Painting Fakes

The Climate Strike and associated heightening of social media discussion has also brought the usual trolls out of their caves. I have no positive proof of this, but I'm pretty sure one or other of the Koch Brothers-funded entities has produced a 'Guide for Climate Trolls*' which is circulating somewhere on the dark web. It contains a short compendium of appropriate trolls from which followers are encouraged to select one or two and elaborate to taste. While I have never personally seen this document I am fairly sure I can list its contents. They are presented below, with handy counter-troll responses in brackets, and now numbered for easy reference . Part 1: For the Striking Children Children are easy prey for trolls and bullies because they are smaller than the rest of us.  The guide makes bullying them even easier with some handy tips.  Here are some replies to help you stand up for the small people in your life. 1.1 -  'I bet they drove there in cars.' (Yo...

In my previous post I introduced the question of religious freedom and discussed Israel Folau's case from the point of view of Christian teaching.  Now, on to the heart of the matter. Whether or not Israel Folau has accurately represented the Christian faith, he has clearly presented his own deeply held personal belief. So much so that he has refused any kind of compromise. He is not prepared to make any kind of apology, even a half-hearted one, nor to take down the post, because to do so would go against his own conscience. So it is arguable that his religious freedom is being infringed.  This is the argument he appears set to make in his potentially eye-wateringly expensive crowd-funded legal challenge. So how should we view this claim? To assess it properly we need to think about how human rights work. This is rather complex in Australian law because our human rights legislation is very piecemeal, split across various State and Commonwealth statutes that operate in vario...

Our newly re-elected Commonwealth Government has introduced new legislation to protect religious freedom.  It is not really clear that we need it (in what ways is religious practice currently restricted?) but there are a number of stalking horses in the debate, like whether Christian schools are free to sack gay teachers, whether preachers can say strong anti-Islamic or anti-gay things in public, and whether bakers can be forced to bake gay wedding cakes.  Bigger and noisier than all of these is the Israel Folau affair. All this kind of turns up the heat on religious freedom without necessarily providing much light, so I thought I'd use the Folau business as a way in to talking about the wider question of religious freedom in Australia and how we might approach it sensibly. First of all, by way of clearing the decks, I'd like to address the question of the relationship between Israel's pronouncement and Christianity. For those living under a rock (or perhaps, living i...

It being NAIDOC week, and us all talking about the voice to parliament, treaties and so forth, it's only fair that I should write a review of Sarah Maddison's book, The Colonial Fantasy: Why White Australia Can't Solve Black Problems. Sarah Maddison is Professor of Politics at the University of Melbourne.  She is not an Indigenous person, but she has written and researched extensively on Indigenous politics and a good deal of this book consists of direct quotes from Indigenous authors and leaders.  She doesn't claim to represent or speak for Aboriginal people. She is careful to represent the diversity of Indigenous views rather than pretend to consensus. Still, her extensive quotes show at least that there is no shortage of Indigenous people who share her view, even if others have a different opinion. Why, she asks, after decades of debate and effort, are we not succeeding in solving the issues of inequality that face Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communitie...

Experiencing serious trauma can change your life, and rarely for the better. People who have experienced trauma are more likely to experience a range of other things - chronic mental illness, addiction, homelessness, marriage breakdown.  Trauma rewires our brains, changes the way we react to situations, makes us prone to 'fight or flight' in situations which are benign for other people. *** You would think that the bigger the trauma, the more serious the effect, but this is not necessarily so.  Case in point: last year I read and reviewed  Jimmy Barnes' two-volume autobiography.  Barnes suffered a horrendous childhood, witnessing domestic violence, experiencing physical and sexual abuse, being abandoned by his mum and left with his siblings to fend for themselves while their dad spent all his time and all the family's money at the pub.   Hardly surprising that Barnes' adult life was a train wreck of addiction, violence, self-destructive behavio...

Here's the text of a letter I just sent by snail mail to our dear Prime Minister. Dear Prime Minister First of all, let me begin by congratulating you on your and your party's recent election win.  You have been handed a huge and difficult responsibility, and I pray for wisdom and compassion for you and your colleagues as you lead us over the coming three years. I should perhaps say, by way of honesty, that I didn't vote for your party.  I disagree with you on a number of things I regard as important.  However, one thing I know you and I will agree on is the value of a democratic system in which governments are elected and removed peacefully by the people.  This system requires all of us to compromise at times.  So I am happy to have the opportunity to graciously accept the choice of the majority of my fellow citizens, as I know you would have graciously accepted the opposite outcome. I am also not a member of any political party, nor a loyalist. ...

Climate change and energy policy go hand in hand.  The biggest source of greenhouse gases, and the easiest to change, is electricity generation.  Of course we need to reduce emissions in other areas too but the electricity system, as a unified system relying on a relatively small number of large scale generators, is an ideal place to make a big impact.  No surprise, then, that in Australia this is the policy area that is most fraught, as politicians and industry players jostle for position and advantage while trying to deflect blame for things that go wrong.  Sometimes it seems impossible to get at the truth in the cacophony of mutually incompatible assertions and accusations. I've recently been trying to get more of a handle on this subject and among other things have just finished reading Matthew Warren's new book, Black Out: How is Energy-Rich Australia Running Out of Electricity? Warren is an energy economist who has worked for the Minerals Council of NSW, th...