Posted by Vic O'Callaghan Australia is unique in the world. One nation, one continent, one island. We have one of the briefest histories on earth and, and, like the USA, are populated by almost all nationalities listed in the United Nations, and yet still we treat people who are different to us as criminals. What enterprising person among us would not do what these people have attempted to do, that is, to try to make a new home in a new land where there is the hope for freedom and peace. Parents become a bit crazy when they think of the future of their children. They tend to think big and take risks. These people have taken enormous risks and yet we see them as criminals. Is there something about us that we still believe deep down that we re a penal colony? Is there a notion in our national psyche that says we superior to all other cultures and we must protect ourselves from all who we see as different? Do we see some cultures as intolerant and consequently take on that which we criticize in these others? The suicide pilots of September 11 seem to have fed the dark prejudices that lurk in the minds of all of us to a point that we can now sit in the comfort of our homes and say that the people suffering in our detention camps deserve what they get. After all, we would except the same treatment if we went to their land. This last observation is probably true. The sadness is that we are equating ourselves with regimes that are directed ignorance and fundamentalism. If we treat people in the manner in which we are, how can we, in all honesty, say we are different? But I believe we are different. I believe we can draw ourselves out of this quagmire of blindness and selfishness. All it needs is a little changing of shoes. How many of us are game to enter one of these prisons? Go on. Have a look from the other side of the razor wire and then look their children in the eye.
on April 29, 2002, 10:20 am
Is there any way we can learn from history? I mean, we study what people did in the past yet still we thunder head-long into the same insane arenas where we feel compelled to inflict suffering on other human beings in the name of things such as nationalism (which, taken to extremes is basically racism dressed in finer clothes) and security.
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