Most of the voters who were panicked into supporting the Howard government over Tampa have now forgotten their fears, while those who were horrified by the Pacific solution and the massive suffering it created (including the loss of hundreds of lives on SIEV-X) still remember. So we’ve seen a gradual easing of some of the most oppressive practices, such as the detention of children.
But the government is still up for gratuitous evil whenever they think they can get away with it, as is indicated by the reaction to the High Court’s decision that the indefinite detention of stateless asylum-seekers is legal. These people have no way of getting out of prison – no other country will take them – and they present no threat to us. But the government is still going to lock them up.
There’s a place in the coldest circles of hell (Ptolemea, to be precise) reserved for Amanda Vanstone, right next to Philip Ruddock.
Other comments Ken Parish has an analysis of the decision He makes a pretty good case that the High Court majority got it wrong, and concludes
I’m not even slightly delighted . In fact it’s a day of mourning not just for Messrs Al-Kateb and Al Khafaji, but for everyone who values liberty, the rule of law and the constraints on unlimited executive power which are so central to liberal democratic principles. What a bunch of miserable bastards.
Miserable bastards as McHugh, Hayne, Callinan and Heydon may be, they are only giving Vanstone and the rest of the government the opportunity to commit their crimes against humanity. They can still choose to set these people free if they want to. There’s more at Barista and Counterspin. I’ll add more links if anyone advises me. Of course, you can imagine what sort of link you’ll get if you support this decision.
John Quiggin 
Steve Edwards,
Yet more long-winded point-scoring. Oh well, it’s my cross so I shall have to bear it.
There is nothing in the “Racial and Religious Tolerance Act 2001” that is anti-Christian. I suggest that any other interpretation is due to your own sense of persecution, not a reading of the legislation.
As a percentage of the population, our immigration intake is not high by historical standards. The fact that we severely ration the intake suggests that the “political class” [ooh, they sound scary] hasn’t been all that successful in your supposed conspiracy.
You’re right in stating that the Kingdom of Yugoslavia was created post-WWI, but that Yugoslavia died in WWII. The Yugoslavia that collapsed more recently was created under a communist government in 1945. Your own sources state that – you should read them before linking them.
Why you believe that Australia, a parliamentary democracy for more than 100 years is anything like Yugoslavia, Lebanon, Bosnia etc. staggers me, but I guess you don’t like the facts to get in the way of an argument.
None of your examples are anything like Australia, and are thus patently unrealistic and RIDICULOUS analogies. If you’d chosen to base your case on Canada or the USA, you would have been on firmer ground, but that would have been too hard, wouldn’t it?
You seem to be terribly concerned about a “demographic bulge” taking place in Australia. Amongst whom, exactly? I don’t see any sign of any one ethnic or religious grouping growing at a dangerously rapid rate. You’re veering off into hysterical exaggeration again.
You call upon basic micro-economics in your assessment of the labour market, but fail to concede that our economy has absorbed all of the immigrants over the last 200 years and yet our wage levels remain high and Australian living standards remain excellent. This may be because you also ignore the stimulatory impact that immigration has on demand.
Your comments on my attitude to crime are facile and best consigned to a high-school debate. I support the rule of law, and never suggested otherwise.
Likewise, we have had “MASSIVE immigration” over the last 200 years in that quite a few people (my – and I’m guessing your – antecedents included) have immigrated to this country. However, the current rate of immigration is only 0.6% (130-140K p.a.) or thereabouts of our population. Family settlers (this is ABS data) are about 18K p.a., or less than 0.1% of the population. Big deal, and hardly the “demographic bulge” that seems to terrify you. The fact that immigration is “the highest it has been for some 12 years” might also reflect the fact that Australia was in recession 12 years ago, and we’ve had a booming economy since.
As I stated earlier, existing immigration requirements already result in Australia receiving relatively highly-skilled immigrants. And those immigrants do assimilate, regardless of your straw-man interpretation of “multi-culturalism”.
Oh, and by all means bring on the Mad Monk. However, I assure you he’s no messiah, just a very naughty boy.
That was a spirited response from someone who believes that “criminal elements” are an “acceptable” byproduct of multiculturalism.
“As a percentage of the population, our immigration intake is not high by historical standards. The fact that we severely ration the intake suggests that the “political class” [ooh, they sound scary] hasn’t been all that successful in your supposed conspiracy.”
You are clearly debating with someone that doesn’t exist, or is not present. Nor did I suggest there was a conspiracy. None of this can be found in my previous postings.
“You’re right in stating that the Kingdom of Yugoslavia was created post-WWI, but that Yugoslavia died in WWII. The Yugoslavia that collapsed more recently was created under a communist government in 1945. Your own sources state that – you should read them before linking them.”
I did read them. You got the history wrong, not me. I wrote:
“As wikipedia notes, the Kingdom of Yugoslavia was in fact created in 1929 as the successor to the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes, which itself was carved out of the ashes of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. The Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia did not come about until 1945.”
Yugoslavia did exist as a united entity prior to World War II, before it was invaded by the axis powers and their puppets (and split between them). When it became independent of the axis, it was reconstituted. The sources show this. In other words, Yugoslavia predates socialism and nazism, even if it did not post-date NATO.
“Why you believe that Australia, a parliamentary democracy for more than 100 years is anything like Yugoslavia, Lebanon, Bosnia etc. staggers me, but I guess you don’t like the facts to get in the way of an argument.”
Clearly, the multicultural ideologues refuse to take responsibility for their policies. I did not say that Australia was like Lebanon, Kosovo or Bosnia (yet). I did point out that the logic of multiculturalism was that we could overthrow the cultural majority and somehow it would be alright.
I also cited much literature that points to the very problem of “diversity” – it doesn’t work. (My main field of study is foreign affairs, admittedly, but diversity is bad for a country’s foreign policy, too) It carries much higher transaction costs than homogenity, and can lead to much, much worse than occasional frictions and cultural disagreements. If you support multiculturalism, you must necessarily believe that Australia can overthrow its cultural majority (or radically shift the internal balance of power) without any transaction costs. I have pointed to three examples of non-success. I would like to see ONE example of success.
The luvvies are setting up the powder keg and blaming the match for the resulting explosion.
“None of your examples are anything like Australia, and are thus patently unrealistic and RIDICULOUS analogies. If you’d chosen to base your case on Canada or the USA, you would have been on firmer ground, but that would have been too hard, wouldn’t it?”
I won’t bother too much with Canada, even though their immigration policy is arguably worse, and the fact that a secessionist party wins large numbers of seats at each election in its attempts to break up the country speaks for itself. I linked to the United States a number of times. You can read the links above, but, more to the point, the United States is now a bad example of “diversity” be it on language or assimilation, crime, underclass. That’s before you even mention wages and living standards the effects of which are well established.
Ah, multiculturalism! Such a successful policy, so long as you don’t have any aspirations for higher living standards. That’s the grim reality for the majority of Americans. On the other hand, if you are a capital-owner, it’s like every day is Christmas!
America – the land of opportunity.
“You seem to be terribly concerned about a “demographic bulge” taking place in Australia. Amongst whom, exactly? I don’t see any sign of any one ethnic or religious grouping growing at a dangerously rapid rate. You’re veering off into hysterical exaggeration again.”
So why create a demographic bulge? Why start one? I mean, the evidence is so overwhelming its becoming underwhelming – relegated to the status of a “truism”, as the distinguished Noam Chomsky would say. We are, of course, getting started, as this article shows:
Pastor Scot, who was born to Christian parents in Pakistan, says he has read and re-read the Koran in its entirety at least 100 times and extensively read and studied commentaries on it.
He admitted telling the seminar that the Koran suggested women had little value, prostitution was acceptable, Muslims controlled the Australian immigration department, and it was an open secret that Muslims wanted Australia to become an Islamic nation.
Pastor Scot said he told the seminar that Australian Bureau of Statistics figures showed the Muslim population in Australia had increased from 201,000 in 1996 to 350,000 in 2001.
He now accepted this was incorrect and that the Muslim population in 2001 was in fact 280,000 and growing at 8 per cent a year.
Only 8% a year? Gosh, that’s only 8 times faster than the rest of the Australian population. Elsewhere, we see a substantial shift in recent years in the number of “settlers” (and their children) who originated in NESB countries.
So I’m thinking – has there been a major “shift”? Well, we can see some trends:
Australia has absorbed almost 5.9 million people as new settlers since 1945. In 1996, when the last national census was conducted, just over 40% of the population identified themselves as first- or second-generation migrants. New settlers haven’t been absorbed evenly across the country though. Migrants are drawn to the big cities. In 1999, 80% of Australians born overseas were living in a capital city, compared with 57% of those born in Australia. One in two Sydneysiders is now a first- or second-generation migrant. In 1999-2000, NSW took the lion’s share of migrants (41%). Victoria had the second largest share (25%) followed by Queensland (16%), Western Australia (13%) and South Australia (3%).
The cultural shifts implied in this are profound. Between 1991 and 1996 in NSW, people identifying themselves as Buddhist increased by 40% and as Islamic by 31%. On its surface, Australian society revels in its ethnic diversity when it means that the suburban corner store, run by Koreans, stocks Turkish bread and chilli sauce, or that schoolgirls in headscarves join the netball competition, or a Canto pop star sell outs an entertainment centre. Multicultural Australia has become a cliche. A cliche that perpetuates a sense of otherness.
As they say – a thousand mile journey always starts with a first step.
Immigration policy has to be back on the table, assuming the political class is serious about crime, unemployment, language barriers, and, heck, let’s not forget gangs fights (again, we are seeing the “usual suspects” I’ve alluded to in previous posts), and street warfare.
“You call upon basic micro-economics in your assessment of the labour market, but fail to concede that our economy has absorbed all of the immigrants over the last 200 years and yet our wage levels remain high and Australian living standards remain excellent. This may be because you also ignore the stimulatory impact that immigration has on demand.”
The words “ceteris parabis” might not mean much these days, now that Latin is a dead language. But to hold all else constant while focussing on a small basket of variables is essentially what social science should be all about. From this, it has been found by economists that an increase in the labour supply… you know the rest.
However, if particular immigrants did increase labour demand at a rate faster than labour supply, conceptually they would:
-increase employment
OR
-increase wages
Or a combination of the above. That’s why Australia doesn’t have an unemployment problem among particular immigrants, or at least it wouldn’t if so many immigrants weren’t unemployed. And the United States has seen rising real wages due to immigration. Or at least in a Bizarro World this would be true.
The solution to all of this is to take particular immigrants that will add more to labour demand than supply, and will minimise transaction costs:
-English speakers
-Capital owners (or those with particular skills)
There is not much more to add to this (well, except for more links when I get the time) as I disagree with little of the rest.
Steve Edwards,
Are you there, Steve? Really there, because you keep saying you’re not. Present and accounted for? Good.
Using your data, which matches the ABS data, there are about 280K muslims in Australia, or about 1.4% of the population. Many of these people are already assimilated, or converted to Islam. Only 62% of Australian muslims were born overseas. Is this really a problem for you? Are you unable to tolerate even 1.4% of the population subscribing to a different faith than yours?
You stated that this population is growing at 8% p.a. That’s not technically correct. What you mean to say is that it grew at about 8% p.a. for the five years to 2001. That does not mean it will continue to grow at that rate.
It’s also instructive that you seem to focus so much on muslims, when there are more buddhists (360K) in Australia than muslims, and their numbers have grown faster (more than 12% p.a.) over the period.
You are clearly frightened of a non-existent threat. Your further arguments on this score have only convinced me that your motives have nothing to do with the welfare of your fellow Australians, and everything to do with intolerance of other cultures and religions.
Fyodor raises some not insignificant points:
“Using your data, which matches the ABS data, there are about 280K muslims in Australia, or about 1.4% of the population. Many of these people are already assimilated, or converted to Islam. Only 62% of Australian muslims were born overseas. Is this really a problem for you? Are you unable to tolerate even 1.4% of the population subscribing to a different faith than yours?”
It will, of course, be very interesting to see what future census will reveal. Will the remarkable demographic changes continue? What can we expect to see? Will Australia remain a relatively cohesive society? We could start with where we don’t want to be, and then construct some scenarios as to where we would like to be.
Some examples can be found pointing to Europe’s grim future, to the point where the political class has even admitted their complete and utter failure in immigration policy.
Holland’s 30-year experiment in trying to create a tolerant, multicultural society has failed and led to ethnic ghettos and sink schools, according to an official parliamentary report.
Between 70 and 80 per cent of Dutch-born members of immigrant families import their spouse from their “home” country, mostly Turkey or Morocco, perpetuating a fast-growing Muslim subculture in large cities.
The raw numbers in France are hard to come by. Five to seven million, say some. Five million or so, say others. The disastrous consequences of French immigration policy are not controversial, indeed highly predictable. Of course, wishful thinking –
“Only 62% of Australian muslims were born overseas. Is this really a problem for you? Are you unable to tolerate even 1.4% of the population subscribing to a different faith than yours?”
– particularly on the matter of second and third generation immigrants is not going to avert the glaring reality of France, the early indicators of which we are seeing in Australia. The warning bells are ringing, but will anybody take notice. The French have good reason to worry.
The Dutch and the French have admitted defeat. But where are the Brits? How are things doing over there? Not so good, as it turns out, unless Kristallnacht (perhaps minus the anti-Semitism, then again, maybe not) can be called a triumph.
Lack of assimilation, greater authoritarianism, a large shift in the demographic balance of power… Much of this down the generations, too.
It gets better:
A Sunday Times survey of 1,170 Muslims showed 40 percent thought that Osama bin Laden was justified in waging war on the U.S., another 40 percent thought that Britons were justified in fighting with the Taliban, 68 percent thought it was more important to be Muslim than British, 73 percent thought that Tony Blair was not right to support the U.S., and a staggering 96 percent thought the U.S. should stop the bombing of Afghanistan.
Don’t worry. None of this really matters. Does it? Is there really a choice between diversity and liberty?
Nor should the following even pass a mention:
My experiences in prison taught me many things. One of them is that attempts to convert prisoners to Islam are prevalent in jails up and down the country, as in the case of Richard Reid, the alleged American Airlines “shoe bomber”.
At Belmarsh prison, in south-east London, and Standford Hill, on the Isle of Sheppey in Kent – two of the three prisons where I served my sentence for perjury and attempting to pervert the course of justice – I had first-hand experiences of the passionate recruitment drive.
Or this, come to think of it. Preying on the disenchanted, converting the misfits, providing a spiritual focus for anti-Western sentiment.
Given that Australia is about to embark on an historic national journey, I think it may at least be wise to check the travel precautions. What have our fellow tourists experienced? What dangers lie ahead? Again, there is no need for hysteria, as a calm, rational analysis can show that, regardless of whether or not we are fearful, we certainly are in for a rough patch.
“You stated that this population is growing at 8% p.a. That’s not technically correct. What you mean to say is that it grew at about 8% p.a. for the five years to 2001. That does not mean it will continue to grow at that rate.
It’s also instructive that you seem to focus so much on muslims, when there are more buddhists (360K) in Australia than muslims, and their numbers have grown faster (more than 12% p.a.) over the period.
You are clearly frightened of a non-existent threat. Your further arguments on this score have only convinced me that your motives have nothing to do with the welfare of your fellow Australians, and everything to do with intolerance of other cultures and religions.”
Non-sequiturs aside, I did not “state” anything – I simply linked to the latest census data (second hand, of course). That is the best info we have to go by for now, so I’ll run with it. Now, I can hazard a guess where the Buddhists are coming from (that is, those that immigrated rather than converted), raw numbers provided in the link of course, but the effects are to be discovered elsewhere.
That isn’t, again, to attack all Buddhists blanket. It is just to serve notice that we have failed in assimilating large numbers of people, including many second generation Australians.
The real question is not: “do you tolerate the views of 1.4% of the population”. Of course I do. The real issue is: do we wish to cross the Rubicon and follow the doomed path of Western Europe?
There is a much better alternative:
Firstly, we would like to reinforce the cultural majority by demanding a high standard of English from prospective immigrants.
Secondly, we would like to ensure that the non-humanitarian immigration stream is entirely business and skilled migration.
Thirdly, we ought to tear down the stated goals of the architects of multiculturalism
Ethnic loyalties, however, need not, and usually do not, detract from wider loyalties to community and country. We therefore believe that migrants should be encouraged as individuals and, if they wish, as groups to preserve and develop their culture, their languages, traditions and arts, so that these can become living elements in the diverse nature of Australian society.
Thank you, Jerzy, too bad it’s been a failure in virtually every country its been tried. Nonetheless, that didn’t stop our courageous political lemmings from seeking suicide as public policy.
It is now only a matter of time before the political class apologises to the Australian people (assuming they haven’t by then dismissed the people and elected a new one) and reverses its terrible policies. John Howard made a start (I will add that he dragged the elites kicking and screaming) in mitigating the excesses of the post-70s “consensus”, but we still have a long way to go.
FYI arrival without a valid visa is an offence- I worked in immigration law enforcement for 16 years. Until the ALP got in and fiddled with the legislation, undocumented arrivals were turned around automatically, and had to ladge a claim for status from offshore- a much fairer scheme than the current which gives advantage to onshore claimants by giving them access to (often activist) legal review. I am no Hansonite- I support Asian immigration, and find them to be generally better for the advancement of Australia than many white-trash residents of the outlying suburbs. However, I think if a person has exhausted the lengthy review processes available to claim status, they should be immediately deported. Ends terminal detention, and saves us a load on maintaining detention centres and tying up the federal court system.
And the deportation of the two subjects of this thread is only a logistical problem- transit countries have refused permission for them to travel through (and based on their form for lodging claims and refusing to budge, probably a fair assessment); it is only a matter of negotiation that will see them departed. If the Australian government is so evil for their action in this matter, why aren’t any of the more enlightened nations of the world putting their hand up to offer safe haven to these persecuted individuals?
i’ve always thought that australia was a country of idiots and the political debate in this country confirms my suspicions. perhaps our country’s excessive dope smoking has something to do the malaise hanging over us.
personally i’m all in favour of protecting our borders and preventing refugees and illegal immigrants from coming here at will. if you oppose the right of a gov to do this, then logically you must also oppose the notion of national boundaries……what’s the point of having a passport system?
in this country we have a culture of complaint where a significant proportion of the people love to indulge in hand wringing, wailing, gnashing of teeth and self flagellation. these people aren’t happy unless they are complaining about something…..anything, they have a need to complain so they are quick to jump aboard the complaints bandwagon whenever it rolls into town.
the arguements of this disatisfied minority is never based on logic but a self satisfying desire to be seen in public all warm and fuzzy and bleeding heart. these people have deep psychological problems.
if we take their advice and allow these criminals to wander thru australia at will, we will have the same situation now facinf europe with hundreds of thousands of illegals unaccounted for and on the lose. is that what we want for australia??
vinnyboombutts,
Thanks for your valuable contribution, but perhaps you could address the original issue of this thread, i.e. do you think that INDEFINITE detention of illegal immigrants is a good idea? Personally, I think it’s a waste of money, and unnecessarily cruel and vindictive.