-valedictory-church-religion-liberal-party/101463452

After reading this article today and then finding a 2018 article about Matthew Guy AKA Guy Smiley (my name for him) supporting the re-introduction of compulsory religious instruction at state primary schools – it is clear. The Liberals can NOT regain power this November.

The Pentacostal church is one of the more deluded religions on the planet. They believe in the mystical being and oppose intellectuals. They have a history of a belief in faith healing from what I can tell – and that crosses two lines. The first is they would have to be anti vaccine. The second – and more important – would be opposition to mainstream medicine. This second one flies in the face of Guy’s commitment to fix the health sector, and supports the Liberal Party’s long established habit of cutting health services.

The fact that the church that Guy made his 2018 announcement in was a Baptist church (the closest relative to the Pentacostal church as I understand it) should also not be ignored.

It is also fact that the Pentacostal church opposes same sex marriage. See Margaret Court, who is a pastor for the church.

The belief in the mystical places this church in the ball park of making things up just to make themselves feel good. This brings up what is happening in America – there is a lot of this sort of thinking certainly in the Republican Party, led by none other than Donald Trump (his delusion that he won the 2020 Presidential election is the perfect example) and while Trump isn’t a Pentacostal he’s leaning in that direction. The power of positive thinking – take to a religious level – is another example, and in fact is the sort of thinking Trump engaged in.

This is the direction the Liberal Party is taking.

And it has to be stopped.

Guy won’t do anything about it. He’s too consumed with power. He won’t keep a single promise he has made. Robert Clark, the Party President, won’t either. He tried apparently but got shouted down by Jeff Kennett with Kennett blaming him for internal squabbles in the Party ranks.

But Cathrine Burnett-Wake has made it clear – Clark was on the right track and has been pushed off it. The move to the extreme right is on amongst conservatives – fueled by a perceived view that most Victorians want no more of the pandemic related regulations and the only way to make sure it doesn’t happen again is to vote out Labor. This perception is false. The last Roy Morgan poll a little over a week ago had Labor up by 16 percent on the two party preferred. If that translates to seats in a uniform manner, the Liberals will be wiped out much like they were in Western Australia.

And I hope that happens – because the far right have to be sent a loud message. And that message is that the majority of Victorians know that what Daniel Andrews and Labor tried to do was right and did it’s job to the best of it’s ability. Labor has dealt with it’s branch stacking issues. It’s time the Libs did the same if they want to stay relevant in the Legislative Assembly.

And Labor need a bigger party room!

Why you shouldn’t vote UAP

Jumping the gun ahead of both major parties, Clive Palmer has been throwing his money around again promoting his United Australia Party for the next election – guaranteed in my opinion to be held on May 21, 2022.

They have no real policies.

That should be the headline. Not any of their protest vote attracting slogans. No real policies. They have major holes in their structure and this should be exploited. Exploited to the maximum to show Australians that a vote for the UAP is a vote for a national economic and health disaster – and I don’t just mean COVID-19 either when I mention health.

Let’s look at their limited list of what they call “policies”;

A. End Lockdowns

This is health fail number one. The UAP is all for allowing COVID-19 to spread liberally across the community, destroying people’s lives either by taking them outright, or harming them for life. That by default will destroy business, jobs and the standard of living by a lot more than lockdowns have. Not to mention the bigger hit on physical and mental health. Freedom costs lives in a health emergency. You only have to look at the United States to know this is true. Restricting movement – any movement – is not covered for in the Constitution. We shut borders during the Spanish flu, and no one complained. We shut borders during the travel restriction period of World War 2, and there was only one complaint. Upholding Section 92 (which Palmer was adversely affected by and this policy is out of petty spite on his part) in a health emergency is murder by proxy. There must be lockdowns in the future if we need them for health reasons. To ban them outright no matter what is just plain wrong.

B. No Domestic Vaccine Passports

This is related to the previous policy, and calls up the idea that the vaccine isn’t working. Health fail number two because it is working. It just isn’t at 100 percent yet because not enough people are vaccinated, thereby preventing the establishment of herd immunity. It shows that the UAP are not science savvy (not a surprise with the climate change denier Craig Kelly on board). Any High Court challenge to them will be thrown out on the grounds of the validity of a single federal law – Section 48 of the Disability Discrimination Act which allows for discrimination on the basis of a disease (both actual and potential as per the precedent of Beattie v Maroochy Shire Council) when it is in the public interest. While it is valid to reject a vaccination if there is a proven medical exemption present, those are the people that are relying those around them to be vaccinated in order to protect them via herd immunity. There is no valid personal reason to say “No”.

C. Respect the Sanctity of Doctor-Patient Relationship

This by itself may look like a valid policy, but looking at the reasons it is being pushed as a validation of alternative therapies that are not approved by the TGA. It’s not named, but they are pushing Ivermectin and Hydroxychloroquine as valid. The TGA has already stated they are not, and that is because the UAP policy is lying when it speaks of “extraordinary success” in other countries. They are fake news stories and have been called out as such. Not a surprise. This policy is also being used as an excuse to hide vaccination status behind this policy a la Novak Djokovic who refused to reveal it until recently. There are times when medical status must be revealed in certain circumstances, such as going for a job where one’s medical status needs to be known. This was a valid defence that was confirmed in the Supreme Court of New South Wales in the matter of Kassam and Henry v Hazzard. In other words, there are exceptions that are valid here and they must be respected as well. The sanctity described is not and can not be absolute.

D. Abolish National Cabinet

This is a ridiculous policy because by default it also seeks to abolish the COAG. If COAG is valid, then so is National Cabinet. It is not a decision making group. It is a discussion group – just like COAG with the one exception of no involvement by the Local Government Association. The UAP is seeking in effect to take the state governments out of the political process at federal level. That is in fact unconstitutional because it goes completely against the entirety of Chapter 8 of it, and also section 51 where matters that aren’t listed are a matter for the states.

E. End Australia’s Energy Crisis

In this section, instead of re-asserting coal mining and coal fired power stations, they instead go to nuclear power. It is well established as dirty power in a number of different ways. Just because it isn’t subject to greenhouse gases like coal doesn’t mean it’s clean. It carries toxic waste. Where will that go? The only way forward in power is through natural resources like wind and solar, as well as hydro where possible (and we’ve already maxxed that out). Palmer wants this for the mining benefits. He has no idea.

F. Strengthen Australia’s Defence

There was no sign of any objection to the French submarine contract, so Palmer lied here. This policy is empty because it only speaks of submarines, and makes no mention of other defence capabilities and makes no mention of troops and the border force.

G. Protecting Free Speech from Foreign Tech Giants

Trying to dictate terms to Facebook, You Tube and Twitter is not in the government’s jurisdiction. If you don’t like their Terms of Service, you just don’t use them. I don’t use the latter two for this reason. You get your message out there in other ways. They censor correctly and in just terms – free speech is not absolute and this policy appears to approve of hate speech within the definition of political debate. That is never right and never will be right.

H. Protect Australian Values

This is a hypocritical policy related to the above policies against lockdowns and vaccines. Australian values are fine and they include freedom from disease – a freedom that the UAP opposes by default. They are happy to provide freedom of religion, including when religion hurts people (such as the LGBTIQ+ community), freedom of speech including hate speech, freedom from fear when we should be afraid of a number of things, and freedom of association including hate and terrorist groups. That is not Australian. We have laws to restrict these things in certain circumstances, and Palmer is being a hypocrite as well given his defamation lawsuit against Mark McGowan which is all about gagging him (it’s a SLAPP suit – no doubt) and I don’t blame Mark for counter suing.

I. Zonal Taxation for Regional Communities

This is not the way to send people to the regions, especially with a slash to the tax regime that will curb the revenue required to provide the services that are needed in the first instance in health in particular. The policy there is noticeably absent.

J. Process Australian Minerals at home

Palmer himself will benefit from this policy hence it’s presence. The reality is we don’t have the space to do this, and it also requires power we don’t have and could never have even with nuclear power or coal fired power. Not to mention the possibility of greenhouse gases out of it. Processes need to be refined first and I see no sign of that in this policy.

Then there is everything that is missing. Where is the Aged Care policy? What is their answer to the issues out of that Royal Commission? Where is the policy on the NDIS? Do they support it? How much will they put into it? What is their policy on farming? What is their policy on our food resources? What is their policy on road and rail infrastructure – especially the latter? Do they support electric vehicles? The list goes on.

The most important gap comes from one of their TV commercials. They complain about a trillion dollar debt that they think will take a couple of centuries to pay off – and yet they have no plan or policy to pay it off. Mining won’t do it. That’s a fact.

The reality is that the UAP are not fit to hold any seats in either the House of Representatives or the Senate.

For this reason, do not give them your vote. Put them behind Labor and the Coalition at least.