Flag ban burns pollies
According to Sunrise (yes I catch it some mornings - one of colleagues who I dop off has it on when I have a coffee and smoke with her) and the abc news site, Big Day out organisers are encouraging people to leave their flags at home due to violence last year by flag waving red necks. They sate that their event is a music festivial and not part of any Australia Day activities (which is the next day) so there really isn't a need for people to wave Australian flags.
This has drawn responses from both the Premier Iemma and Opposition Leader Debnam. They deride it as a disgraceful, unrespectful, political correctness at its most extreme. They don't actually say it, but their whole demeanure also says "you draft dodging, long haired, weed smoking, pinko tree hugging, crystal loving hippies who should get a real job."
Debnam even states that if they refuse to embrace the Commonwelath national flag then they should move off State government property. (Though I think that agrument really only holds water if it was the State flag they were "banning")
I agree with the Big Day Out people. It's a music festivial, not a political event. The sort of people to wave flags at these events are usually the sort to cause trouble. If trouble occurs the pollies will blame the Big Day out people for not keeping those sort of people out.
Of course it's all a moot argument. The flag is not banned, merely encouraged to say away.
This has drawn responses from both the Premier Iemma and Opposition Leader Debnam. They deride it as a disgraceful, unrespectful, political correctness at its most extreme. They don't actually say it, but their whole demeanure also says "you draft dodging, long haired, weed smoking, pinko tree hugging, crystal loving hippies who should get a real job."
Debnam even states that if they refuse to embrace the Commonwelath national flag then they should move off State government property. (Though I think that agrument really only holds water if it was the State flag they were "banning")
I agree with the Big Day Out people. It's a music festivial, not a political event. The sort of people to wave flags at these events are usually the sort to cause trouble. If trouble occurs the pollies will blame the Big Day out people for not keeping those sort of people out.
Of course it's all a moot argument. The flag is not banned, merely encouraged to say away.
posted by Renegade79 at 11:15 am
20 Comments:
Yeah I'm not sure what to make of this one (I don't know enough about what happened last year).
So far my thinking is that flag-toting trouble-makers will make trouble with or without flags, so banning them will probably achieve nothing.
But if it's true that our flag incites violence at events like this then it's pretty sad.
Just my $0.02 worth.
Who can blame the politicians? Easy poll points!
Now I don't like patriotism in general, allot of people would disagree with me, mainly because its main use is in 'picking' on people of other countries (be it war or just bullying them at Big Day Out concerts).
If organisers don't want to get blamed for allowing the same behaviour as they experienced in the past, i.e. 'belligerent nationalism', then they have to mitigate the risk.
By asking people to refrain NOT BAN (as every polly has said) from bringing a flag to an event that is the day before Australia Day and not the day itself, then those that do bring flags can be more effectively monitored and will help security curb unacceptable behaviour during the event.
HOWEVER, if it was banned, that is one form of a restriction upon the freedom of speech. Which I do not agree with.
And that's my $0.02, bringing us to a total of $0.04.
Oh and damn you Nat for posting this before I did!
Actually Linds, my orginal post was my $0.02, so the total is at $0.06.
Whatever the organisers orignal intention, it ha been undone by the pollie's jumping up and down on the bandwagon. Before this was quietly passing under the rader, now hundreds of hooligans bandishing flags will turn up, looking for a fight just to prove how patriotic they are.
Poltical point buying at the sake of peace.
http://www.worldnewsaustralia.com.au/yoursay.php
SBS beat you both...I think...actually I haven't bothered to check the corresponding dates...so it's more an assumption than a thought.
Reading through the plethora of responses here is both encouraging and demoralising. At worst, most people seem to have a firm enough grip on the English language. Not that English is any better than any other language...yadda yadda ya...
There's no date/time stamp to the sbs thing.
Anyway it's not a race. If I went around checking all blogs/opinion polls before posting then I would never get any posting done.
Besides, small multiple attacks on different fronts beats full frontal assaults on the strongest point any day.
If it's not a race, why did you bother checking for a time stamp? :P
...I ws only teasing anyway ;)
on an almost conneted note, did you guys know that BDO have decided to have a " carbon neutral festival" nation wide this year? Mmmhmm, it's true!
Hopefully this will inspire other event organisers to follow suit!
hang on, I thought of a possible connection...maybe the flags made the carbon equation too complicated/unpredictable? :D
I always look for a time stamp/date to see how relevant an article/poll is.
fair enough.
I went to a Lions event thing today, and from informal survey the people there a) hadn't heard about it, or b) were completely outraged that the flag had been 'banned'.
But it hadn't been banned!
If it had been banned, then it would be a different agrument and I wouldn't be in favour of the BDO organisers
No it hadn't been banned. My comment was aimed at displaying how it all gets distorted with press/pollies in the mix.
Don't worry- you'd be proud of me- I took it upon myself to stand up to the nasty dragon lady of Lions (half the club has left since her joining because she is horrible, belittling and demeaning) and set the record straight. Once I shut Dragon lady down I had them all lapping up my opinions. It was a strange sensation...power...mmm....
Most of them left more informed, if not pursuaded to this way of thinking...
Well done. Yes a clear agrument, knowing all sides of the issue and the knowledge that you have done more research into the subject does a certain power to it.
Stick with me kid and you'll go far
Can I be "Grasshopper", rather than 'kid'?
:p
You can be padawan is you like
Well, what is the actual translation for padawan? I don't want to sign up for something if it has nasty connotations...
Could it be "young padawan"?
According to Wiki:
"Padawan: An apprentice Jedi who undergoes intensive one-on-one training under a Jedi Knight or Master after graduating from the academy. As tradition a human Padawan grows a long strand of braided hair that is finally cut off during the ceremony of knighthood, when a Padawan becomes a Jedi Knight. A Jedi may have only one apprentice at a time, and is required to promote the current apprentice before taking another. Master Yoda was seen training several younglings in Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones, during the scene where they locate Kamino for Obi-Wan, one of whom Yoda refers to as a Padawan ("...the Padawan is right")...."
I'm not doing the braided hair thing on account of it looks stoopid...
The hair thing was a long time ago, in a galaxy far away.
Remember Luke Skywalker sets up a whole new jedi order
His hair is just as bad. And he wore yellow with brown! To a formal ceremony no less!
Still a long time ago, in a galaxy far away.
We are talking yellow and brown! There is no time or space where that particular colour combination (ie as dispalyed in the film) looks good. Except maybe if you inversed them, what's the inverse of brown?
...I really would prefer little grasshopper...
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