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The divisive Voice referendum campaign Australia has just endured could well be described as the nadir of our country’s tumultuous political history. But there is growing evidence that the elitist and progressive Left is not accepting the resounding defeat of the Voice proposal.
Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk’s decision to give every public servant the option of an extra week’s leave — on full pay no less — to mourn the loss is bizarre and leads one to speculate what other mind-bending outcomes would have resulted had ‘Yes’ succeeded. The Voice was a most divisive construct, causing sometimes bitter argument between old friends and within families and organisations. The Queensland decision comes with a very heavy price tag, potentially the wages of over 200,000 people for five days plus disruption. In any case, many of these would have voted ‘No’. Quite simply, it is a ludicrous and outrageous decision. The stupidity involved reminds us of a quote attributed to Albert Einstein: “Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I’m not sure about the former.”
Several universities provide free counselling services to their staff and students to overcome the depression created by the trauma of the ‘Yes’ campaign’s defeat. And then there have been the repeated statements, floated by illiberal journalists, that intelligent, well-educated people voted ‘Yes’, whereas dumb, uneducated people voted ‘No’. If ever there was a stereotype – the attribution of certain characteristics to people on the basis of their formal education – this is a standout. In addition, especially over the last few days, ‘No’ voters have been labelled racists. The people behind this invective might use the Misinformation Bill, now being considered by the Albanese government, to destroy free speech because whoever disagrees with them must be automatically guilty of distributing misinformation.
The reality is that the campaign by determined, valiant, and successful ‘No’ supporters was essential in avoiding Australia becoming an officially racist country. Indeed, if the Voice had prevailed, some people, merely on the basis of their claimed racial connection – a characteristic over which people have no control, and where authenticity can often be challenged – would have permanently enjoyed a privileged, exalted, position in the governance of this country, thereby making a mockery of the equality embedded in Australia’s DNA. If the Voice, a potentially divisive and conflict-ridden concept, had been enshrined in the Constitution, the preferment of group rights over a person’s individual rights would have become a permanent part of our constitutional structure, .
In the end, the magnificent, courteous campaign run by the ‘No’ camp, especially by the Opposition spokeswoman for indigenous affairs, Jacinta Nampijinpa Price and the exhortation to implement the principle of political equality communicated throughout the campaign, made the defeat of the Voice proposal possible. In the end, voters came to realise that the entrenchment of the Voice in the Constitution would result in the allocation of special rights for Indigenous people, merely on the basis of their race or claimed racial part-descendancy.
Nevertheless, a step at a time, a country that should be united in a common purpose to protect the lives, liberty, and property of its citizens is being divided by the merchants of racial division. For example, the ‘Welcome to Country’ ceremonies, respected by few, will probably continue, flags purporting to represent some and not others, will continue to be flown, and the practice of place-name changes will also continue unabated. In Australian schools, children will continue to be made the targets of indoctrination, taught to be ashamed of industrious forebears who made Australia a wonderful place in which to live.
It is fair to speculate that a successful ‘Yes’ vote, rather than being “modest proposal”, would not have achieved reconciliation, but instead would have generated, over time, incessant demands for political power, reparations, land rights, treaties, ‘truth-telling’ commissions, and more. A successful ‘Yes’ result would also have overturned the noble aspirations and achievements of the 1967 referendum credited for developing a colour-blind policies, coupled with an expectation governments would assist those who need help to overcome serious handicaps regardless of race or ethnicity.
It is thus to be hoped that the victorious ‘No’ vote – 61 per cent of voters – will put an end to the grovelling, obsequious, prelude that speakers recite, paying fake tribute to past, present an emerging tribal ‘elders’, distorting the history of Australia in the process.
Writing in The Australian, Bella d’Abrera commented that in 1788:
the British colonists brought with them centuries of accumulated knowledge and the basis of our cultural heritage. They brought with them the values of liberty, inquiry, toleration, religious plurality, and economic freedom. They brought with them Christianity, which had positioned the individual as the locus of meaning, sovereignty, and significance. Equality of man, individual dignity and the abolition of slavery were all bequeathed to the world by Christianity and Christian thinkers.[1]
How much longer will that confected symbol of division, the ‘Aboriginal flag’ be flown beside the one under which Australians fought and died defending a free society that is today rapidly becoming less free? Geoff McDonald described in 1982 in Red over Black how the KGB, during the Cold War, nurtured the Aboriginal victimisation industry. The publisher describes this book as “the chilling and almost unbelievable story of the Marxist manipulation of the Aboriginal ‘land rights’ movement, told by a man who learned of Communist strategy while in the Communist Party” and “the long-range Communist strategy for the establishment of an Aboriginal republic under Communist control.”
So, while the defeat of the ‘Yes’ campaign is obviously very pleasing, it is only one crucial step in the direction of developing, and thereafter maintaining, a united country. This is because the relentless pressure for special rights for indigenous Australians will undoubtedly continue and may even accelerate. The activists will certainly clamour for constitutional recognition and ever-grander benefits.
The demonstrable, and justifiable, moral obligation to assist remote indigenous communities will succeed only if a united and prosperous country can support such communities while fixing other critical issues such as homelessness, energy security, foreign aggression and morale. Targeted support and societal help are needed to close ‘the Gap’.
The only result, truly worthy of celebration in Australia, is a resounding commitment by our political leaders, to the implementation of the principle of political equality, where everyone, regardless of race is treated equally and any demonstrable problems are sought to be remedied by empowering people to look after themselves by shedding the shackles of government dependency.
Gabriël A. Moens AM is an emeritus professor of law at the University of Queensland. He serves as pro vice-chancellor and dean at Murdoch University. In 2003, Moens was awarded the Australian Centenary Medal by the prime minister for services to education. He has taught extensively across Australia, Asia, Europe, and the United States.
John McRobert is a civil engineer with over 60 years’ experience in the design, construction and maintenance of major infrastructure, and the study of extreme natural events on man-made structures. He founded CopyRight Publishing in 1987 to facilitate informed debate, publishing over 200 books, including seminal volumes by geologists and engineers on major Earth seismic events.
[1] Bella D’Abrera, ‘Let’s Honour our Western Heritage Without Shame’, The Australian, January 24, 2018. <https://www.theaustralian.com.au/opinion/lets-honour-our-western-heritage-without-shame/news-story/cb476aa84d494a95271ed7563d6a0e32>
Good article, thanks.
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Frustratingly, after hearing this morning (23 Oct) about the unsigned “open letter” to the Federal Parliamentarians from disgruntled “Voice” advocates, I tried in vain to find an actual copy of the damn thing! There were lots of posts from various media sources ABOUT the letter, containing a few excerpts, but no-one has provided the document or a link to it! Even Microsoft’s AI tool couldn’t find it, though it repeatedly referred me to the ABC NEWS website article. Hopefully, some Q-O-L contributor/commentor can give us a link?
The media does this all the time. ‘So and so allegedly said something racist.’ They never tell you what exactly was said – because that would allow you to make up your own mind.
I also looked for it tonight, but was unable to trace it. It sounds pretty radical, to say the least – not surprising – as we see their flag and supporters in the Hamas demos.
Tried posting the link without success, but you can do as I did:
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Google “statement for our people and country”.
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Then following the link to The Monthly which has an article with the link.
Had the Yes vote succeeded, those who lost the battle – because a battle it was – would be told “The umpire has spoken, get used to it.” No sympathy or special holidays for them!
I don’t understand where the idea came from that the Left would accept the will of the majority. Now they will just go harder, everyone knows that. Nobody expected anything to change for the better after this pointless referendum.
“..a quote attributed to Albert Einstein”
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Well done. It’s great to see “attributed to” instead of the more common adamant and so often dubious “Einstein said…”.
I wish the University of Sydney offered grieving leave!
Or celebration leave.
Well written! Then again watching the Left slowly but determinedly trundling itself towards the cliff of electoral oblivion has a certain fascination.
I think Greg Craven had it right in the Australian today …
The whole purpose of the referendum was (as is now becoming increasingly apparent) in effect to … “challenge the ongoing legitimacy of Australia’s constitutional and national foundations.”
What’s more, Dutton’s stated desire for another referendum on recognition in a preamble is little more than an admission that he holds exactly the same position – that Australia as a nation lacks legitimacy and some how we need to apologise for our very existence.
Certainly there are precious few politicians, or constitutional lawyers who you could identify who would put their careers on the line to defend our national sovereignty in the face of the Aboriginal “Voice” I think Australia is in a lot of trouble – is there anyone left “who has a nation in them” (with thanks to Oswald Spengler.)
So why did Craven support the yes vote?
When he came out in support, sought of “Yes ” it looked like a winner. I think Greg like many didn’t want to be on the wrong, albeit right side, of the debate.
Much of the post vote analysis speculated on the influence of intelligence and the formal education on the voters. However, a cursory look at the Yes and No spread seemed to indicate that those that knew the least about indigenous community circumstances voted Yes and those more in touch with indigenous needs voted No.
If “Yes” had succeeded, then people on the taxpayer funded payroll should have had one week’s paid leave in order to celebrate, and maybe another week so they can gently come down from the exhilaration!
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Basically, the Left does not accept our sort of representative democracy, because they believe that they are on the right side of history, having a cosmic mandate to roll out their agenda. That is why the ‘Yes’ supporters will not accept that the ‘No’ vote means ‘NO’!
I note the almost comical cultural appropriation inherent in the so-called Aboriginal flag. I wonder if others do too?
There are a myriad of conservative devotees to these papers on Quad Rant, and you are all talking about the yearning for a Government who could rule for all Australians. This, of course, is an admirable wish and I join you all in wanting that very Government and I fervently wish for a Prime Minister and his cabinet who can deliver that. I need, though, to ask three questions, if I may, so as to arrive at a certain conclusion:
1. What is the name of our National Anthem?
2. What is/was the purpose of a National Anthem?
3. The sun does not rise in the East! Do you agree or disagree?
1. Don’t know, I voted for Waltzing Matilda.
2. Pass
3. Pass
1. I voted for “Song of Australia”, so the best chances are that you were in the ACT and I was in SA.
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2. To give the Left something to whinge about
3. The Sun only rises due east and sets due west on 2 days of the year – the Spring and Autumn equinoxes.
3. The East is red,
The sun is rising.
It’s a damn shame that the essay above is true.
The term ‘Indigenous people’ is also an oxymoron. What does it mean?
Does it mean citizens who live and practice a stone age way of life in the same manner as before the British settlement? It can’t be because nobody currently on Australian soil lives like that.
Or does it mean people who parade like some pale-face scotsman draped in a kangaroo skin hide (which he did not hunt for with a spear and woomera) and answers to the name Marcus Stewart, which is more Scottish than Ivanhoe, yet believe their right to monetary reparations should be honoured because the British and Australians developed and advanced a Western Democracy upon a stone age mob?
Show me an Aboriginal community anywhere in Australia and I’ll show you a motor car, clothing, clean water, waste water treatment plants, fences, electricity, the internet and anything else that is provided by Western civilisation.
I wouldn’t bemoan the public servants taking a weeks paid leave in Queensland. There will be real efficiency gains with public servants staying home, and not clogging up industry for a week. I reckon that is a win for Queensland.
Couldn’t agree more.Public servants are at their most dangerous when they are doing something-usually interfering with freedom.
Hissy fits will achieve little. We need to expose the real reasons for the ‘gap’ and similar issues. It is Aboriginal culture.
The demands for a Royal Commission into tracking expenditure on Aboriginal issues will be worthless unless it also reveals why the money that actually does reach its intended targets fails to have effect.
The Queensland Government is considering creating a local voice on Mornington Island, where spending has risen 81 percent in the last six years but failed to improve outcomes (Local voice on cards for remote island, 24/10).
This is the situation prevailing widely across Australia. The reason for these failures that a Royal Commission would find is culture. Culture prevents many Aborigines from accepting ‘white man’s’ help. Many Aborigines believe ‘their ways’ must be retained.
The situation will be improved only when those Aborigines decide, with government help, to ensure they and their children get a modern education uninterrupted by ‘sorry business’ and the like; when they are prepared to work and to move to places where jobs exist; when they stop the cultural practise of ‘humbugging’; when they understand that their poor health is in large part due to their living in self-generated unhygienic conditions; when they stop allowing sorcery to influence their lives; when they stop entrenched, traditional, family-based kinship rivalry; and the like.
Imagine if there had been no reconciliation movement, no apology by Kevin Rudd on 13 February 2008 and we had continued as a nation where about 97% were not formally given an inherited, or assumed by association, race stain which had be be expunged individually and collectively. We would have remained in the Enlightenment mode of not “visiting the sins of the father upon his sons”. Unfortunately this cheap stunt by Rudd et al. set up Reconciliation Australia whose function was to reinforce reconciliation by means of widespread propaganda which penetrated our public service, institutions and the public mentality generally. Now the cult of reconciliation is unquestioningly taken for granted. It was the mother of the constitutional Voice to Parliament. Reconciliation was a specious idea from the start and has done irreparable harm to our solidarity as a nation.
Amen to that Petronius!
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Let us look at the word: Re-conciliation; it takes for granted that non-aboriginal people did something bad to aboriginal people, and therefore conciliation requires whatever it takes to restore the rights of the later and/or satisfy their grievances. But, from January 1788, the attitude of the British towards whoever they met was to offer friendship, and where difficulties arose, to genuinely conciliate. So, reconciliation is not what is needed, and it will only lead to advancing the agenda of the Aboriginal Activists.
Allowances were made in the second road map from the 26 page Ularu statement from the heart ( in case the voice did not succeed) to move straight on to treaty and Makarrata commission.
The voice not getting up will have no affect on the yes advocates as Australia heads down the road of racial division
You are right about that, rmclean! But, isn’t the Uluru Statement only ONE page? Talk about misinformation and disinformation! Albo should be held to account for his omission! Perhaps the 60+% of Australian voters should launch a class-action against Albo? Were Albo and Chris Kenny just good-natured simpletons, or did they really know and understand what was in those following 25 pages, and where it would take this country?
Those anonymous “leaders” insisted a voice was still necessary, completely ignoring the hundreds of already extant representative Aboriginal organisations, culminating in the NIAA and Coalition of Peaks. The odd thing was: whatever happened to those two groups in all the campaigning? Nary a peep. Were they afraid that, if Yes won, they’d be out of a job? Not bloody likely. Indeed, what do they do at other times? Apparently, they cost heaps, and have plenty of staff, and meet regularly with Linda Burney — and are supposed to be telling governments how to Close the Gap. So, permanently MIA, without explanation.
Those faceless leaders also reckon that the No vote means we vile racists have no faith in their ability to manage their own affairs (let’s refrain from getting into all the welfare-dependency etc. in remote communities). Well, why don’t they just form a political party. or lobbying outfit, like all other big interest groups do? Should governments do everything for them, and pay for it as well? Show some initiative, instead of bleating victimhood all the time . . .
They don’t need to form a new political party. They already own the Greens, Labor, the Teals and half of the conservative parties. And their publicity machine is their ABC and the rest of the MSM.
Why, of course! Thanks for bringing the bleeding obvious to my attention . . .
The ‘Aboriginal flag’ should not be flown from anything that the tribes were incapable of building before settlement.
Also, we should repeatedly remind the tribes that flags are a Eurasian concept, and that they are engaging in cultural appropriation by using them.
The demonstrable, and justifiable, moral obligation to assist remote indigenous communities will succeed…
This was the main reason for my voting No. I saw The Voice as a ploy by the government to defer much required hard decision making. That decision being the closure of historically and currently logistically unserviceable remote communities. The WA Government tried it in 2014 with John Howard’s ‘lifestyle choice’ getting the bulk of publicity. The most recent Productivity Commission’s Interim Report on The Gap stated that remoteness was the prime contributing factor to The Gap especially through the impact it has on the National statistics that are always quoted and were prominent during the referendum.
WA Premier Barnett said many of these communities were not only unviable in an economic sense, but were not sustainable because of poor health and education standards and social problems such as domestic violence and child abuse. His government wanted to close up to 150 of the state’s 274 remote indigenous communities. Human Rights activists campaigned against the move. As a result another generation of aboriginal children are condemned to a life of dust, dirt, disease, desolation, depression and an early death in the name of didges, dances and dot paintings. Not to mention that the Kimberleys accounted for 40% of Domestic Violence deaths over the last 4 years. The highest priority for any government in Australia that wishes to improve aboriginal life outcomes is to shut down any aboriginal community with less than 1000 inhabitants. Non-aboriginal remote communities are doing that themselves.