Tasmania's parliament
In GLW #287 Tony Iltis wrote about the proposed revamp of Tasmania's parliament. The current format is a two-house parliament with 35 members elected to the lower house with each of five electorates returning seven members each, and an upper house (or house of review) returning 19 members all elected from single member electorates.
The proposal is to reduce the number of members from the bicameral 54 to a unicameral 40 — to be made up of 28 members elected from four electorates of seven members each and 12 members elected from single member electorates.
Tony suggests that this will make it harder for smaller parties and independents to be elected. This is only true in the sense that with fewer seats available it will be difficult for any party to get as many members elected.
The key point to getting a broad range of opinions into parliament is not the number of electorates but the number of members elected from a multi-member electorate. In a single-member electorate you need to get approximately 50% of the vote (by and large, only mainstream candidates will achieve this); in a three-member electorate you only need about 25% and in a seven-member electorate you only need 12.5%.
Reducing the number of seven-member electorates from five to four will not make it any more difficult for Greens and other independents to get elected. They will still need to get 12.5% of the vote. There might only be four Greens rather than the usual five, but equally there will most likely be only 12 Liberals (or Labor) rather than the usual 15.
The real point of concern is probably the review function performed by the upper house. Whether the currently designed upper house is a pack of fuck-wits or not does not reduce the genuine need for a review function. This is generally achieved by having the two houses elected in a different manner and, to a certain extent, at a different time — much like the federal parliament.
What the proponents of Tasmania's much needed parliamentary overhaul have not yet spelt out, and need to before any referendum, is what form a review function will take and what guarantees it will offer if we move from a bicameral to a unicameral system.
South Hobart
[Abridged.]
Ruling-class tool
Every word John Howard speaks is in "the language of the class struggle". Every word John Howard the Coward says is designed to obscure the cruel effects of his policies on the Australian people. He is carrying out the agenda of his Party's financial backers, and they are the ruling class. Howard is also carrying out the political agenda of the USA, internationally and domestically — nuclear expansion, war games, nuclear bases.
Howard's words are the wolf language of the ruling class, in their class struggle to plunder more from the poor, and to drive down living conditions, and life expectations.
Howard is so undeveloped intellectually, emotionally, culturally and ethically that he is not sure of what he's doing, and the tens of thousands of his victims are kept away from his unobservant eyes. He is a world-class hypocrite, and he does not know it. He is the perfect ruling-class tool — a mindless, soulless, gutless, heartless Liberal Party apparatchik, who mouths the gruel of lying platitudes to cover up the crimes of the classes he serves, the ruling class of Australia, and the ruling classes of the USA, England, Thailand etc.
Blue Mountains NSW
Socialists and terrorism
Revolutionary socialists oppose terrorism because, as Leon Trotsky pointed out in a 1911 article ("On Terrorism"), it "belittles the role of the masses in their own consciousness, reconciles them to their powerlessness, and turns their eyes and hopes toward a great avenger and liberator who some day will come and accomplish his mission" (my emphasis). In opposition to the advocates of "revolutionary" terrorism in Russia, the Russian socialists "demanded work for the preparation of such forms of violence as were calculated to bring about the direct participation of the masses and which guaranteed that participation" (Lenin, "Revolutionary Adventurism", 1902).
Gerry Harant ("Write on", GLW #288) claims that in rejecting terrorist actions as an effective method of struggle against oppression I am rejecting all forms of armed struggle. In my article on terrorism (GLW #287) I pointed out that socialists are in favour of armed defence by the oppressed masses against the violence of the oppressors. By equating the latter with terrorist actions (armed actions carried out by small groups outside of the context of a mass armed struggle, i.e., a popular insurrection or civil war) it is Harant, not I, who is getting "caught up in the hypocritical rhetoric of our violent class enemy".
By not distinguishing between terrorist actions and armed actions carried out with the participation of the oppressed masses, Harant fails to follow his own advice that socialists should be "selective in ... what we support".
Denis Kevans ("Write On" GLW #288) disputes my claim that the IRA has committed terrorist acts. He does so — not by attempting to show that the IRA's armed actions have taken place within the context of a mass armed struggle (which they haven't) — but by accusing me of not knowing that the IRA has been "waging war" to get the British army out of Ireland.
I am perfectly aware that the IRA has been fighting to get British troops out of Ireland — an objective I wholeheartedly support. But support for this objective should not lead us to blindly endorse every action carried out by the IRA.
Summer Hill NSW
Di and Teresa
How clever of Earl Spencer to include a "controversial" criticism of the monarchy in his speech. How necessary it was, to divert public and media attention away from the ludicrously wealthy and luxurious conditions in which the aristocracy live. How divine of Mother Teresa to highlight, by her timely passing, the truly compassionate way of life: against the "photo opportunity with the poor and suffering", that other celebrities set up.
Malvern SA
Men's oppression
Men are expected to be manually and technically competent, assertive, intelligent, athletic, etc. On the other hand, women are expected to be slim, fragile, pretty little home-makers who have an affinity for "simple" tasks like cooking, cleaning and looking after children. This gives men a higher status than women.
It helps the capitalist system to get away with not employing or promoting women as much as men. Capitalists get away with paying women less than men because people believe that they are less competent and less efficient. People are conditioned almost from birth to accept it as natural that women should be treated this way. Both men and women suffer oppression if they do not meet their sex's rigid gender stereotype.
Women who want to play football or join the army are marginalised, intimidated and labelled as "Butch" or "tom boys". Many young men get bashed and are marginalised by their peers for not showing sufficient evidence of "normal" male interests, such as beer, cars, women and football.
The media, and health and beauty industries strive to create a very narrow definition of what we are supposed to look like. Women are compelled to starve themselves, many of them dying in the process. Men are also oppressed by the body image stereotype, albeit a lot more mildly.
Whether or not we label this oppression that some men suffer as "men's oppression" or not should be based on whether it helps to draw men into the battle against women's oppression, or whether it trivialises women's much more severe oppression and weaken the movement against it?
As for men's liberation groups, I find it quite selfish that some people spend their time trying to liberate themselves from conditions that really are quite pale in comparison with those which the system imposes upon women.
Hobart
[Abridged.]
Mother Teresa
Mother Teresa earned the unending gratitude and support of the Vatican, some people worshipped her, but it was very unfortunate that so many supported her fanatical campaign against abortion and contraception, ignoring the facts that India is disastrously overpopulated with nearly one billion.
She must have known the suffering and misery caused by the papal policy. Unemployment and illiteracy stands at 50%. When she was asked if she would agree that there are too many children in India she replied " I do not agree because God always provides. He provides for the flowers and the birds, for everything in the world he has created. And these little children are his life. There can never be enough".
Christopher Hitchens, author of The Missionary Position: Mother Teresa in Theory and Practice, remarked, "If it were true that God always provides, then obviously there would be no need for the Missionaries of Charity in the first place".
Adelaide
Free speech for some
A new twist to the debate in the anti-racist movement about "free speech" should be of concern to all socialists. In Brisbane, the International Socialist Organisation (ISO) has announced a ban on me — as a socialist opponent of their line of "no free speech for racists" — from entering their public meetings.
This arises not from me heckling, offering personal insults, speaking out of turn, or even overrunning my time at any ISO meeting, but only from a leaflet on the debate I distributed at a recent ISO public meeting. I argued that the practical gist of ISO policy — to build for big and vigorous anti-racist protests at One Nation events — is right, but that to tie it to rhetoric of "no free speech for racists" is counterproductive.
I was told I must not distribute the leaflet anywhere in the building. Although the ISO plainly had not booked the whole building — there was belly dancing, for example, in another room — I complied without fuss.
In the meeting, I put my argument — courteously and constructively, I think — then said the leaflet explained more, but unfortunately the meeting organisers had banned it from the building, but people could get it from me in the street after the meeting. Several people from the meeting expressed surprise at the ban when they got it from me afterwards. I guess this is the reason for the extended ban, but it would be better not to ban at all.
Brisbane
Heavy metal and violence
GLW readers who appreciated Peter Montague's article (GLW #288) detailing the positive correlation between heavy metal poisoning and violent behaviour, may also find interest in Harris Coulter's book Vaccination, Social Violence and Criminality: The Medical Assault on the American Brain.
Coulter documents case studies linking violent criminal behaviour with brain damage caused by vaccine-induced encephalitis. As the iatrogenic causes of illness remain something of a taboo, I highly recommend this volume as essential reading for anyone who is aware that profit can take precedence over our well-being.
Sydney