Greens and pacifism
Marit Hegge (GLW #27) contrasts a "green Green" with a "socialist Green" party, one of the contrasts being the status of non-violence as a Green principle. Some socialists have, as Marit says, adopted, from expediency, the Green plank of non-violence whilst the socialist tradition has recognised the near-certain necessity of revolutionary violence being used to resist or overthrow an oppressive order. Marit's conclusion — that "socialists should have enough confidence in their beliefs to stand up and be proud to be socialists, rather than hide behind the Greens" — is honest and warranted.
History offers endless lessons in the violence of the powerful against effective resistance movements, from slave revolts to the workers' and peasants' revolution in Tsarist Russia, and the Vietnamese independence struggle. Socialists have argued that for Spartacus, the Abolitionists, the Bolsheviks or the NLF to have abjured arms would have been to invite them to be fools or saints. Fortunately they were neither.
Revolutionary violence is a necessary evil, with an emphasis on both the adjective and the noun. In all cases, it should be strictly subordinate to politics. The gun was a very minor part of the Russian revolution — the loss of life was around ten only. Propaganda and persuasion, strikes and demonstrations were crucial but they were backed up by a preparedness to use military means. As Isaac Deutscher put it, the Bolsheviks regarded violence "in the surgeon's manner, as an indispensable but strictly limited part of a necessary and salutary operation".
Marxists can not assent to an abstract principle of non-violence. Its necessity is not something we should shy away from. Nevertheless, this does not mean that socialists can not be Green. A Green world of ecological and social harmony has to get rid of the current system which can not accommodate this harmony. Unless history has a large, non-violent rabbit lurking in its hat, the powerful won't go without a shove.
It would be retrograde if adherence to the principle of non-violence were used to exclude non-pacifists from a Green party but if a Green party is to be a pacifist party that is the right of potential party members to decide in an open process. It should not be decided in advance.
Phil Shannon
Narrabundah ACT
Alternative medicine
In the 1980's the French researcher Jacques Benveniste was challenged by homeopaths to prove them wrong: he proved them right. Classical scientists then conducted 70 different trials in several laboratories in four countries, and the researchers discovered "... phenomenon that shakes the present rules of microbiology, chemistry, physics and other sciences". This was reported in Nature 30.6.88.
The deputy editor of this scientific journal which is totally opposed to homeopathy, Dr Newark, said "This can't be explained by ordinary physical laws." But he also said (and here we may kepticism which Phil Shannon admires). "It is a bit unfortunate that this paper could be seen as lending credibility to ... homeopathic medicine."
Unfortunate for whom? — the unbelievably wealthy and politically powerful international drug cartels which promote conventional medicine and suppress alternatives, while diseases (iatrogenic and otherwise) continue to increase in variety and % of population affected.
Why does Phil counter my dialectic rebuttal of his grossly inaccurate opinions and argue their cause with the usual emotive sophistry (GL #25).
Let us not worry that people believe in pyramid power. Let us rather worry that the medical establishment actually promotes the idea that mind has power over matter (the mythical placebo effect) in its bid to denounce the idea that biological energy fields affect matter. Amid such innuendos of hypnotical double-think are scattered the ashes of truth.
If Phil would send me his scientific evidence disproving the biological energy therapies, I would be grateful. If, on the other hand, any person or group is interested in studying or promoting what I prefer to call Real Medicine, please write to C.U.R.E.D., PO Box 427, WA 6333.
Rob McKinnon-Lower
Denmark WA
[This subject appears to have been worked over sufficiently from both sides now. — Editor]
Ayatollah Fred
I wish those people in NSW fighting against the Ayatollah Fred Nile all the best. Nile's attempt to turn basic rights for women and civil rights generally back to the dark ages is seen by religious crackpots around Australia as the start of a nation wide crusade. The consequences would be horrific: women will die in the backyards while the rich have their abortions in comfort, and sex education (particularly safe sex practices which through the AIDS crisis became more open) will be set back 30 years.
In this context I have yet to hear one single anti-abortionist calling for a widening of public campaigns to promote safe sex and the easier availability of contraceptives. Let's hope realism and compassion will prevail over religious fanaticism.
Michael Rose-Schwab
Rapid Creek NT
For earlier meetings
With so much unemployment and constantly increasing poverty in this dear "free" world of ours, few of us can afford cars and taxis. It is also dangerous for women to be in the streets after dark. It is therefore infuriating to see in Green Left each week lists of interesting meetings and films invariably scheduled for Saturday or Sunday at 8 pm instead of the afternoons. Why can't these be held at 2 or 3 pm, so that more of us can attend and get home in safety, before dark?
Rosemary Evans
St Kilda
Parliamentary responsibility
Most of your forefathers, up to the year 1940, would, under present laws, have been hung for the gruesome crime of indiscriminate murder of approx. 700,000 Aboriginal inhabitants of this country.
The main basic reason of course was to make "room" for wheat, sheep and cattle. The main instigators who fired the guns and used the axes were the graziers, farmers and local Policemen. The necessary support for their actions of course came from the politicians and local Judges, lawyers and Parsons. In these days, such pillars of society have spread a thin veneer of civilised behaviour over their faces. But basically, little has changed. Aboriginal peoples have been largely polluted with "white" blood by two centuries of Christians.
One group, based in the Adelaide Hills, numbered over 300 until the white settlers came. Within 4 years, due to the careful attention of sadistic evangelical preachers and sheep-men, plus measles, their numbers were decimated down to 12. These were moved away from their own lands and then could not survive. There are thousands of stories like these — hundreds in NSW. Maps of the original tribal areas can be obtained. The Aboriginals must be allowed land rights. Now. This government promised, but are afraid of the mining/grazing lobby! In fact, they appear to be afraid of all business-men, especially "Knights"!!
Natural justice is happening both here and in the USA. The thin top-soils of Australia and USA have been washed or blown away due to the eating habits of sheep and lack of care by farmers/graziers.
Where are our markets for wool, wheat and meat? Where are the trees and shrubs that held erosion down to a minimum? Graziers everywhere and their sons are beginning to wonder where they went wrong.
Not a voice was raised in the dumb Parliament in the earlier days , and are still not raised. If the mentality of these Canberra sales-reps could broaden sufficiently to care for the last of the Aboriginals, then it is certain that they would also begin to care for the country, the land, the trees, the pollution and the common people. The Australian people should be allowed to bring a class-action against those in Cabinet who allow major mistakes in unemployment and giving/wasting away our natural resources to happen. They are overpaid for what they do.
John Clancy
Sutherland NSW
From frypan to fire?
The "solution" to a human/ecological problem may be planted in the minds of rescuers by the perpetrators of the problem to perpetuate their dominance.
-2>A hearing under the old fault-based divorce law was suspended while the plaintiff husband sought details of time and place to indict the archbishop co-respondent. When he was desperate for a specific charge an anonymous tip gave him a date and a motel name. The court threw out this evidence when the archbishop brought evidence that at the time he was addressing a conference of thousands far away. Some think Bert Evatt was duped similarly in striving to pin Menzies' evidence in the Petrov case.0>
It may be true that the Clorox leak (GL Sep 4) is genuine, that Clorox is flat out greenwashing its chlorine products and preparing to smear Greenpeace in anticipation of a worst case "Chlorine free by '93" campaign. At the same time the company may have arranged, or merely turned a blind eye to this leak, knowing that it is on the verge of developing a less provocative alternative and so stealing a march on competitors. In case this is so Greenpeace ought to look carefully at future alternative proposals such as use of peroxides or ozone producing gadgets before giving them preference over chlorine products.
Doug Everingham
Westlake Qld