It's a joke that mocks the left's bloodthirsty perception of us over here on the side of reason, and began with this post.
Looking forward to your attack on Margo Kingston's use of the phrase "bleeding hearts". It's all about hearts that bleed! People die from such cardiac failures. The imagery is revolting, we should all distance ourselves from it, etc, etc ...
Darpie old mate... RWDBs are boring as fuck. Who are you reaching out to and fer chrissakes, why bother?
When I find a blog which attracts 'friendly' comments to the effect that 'Jews created the Holocaust so they could get a Jewish state,' I'm confident that I've found one I don't need to read twice.
Run the issues and stop reporting on the reporters.
Darp, you must have been tired when you wrote this rubbish. RWDB is a term used quite satirically as it sums up the stupidity of the left and their view that somehow they are the real moral abtitors of the world. I was asked quite seriously the other day in Richard Nevilles Loon Fest Blog, why I preferred eating McDonalds and Killing Babies to communism and peace! When confronted with this type of gross stupidity, it is hard not to take the piss even further and shovel a few more coals onto the fire. I can honestly say that RWDB is not a tag I have ever hung on myself though, quite simply because a post such as yours is the obvious result.
Part II
For the record, I don't consider myself terribly right wing at all. I think I'm a moderate. I see some merit in both arguments but, so far, I've never seen a practical demonstration of Communism that has worked. Great theory maybe.. but it doesn't work. Simple.
I have a theory that KFC and VB will make me slim and attractive. It doesn't work though. Not my fault though. It's the system. Fucking gravity!!
Anyway, have a bex and a good lie down and see if this is still a sensible post after that.
Just throwing my 2 cents in - surely the image is used in jest.
Without reading any background or opinion, I saw the image and thought to myself: "ha ha, aren't those RWDB so hilariously self-mocking. Boy, we'd better watch out because that attempt at irony will no doubt convert sensible thinking people in their thousands to the cause of moral conservatism and free-market excess."
Well Darp, given most RWDBloggers leave more arse-twitching, seriously pissed off comments on my ostensibly right wing blog than lefties maybe I'm not the man to comment.
But the skull imagery certainly doesn't appeal to me, kinda like those bad bunnies in Watership Down who glorify death and sacrifice their mates to hunters' snares. It's all a little too reverse camp, you know...big hairy bears flapping about in chaps and leather caps trying furiously to prove how masculine they are.
Arse-twitching? Bunnies? Bears? I really don't fit into the RWDB mould! I am all alone in the blogosphere *trails off sulking*
I thought they used the skull-and-crossbones because it reminded them of their mascot, Phillip Ruddock.
Gibbo - why do you conflate "the left" with "communism"? - you need to read more mate..
I'm with Tim Blair and Gibbo. It's an ironic label, adopted because of that "Right-wing=fascist" perception by some folks. For another example of this, check out Evil Pundit's blog (evilpundit.com). The title says it all.
I remember a lefty friend of mine commenting on my blog once - in all seriousness - that the right-wing was the side of selfishness, greed, war and immorality while the left-wing was the side of generosity and peace.
It strikes me that it's characterisations like this that are the bigger problem, not the humorous use of labels like 'right-wing death beast', etc.
Darp writes: "Right-wing/Conservative friends are not racist, nor do they believe in poisonous and divisive theories of racial superiority and differentiation."
While it’s somewhat of a diversion from the topic of right-wing symbolism, I want to refute this measured claim of darps (though he – subtle as always -undermines it elsewhere).
I think the right (friends or not) DO perpetuate the horrors listed above - though most (probably our friends even) do so inadvertently. Whether through their comfortable silence, or their blind acceptance of the status quo, they are instrumental in the perpetuation of 'ethnocentrism'- the assumption of the superiority (or correctness) of their own cultural, racial, and probably class beliefs.
Continued...
This is to say, ask an indigenous person whether they think 'white culture' isn't racist. The fact a participant in this culture is not EXPLICITLY violent, does not, arguably, lessen their capacity for “racism”.
As for the right-wing imagery, I’m totally enamoured with Flashman’s suggestion; it IS their mascot, Phillip Ruddock.
Anne, you can call it communism, socialism, environmentalism or any other ism you like. I have been told on many occasions that I am ignorant of the many subtleties of the various isms above but to me they are basically all the same. There are a lot of subtle differences between lung cancer and liver cancer but they will both kill ya dead!
Again, I am only interested in systems that are capable of working. Communism/socialism has never worked anywhere outside the realm of theory. If I am wrong, show me where that place is, and explain why you don't live there. Capitalism is far from perfect but you don't sell your car cause the ashtray is full. You do, however, scrap it when the whole thing doesn't work.
Gibbo,
Not all ISMS are the same!
Who said capitalism works? Was indigenous culture capitalist in nature? It WORKED for 40,000 years...
What your really saying is that you don't want to give up a system that WORKS FOR YOU... bever mind the poor bastards for whom it doesn't. Again -ethnocentrism.
Anne's dead right. I for one not being from Australia think this is one of the most racist countries in the world. Look at the way the aborigines are treated. I don't care what anybody says but any Aussie that leans towards the right is a racist. In fact I'll go as far as to say all Aussies are racists, they can't help it it's ingrained into everything.
Anne, don't start on the racism crap. The left are just as capable of racism as anyone. Racism is not something white people do to black people or the Right does to the Left or Aussies do to wogs. It is something people do to each other. There is no race or culture which is not capable of horrible racism whenever it suits. If you have not experienced this, then you don't mix enough with people of races and cultures other than your own.
Racist Right is a tag I will not wear under any circumstances. Maybe it is you who needs to read more.
davo, the answer is simple. Move to a non racist country. Where is that again?
You really do assume the euqality of all things don't you Gibbo...yet again, ethnocentrism.
Do you get (when you read more you will) that society and the insitututions within, are founded on fundeemnatl INEQUALITIES. White culture is founded on the oppression of black culture, patriarchy on the oppression of women and so on...
Or do you, like the rodent johny, assume this ridiculous ideal of an actual state of nature in which we all start out the same and where you end up is a product of personal responiblity crap...
Racism is institutionalised, even I (from the left) am guilty of it...just as (sorry guys) men are guilty of sexism by virtue of the institutionalised privileging of their own perspectives, desired etc...
sorry for the spelling errors...I was on a wide ride and couldn't stop...
Gibbo all I was saying is that Aussie is a racist country, it's just a fact. I'm from NZ ( and I'm not saying NZ is without it's problems ) but from my experience we work side by side with Maoris, half my family are Maori, intermarriages are the norm etcetera. I have worked in Australia for two years. In that time I have never seen an Aboriginal in my workplace, I have never seen an Aboriginal person walking hand in hand with a white person ( OK there may be exceptions in certain rural areas, but I talking mainstream here...). Your country has a big seeping wound and that wound is your failure to address your genocide of the Aboriginals and that cuts into every facet of white Australia.
If any of you want to carry weapons for fun, i suggest you move to beirut!
weather is nice, they are in a rebuilding phase, the nightlife is also good, plus the kebabs and much healthier.
you can carry around glocks like its nothing, or join a militia and hang with the homeboys.
plus, you can wear the camos every day.. i mean that would be pretty cool.
Davo, Anne.
I'll write something more substantial on my blog on this subject today as short "bites' are not helping either of us get our point across. I will say agian, if you think racism is the foundation of "white culture" then you don't get around enough. You need to mix with a few more wogs. Most of 'em are great folks, like everyone else. Most of 'em are quite capable of being racist bastards when it suits, like everyone else. I grew up in Cabramatta in the 60's and 70's and if you were racist, you didn't have any friends.
Davo, I lived next door to an Aboriginal man with a white wife for many years. It is not as uncommon as you think. He even had a job and sent his kids to school! Wow, just like everyone else.
Anne, I do assume a great deal of equality between races. I fail to see how this is ethnocentrism.
Anne, tried to respond to your comments before but couldn't get my thoughts in order. Anyway, my basic response is this:
I am not, nor will I ever be, responsible for an institution. I am an individual, not an institution. Therefore, I am responsible for my own actions.
So I reject this idea that I am sexist/racist/etc, etc by 'association'. Judge an individual on the way s/he acts, please.
To broaden the discussion out a bit: I remember chatting with a lefty friend about homophobia; she maintained that the only 'proper' thing to do was to actively struggle against homophobia.
My position on this - as, indeed, on all forms of discrimination - is different. The only way to fight against discrimination is to be open-hearted, generous, accepting; to acknowledge the free choices made by other people, and, in short, to be a member of a liberal community.
In short, what I argue is similar to what Gibbo argues - discrimination, of any short, is something people do to one another. It is a personal failing.
Well put Tim. You summed up what I was trying to say very well. It is a personal failure, not a genetic trait.
Dark Powder, I don't quite get your angst. We're just chatting.....and besides which these are conversations that NEED to take place....
Gibbo, Does "not getting anywhere" mean you think I should just agree rather than continue to debate the ideas...mmm
I must make my philosophical position clear...individuals are not born in a vacuumn. They are insitutionalised; constructed by vittue of a set of existing ideas about culture, about sex, and about sexuality. This is not to say one cannot take individual responsibilty for one's own actions, but that this is a mighty leap from one's comfort zone that can ofetn involve (if one seeks to affirm others as THEY wish to be affirmed) denying one's own privilege.
Often, the defence of 'white culture' is founded on the (false) assumption that it is innocent of internal bias - which it is not.
Continued
Notice also TimT, you used the words "liberal community" in your defence. This is sort of what I mean...this concept is a conecept specifc to 'white culture'...you are assuming the innocent value of conecpts that are peculiar to yourself - as one institutionalised within a specific culture. And did you know, there are even some cultures for whom the concept of "individual" is absent. What on worth Johny Howard do without this word....
Anne, you seem to have slipped from discussing race to discussing culture? Two totally different things. We have great choice in choosing our culture, not our race.
Sorry - I don't think we choose culture. And I don't like the term race....as it implies some sort of biological determinism which blinds us to the ways in which "culture" (a thankfully more fluid/chnagable term than race) constructs who we are.
I better get back to work and stop hogging the blogg space (sorry)
Gibbo...I'll check your site later for your thoughts on the matter...and, of course, respond accordingly.
"The only way to fight against discrimination is to be open-hearted, generous, accepting; to acknowledge the free choices made by other people, and, in short, to be a member of a liberal community."
This sounds like paradise to me. How else would you have us live Anne? What is wrong with the description of the above community? And how would you make such a community better?
Its not a question of whether I think the description is WRONG...its a question of whether the notion of ""liberal (and the philosophical ideas this word contains) are NEUTRAL, or in fact service a partcular privileged group.
In some (not all) respects, a liberal community services me adequately; but lets not forget that the establishment of this "culture" came at the expense of a VERY ALTERNATE type of culture -which functioned just as well (even argueable better) than this one..
Sorry if I think a (political)culture that values profit over people, profit over the environment, breeds human alineation by defining its members as means to a profit end rather than acknowledge their intrinic worth, is flawed - but I do.
Are their any indigenous bloggers out there who would like to take up the slack and explain the inherent bias of these quetsions?
Go on...please.
Don't let me interrupt.
Yeah, sorry darp....I do recall responding to the issue of the day - right-wing symbolism - somewhere above....
I'm an indigenous blogger and gawd, where do I begin?
The inherent bias exists in the total disregard of the fact that white Australia is a cultural and population majority, while Indigenous Australian culture and population are very much a tiny minority.
There is also the fact that Indigenous Australians are the native people of this country and the atrocities acted out against us since invasion were perpetrated by the invaders, the ancestors of white Australia.
The policies of assimilation, white australia, the stolen generations and mass genocide of both Indigenous Tasmanians and Indigenous mainlanders by non-Indigenous Australians of every culture/race/breed/whatever further confirms the fact that Aboriginal Australians have been and continue to be oppressed by members of every other culture that make up the current white Australian community.
Wow, that was a really long sentence. I better post this response before it gets too long.
Liv,
Interested to know...are the explicit policies you list any more (negatively) significant, to you, than current "institutions"? This is to ask, do you regard the functioning of current insitututions (say legal or educational institutions) as involving an implicit policy of assimulation? Or would this be a flawed way of looking at things?
The title "Right Wing Death Beasty" is, as many have pointed out, a satirical reference to the type of racist, sexist right-bashing that Anne has demonstrated on this thread.
Darp has fallen straight into the trap by posting a thread that does the very thing that the RWDB badge satirises. Good work, Darp, you've proven our point.
You obviously weren't reading very closely....there was NOTHING, I repeat NOTHING, in what I wrote that said sexism, or racism was particular to THE RIGHT....I even called myself racist at one point.....you've missed the point entirely Oh Evil One...
EP,
You may or may not have noticed that I concluded my entry in a somewhat satirical note. Hence, it is (evil laugh) YOU my friend who has fallen into my evil trap by falsely believing that I had fallen into yours.
(thunder/lightning/evil laughs/organ sounds - Phantom of the Opera music)
BWAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHHAHAHA!
Well, Anne, since I also called you a racist, then we agree and no more need be said.
Nice try, Darp, but I'm the evil guy around here -- see my name, it says "Evil" right there.
P.S. You lefties are all personally responsible for the actions of Stalin, Mao, Castro, Pol Pot and Whitlam, because you're socialists like they were.
Liv, you've had the textbook out haven't you 
You forgot the bit about all the kiddies running around happily flying kites. What a utopia it must have been. No disease, no war(tribes would NEVER fight against each other would they), no hunger, everyone equal, everyone living forever in a communist paradise. Wow!
I don't mean to be flippant here and have tried to keep it sensible but when you put out the call for an indigenous bloger to prove how racist Aussies are, "because only THEY know the pain", you are being racist and condesending all at once. Get your head out of the Green Left Weekly and grow up.
Yes yes yes, but do you have an organ?
Cos if you don't then that makes me automatically more evil. I have an organ, blood red candles, a cape and a mask. I am infinitely more evil than you!
Just again on the point of being suckered in by the RWDB thing - I mean, I DID point out that I suspect that the whole thing was a pisstake - a means of baiting the left "into having a spack attack."
Part II
Contrary to what you think, all races and cultures on this earth go back to a common origin somewhere. To pick an arbitrary point in time as a starting point for your culture and then to say that your culture is better 'cause it's older is just fantasy. We ALL have a culture that goes back much further than 40,000 years.Welcome to the human race folks. Aboriginals are not a seperate species. You can't have it both ways. Either it is wrong to draw distinctions due to race or it is not. I think it is wrong.
I've done as I said and posted in a bit more detail at my place. Comments are welcome.
"we work side by side with Maoris, half my family are Maori, intermarriages are the norm etcetera."
Perhaps Maoris have themselves put some effort in to succeed rather than expect the government or what/whoever to solve their problems.
Without a reasonable degree of assimilation and personal/tribal responsibility, Australian Aborigines have no future.
I ..have to get semi serious at this point.
Just because Aust and NZ have such close geographical proxmimity to one another, you cannot make black and white comparisons between how the Maori have dealt with their plight and how Australia's indigenous community have handled theirs.
They are two fundamentally different societies/case studies.
For starters, the Maori make up a larger proportion of the overall Kiwi population than do Australian Aboriginals with pertinence to Australia's overall population. Significantly larger.
Compared to Australia where you have Kooris, Murris, Pindinjaras and countless thousands of other linguistic and cultural divisions, the Maori are relatively homogenous (apart from "those funny Maoris up north" - my Whakapapa, my ancestors)
Woah woah.. Gibbo I think you should learn how to READ.
Anne put out the call for an Indigenous bloggers perspective, I added your name in my greet as you were one of the folk debating with her.
I never once claimed that life before invasion was a utopia and I never once stated that as an Indigenous Australian 'only WE know the pain'.
I think YOU should get your head out of your arse and grow a fucking brain.
And shit, it's a tiny country. Communication and organisation amongst the disparate clan groups helped forge a significant proportion of the Maori population into a united front against the European colonisers.
Some point to the intrinsic aggression and war-like behaviour of the Maori as being the only thing that preserved their culture. They inflicted massive losses on the British troops when they tried storming Maori fortifications etc.
I personally put their survival and overall higher standing in every day NZ life down to their,
A)Relative homogenity
B)The size of NZ
C)Tawera Nikau's mullet
The third one is a joke.
Australias indigenous community did not have the benefit of the first two points.
Darp,
The point I am trying to make is that most non-Aboriginal Australians do not believe that Aborigines make sufficient effort to help themselves regardless of the many tribes etc you mention.
Whether this is the fault of the media, education etc, I don't know. That perception, whether real or not, has to be fixed.
anne,
I added those particular policies as they were the first that came to mind, but I do believe that any policy to assimilate one culture into acting/behaving like another is ultimately racist.
The complication there is that to survive and excel as Indigenous Australians in a modern Australian world we have had to adapt to the non-Indigenous culture forced upon us and in turn lose part of our own culture.
I can't even begin to comment on what policies are inherently racist or not, Native title is the first thing that comes to mind, but I'm sure Darp would prefer less comment hijacking and more discussion on the RWDB skull and crossbones thing.
If you have any more questions, feel free to leave a comment at my blog, hell that goes to you too, Gibbo, or anyone else who has any Indigenous specific q's.
I am middle-aged and, I guess, like many white Australians, I have never met an Aborigine (although I have been accosted by them many times on Redfern Station). And that has to be a big part of the problem.
Darp, you may well have suggested somewhere in your post that the RWDB thing might be a piss-take.
But any such disclaimer falls flat when compared to the majority of your post, which goes to lengths to associate the RWDB synbolism with poison, neo-Nazis and SS concentration-camp guards.
It's pretty clear that you are blatantly smearing the Right by making gratuitous associations with nazism, despite your dissembling.
So don't complain when someone says that all lefties are bleeding-heart tree-huggers who, if put into power, would recreate the killing fields of Pol Pot. Because that's the equivalent of what you've said here.
EP said:
"P.S. You lefties are all personally responsible for the actions of Stalin, Mao, Castro, Pol Pot and Whitlam, because you're socialists like they were."
EP, You forgot Don Henley.
Tawera Nikau's mullet is a joke? I think he'd be somewhat insulted by that, especially if you have a look at this!
Ron,
It's something that most Indigenous Australians also believe, due to the loss of the basic human right of choice and self-determination after invasion. My great grandma and great grandpa had to apply to the chief protector of Aborigines to get married! It may seem like a long time ago, but my great grandma passed away only last year and her life has affected every single one her children, grand children, great grandchildren and great great grandchildrens lives.
It's hard to be a proud blackfulla, but someone's gotta do it. I was lucky that my ma places a great importance on study, career and staying true to yourself, so I've been able to survive in modern Australia. However, and this is a big however, I know none of my traditional language, I've never gone through womens business and I've never been given a dream time story or an animal totem. But I am learning and hopefully I'll be able to teach my own children too.
Politically believe in the freedom and responsibility of the individual rather than the group. In todays day and age, I guess that makes me right wing.
I don't accept or tolerate racism. Growing up, half my parents friends were Asian background, then we moved to the Middle East for five years. Since then I have studied at Melbourne High and the University of Melbourne, both of them with dynamic multicultural student bodies.
Pirates: almost as bad as al Qaeda. They stole other peoples livelihoods and terrorised the trading communities of the world. The burdens their activities placed on trade were crippling. No wonder every European country in that area seemed to follow a mercantilist trade policy rather than free trade.
Also Ron,
You'd probably never know I was black if you passed me in the street.
That is yet another inherent flaw in white Australia, assuming that all blackfullas are dark skinned, with low brows, big flat noses and curly thin hair.
Also, I've never been accosted at Redfern station and have lived there for years.
I thought the skull and crossbones was a reference to the fact that most RWDBs are bald bonebags.
Hang on, I'm a bald bonebag... that's stuffed that theory up!
Maybe they are depicting the way most Africans will look by the time they pay off their 'debt'....
OK, sorry, I like some RWDBs so that was a bit low...despite containing a kernel of truth.
Ooooh ...bald bonebags, Redfern Station, Nikau's mullet.
Nah ..unlike certain other blogs, I really don't give a shit about off-topic posting. Go for your lives.
HERE is another picture of Tawera Nikau's mullet.
Thanks for your comments, Liv.
I am a born and bred city old bloke whose thankful for the Internet as it allows me to keep 'meeting' people and learning.
Cheers Darp, and that's a great eye-gouge going on in the background.
Blogwars distilled in an image.
AND...you'll notice that David Barnhill, the guy doing the eye-gouging, is a Baldy bonebag as well!
Gibbo: "Anne, you can call it communism, socialism, environmentalism or any other ism you like. I have been told on many occasions that I am ignorant of the many subtleties of the various isms above but to me they are basically all the same."
Well excuse me then if I conflate the entire right wing with fascists.
poor old simon bonetti, always got beat up most from his own blokes. EASTS TO WIN.
'Capitalism is far from perfect but you don't sell your car cause the ashtray is full' Well I'm thinking of selling my car, not because the ashtray is full but because I saw a huntsman spider in it this morning and couldn't catch it! In the market for a new car Gibbo?
I know I'm ugly, but goddamn, Darp. I frighten small children???
HAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAH...I knew you'd love it!
Im agreeing with TimT here. I believe that everyone is perfectly capable of making their own choices, including whether they are going to be racist or not. Anne may be correct in that it may be ingrained into white culture, but that is no excuse.
I have a sign on my computer - no more blogging today...but I can't help myself.
Darp, you did say "check the Northern District Times"....you didn't say "the front bloody page"!!!
Thanks for your comments liv...
Good work lumping Whitlam with "Stalin, Mao, Castro, Pol Pot" because God knows you can all categorise them together nicely.
I have an organ, blood red candles, a cape and a mask. I am infinitely more evil than you!
I also notice, from the image up the top, that you are a nazi-murdering cyborg.
I designed the RWDB logo, I used to have it on my site but never got around to putting it back up when I redesigned it.
BTW Darp, the Tim Dunlop link doesn't work.
having been summoned like the ghost of someone's dear departed grandma, and freaked out by darp's wierd glare and !spooky! organ music, i guess it would be rude to not etc...
okay: where were we?
1. are the RWDBs inherently racist?
blanketly casting nasturtiums on all those who bear the dubious honour of RWDB (which i *clearly mistakenly* thought might stand for "right wing don't bleed" in contrast to LWBHs)is kind of pointless, when many of them (ie see above) are quite willing to prove themselves personally racist. there is something, though, at the core of neo-con laissez faire which implies that disadvantage (including racial discrimination) is just an excuse for failure. the basic RW underlying assumption, that those in power and with wealth have somehow "earned" it clicks in very neatly with racist assumptions that the poverty and disadvantage of non-white people is their fault personally.
continued...
2. is "white culture" inherently racist?
what "white culture"???? i'd say it has less to do with a culture that is ethnically european, but rather a culture which cut its teeth on other peoples' countries and resources - ie colonialism.
3. is all racism equal? (eg is non-whites racism just as bad as white racism)
you can't answer this one without looking at history - the most damaging effects of racism have occurred in the hands of whites - south africa, the holocaust, massacres of first nations peoples etc... nasty but true. so a racial insult today - if directed by a white person at a non-white person - can't help but take its violent power from the memory of all those people enslaved / killed / locked up under the same taunts. "hey whitey" doesn't have the same violent power cos it doesn't have the same history.
Great racist post, sjusju. You're definitely a racist.
Great post indeed sjusju
RWDB, eh?
I prefer the acronym RWDH.
But then again, that's kind of a tautology.
sjusju,
White culture is inherently racist?
So I take it that you are saying that democracy, the industrial revolution, the telephone, the telegraph, the radio, the television, the cinema, the internet, the aeroplane, the car, the computer, the piano, the guitar, the symphony orchestra, four part harmony, polyphony, the sonnet, the ode, the novel, Shakespeare, Mozart, Donne, Spenser, Churchill, Lincoln, Menzies, Joyce, Fielding, Dickens, cubism, surrealism, avant-gardism, classicism, neo-classicism, pointilism, the renaissance, Protestantism, Republicanism, Royalism, Socialism, Capitalism, physics, chemistry, trigonometry, immunology, Pasteur, Einstein, Marx, Hayek, Smith, Schrodinger, etc etc ad infinitum bla bla bla ARE ALL racist, simply by a tenuous asssociation with colonialism?
Give me a break.
Marx and Einstein ...uhm ..Hitler didn't classify them as white.
And since when are we taking advice from Hitler????!!!???
PS - I'm going to go along with the general comment hijacking theme here. I'm interested in the debate going on earlier with Liv, Anne and Gibbo, so I might put a post up on my blog, when I have time, in a day or to, allowing for more argument on this topic.
Me loves arguing!
Sjusju, you are a classic. I love how all racism is not equal. Hahaha. Whats next? All racism is equal but some is more equal? Four legs good, two legs better?
I was getting a bit serious about all this crap here today but you just brought me back to Earth. Simple advice I should have followed myself! Don't argue with bigots. They are too stupid to understand how stupid they are. Thanks for your very funny comments.
P.S. Change the foil hat at least weekly. Apparently the aluminium leeches into your system after a while and you can go "all zany and whacky"
Darp, your comments section is starting to look like Crazy Dick Nevilles. All we need is Shane Muir and his weather altering chemtrails! Hahahahahahaha.
This is so lowbrow. The Armadillo and I have been having a real comments section conflict.
Oh, how can I NOT resist!
1. What are we all doing with labels & loving them! Unless we are taking the piss, and in that way its comedic, then labels are part of the problem people evolve into becoming ie racist.
I have been told I am left wing, but what does that mean? That I AM Socialist - then which kind? Pure Marxism or Trotskys take on it all? No, maybe Stalinist... If you DIDNT know your labels (which many of you dont, and I'm not too uptodate on a lot of them) well, Socialist would be lumped in with ANARCHIST. Cool, well you put a GLW seller in with a Anarcho-Squatting-Computergeek & see if the walls need cleaning.
So, Judges of Blogland - I said I am left-wing, what does that mean I am. I promise I will take it all personally.
(cont) yeah long post....
2. Is using Skull & Crossbones a joke? Where is there an indication that it is? If RWers are taking the piss out of themselves, as it seems, then really - who is a typical crossbone loving RWers comedy idols? Lineage please...
Have to agree with Darp - individual liberty, free markets and small Govt ....... skulls. Brilliant!
That said, hey, the last time I read GLW I needed to see a Headache specialist. Glum Left Weekly indeed.
3. Whites racist? Yeah its in us. I dont think saying that the invention of the telephone is racist, or comes from there. Thats just playing games.
Those who espouse RW ideology may really need to see a counsellor. From what I have read, and the writings of Andrew Bolt, a out & proud RWer, serve that well, that I find so little not in common with David Irving. Irving is classic Nazi, whereas Bolt is pro-Israeli extreme Right. In small terms, there is difference, but both would & do bag anything to do with the Stolen Gen
(cont)- truncating
RWers I would gather are not saddened by this part of our history. In fact, they make it their point to strike out & make this SG issue part of the 'elite' stuff. Which is a sickening statement.
For instance, I could follow Bolt etc and enact this in person. EvilPundit, Yobbo etc, come join me in this.
Lets hang out in front of a place where Aboriginals hang. Lets see a gang of whites taunt them, then set upon them with chains, planks of wood, ropes to tie around their necks & see them called all sorts of names. This is the perfect time to not just talk it, but WALK it too!
(cont)
Immediately after the whites have run away cheering & whooping, sit & say that no way:
a) will you ever be seen as an elite
b) they brought this on themselves
c) the myth of the Black Armband Aboriginal Industry means these sulking people cant get off their backsides and they piss welfare...
no
no
no
dont stop, just keep doing it. It must feel good.
"Yeah, sure, so youre saying Aboriginals are innocent etc." If this is your reaction, then you are a part of the problem. I am not saying it doesnt go the other way. Thats not the point of me writing this grotesque way of seeing human life wither.
(cont) But its a symbol of what I see to be the way general white 'leaders', that is spokespeople for those who are non-Indigenous and European/UK background, speak 'on behalf of -us-'.
Yep, John Howard is my spokesperson in the statespersons stakes, so is Phillip Ruddock. I dont want them speaking on behalf of me, but they do on behalf of all Australians to those overseas.
RWers, what happened to you earlier in life that on one issue alone that IS a bleeding sore, more bleeding than South Africa (theyre looking at their shit) or Germany (ditto).
(cont- 2 more to go)
How long will this willfull ignorance, media lying (thanx Murdoch, Bolt is dispensible as Murdoch is who you hear. Bolt is an empty slate, Murdoch sends the script, he repeats it & adds his personality) and mass ignorance about what HAS gone on in this country.
All RWers reading this - have you sat in front of an elder before? If you did, did you recant exactly how you speak to us, to the Elder. Did you say that the Stolen Generation is a hoax? Thats like saying to a Concentration Camp victim of any country that they were dreaming when they show you their left breast cut off?
(cont - yeah I know its long...)
No, obviously. Well, the past is important. If RWers feel that ignorance is not bliss & is doing their best in their own fashion to learn about Aboriginal culture & leave those ancient racial-superiority view behind, then I congratulate you. But your spokespeople in the media (Janet A, Miranda D, Andrew B, Piers A) arent.
So, are they really your spokespeople? Who are? Who presents an intellegent viewpoint contrary to leftwingers without resorting to lying or derogatory comments?
Before you label me a lefty commie, I havent even started on official Left-Wingers™, so dont slant me. I am just after loving-compassionate people around me, and even RWers would agree that this country is less compassionate under Howard.
To answer your question, yes, the skull and crossbones is a joke.
It was a joke started by Tim Blair, partly at the expense of Hillary Clinton's ridiculous "Vast Right Wing Conspiracy" and the hysterical reactions of the left to conservatives in general.
Tim coined the term "Right Wing Death Beast". I designed the logo featuring the skull and crossbones because I thought it was a fairly good graphical
representation of "death".
I think the source image I used was suitably cartoonish that people would know it was tongue-in-cheek, but obviously I'm overestimating some people here and there.
I actually think it's a pretty nifty logo. Considering my artistic talents are limited at best, I'm pretty happy with the way it turned out.
By the way Darp, your attempt to shame us by linking to examples of nazi groups who use a similar logo is pretty pathetic. There are groups out there flying the Eureka flag as a symbol, does that mean anyone who honours that flag is a racist?
If a neo-nazi group used a triangle as a logo would that mean anyone else using a triangle was also a racist? Pretty pathetic if you ask me.
there is something, though, at the core of neo-con laissez faire which implies that disadvantage (including racial discrimination) is just an excuse for failure.
1. Neo-con and lassez-faire are two entirely different things. If you're going to throw around buzzwords, at least have the good sense to look up what they mean before shooting your mouth off.
2. Rubbish. The core of lassez-faire thinking is a
that less government intervention results in better results for everyone. b that whatever a man earns is his own to keep, and that for the government to take it to give to the poor is theft.
the basic RW underlying assumption, that those in power and with wealth have somehow "earned" it clicks in very neatly with racist assumptions that the poverty and disadvantage of non-white people is their fault personally.
"somehow earned it"? Are all rich people lottery winners or something?
There are poor white people too, you know. It would be more accurate to say that rich white people have earned it, and that poor white people are at fault for their own poverty. Same thing for rich and poor people of any colour.
The main difference between us right wingers and you left wingers is that we believe "all men are created equal", while you believe "all men should remain equal".
It's about equality of opportunity rather than equality of outcomes.
Yobbo,
here are groups out there flying the Eureka flag as a symbol, does that mean anyone who honours that flag is a racist?
Believe me, me of all people is very much aware of this.
You can't really make the comparison. The argument over Eureka concerns what the image should stand for. Is it a leftie symbol representing the rights of the worker? Or as a small minority insist, a symbol representative of the white Europeans battle against the Chinese.
With the skull and crossbones, I don't think the jury is out on that one. It clearly symbolises death, destruction and evil.
You'll notice that I have stated that I see the jocularity and intentional irony of this.
wow you guys are so... tuff! like throwing the politics 101 definition of "laissez faire" at me - yeaaahouch! and totally turning my statement around to mean that pianos are racist - tricky!
and then, even better, acting all like you *agree* with me by thumping out your own delusion that those with stacks of cash and influence got there purely off their own smarts and sweat, and that parental contributions, entrenched priviledge, inherited wealth and "socialist" things such as universal free education had nuthin' to do with it.
And even if rich peope don't quite "earn" all their wealth and priviledge, it would still be "stealing" to distribute a bit of it to ensure that someone born into less fortunate circumstances has a fair go at life.
whoa! i can't hack this tuff-as-shit pace, and i don't have a mullett to display, and there are a few other things i'd rather be doing than posting every 16 minutes to explain the concept of "colonialism" to some right-wing dungeons and dragons geeks, so i'm taking my sissy-girl politics elsewhere. ciao.
TimT
Some of your comments to sjusju indicated you have a very narrow notion of racism. My arguments above were about the fact racism extends
BEYOND explicit examples of racism by particular individuals.
Racism is INSTITUTIONALISED because a particular culture (and its inherent values) are privileged over another, thereby undermining the values of the later. In Australia's instance, this happens to be the values of white culture of indigenous culture.
This is why colonisation (which you seem to separate from "racism" - narrowly defined) IS inherently racist - that is, it is about privileging one set of values over another.
This type fo racism has nothing to do with individual actions (except in so far as we allow that privileging to continue...)
I have to agree with Evil Pundit, Sjusju's post was racist.
There's plenty of racism in our society, and in Australia's case the bulk is directed at non-whites by whites.
But lefties have to stop being flagrant hypocrites and enunciating blatantly racist viewpoints themselves, while lecturing others.
To start saying white racism is worse, is in itself racist, and rather demeaning to victims of non-white racism-driven genocide like the Tutsis, Cambodian and Burmese minorities, Chinese in Indonesia, Chinese at the hands of Japan etc.
Anne, you have said that Tim has a narrow view of racism. I think this is the point of difference between our arguments. I also have a narrow view of racism. I think it is a simple problem with a simple solution. Don't tolerate it and it will go away. But that means you don't tolerate it anywhere. You can't say that white against non-white is wrong but non-white against white is ok because it is somehow justified.
Please, let me say one more time to be very clear. The notion of judging someone because of their ethnic background is abhorent to me. NO MATTER WHO IS DOING IT. If you can label me as a racist because I am white, then you are being racist. [part II to come]
If you can somehow justify it, then "the other side" can too. It is as simple as that. You can say it is ingrained in white culture but I'm sorry, you are wrong. It is ingrained in PEOPLE. We are all inherently tribal and protective of "our own". As I tried to demonstrate in the post on my site, tribal allegiances can move in an instant when it suits. I believe it is something that we will eventually get over as a species, but that will only happen when it is not tolerated for ANY reason.
The way to wealth under todays corporatism is
- a very smart accountant
- access to family funds as basic capital
- knowledge of OPM mechanisms
- comparatable knowledge of tax minimisation
and more importantly
- building up of a brand - eg Nudie.
The 'rich people got rich by earning it' is very 1920s. Name a way you physically work now to earn lots of money! A few escape through the hole, but its the fallacy that yobbo has fallen for that this is the way it is for the majority of people.
(cont)
Yobbo, as much as you enjoy the capitalist system, the way I am earning a buck, I wont be calling on you to be my business coach (yes, you werent saying you were one, making a point thats all) Your thinking is purely mid-20th century. Please update.
Businesses that are going to amass wealth in the future are
• international
• involved in service industry
• support neither 'left' nor 'right' government as they are all in the same bowl now - are mostly non-political
• are web-based as much as realtime based
• give as well as recieve.
The combination of social democratic ideals and business genius is being used by new & upcoming businesses. The old style businesses, still in control of the worlds capital will shift or die in the next 20 years.
If you Yobbo, are not talking the new capitalist talk, then youre really not making it dude. Just adding my observations of new 2004 start up businesses that have great potential.
Eric, I always find it funny that people with the arse out of their trousers always know how rich people get rich.
I aslo find it bizarre how many people who bag "the rich" buy lotto tickets. It seems that money is ok if you get it by accident, but earn it? No bloody way! Evil pricks.
I personally have never been rich but I'm willing to give it a go once to see if I like it.
"I've been rich, and I've been poor, and honey - let me tell you something. Rich is better."
Mae West.
Incidentally, I've just posted my response to some arguments in this thread. And now I'm posting yet another disgusting attempt at link-whoring in order to get readers over at my blog - willtypeforfood.blogspot.com. Second post from top!
Gibbo,
"we are all inherently tribal"...?
Boy, has capitalism fucked your brain...we are not inherently anything...we are social creatures - which means we live in a SOCIETY - that can be organised anyway we want it.
Biological determinism is right wing, deceptive, castrating, crap.
And I'm not labelling you racist because you are white - I am, and have been for a while now, talking about INSTITUTIONALISED RACISM - a dimension of racism not (directly) connected to individuals (except through our complicity in the perpetuation of those institutions and their inherent values.)
Tim T that was shameless!
Darp, what's going on? Every time I long on to this website, the number of comments is 'decreasing'. This morning it was hitting 108. This afternoon it has sunk to a measly 95. You couldn't be (horror!) deleting comments, could you?
How many comments are there in this thread, anyway? Are those numbers just up there to fool us? Or - as Anne might have us believe - are numbers just another fluid social construct?
Could be, might be; who knows?
Define what a number is TimT, and I'll have a go at working through the possibility for you...
Anne, "fucked in the brain" am I? You obviously went to the same school as BigBob. You're a classy pair with a real knack for debating. I only went to year 10 so I can't use all those lovely big words that you do. Be careful though, your sounding more and more like a Python sketch all the time. "Come and see the violence inherent in the system!"
I'll try to put my point across one more time, sensibly, and without telling anyone to fuck off or that they are fucked in the brain.
[part II follows]
[Part II}
I at no point blamed "biology" for this. I fully accept that we are social creatures with the power to determine many outcomes. But neither of these factors occur in isolation. We are a product of our genetic disposition AND our environment. That has been my argument all along. We have the power to determine our own situation! By rejecting racism on a personal level, we can have great effect.
[part III follows]
[Part III}
As far as not being inherently tribal, well I think you need to do a bit more research. It is one of the main reasons we have survived and prospered as a species. The fact that we tend to gather in groups is exactly what the post on my site is all about. My point was that the groups, or tribes, can be extremely fluid in their composition. We make alliances, to our own benefit, to suit our current circumstance. This is the very essence of politics and diplomacy. The friends we have now, as a person or a country, will change as time goes by and depending on our current needs.
[part IV follows]
[Last Bit]
What you seem to not understand is the effect that the individual has on society as a whole. I see "society" or "the state" as a collection of individuals that have a common motivation. You see it as a "top down" thing that the individual must act in accordance with. The individual therefore, has no responsibility for their own situation. It is now the fault of "the system". This is exactly what pisses the lefties off about John Howard. It is not the effect that HE has had on the country at all. It is that he reflects very accurately what the MAJORITY of the population feels. He is just the focal point for your( the lefts) dissapointment with the views of the majority.
No, I don't see it as (exclusivly) top down; I have never undermined the power of individuals to act. Its not an either or thing; its that the exclusive identification of racism in terms of the individual blinds us to THE OTHER SIDE of the issue - its institutionalised dimension.
And...it is John's Howards inability to acknowledge this aspect which is so dangerous.
Bu the same token, I mean social in a more abstract sense...even one's power as an individual is mediated by the values of the culture in which they born, dwell, etc... My arguments are an attemtp to ask people to stand outside of that...and to acknowledge that bias...
No, I did not say you are - inherently - fucked in the brain, I said capitalism had fucked your brain...and mine, and everyone elses who are persuaded by its (false) promise of satisfied desire...
BTW, your mullet picture frightend me! If you were a chick, you probably would have burned it by now...well, at least I would have...
Also Gibbo
I'd be intersted in your thoughts on 'free speech' in Friday's blog thread...especially since you have shown contempt for the PYL...
It's down to 25 posts now. BTW Anne, I did find a definition of number after a little googling, but frankly, I couldn't make head or tail of it. Something about bijective sets....
"It is that property of sets which is common to all sets that are bijective with each other. Two sets that are bijective with each other are also called "equivalent" sets. So our A and B are equivalent sets. A number is the property common to equivalent sets. "
Here.
"Darp, your bijective set of comments appears to be decreasing!"
I am interested in your views, BTW, and don't wholly disagree with them - of course we are influenced by culture. Actually, the language you use reminds me a lot of the things I encountered when I was at Uni - are you a student, or possibly a tutor/lecturer?
Zero posts! Pretty soon we'll be going into negative figures. Is this some kind of haloscan quirk?
Commenting by HaloScan
