Freedom of Speech, Australian Governent, Religious Freedom

Hey guys! This is a reply to Jnic's post last week which can be found be clicking here! 

First the qualifiers. I think most of my friends know my views on religion and society. Despite, having a Catholic education and a church attending parent, I have remained agnostic at the best of times and downright atheist at the worst. In preparing to write this post, I spent the better past of this week researching the issue at hand and these views of course will reflect the qualifiers above.

Egyptian Newspaper

What has happened in France has of course sent shockwaves across the Western world. France, compared to the other Western country has a relatively high Muslim population and has for at least the past decade, had a very strong separation of secularism and state. France, whose national anthem is from revolution, who's chant of Viva libertie and viva la France, has always represented the ideals of freedom. Now, in the 21st century, it feels like the Western world is increasingly being forced to choose between freedom of speech and freedom of religion. (I understand these are vast generlaisations but lets roll with it.) Even France, with all its ideals set in freedom, is facing the same problem. From here, I feel #Jnic# in his last post more than adequately set the context for this post.

Rally at Paris

In Australia, Tony Abbot's government approval rating has polled at appallingly low numbers. Yet for whatever reason, he and his party was chosen by the majority of Australians in the last election. If we believe in what we are taught from day one, that democracy is the best political system that is on offer, then we at some point need to trust democracy. To do so we need to trust the government that we choose. When they believe that some invasion of privacy is necessary for the safety of the country, we  can't just plug our ears and ignore the facts.

Which isn't to say, we shouldn't criticise and demand something different but when there's no viable alternatives on the table then I don't see the point in complaining. At the end of the day, both Sydney and the latest massacre happen within a month of each other. Not half year before that, the same thing happened in Canada. It may be alarmist of me, but doing nothing seems to be downright negligent.

If the government was to decide, that they need metadata to ensure my safety then so be it. Because at the end of the day, the metadata which our government are taking from us, I trust, will be used for the right reasons.

Increasingly, we are worried about the erosion of our freedom and privacy. I feel what has been overlooked in many cases is how many more ways we now have to express our freedom. With the advent of social media, the internet and the ability to reach potentially millions of people, we have been given more freedom than any of forefathers could have imagined. Whilst some of that may have been taken away we need to understand, this generation, in the here and now, has more 'freedom' than any other generation before us.

 

 "I am a Muslim and I love Jews", "I am a Jew and I love Muslims" at Paris rally

They say that knowledge is knowing a tomato is a fruit and not a vegetable. Wisdom is knowing that it doesn't matter; it still makes a good vegetable soup. Freedom, gives us the right to say what we want. However, we need to recognise that a lot of things that we say, could be conceived as extremely offensive to large groups of people who are willing to act on it. Whilst we cannot let extremist, change what we do, we need to think more critically on the effects of what we say. It is in this light, I don't understand why the magazine which was targeted chose to publish their latest edition and why it has been so popular. I honestly hope that it has been popular to support victim's families, rather than just proving a point. Surely there are better ways than to express our freedom of speech.

Religious freedom however, is a completely different beast entirely.

In VCE English, we were taught that there's no right way to analyse a text. In primary school, we were taught that we are allowed to choose to believe and follow in whatever religion we chose to. So what happens, when people use religion to justify horrendous actions, such as the ones we've seen in the past couple of months.

There are ways to contrive anything to become something that it originally was not intended to be. I'm not going to pretend I'm an expert on the Islamic faith, but at some level, we need to make judgement as to what a group of people represent or at the very least, intended to represent. Fundamentally, from all the values that I was taught, from the people I have met and my own life experience, I believe that (many) religion are a ideal which provides a lot of positive guidance for people lives and that it has a hugely positive influence on society.

So when, extremist group, use the ideals of Islam (or any other religion) to justify their actions I feel more than justified in saying, their interpretation is wrong.

I heavily frown upon using the populace argument, but in this case I'm going to. At its very core, religion is shaped by its followers. The belief of a religion should evolve and change over time, directed by its leaders. It should follow that, the belief that the majority of a religion is the belief of the majority of its followers. Following that, when the majority of Muslim would rather not associate themselves in the same light as ISIL followers, than again, I can justify myself when I say their interpretations as wrong.

 More state power, not free speech, the likeliest we-are-Charlie result

Reddit user raises an often understated point.

Odd World Leaders at the march

~TastyJacks~

The freedom-safety tradeoff; why we should refuse gaining one at the expense of the other

This post is in response to the content of this article:
http://www.gizmodo.com.au/2015/01/george-brandis-is-using-paris-sydney-terror-attacks-as-a-lightning-rod-for-metadata-laws/

">MFW trying to define metadata" ~ George Brandis

The events of the past number of months have been undeniably shocking. It can be argued that terrorism has not been this prevalent since the watershed attacks of the early-to-mid 2000s. Each time issues of national security are raised, I become despondent as to how ruling authorities of many countries behave. My apprehension is not so much towards the direct military/police action that is taken following an attack (although I am by no means condoning all of these responses as weighted or proportionate); rather, it surrounds how massive sacrifices to freedom are made under the façade of “national security”.

Ultimately, governments seem to believe that they need to be taking part in a constant trade-off situation, between the freedom and liberty of its citizens on the one hand, and the safety of the broader public on the other. Herein lies the hypocrisy of many nations. Western democratic nations constantly and sometimes loudly (*cough* ‘Murica *cough*) espouse the values of individual freedom and relative-libertarianism. While the extent to which this is an actual portrayal of reality is always being debated, it is plain to see that, since the fateful morning when those planes descended upon Lower Manhattan, the collective freedom of individuals right throughout the Western-hemisphere has fallen – this coming despite the onset of the Information Age and all of the extra freedoms that should have come with it.

The “safety-precautions” taken post-9/11 most definitely exceeded their original scope of terror-prevention and detection. This has been most recently confirmed by Edward Snowden’s revelations on the NSA’s PRISM program; a clandestine, electronic mass-surveillance program which treats the entire population as persons of interest, in spite of the lack of the law’s usual requirements of probable cause. This scattershot, blind luck approach is not only largely ineffective, but also highly invasive and restrictive. In spite of this, elements of the US government has remained largely unaccountable for this mass privacy breach due to the consistent playing of the “national security” card- an over-played catch-all trump card used to justify the unjustifiable.

I do not doubt for a second the need for adequate preventative and public safety measures, though. Do I care that I’m unable to take a bottle of water with me on a plane? If it’s going to lessen the risk of me dying aboard a bombed flight, then of course not. Do I still have faith and believe in the necessity of our police and security services (ASIO and ASIS)? Of course I do, since there has, and always will be, hateful people who intend to bring harm upon others.

Instead, what I would advocate for would be measures, proportionate responses to these threats, as opposed to the over-reaching, counter-productive responses that have been taken by many governments around this world. I’m all in favour of surveillance, so long as it is highly-targeted and done in cases of reasonable suspicion. In the same way, I’m all in favour of people having more freedom, just so long as it does not impinge on the ability of others to safely enjoy their own freedom. The current Australian government, with its proposed metadata laws, is acting as if it is offering the golden key to all public safety; an easy-fix for all sorts of crime prevention. In reality, these ineffective metadata laws are thinly-veiled in their attempts to hand more control to the government. I sincerely doubt the passing of these laws would make any sort of noticeable impact upon a crazed individual’s capacity for delusion and hatred.  

It simply doesn’t have to be a contest of picking one over the other. It doesn’t have to be freedom vs. safety; national security vs. individual privacy; over-reaction vs. under-reaction… Just because we aspire to live in a safe society, it doesn’t mean that we have to sacrifice our freedoms in order to achieve this. As a famous little girl from the Old El Paso ads once said...

#J.Nic#

'Tis the Season

So this week(s) I’ve really struggled to put anything on the page, despite having over 6 weeks now to think up and write something, I’m sorry to say I have nothing profound or noteworthy to say. I imagine the responses elicited by this post will be “Cool story bro” and I am going to use Christmas as my excuse. It’s the silly season and Christmas and New Year’s is a complicated time for blog writing; Do I write about my own personal Christmas celebration? My unimaginative New Year resolutions? Do I write about the money spent? The unwanted presents? The Band Aid song going around? My Cats? In the end dear reader you are going to get to know what I love about Christmas and why I like spending money; not exactly ground breaking, I know.

I love Christmas. It is that simple, it is by far the day I look forward to the most in any year. I could list while all the other holidays don’t compare, Easter (I dislike chocolate and don’t do religion), Halloween (I’m Australian.) But the take home point is that I love Christmas. It is not the giving or receiving of gifts that I love the most nor the food (though the food comes a close second), but the overwhelming sense of security I get from being surrounded by the people I love. Even as a child, my fondest memories are dominated by a sense of security most keenly felt in the moments before I feel asleep for the traditional mid-Christmas day nap, essential in my family after having a large meal. It was those moments between not being awake and not being asleep either, where I could hear the various rooms of my Grandma’s big house filled with the voices of my family. Their conversations unimportant, people who I knew loved me. These moments gave me such a strong sense of  self and belonging, security in knowing that in this wide world filled with 7 billion people I had my own people who supported me no matter what and a place within my family.

Essentially the point of that rambling story is that I draw security form those around me, which is I am sure true of a lot of people. What I do not draw security from however is money. Not that money isn’t important, it is, it gives you options, choices. However largely due to my upbringing money is not a measure of security for me. My family lives by the saying “you can’t take it (money) with you into the next life”. Money is therefore in my opinion meant to be spent. Now I don’t mean all in one go or right now, you can have it marked for future expenses etc. but sooner or later the money will be spent. There is no point for me having it sit there just to make me feel secure. Money itself has no intrinsic value; you can’t eat it or wear it. What it does gives you, is options and choices, if I can reasonably afford something, why not? Even debt often frowned upon I feel gets an unnecessary bad rap.  As long as the debt is feasible it’s “all good”. This view has been strengthened through uni, debt is simply you curbing your future consumption for current consumption, e.g. uni I would not be able to go to uni without student HECS debt. It’s a necessary evil. I do acknowledge however that at my current stage of life I largely have a lot of freedom and no responsibility, no kids, no house etc. However regardless of what stage of life I am in I adhere to the ideal of working to live, not living to work. 

-Mrouge-

Sydney:The Failing of Australian Media and Society

The tragic events from Sydney in the past week has (somewhat disappointingly) brought into stark reality the apparent difficulties of multiculturalism. Both during and after the siege, it has been emphasised to the public that the hostage taker followed the Islam. Whilst it is clear to most people, that the siege in Sydney was the act of one man acting alone, it is apparently still not clear to the Australian media. The Australian media has an incessant need to speculate with little fact, even less evidence and almost no concern for the society that they are 'telling' the news to.

During the early stages of the 'siege', many news outlet made vast assumptions of he gunman, the origin of the flag being shown in the windows and in general the nature of the 'siege'. A very simple example of this would be the dramatisation of the situation as a death cult seen in the Daily Telegraph, showed Australian society, the true nature of the Australian media, to sell ads, to sell as many copies as possible and to protect their own bottom line. The media today, values these goals above all else, even if it comes at the cost of Australian values, even if it adds fuel to the hysteria of the situation.

First and foremost, the media needs to take a look at themselves. What they give to the public has an effect to their consumers. Consumers, pick up a newspaper, because they want to be informed. We watch TV because we want to be able to see whats going on. Sometimes, we consume mass media so that we can form an opinion based on others' opinions. So when a media outlet, gets it wrong, it has an effect on the public. The notion that issuing a retraction or a 50 words apology makes everything okay again needs to be quashed. 

'Consuming' an apology is not enough to remove the preconception caused by 'consuming' the original source of incorrect news. Once we consume something, our opinions change. Reading an apology doesn't automatically revert our opinions back that way. The media cannot be allowed to use apology as a tool to sell sensationalized media. The media has an implied responsibility to distinguish facts and speculation. They should not be reporting speculation as fact. This is only made worse when facts are simply wrong. 

As the public we need to stop consuming news such as this. We are not fools. Yet, again and again we pick up the same drivel, knowing there are betters sources of news out there which are fairer, balanced and factual. Then why do we continue to consume such trash? Certainly it is easier to be told what to think. Easier still to just stare in front of the screen and get all the facts from the one source. It is however, highly dangerous. The opinions that you form are not your own, but rather those of others. When we are lazy about forming our own opinions, it becomes easy to fall into a rut of complacency. 

Australia needs to do more than just being told what to think. Growing up, again and again, it was impressed upon me that Australia was a welcoming, multicultural society made up as a jigsaw of world cultures. Perhaps, cynicism comes with growing up, but the reaction after Sydney was not the one I was expecting; at least not the one I would have expected when I was young. Apparently, being just tolerant of other culture is enough now. As long as we're not making trouble for others, we've done our part for society. Australia, we need to think for ourselves and dictate our own society.

~TastyJacks~

Cool Stories: Clubbing Balls

+ MRouge+: Labour Migration and Rejection from Jobs

JWren: Why the Victorian election was a farce...

Andrea: An Epic Tale of Good Versus Evil

When I was younger, like so many I grew up with stories from those from the older generation(s). Of particular note for me was paternal grandfather who had some extraordinary stories based on real life. The greatest story tellers of my life, weren't afraid to embellish their stories; drawing on real life stories and just making it slightly more exciting than it otherwise would be. 

I've had a very long week working this week and haven't been able to clear my head, read up on current affairs and really don't have much to write on. Plus considering Christmas is so close ,I think I might go back and write something lighter. Its interesting because the posts I use to write, use to be exactly this, a whole bunch of cool stories. 

Every year, the university calender is littered with "balls." No, that's not a euphemism.  Balls are just dances with less formality, a little more emphasis on fun and a good night out. I think every year, I've attended two, most of which I've organised. The success and enjoyment of each of them have varied but there is one particular one that sticks out in my mind.

Balls

This particular ball was in my second year at university. Out of the all the balls I've been to, this was the only one that wasn't a Melbourne University ball and one of the few I didn't organise. One of my friends organised it and asked me to come. To be honest, I think I was just filling up numbers but regardless, I didn't mind going; any chance to share a drink with friends and meeting some people.

Balls are usually themed and the amount of effort that's put into fulfilling the theme varies between ball to ball. Sometimes, they're very loosely used; just an excuse to wear a suit and for the girls an excuse to wear a nice dress. Others, are a lot less formal; onesies, full costumes of sea animals, game characters, characters from the future all spring to mind.

Terrible movie

The theme for this particular ball was "Midnight in Paris." Which, for that year, wasn't unexpected considering the movie had just come out. Me, having never enjoyed costume wearing/making just wore the same suit I do to all the balls. I think everyone else made some sort of effort but you know, I'm a fun hater.

When I first got there, it was striking how well decorated the venue was. The lighting and the theme was well matched . We all sat down and exchanged some pleasantries and you know, all the usual thing normal people do. At some point I went to the bar.

Part of the fun of balls is the free flowing alcohol. I mean, half the cost of any ball is the free flowing alcohol Its important for me as an University student and as Jackson Chen, it was important to get the most value out of any dollar. At the bar, there was a limit of two drinks per person.

Me, trying to get the most value out of the night took two drinks, even though really I was only going to need one. But you know, whatever. Found the most expensively looking drink and asked for it. A mixed drink called something sunrise. Or sunset, or something. It doesn't matter.

Weaving my way back to the table, drink in hand one of the girls (I didn't know) exclaimed where'd you get that!

In all good stories, the main character are detailed in long descriptions. I would like to give you this description but I honestly can't remember much. Not going to lie, pretty good looking though... We're going to call her Amy. Mostly because I don't know any Amys so no one can be offended.

In typical snarky Jackson style I replied.

> "At the bar."

>>"What's it called"

>"I dunno."

*short pause*

> "Would you like it?" *Offers said drink*

>>"Have you drunk from it?"

>"No"

>>Proceeds to take it from my hand. "Thank you"

Many Decorations

You know, looking back,  I never got to taste that drink. It was a very girlie looking drink anyway. Definitely not a burly big man like me.

(You know she probably knew exactly what drink it was, just didn't want to get up and get one. I don't believe I fell for that.)

The ball was certainly different from all the other balls that I'd been to. Being an 'other' University's ball, I saw a lot of high school friends there who I hadn't seen since graduating. It was nice catching up with them and seeing some other friends. There was a girl there who I hadn't seen for a very long time, where when we parted, we left a few things unsaid and it was nice seeing her again. Actually thinking back, we still left a lot unsaid between us.

Much alcohol

Anyway, I digress. I drank a lot, danced a lot and then drank some more. Again, looking back I don't remember a lot (which is unusual for me). I remember dragging friends on to the dance floor (because woo dancing), taking photos and using the toilet several time. I remembered being particularly tired after a long stint on setting the the dance floor on fire with some massive moves. The girl who had taken my drink, was also at the table sitting down.

So we started talking. I really, really wish I remembered all the things we talked about. I remembered her telling me about her cousins? Where she was staying after the night finished? I don't remember whether I decided to be obnoxious Jackson or charming Jackson. Probably obnoxious. I feel like we talked for ages but honestly it was probably 20 minutes? It was a good chat though, always good to have intelligent conversation with people you don't know well. They don't have pre-conception and misconceptions which these days is a real luxury to have. The conversation was honestly, very interesting and rather intense. I still remember bits and pieces. Alcohol infused conversations are the best.

As the night winded down, my friends filtered back to the table and Amy asked me whether I was going to the after party.

There's not a lot of things I don't like. Okay, thats a lie, there's a lot of things I don't like, but one of the things I don't like is clubbing.

>"Nah, I don't think I will"

>> Various back and forth as to why I don't want to and her saying why clubbing is great. (its not)

>>"Well, I'm going to get changed, but I'm coming back and when I'm back I expect you to be ready to go"

>"Um ... sure."

Such Wow

So she goes away and the friend who invited me started teasing me and egging me to go. You know how it is between guys. I had had a fair bit to drink at this point, but and there was still alcohol to be consumed to ensure the greatst value for money was achieved. I wanted to talk about anything but what I was doing for the rest of the night. But he was very insistent.

After 40 minutes of, "so are you going?" or "What did you talk about" or " why don't you want to go" or " Come, don't be a fun hater" I got sick of it and said

"Its been 40 minutes. If she comes back, which I highly doubt, I'll go, but you need to shut up and let me enjoy my beer."

Of course, as soon as I say that, Amy creeps up behind me and goes, "alright lets go, Jackson." Ok, creeps up is a bit of a strong word. Seriously, was it unreasonable of me to assume that she wasn't coming back after 40 minutes? Who needs 40 minutes to get change. I don't even.

Change

Now one of my biggest pet peeves is people not doing what they say they're going to do. I give my friends a lot of grief for it, so I not wanting to seem like a hypocrite I went. There was a bus to get there, and guess who I was left alone with to go to the club with. We just talked some more. Not going to lie, the conversation was pretty interesting. That conversation I remembered.

When I got there, there was apparently an entry fee, even though there wasn't supposed to be. As soon as I saw that, I made my apologies and left. After all, all I said was that I was going to go. I didn't say I was going to stay. That 40 minute detour cost me the last train home, meaning I had to split a wonderously expensive cab ride home. Slightly anti-climatic I know.

At the end of the day, that ball was probably the most enjoyable ball I've been to. It was nice, relaxing and I met some good friends. There were some conversation that night, that were absolutely magical, that I don't expect on having again anytime soon.

Story telling is something different. I exaggerated a lot of what happen and combined a few stories together to make something readable. What happen afterwards and which bit I did and did not exaggerate is up to you. Because every story needs a little mystery.

An Epic Tale of Good Versus Evil

This week, I’d like to speak about what makes a person evil. This is going to be based on a Ted Talk that I recently watched, given by Professor Zimbardo and relating to the crimes against humanity committed by American soldiers in Abu Ghraib. Zimbardo is a psychologist who conducted the Stanford Prison Experiment, in which he used university aged males to simulate a prison environment, giving one group the title of ‘prison wardens’ and hence the other group became the ‘prisoners’. Zimbardo observed that it didn't take long for the prison wardens, who were given power, to blindly follow orders from the experimenters and hence display acts of cruelty and injustice towards the helpless prisoners, who in turn displayed signs of mental breakdown within a short number of days. Overlooking the obvious and blinding ethical problems with this study, Zimbardo managed to show a different side to evil than what is generally given in movies, books and other media sources.

Many stories centre on a clear distinction between good and evil; take Harry Potter, where the distinction is made clear by which house one is sorted into, or the Lord of the Rings (yes I’m aware I’ve mentioned LotR in more than one post now), where, for the most part, being good or evil merely depends on what race you are. This overly simplistic view of two dichotomies causes problems when we translate these beliefs to our own reality. The prison wardens and prisoners in the Stanford Prison Experiment weren’t different in any way at the beginning of the experiment, however by the end, one group were committing sadistic acts on the other. So yes, it can be seen that good and evil seem to fall into group patterns. However, Zimbardo argues that the order should be reversed; one is not put into a group because one is evil, rather a group can become evil if the situation leads them to it. This hypothesis is validated in the event of the Abu Graib prison tortures, where previously upstanding American soldiers were told by authorities to obtain information from the prisoners as soon as possible. Blind obedience of these orders, stemming from values that are generally accepted and celebrated in our society such as respect for authority and ability to follow instruction, and a group mentality perpetuated by a misguided value of ‘doing the right thing’ and ‘serving one’s country’ resulted in horrific acts of physical and sexual violence and humiliation.

For me, this understanding of evil is terrifying. It is basically stating that, if given certain orders in certain situations, any human can commit evil acts. And from my understanding, following orders is something that is, if not innately human, definitely taught to us by school, family values and society as a whole. If this is the case, then anyone is capable of evil – and I think everyone has a few dark thoughts occasionally that can testify to the postulation that there is a bit of evil inside everyone. An interesting means of proof for this, I think, comes from the popularity of ‘shock jocks’ in the media – take Kyle Sandilands, for example, who is known for some very rude and derogatory comments and is generally publicly chastised for these comments, but whose listeners all followed him when his radio show moved stations. I think that the reason Sandilands is popular is because he merely voices all the negative thoughts that we sometimes have, and it’s comforting to know that someone else is also thinking them, but that someone is worse than you because he’s actually gone ahead and voiced these thoughts. So from ZImbardo’s theory, anyone can be evil if they’re in the right situation – which just means that those who haven’t committed any acts of evil have just been lucky enough to avoid such trying environments.

However, as Zimbardo points out (and I fervently cling to this inkling of hope for humanity), there are people who stand up and act as the ‘hero’, who are not slaves to blind obedience. And the only way that we can do that is if we’re aware of what is happening around us, and, more importantly, aware of what’s going on inside our own heads. If we KNOW that we’re in a situation that could possibly cause us to act cruelly towards others, then at least we may question our subsequent decisions. It is important that, while we may enjoy epic tales of battles between good and evil, we  keep in mind that one person is not born ‘good’ or ‘evil’. As Sirius Black wisely points out:  

Why the Victorian election was a farce...

While much of last weekend’s Victorian election was focused on the return of Labor after ousting a one-term Liberal government, not a lot was said about the results in the Legislative Council (upper house). In fact, I'm sure that most wouldn't have the slightest clue as to who was elected to the house of review, with the vast majority of coverage focused solely upon the Legislative Assembly (lower house).

Much could be speculated as to the root cause for this lack of interest – for one, the fact that voters were largely disengaged with this election (myself included, admittedly) right up until a couple of days beforehand. There is not much that can be done about this disengagement, given the increasing decentralisation of power away from the states (and towards the federal government), as well as the lack of motivational or inspirational party leaders. However, my main concern is how the general population’s disengagement teams up with the more serious issue at hand here – that is, the farcical nature of the upper-house election process.

The simple fact is that the current upper house ballot procedure doesn't work. Voters are given a ridiculously long piece of ballot paper, on which is listed senate candidates from the main political parties as well as candidates from a myriad of micro parties. These micro parties, listed here, often focus on capturing the vote of a highly specific segment of the population. For example, animal rights activists in the case of the Animal Justice Party, cyclists in the case of the Australian Cyclists Party, conspiracy theorists in the case of the No Smart Meter party (seriously, read their policies… they’re pretty out-there), or xenophobes in the case of the Rise Up Australia party. I'm not arguing that these parties don’t have a right to be heard – on the contrary, people should be able to vote along the lines of whoever they believe best represents their own interests. Where I take issue is when someone’s vote is transferred under a “preference deal” to another party at the discretion of the party they voted for.

In essence, the system of voting 1 above the line is intended to reduce the chance of informal voting due to a tedious voting process. However, putting such a system in place become tedious in and of itself once it gets to the counting of votes, and people’s votes are incorrectly attributed to parties due to the delegation of preferences.

The alternative to these dodgy preference-shifting deals is to number the boxes below the line in order of individual candidate preference (all boxes in the case of Federal elections, or 1-to-5 at least in the case of the Victorian election). This is such a daunting task that only a small percentage of voters ever do so – most don’t have the time/interest to investigate each candidate and sort out some sort of preferential ranking.

The end result of such a flawed system is the likes of which we saw in the 2013 election – the election of a Ricky Muir, a motoring (and Kangaroo faeces) enthusiast.

A similar result looks likely in the recent Victorian election, with the likely election of multiple Shooters & Fishers senators, as well as representatives from the Country Alliance, Sex Party, DLP and of course the major parties. For further details, see here.

While I am no expert in the design of elections, it is plain to see that the current system is flawed. By simply allowing for more than one preference to be allocated above the line, these back-room preference deals would be able to be rendered ineffective. This would also allow for voters to who usually vote below the line to vote based on policy, rather than on random name selection amongst the candidate lists of parties. Surely, any system would be better than the current one, which is just inherently bad for democracy.

In many ways, this problem is a self-fulfilling prophecy; the more the upper house becomes less representative of the broader population, the more voters become disengaged from the political process. Consequently, the more disengaged voters become, the more likely it is that these radical parties gain disproportionate representation in our democratic structures. By facilitating such a system, it allows the mandate of the majority to be used in order to make decisions in the interests of the minority. This process simply can’t be allowed to continue unquestioned. 

#J.Nic#