A community says no to racist burqa bans

(A version of this article was also published in the Sydney Hub.)

Sally McManus, Australian Services Union state secretary, addresses the meeting. Photo by Robert Alcock.

All around the Western world, far-right groups (some with neo-Nazi orgins and links), are gaining political ground through an orchestrated campaign against Muslim communities. By spreading fear and hatred against recent immigrant communities from Muslim countries these groups have tapped into well-resourced post-9/11 war propaganda campaigns initiated by rulers of the world’s richest and most powerful states.

One of the favourite tactics of these anti-Muslim hate campaigners is to push laws banning the burqa, the fully-veiled dress style used by a tiny minority of Muslim women. In Australia, the ultra-conservative Reverend Fred Nile, leader of the Christian Democratic Party and a member of the NSW Legislative Council, and Liberal Senator Cori Bernardi from South Australia, have unsuccessfully tried to move private members bills to ban the burqa.

The burqa ban issue became a local controversy in the Sydney’s cosmopolitan inner-west suburbs when Sergio Redegalli, a glass sculptor and gallery owner, painted a stark “Say no to burqas” mural on the wall of his studio in Newtown.

Two local residents, Amanda Perkins (a union organiser) and Pip Hinman (prominent anti-war campaigner, community activist and Socialist Alliance election candidate in several local, state and federal elections) organised a public meeting in the Erskineville Town Hall on November 24 to bring the debate into the open.

Presentations by Sally McManus, Australian Services Union state secretary; Aisha Chaabou, a student activist from the University of Western Sydney, Father Dave Smith, Holy Trinity Church and Pip Hinman kicked off the debate. Several members of the audience spoke for and against banning the burqa. Redegalli, the painter of the anti-burqa mural, also spoke. (You can read Pip Hinman’s presentation here.)

Redegalli is slippery about his motives. He claims he just wanted to “start a discussion” but his anti-Muslim prejudice is clear. He told the meeting he’d love to have a discussion with Muslim women about the issue — prompting a Muslim woman at the meeting to remark that having such a mural on his wall was not exactly “inviting”!

Some people think he maybe just looking for free publicity for his business but he’s playing with some nasty far-right forces. On the far-right http://www.australianidentity.net site (which describes itself as an “Independent patriotic forum”), Redegalli was first applauded (some forum members said they rushed to have their photo taken in front of it) and identified as a great opening. Some suggested buying Xmas presents from his gallery to show support. But when Redegalli amended the mural to replace the clear image of a woman in a burqa with an outline, one member of the forum wrote: “Well, this was predictable.  The gutless dago has removed it…”

Perhaps the Italian-born Redegalli ought to reflect on this.

The audience was diverse, with a wide range of age groups and ethnic backgrounds represented. Photo by Robert Alcock.

 

Amanda Perkins. Click on pic to watch Youtube. Photo and video by Robert Alcock.

Watch Youtube videos from the meeting here:

• Part 1 (Amanda Perkins): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xLSteEwp3Uw
• Part 2 (Sally McManus): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L3SokUo6rpU
• Part 3 (Fr Dave Smith): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eBhNFho9I-E
• Part 4 (Aisha Chaabou): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MeZlTrKGDw4
• Part 5 (Pip Hinman): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6U9f2u5Ui6c

“We were encouraged that many people, including lots of local residents, had a chance to have their say. An overwhelming majority of attendees did not support calls to ban the burqa”, said Perkins after the meeting. At the end of a wide-ranging, passionate but civil debate, Hinman moved the following motion which was supported by two-thirds of the people at the meeting:

“This Town Hall meeting is against any ban on the burqa.

“Calls to ban the burqa tap into racist campaigns against people of Islamic background.

“Calls to ban the burqa do not assist those women who do not want to wear the burqa. Rather they penalise and stigmatise a small number of women, and make it hard for them to leave their home.

“For these and other reasons, supporters of women’s rights and human rights should resist calls to ban the burqa.”

Two commercial television stations, Channel 7 and Channel 9, filmed the entire meeting but in their news items broadcast the following night focussed solely on the small pro-burqa ban minority.

OK, many readers will not find that too surprising perhaps but they may find it a little shocking that these two TV stations were actually promoting and projecting to a mass audience an orchestrated media stunt by the far-right Australian Protectionist Party.

The APP split off from another far-right party called Australia First (a group headed by the notorious open Nazi supporter Jim Saleam) in 2007, and hopes to advance in electoral politics on a model borrowed from the British National Party. In March this year, Nick Chance a visiting speaker from BNP coached APP members on how they could advance by using anti-Islamic propaganda and by shedding connections with anti-Semites and overt neo-Nazi types. Alas for the APP, its members and supporters find it hard to hide their racism as a perusal of its Facebook site quickly reveals (see some excerpts below).

Members of the APP, and another far-right group called the “Southern Cross Soldiers”, came to the Erskineville meeting with prepared scripts and a male APP member, Robert Hunt, dressed in a black burqa. With the TV cameras focused on him, Hunt strode to the front to address the meeting and then theatrically whipped off his mask and said: “No one has raised the issue of security yet. I’m a male!”

APP member Robert Hunt in his burqa. From Channel 7 news coverage.

For extra emphasis, Hunt added, that he could have gone into the female toilets!

Later, boasting on his Facebook page, Hunt wrote:

“Yes it was me! … and the sound of the vaginas closing in the front… I had never heard so many squeeks as to what I did when I said I could have gone into the female dunnies.”

Another wild-eyed APP member, Jack Zedee, said he was a former soldier who lives in Lakemba (a Sydney suburb with a big middle-eastern community) and that he was sick of being abused and spat at by burqa-clad Muslim women in the street and fearful of “Sharia law” being imposed in Australia!

Another speaker who seemed costumed and primed with a crude script was a woman who a gave her name as “Skye Patch” and claimed to be a “concerned resident”. She declared herself to be from “Generation X” and argued for her right “as a proud Australian woman” to wear a sleeveless dress, makeup, high heels and be free from “political correctness”. She was very Pauline Hansonesque in her language and played to the TV cameras.

It was a wierd argument. There is no move to “impose Sharia law” in Australia and there is no move to ban any dress apart from the burqa, but allowing Muslim women wear a burqa is the “thin edge of the wedge” and next thing we know we’ll all be under Sharia law! It’s the sort of wild leap of no-logic that you would think the white supremacist far-right (born again as anti-Muslim hate campaigners today) would struggle to get a mountain goat to chance. But perhaps not if they get a little help from powerful rich friends with TV stations.

Channel 7 distorted this overwhelmingly anti-racist, anti-burqa ban meeting into what will undoubtedly serve as a propaganda film by the APP and other far-right groups. A Channel 7 reporter later admitted to one of the meeting organisers that he had lined it up with the APP. You can watch it here.

Fortunately, a local resident filmed the entire meeting and this will be posted to Youtube soon and made available off the Green Left website.

With such hatred and racism being spread by the big business media, it is all the more important to keep alive the alternative media like Green Left Weekly.

If you can help us get there please donate online today at www.greenleft.org.au/donate/details, or direct deposits can be made to Greenleft, Commonwealth Bank, BSB 062-006, account no. 00901992.

Otherwise, you can send a cheque or money order to PO Box 515, Broadway NSW 2007 or phone in a donation on the toll-free line on 1800 634 206 (within Australia).

As the year draws to an end, we appeal to all our readers to donate to the Green Left Weekly $300,000 annual fighting fund. $6,507 came in last week in donations and from fundraising events — thank you! We have $106,233 left to meet our target.

University of Western Sydney student Aisha Chaabou. Photo by Robert Alcock.

Father Dave Smith, Holy Trinity Church. Photo by Robert Alcock.

Pip Hinman, Sydney Stop The War Coalition founding member, Socialist Alliance and community activist. Photo by Robert Alcock.

Organiser and chairperson Amanda Perkins (foreground). Speaking: Sergio Redegalli, who painted the "Say no to burqas" mural. Photo by Robert Alcock.

 

Some postings on the Australian Protectionist Party’s Facebook page (typos included):

“Thanks to those of the APP who made it to the Erskinville meeting and debate last night , again the APP and SCS wher there to ensure the people of Australia got a say “Bloody well done to all !! i’m proud of you and know whikle theres folks like you our great nation has a decent future , stay strong folks! God Keep …you all safe and Bless you all”

* * *

“being Islamophic is like being scared of sharks , shiows you have a sence of survival as Islam wants all who are not of Islam dead or slaves you idiot sap greens supporter”

“It’s impossible for them to truly assimilate because they identify first and foremost with an alien religion that controls just about every aspect of their life and is often contrary to mainstream Western values. ”

“As their numbers grow they inevitably organise and become more demanding, bringing about inevitable clashes with the host population.”

“I wonder if any old soldiers there still had their trusty machine guns from WW2 handy to mow those muslim pigs down!”

* * *

“Former one nation leader Pauline Hanson is disillusioned with living in the UK and is now come back to Australia”

“Perhaps Pauline could join the APP? Would this be a good idea?”

“Perhaps Jack!…. she’d have the right political mindset”

“Yes,,more people are awake now she would get more support.”

“I would vote for her ….”

* * *

From the Ban the Burqa in Australia Facebook site:

“Observation: Why is there a major news report nearly every week about some Islamic attempt to destroy other countries societies or harm that societies individuals. i.e. Bombings and hate filled rallies. The stance of Islamic fundamentalists and so-called moderates warning that any derogatory remark about Islam is met with death threats. Coupled with the Violent history of Islam, one wonders why so many want to join such a cult/religion.”

“if the muslim ?!@* heads dont like it fuck off home if your so/worried about you culture and tradition being carried out why come here and fuck us up the arse in the first place we dont need you we can walk or drive our selfs and we do have doctors matter of fact fuck off anyways!”

“Haha the rag heads are trying to ban my page”

“Mussies and mussie lovers. The thing they have in common is that they are Anti-white Australian.”

“watch out, these stinking sweaty cockroaches might outbreed us! … there is danger they breed like flies with all the centrelink benefits accordingly and buy up all the business and only employ their own”

“I have been very aware of that for some time Tom! Also the conversions of whites and Aboriginals to Islam is on the rise.

“They have told the aboriginals that they descended from the muslim sufies 4-6,000 years ago. Anthony Mundine became a muslim only because of Mohammod Ali and the power he has been fed has made him a risk to his own people. He is just being used to lead his people to the slaughter.”

Farewell Comrade! Max Watts (1928-2010)

Max Watts on his 80th birthday. Photo by Vivienne Porzsolt.

Max Watts, who became a well-known personality on the left in Australia, particularly in Sydney, died on November 23.

Max was a left-wing freelance journalist, an occasional contributor to Green Left Weekly and its discussion list , and a solidarity activist with many national liberation struggles including those of Palestine, Kanaky, West Papua and Bougainville.

In the 1960s, he was a central activist in Europe working with soldier resistance to the Vietnam War within the US armed forces. Resistance inside the army (RITA) was one of his great political passions.

Max was an extravagant personality, and some people may have found him difficult at times, but he was someone always firmly on the left and on the side of all struggles against oppression and exploitation. You could count on that and he will be remembered by many comrades in the broad left movement.

Max shook his head at the persistent tendency of the left to be over-factionalised and divisive but he was quick to work alongside those who took up serious struggle. An eagerness to understand and show solidarity with new forces in motion in any country was one of his characteristics.

Max passed away in Sydney’s Royal Prince Alfred Hospital from kidney and heart failure. He was with close friends Rosie, Lydia, Vivienne and Barbara at the time and passed peacefully.

I managed to say goodbye to him in hospital a few days before he died. He was quite feisty then — though somewhat confused and disoriented, probably due to medication. After about an hour, my attempts to get him to stay in his bed earned me the following last words: “Boyle, your visiting time is up!” It was classic Max!

Max will be formally farewelled in Sydney on December 1 at 11.30am at Camellia Chapel, Macquarie Park Crematorium, Plassey Road, North Ryde.

Phone 0411 366 295 for more details.

It requested that flowers not be sent to the funeral. Instead, if you would like to do something to commemorate Max Watts, it is suggested that you could contribute to the management of the archive which has been established in Amsterdam at the International Institute for Social History. This comprises Max’s enormous store of papers in relation to his RITA.

Details:

Foundation International Institute for Social History
Amsterdam, Netherlands

ABN AMRO Bank
IBAN NL58ABNA0548517347
BIC ABNANL2A

IMPORTANT! It is essential to reference to ‘Max Watts Archives’

Friends of Max have set up a Facebook group. If you would like to leave messages or photos or other material, go to www.facebook.com and search for “Remembering Max Watts”.

Red Shirts flood centre of Bangkok again

Ratchaprasong is a sea of Red Shirts again. Photos by Khun Kamberg CBN Press.

November 19 – Thousands of supporters of the Thailand’s Red Shirt (popular name for  the United Front for Democracy Against Dictatorship) movement once again turned Bangkok’s busy Ratchaprasong Intersection into a sea of red.

They turned out in their thousands (see video of the crowd posted by Richard Barrow to Twitter here) to mark six months since the military bloodily attacked and dispersed a mass protest camp that occupied this area in April and May this year. Over 90 people were killed, thousands injured and hundreds or protesters are still imprisoned.

This is the second peaceful mass protest to fill Ratchaprasong since the crackdown – the first took place on September 19. The turn out then was estimated at between 10-12,000, a show of defiance against an emergency decree still in force in Bangkok and in some provinces. The size of the September 19 turnout caught both the rally organisers and the authorities by surprise.

The military-dominated Centre for the Resolution of the Emergency Situation is appears to be increasingly ineffective.  On November 19, large contingents of police and military were mobilised from early in the morning but less than half an hour after the 4pm began, police retreated conpletely from Ratchaprasong, according to eyewitnesses.

One the same day, CRES issued a decress banning any goods that goods that “provokes, incites, agitates, or causes disunity in the general populace” on the pain of 2 years jail, 40,000 baht, or both.

“Individuals are forbidden to have in their possession, or possess with intent to sell or otherwise distribute, products, clothing, consumer goods, or any other objects that contain printing, writing, drawing, photography, or any other method that conveys a meaning which provokes, incites, agitates, or causes disunity in the general populace, or acts or supports acts which cause a state of emergency.”

T-shirts, sandals, floormats and a host of other popular anti-government merchandise, now openly on sale in the streets – could be covered by the ban.

The latest Red Shirt protest also comes as sections of the Yellow Shirt movement, which mobilised against the last elected government of Thaksin Shinawatra have started to turn against the current military-installed government of PM Abhisit Vejjajiva. Strangely the dissident factions are reported to be calling for another military coup!

 

Anti-military dictatorship mural.

 

Jubilant crowd.

 

Red Sunday group leader Sombat Boonngamanong meets MP Jatuporn Phromphan of the Peoples Power Party (PPP).

Candles lit to honour those killed in the May 19 military crackdown.

 

Even McDonalds was occupied by the Red Shirts!

Australia’s best political cartoonist wins Cartoonist of The Year Award

Canberra-based political cartoonist David Pope (AKA Heinrich Hinze) has won one of Australia’s top cartooning honours, taking out the 2010 Cartoonist of the Year Award in Melbourne on Nov 6. Here is his perfect comment on the big four banks that dominate Australian financial sector (and much of the rest of the economy too!).

His cartoons — which are incisive in their relentless exposure of the rich and powerful, and their minions — are now regularly published in the Canberra Times . An archive of David’s work is available here. Enjoy and be empowered!

When the world is the obscenely ridiculous, unsustainable and cruel path that it is today, we need one, two, three… many David Popes!

Put politicians on a nurses wage!

Rachel Evans at nurses rally at Royal Prince Alfred Hospital. Photo by Darrien Perry.

If federal Labor Special Minister of State* Gary Gray thinks we should feel sorry for him because he took a pay cut from $675,000 a year to $130,000 when he left his senior executive position at Woodside Petroleum to become a politician, he must be stupid.

Most of us can see that corporate CEOs are grossly overpaid and, worse, they get paid more if they are better at hurting and ripping off millions of people.

Gray wants to close the gap between corporate CEO and politicians pay (already much higher than that of the great majority of workers) — and not by cutting obscene CEO pay! This would widen the gap between politicians and the people they are supposed to represent.

How about capping politicians pay at the lel of that of a skilled worker, such as a nurse? That way the pollies would have a better idea what life is like for most people and this might have a positive impact on the decisions made by governments.

Wasting public money to make the well-off even more well off has become the norm, whether we have a Labor or a Liberal-National Coalition government. Last week it was revealed that the NSW Labor government was prepared to secretly subsidise the price of coal power by $1-2 billion in order to sweeten the deal for the companies bidding for the NSW electricity privatisation. That’s on top of at least another billion in subsidies to the coal industry which Green peace had unearthed.

We’ve also found out that NSW would have been at least $4.6 billion better off if it had publicly borrowed to build and operate the Sydney Harbour Tunnel, the M4, the M5, the M2, the Eastern Distributor, the Cross City Tunnel, the M7 and Lane Cove Tunnel, instead of handing it over to the private sector.

That’s just a small part of the corporate profit subsidies from the public purse. Billions more go to fattening the profits of private schools, private health insurance companies, big car companies and even the profit-gouging big four banks.

The big companies get away with lower and lowers taxes while poor are slugged ever more as governments rely more on direct taxes. According to a November 15 Sydney Morning Herald report, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development said that the Gillard government’s compromise minerals resource rent tax was so weak that ”taxation of profits of mining companies is likely to remain much lower than before the mining boom”.

Most of us would rather see public money spent on public services. On health, education, public transport and on seriously making a transition to renewable energy. But while our politicians-who-would-like -to-be-paid-like-corporate-CEOs don’t think twice of tossing a few billion the way of the same corporate rich, you have to fight them tooth and nail to get them to spend a cent on our common good.

On November 24, NSW nurses will be going on strike to get the government to agree to a mandated minimum staffing ratio of one nurse to four patients in hospitals. Victorian nurses won this minimum standard 10 years ago (after a fight) but in NSW the Keneally Labor government is refusing to budge.

I joined nurses last week at their rally outside the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital and spoke out as an appreciative patient.  My appreciation for the public hospitals and their dedicated (but overworked) staff increased since I was rushed in with a heart attack in 2007. Most people only get to appreciate the public health system after such an emergency.

In my moral universe, one nurse is worth way more than boardrooms of overpaid corporate CEOs. But this a society being run on upside-down values.

Many people agree with this but don’t think we can change the system. But everytime someone steps up to take some action to fight for change – no matter how modest – our collective confidence in the possibility of bigger change grows. This is why Green Left Weekly offers a voices for all those fighting for change — whether it is a nurse seeking better staffing ratios in the interest of patient and staff safety or a community activists standing up to mining companies determined to extract coal seam gas from under our water catchment areas, farms or even our cities.

As the year draws to an end, we appeal to all our readers to make a generous donation towards the Green Left Weekly $300,000 annual fighting fund.

If you can help us get there please donate online today at www.greenleft.org.au/donate/details , or direct deposits can be made to Greenleft, Commonwealth Bank, BSB 062-006, account no. 00901992. Otherwise, you can send a cheque or money order to PO Box 515, Broadway NSW 2007 or phone in a donation on the toll-free line on 1800 634 206 (within Australia).

* What does a SMOS (special minister of state) do apart from talking up pollies pay and collecting a minister’s salary in the process? See: http://www.smos.gov.au/

Thailand: Red Shirts plan another major rally for November 19

November 14 commemoration of the assassination of rebel general Khattiya Sawatdipho (popularly known as Seh Daeng) at Lumpini Park, Bangkok. Photo by "Klaus Crimson" (reprinted with permission).

Supporters of Thailand’s opposition Red Shirt movement are preparing another major mobilisation on November 19 to commemorate six months since the military repression of their mass protest camp in Bangkok’s Ratchaprasong Intersection.

The Red Shirts have being holding several build up actions around the country including mass bike rides of red-shirted supporters in several cities and towns. And on Sunday November some 1,500 Red Shirt supporters rallied in front of the Rama VI statue Bangkok’s Lumpini Park to mark the assassination of rebel general Khattiya Sawatdipho (popularly known as Seh Daeng) six months ago as he gave an interview to a New York Times journalist in the Red Shirts protest camp at Ratchaprasong.

Major General Khattiya was already a popular figure in Thailand because he had clashed publicly with the military and police leadership over corruption and democracy but became even more popular in 2008 when he defended Red Shirt activists from being beaten up by the Yellow Shirt thugs (the armed Naclop Srivichai) who support the current military-installed government of Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva.

According to “Klaus”, a Red Shirt activist in Bangkok who took the pictures displayed with permission with this story:

“Khattiya recognised that the redshirts also need guards to protect themselves from the attacks of the yellow thugs. He started to train his own group of black-clad guards, called Naclop Prachao Taksin or ‘King Taksin Warriors’, who were trained in street combat and protection activities to support the Red Shirts.”
“King Taksin” has nothing to do with the deposed PM Thaksin Shinawatra, supported by most Red Shirts, explained “Klaus”, but refers to the historic warrior King Taksin who successfully defended the kingdom of Siam from invading Burmese armies in the 18th century.

Seh Daeng's daughter, Nong Poor, at Lumpini Park, Bangkok. Photo by "Klaus Crimson" (reprinted with permission).

“By training this group and supporting the redshirt movement he was getting into a deadly conflict with the then commander of the army, General Anupong Paochinda.

“Khattiya risked his military career by stepping out and supporting the movement against the coup and for democracy. During the conflict in April-May this year, he coordinated the activities of most black-clad guard groups and supervised the erection of the barricades and defence of the Red Shirt camp at Ratchaprasong.

“He is remembered as a hero by the Red Shirts and earned a firm place in their hearts because he sacrificed all his privileges as a high-ranking general for the cause of the redshirts and died as a warrior by the bullet of a cowardly army sniper.”

The November 14 rally was attended by Khattiya’s daughter, Khattiyaa Nong Dear, and other family members and close friends.

Everbody at the rally was talking about the big rally on Ratchaprasong planned for November 19 to mark six months since the military crackdown, “Klaus told Links & Green Left.

“There are many different activities planned to cover all the day. Some groups are talking about using ‘flash mob’ tactics.

“All of the groups will converge on Ratchaprasong in the afternoon. I reckon we can expect a huge crowd similar as on September 19.”

I asked “Klaus” what was the level of morale and confidence of the Red Shirt movement today.
“The question of morale is a difficult one. On one hand, there is growing frustration about the continuing repression by the government, the strengthening influence of the army and the continuing attempt to hide and whitewash the government’s wrongdoings and violations of human rights during and since the crackdown.

“On the other hand the frequent public activities of the Red Shirts are morale boosters and remind individual Red Shirt supporters that they are not alone. What is also obvious is that since September 19 a larger number of small groups of Red Shirts, which are getting more and more organised. Each of these groups are now able to initiate and stage their own mass activities.”

“Gunn”, a Red Sunday activist, told Links & Green Left:

“The Red Sunday group will also be taking part in the memorial actions in Ratchaprasong on November 19. We expect a big crowd. The Red Sunday group has organised many successful red bike rides and its leader Sombat Boonngamanong will be staging a variety talk show on December 5-6 to raise funds for the movement. ”

And the popular street sellers of the banned sandals (see below) featuring PM Abhisit, are sure to make an appearance as they did on November 14, despite the danger that they will be arrested again.

Sellers of banned sandals made a good trade. Photo by "Klaus Crimson" (reprinted with permission).

Halt in the name of the law, drop those shoes!

Shoes were thrown at George W. Bush and Hilary Clinton. Photo by Peter Boyle.

 

(Published in the Sydney Hub.)

This is a cosmopolitan 21st-century city in a liberal democracy, isn’t it? Folks are allowed to express themselves freely, dissent and protest against the powers that be, right?

Not if we don’t insist on it, it seems.

The Sydney Stop The War Coalition planned a symbolic “Shoe away the war criminals” action outside the US Consulate to coincide the AUSMIN war talks between the Australian Government and US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in Melbourne on November 8.

The plan was for protesters to throw shoes at cardboard cut-outs of Gates, Clinton, PM Julia Gillard and foreign minister Kevin Rudd. Totally coincidently, this plan was decided on the same night that Hunter Valley activist Pete Gray threw his shoes at former PM John Howard on the ABC TV Q and A program.

 

Photo by John Immig.

Both actions were inspired by the example of the Iraqi journalist Muntadar al-Zaidi who threw his shoes at former US President George W. Bush in 2008.

The AUSMIN talks discussed Australia hosting more US military bases, more stockpiles of US military supplies in Australia, more joint training exercises on Australian soil, greater access to Australian ports for US ships and planes, and more joint military patrols throughout the Asia-Pacific region. So the anti-war activists had something serious to protest about.

The shoe-throwing action was to be a peaceful, fun protest, but it alarmed the NSW police.

Photo by Peter Boyle.

The police tried to impose bizarre conditions.

“Under no circumstances are participants to throw any object towards any person, building, structure or thing”, the organisers were told, in writing. “Under no circumstances are participants to throw any object into the air.”

According to police, any such acts would be an “arrestable offence”. On the face of it, this would have made juggling an arrestable offence!

On advice from civil liberties lawyers, the anti-war activists refused to agree and went ahead with their action. They were prepared to be arrested, but on the day the police backed off and the peaceful protest passed without incident.

There is an important lesson to this story. If we don’t speak out against injustice, and insist on our right to protest, it will get harder and harder to do so.

We can’t take for granted the freedom to protest. In many parts of the world, if you protest against the ruling establishment you risk getting beaten, arrested or killed.

Nearly four decades ago, when I first became a political activist, the police in Australia did not respect people’s right to have a peaceful street march. It had to be fought for and won, and many activists suffered beatings and even spells in jail to win this right. Veterans of the early marches that inspired Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras in Sydney can testify to this.

I witnessed the winning of this right in Perth, WA in the early 1970s, as a young student. A large number of anti-war protesters were making their way from the (more radical) “over East” to protest US bases in the North-West coast. The WA police put the word out that anyone who marched on the streets would be arrested. But we defied them and took to the streets in thousands. The police backed off their threat and from then on the right to march in protest in the streets was won.

Roll forward a couple of decades and this and other basic rights are under threat. Post-9/11 the police have gained many new powers and are constantly seeking to narrow down the right to protest.

Recently in Sydney, the police have prevented anti-war activists, refugee rights activists and this year’s Reclaim The Night protest against violence against women, from taking to the streets. If we don’t stand up to this threat to a basic freedom, we could lose the right to protest altogether.

(Peter Boyle has been preselected by the Socialist Alliance to head up a 21-strong ticket for the Legislative Council in the March 2011 NSW elections.)

More nurses, less politicians’ spin!

 

Nurses rally at Sydney's Royal Prince Alfred Hospital.

For the second week in a row, nurses held lunchtime rallies outside their hospitals in support of the NSW Nurses Association campaign for a mandated minimum nurse to patient ratio of 1:4 in public hospitals. This ratio has been mandated in Victoria for ten years but NSW lags behind.

Lower ratios in NSW have meant poorer care for patients and has also placed nurse in danger.

One young nurse explained at the rally on November 10 at the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital that she had been recently assaulted while on ward duty. This would not have happened if there had been a mandated minimum nurse to patient ratio of 1:4, she said.

I was one of two grateful patients who spoke at the RPAH rally in support of the nurses campaign.

I told the rally, that I had been brought to RPAH by ambulance when I had a heart attack in 2007 and gained a strong respect for the public hospital system and its dedicated but overworked staff.

Most people don’t appreciate public hospitals until they are brought in for emergency treament, I said to the rally, but it is an important public asset that we have to fight for.

James Data, the other patient who spoke at the RPAH rally was in a wheel-chair and a current inpatient. He challenged Labor Premier Kristina Keneally to “come an work one night shift in the hospital to see how things really are”.

Readers can register their support for the campaign at www.one2four.com.au

 

Peter Boyle addressing nurses rally at RPAH.

More pics here.

Subversive shoes and other ridiculous matters

Being a political activist can be fun. A few of us enjoyed participating in Sydney Stop The War Coalition shoe-throwing action on November 8 outside the US Consulate in Sydney to protest the AUSMIN war talks with US Secretary of Defence (War, actually) Robert Gates and US Secretary of State Hilary Clinton in Melbourne.

The best fun wasn’t the shoe-throwing as much as getting one up on the overzealous constabulary. In the post 9/11 era, the police are imposing ever more ridiculous restrictions on people’s democratic right to political expression, while white collar criminals are getting away with billions of dollars in ill-gotten gains.

In the lead up this peaceful, symbolic, anti-war action, which involved protesters throwing shoes at cardboard cutouts of Gates, Clinton, PM Julia Gillard and Kevin Rudd, the police sought to impose these conditions:

“Under no circumstances are participants to throw any object towards any person, building, structure or thing… Under no circumstances are participants to throw any object into the air.”

Any such acts would be deemed to be an “arrestable offence”, the police threatened.

On advice from civil liberties lawyers, the anti-war activists refused to submit to such restrictions and went on with their action. They were prepared to be arrested but on the day the police backed off and the peaceful protest passed without incident.

So what was the logic of such a restriction, which would on the face of it have made juggling an arrestable offence?

One of the lawyers who attempted to negotiate with the police in the lead up to the action was told that shoe-throwing was offensive. How would you like it, argued the policeperson, if someone starting throwing shoe in public at an image of Saint Mary McKillop? The lawyer was tempted to reply, if Mary McKillop was alive today she might be one of the anti-war protesters throwing shoes at the cutouts of the war criminals.

The lesson of this story is simple. If we are not willing to speak out at the unspeakable crimes that are being committed today in the greedly interests of the rich and powerful, it will get harder and harder to do so.

The freedom to protest cannot be taken for granted. It does not exist in many parts of the world, where if you go out and protest against the ruling establishment you risk getting beaten, arrested or even shot dead. Even in Australia, four decades ago, when I first became a political activist, the police did not respect the right to have a peaceful street march. It had to be won, and many activists suffered beatings and spells in police lockups in the process of winning this right on the streets.

New activists are often shocked when they first come up against repressive arm of the state. The police can be very intimidating, especially when they deal with you in isolation. This is where a project like Green Left Weekly plays an important role. Not only does it champion the right to protest but it also helps share the experience of generations of fighters for freedom and justice.

Help keep this precious political asset for the movements alive by making a donation toady to our Fighting Fund. The year is fast running out and we still need to raise $118,000 to meet our target for this year. If you can help us get there please donate online today at www.greenleft.org.au/donate/details , or direct deposits can be made to Greenleft, Commonwealth Bank, BSB 062-006, account no. 00901992. Otherwise, you can send a cheque or money order to PO Box 515, Broadway NSW 2007 or phone in a donation on the toll-free line on 1800 634 206 (within Australia).

Readers can also buy a Green Left Weekly subscription a friend, workmate or relative to help keep this project going.

Green Left website: A valuable online archive

Green Left Weekly cover from 2001

The Green Left website had a 13.3% rise in readership in October compared to the previous month, perhaps reflecting the developments in Australian politics since the failure of the traditional parties of government to win a parliamentary majority in the August 21 federal election.

The site had 104,719 unique visitors over the month.

The most-read article on the web, published last month, was Kiraz Janicke’s “The burqa: reject the fake ‘feminism’ of the right” which has had more than 3000 readers over the month. Articles about Greens MP Adam Bandt, Senator Bob Brown and independent MP Andrew Wilkie were also very popular.

On the first day of November there was a sharp spike in Green Left’s web readership. The source of this spike was some 3000 visitors who read an article we published way back in 1999, entitled “Why is hemp illegal” . These readers were directed to the Green Left site from the US-based referring website www.stumbleupon.com

A steady stream of people interested in this article about the famous weed has continued to flow since then.

However this is only one of several articles published online by Green Left many years ago that continues to get a steady stream of readers.

Another favourite from the Green Left web archive is “How the CIA created Osama bin Laden” (published in 2001).

“The Aboriginal struggle for justice and land rights” (2001) is also regularly read as is “Vietnam: war and the environment” from 1991, the first year Green Left was published.

There are many articles from long past issues that continue to draw online readers, proving that Green Left is a valuable and free online archive.

Over the last month we began placing advertisements for Green Left subscriptions and donations in the body of all longer Green Left articles on the web but it is too early to see if this has had a positive impact on subscriptions and donations. We have also begun to include links to selected related articles in some articles.

If you read Green Left on the web, please remember that while reading Green Left on the web is free, producing it isn’t. As the year draws to an end, we appeal to the thousands who read Green Left on the web to make a generous donation towards our $300,00 annual fighting fund.

If you can help us get there please donate online today at www.greenleft.org.au/donate/details , or direct deposits can be made to Greenleft, Commonwealth Bank, BSB 062-006, account no. 00901992. Otherwise, you can send a cheque or money order to PO Box 515, Broadway NSW 2007 or phone in a donation on the toll-free line on 1800 634 206 (within Australia).

Web readers can also buy an e-subscription to help keep this project afloat. You can also help increase our web readership by sending links to articles that your friends, relatives or workmates may be interested in.