I have taught in some very different schools, where a range of religious teachings are followed.
In Victoria, Religious Education is taught sensibly and sensitively. In primary schools it’s usually optional and non denominational.
In secondary schools the two main religious subjects offered to VCE (Year 11 & 12) students are Religion & Society and Text & Traditions.
They lend themselves well to a personal reflection on religion, comparative theology and the impact of religion on society.

There is a wide expanse of territory for study. Within Text and Traditions there are four recommended texts: Ezekial, the Gospels of Luke and John, and the Qu’ran.

Students may choose to study one of the four texts in isolation before comparing with others.
It has never been an issue.

Let’s be clear though, what I’m referring to are electives for senior students. Students, one would hope, who have a grasp of their own beliefs and some functional critical thinking.

We know religious beliefs are  deeply held and highly personal. Most of us let it sit quietly; some choose to evangelize.
Some go to war in it’s name, but it still extends the promise of a healthier, more tolerant community.

I find it ironic Mr Rudd  and Mr Abbott, two Christian politicians, are prepared to dance around each other on an issue that could actually bring them – all of us – together.

They could agree that universal messages of tolerance, compassion and forgiveness in senior classrooms are a good thing, or they could agree to both stay out of the debate.

They could agree diversity of faith makes us stronger and philosophical debate makes us wiser.

Instead, they’re eyeing each other off like feather-weight boxers, twitching and flinching each time the other makes a move.

Prime Minister Rudd used a back bencher, Senator Landy to question the merit of the Bible in the new National Curriculum. Opposition Leader Abbott immediately weighed in.

This threatens to degenerate into a circus.

We must send a clear message: We resent the exploitation of religious belief for political gain. It cheapens politics and demeans our beliefs.

If religion is to become nothing but a lever for politicians to pull,  we may have to pretend we’re all Jedi so they leave the matter alone.

May the Force be with you.

Paul Roberton

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Higgins is regarded as a conservative area.  It has always voted that way.  Its settled affluence, extremely high education levels and orderly dignity suggests Tory.

In moving around the electorate campaigning over the last few weeks, the error of such assumptions has been dramatically proven.

On climate change – seemingly, the cause of the Left – Higgins citizens have been highly outspoken, expressing to me their horror at the Liberal Party’s denial/sceptic line.

If I can synthesize the comments of many, they say such slogans might play well to the self-interest of blue collar conservatives, but here, where people know how to think for themselves, it is seen as the politics of shallow cads.

They welcome the prospect of a low-carbon and low-pollution future.  They always viewed air pollution as a wasteful and dangerous abuse, but never had the science to support their observations.

Electric cars?  Bring it on!

A number said they hold shares in major companies but saw no difficulty in sacrificing earnings and dividends for a few years to migrate to an environmentally sound economy.

Voters made it very clear to me they accept the need to alter course on climate change and expect government to act quickly and decisively.

The real eye-opener came on Monday, with the election of Tony Abbott as Liberal leader.

The genteel voters of Higgins do not like this man, and while maintaining their decorum, were very rude about him.

They regard him as an interloper from the DLP, with his intrusive moralizing about what other people should and shouldn’t do.

Higgins voters reject his reactionary opinions: the free and open society in which we live has been hard fought for; we do not want to go backward.

The women in particular loathe his anti-abortion views.  All seemed to have a niece – always a niece – whose life would have been ruined but for the help of an understanding surgeon.

I wonder whether their evident dissatisfaction will change their votes?  We shall see on Saturday.

To the many Higgins voters who were kind enough to spare a moment for the Australian Democrats candidate, many thanks for your frankness and patience.

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Tony Abbott is an intelligent and articulate man.  But the hard-line Catholic conservative beliefs he articulates are poison to middle Australia – where governments are made and lost.

Were he to become Prime Minister, our country would be a centre of commerce, not a civilization.  He would enact a huge increase in economic inequality:

• Further tax cuts for high earners while ‘bracket creep’ raises taxes on middle incomes
• Major cuts to social security that help the poorest and weakest
• The emasculation of trade unions – a la Work Choices
• A counter-revolution in education where opportunity at all levels must be bought

In the dark days at the end of World War Two, Robert Menzies dusted off the famous essay ‘The Forgotten Man’ by William Graham Sumner (1840-1910)[1] and declared himself the champion of middle Australia.

His rationale was the workers were protected by the union movement and the wealthy could bloody well look after themselves.  His ‘Forgotten Man’ speeches galvanized the country after the suffering of war and put the Liberal Party in power for an entire generation.

By current standards, Menzies sounds like a conservative though he wasn’t – he was a liberal who oversaw the greatest lift in living standards in our history.  He embraced the economics of John Maynard Keynes and the small ‘L’ liberal credo that recognized government must do what individuals and business cannot do themselves, and that some activities, notably education, are too important to be decided solely by market prices.

The Liberal Party’s core constituents are business leaders and blue-collar conservatives, whose tenuous existence makes them fear change. Menzies used his stature to stare down their insistent demands for monopoly rights and social repression and instead provided the measured progress middle Australia requires of government.

The Emissions Trading Scheme that destroyed the Liberal leadership requires both these groups to change by  pricing carbon emissions.  For business this introduces an era of creative destruction as we replace our industrial kit with less damaging alternatives.  And blue-collar conservatives see only hard-to-evade costs, for benefits they cannot see, imagine or touch.

Malcolm Turnbull was leading his party down this path of measured progress.  Instead, they have plotted a different course and consigned themselves to oblivion.

The ALP will delightedly invite voters to kick the Liberal rump.  And we will.

David Collyer is currently contesting the Higgins by election for the Australian Democrats against Clive Hamilton for The Greens and Kelly O’Dwyer for the Liberal Party,

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The moral zealots are working overtime in Canberra pushing to see the gay and lesbian same sex union laws buried yet again.

This couldn’t happen if the ACT had the same standing as the Australian States – the responsibility and right to make binding laws on behalf of its citizens.  The ACT and the Northern Territory risk a Federal veto on any legislation a majority of parliamentarians may pass.  It’s way past time the territories were given the same constitutional standing State governments – and voters – expect and enjoy.

This disparity between territories and states means those living in the ACT and NT do not participate in or receive the same democratic freedoms the rest of Australia takes for granted.  This must change.  It will take a referendum to do it too.  Surely this is a referendum that would command a majority of votes in a majority of states, one Australia would pass.  The people in the territories are Australians too, after all.

Gay And Lesbian Rights

Naturally it follows, once the territories are given the same respect  – and recognition and autonomy – as the states, we will see laws such as for gay and lesbian marriages in the ACT proclaimed, out of the hands of the moralising minority that somehow manage to populate the federal parliament.

We’d see it taken out of the hands of the conservative crusaders who claim to be christians (none of this newfangled compassion nonsense) shuffling around the corridors of parliament pushing one eyed, “our size fits all”, depraved, dishonest and dissolute doctrines.

I suggest to the gay and lesbian rights movement that to achieve their goals, autonomy for the territories would be the vehicle they need to accelerate their freedoms.  This is common ground for their community and the heterosexual majority

This is a broader set of rights.  At the end of the day, we all win.

Scott Kane

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The fashion industry, notably the Ralph Lauren company, is out of control.

For years now society has demonstrated it does not find the ultra thin bodies preferred by the fashion world attractive.  Authoritative research has proved these thin models we are all familiar with have a destructive psychological impact on women, particularly young women and teens, and can lead to psychological disorders such as anorexia nervosa and bulimia.

The data has been collated, analysed, charted and presented.  The verdict of public opinion is well and truly in.

What is Ralph Lauren’s response?  To release a clearly Photoshopped image of a model whose head is larger than her pelvis.  (If you click on the image you can zoom in)

Arguably both of the images, side by side, have been Photoshopped.  But look closely at the one on the left.  Her skin is a superfluous accessory.  This lady, through image manipulation, has been rendered skeletal.  Not that she was in any way large or even average to begin with.  One female model – again a mere slip in stature and weight – Ms Hamilton, said Ralph Lauren did not renew her contract because she was “too large.”

This is a disgrace.  Business has a responsibility to not only sell its wares, but to also operate within what is socially and culturally acceptable.  This cynically modified image is neither.  To display a full grown woman – after tricking it to proportions no woman could stay alive with – purely to create an ideal based on the “desirable body shape” of somebody with a lot of problems (Ralph Lauren?), is bizarre, socially unacceptable and sick.

I usually hesitate long and hard before advocating government regulation of business.   But living people must come first.  My own daughters are exposed to this moral deception – every hour of every day.  Your daughters, girlfriends, wives and mothers are dismissed and denigrated by an industry that has no respect for the health of the people they are selling stuff to.  It is no better than the tobacco companies selling poison and death by the packet.

Ultimately, we  pay for the mental anguish and health care costs of our loved ones that are caused by the deliberate excesses of companies whose moral and cultural compass has been sent to orbit Pluto.

It must change.  Legislation if necessary.  Clearly, they are not going to yield on their own.

But then I wonder “Why portray women like this?  What happened to you people as children?”

The rights of  women as individuals have come a long way.  But this kind of imagery demonstrates how much further there is to travel.

What can we say, except maybe: “ET go home!”

A remarkable similarity.

.

Scott Kane

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