Laurie,
There are many people who sincerely hold a different view from you and they hold many
varied viewpoints.
This does not make them John Howards. Calling them John Howards does not advance your
cause, even if
passionately held.
The hallmark of a democracy is that people are entitled to hold and express their own
point of view. We may
not always agree but we have to respect that right.
Taking responsibility for our shameful past should not depend on whether we are a
monarchy or a republic.
There is nothing holding us back from taking responsibility for that if we sincerely
wish to do so.
My personal wish is that, as a people, we would be as passionate about changing the
fact that genocide is
legal in Australia, that we are in violation of the UN charter on human rights, and
that many Aboriginal
Australians have to endure 4th world living and justice standards. There is nothing in
our political system
preventing us from doing something to change that. If we did, it would be a greater
source of pride in the
eyes of the world than merely changing our politcal system.
Off the soapbox....;-)
Trudy
Laurie Forde wrote:
> The nonsensical reasoning here is---because we are a nation of John Howards,
> we should keep the Monarchy until we somehow cease being a nation of John
> Howards and face our shameful past, thereby becoming whole enough to have
> our own Head of State.
>
> How about---if we change our most obvious symbol---our HOS from a foreign
> Monarch to an Australian we may gain enough fortitude to take responibility
> for our national identity, including our shameful past, and do something
> about it?
>
> Laurie.
> --------------
>
> Trudy Bray wrote..........
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Trudy Bray <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> To: news-clip <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> Date: Tuesday, November 02, 1999 9:04 AM
> Subject: The Age: Voting from the heart on the republic
>
> And yet another point of view... --- Trudy
> ===============================
>
> THE AGE
>
> Voting from the heart on the republic
> By DAVID TACEY
> Tuesday 2 November 1999
>
> MANY Australians, probably the majority of us, will vote no to the republic
> for
> basically non-rational and spiritual reasons. These reasons have been
> ignored in the
> clamor to outline the technicalities that have some lawyers in knots and
> tangles.
>
> Citizens will not be casting their votes on the basis of technicalities:
> they will be
> voting according to gut feeling and emotion.
>
> The gut feeling of many of us is that our replacement constitutional model
> cannot be
> trusted, partly because it has left so much human reality out of account. It
> is not that
> we distrust our own kind in positions of high authority, but that we doubt
> the
> authenticity, depth, and stability of a system that makes no attempt to
> connect with
> enduring spiritual and moral values.
>
> While the heads of many Australians are secular, rational, and receptive to
> the
> logistical chatter of glib republicans, the hearts of many of us remain
> unconvinced by
> the rhetoric and will vote against Peter Costello's "common sense" on
> 6November.
>
> It is not that we are necessarily pro-British or conservative, but that we
> sense
> something vitally important is missing. The symbols of the state need to be
> suggestive of a larger reality. They must lift us out of the mundane and
> connect us
> with values that are larger than life.
>
> This transcendent aspect of public symbols can hardly be overestimated. The
> genuine symbol, wrote the psychologist Carl Jung, is the "best possible
> expression of
> something as yet unknown".
>
> A sense of awe and mystery must attend to a public symbol, so that it
> attracts human
> interest and commands respect. Ultimately, social authority can be believed
> only if
> there is a sense that it is connected to a source that is greater than
> itself. Until we
> locate that greatness in our own cultural context, we naturally remain
> attached to a
> borrowed greatness.
>
> It is easy for rational minds to bad-mouth the monarchy and to talk about
> inherited
> privilege, unfair advantages and a queen too far away to care.
>
> But the transcendent dimension afforded by the monarchy has much appeal. It
> has
> continuity, with kings, queens, rituals, ceremonies, and other symbolic
> elements that
> trail off into the mists of time. Cohesive social structures are based on
> such irrational
> symbols, encouraging citizens to form their own emotional identifications
> with these
> historical symbols.
>
> Progressives protest that this is nostalgic and sentimental attachment to
> the past, but
> these mythic elements have real value for the soul. We think of the monarch
> not only
> as the head of state, but as the head of the Church of England.
>
> I am neither English by descent nor Anglican by faith, but I find these
> elements
> attractive. Central to the monarchy is a deep connection between people and
> their
> God, or between ordinary life and their dreams of eternity. These are
> important
> symbols, and they provide a point of stability in an unstable world. They
> provide a
> powerful tradition of mystery and elevation in a world that has become
> appallingly
> flat, secular and bland. Will that blandness merely be enshrined and
> extended by our
> current republican model?
>
> The idea of an Australian head of state does not arouse our imaginations,
> because it
> is not clear what mystique the presidential role will carry, and what
> transcendent
> values will be embodied in the new position. When we think of an Australian
> head of
> state, we imagine merely a man in a suit and tie or a woman in a frock. When
> we
> think of the republic, we see a new kind of bureaucracy, and people working
> efficiently, but without transcendent meaning.
>
> Our current images are too banal, and if the soul of the nation is to get
> excited about
> a shift to a republic, we must know what vision the presidential role will
> serve and
> what great values the republic will strive to uphold. The sociologist Robert
> Bellah
> wrote: "No one has changed a great nation without appealing to its soul."
>
> Australia cannot manage a transcendental public symbol at present because we
> have
> not done enough soul work. White Australia's traditional symbols are
> European, and
> they relate to an ancient past that progressives say is irrelevant to our
> present
> context.
>
> But the local or indigenous symbols of transcendence are Aboriginal and are
> therefore not available to Euro-Australia.
>
> However, a spiritual dialogue could and should take place between
> Euro-Australia
> and Aboriginal Australia. It is from such dialogue that new symbols will
> emerge. Until
> such dialogue occurs, we are still essentially a colonial nation, and are
> not mature
> enough to have our own symbols of higher authority.
>
> In this way, politics, morality, and social justice are intimately tied up
> with spiritual
> questions of meaning and identity. We cannot have local transcendental
> symbols until
> reconciliation has taken place between the races in Australia.
>
> Symbols will emerge, in time, like fruit from the tree of the Australian
> nation. But we
> cannot display wonderful fruit until we have tended the tree and allowed the
> roots of
> this country to be repaired and nurtured.
>
> Not only is the soul of this country afflicted by present injustice and
> unfairness, but it
> is burdened by the memory of great suffering, conflict, massacres, and
> brutality.
>
> Our nation's sorrows have yet to be honestly recognised or consciously
> mourned.
> There is enormous unconscious grief in the Australian psyche, and this grief
> is
> blocking our way into the future.
>
> It is only by facing our wounds with integrity that the wounds will close
> over and the
> future will be allowed to be born. In this sense, our impatient and
> rancorous cry for a
> republic is premature. It is like wanting the prize without putting in the
> hard work.
>
> The same John Howard who refuses to apologise for our past, who rejects the
> so-called "black armband" view of history, is the Prime Minister who
> advocates
> clinging to our European symbols of political and spiritual identity. There
> is some
> consistency in this position. Genuine Australian symbols of identity will
> not arise until
> we have integrated our own experiences, until the soul of this country is
> reconciled
> with itself. Until then, we will remain existentially unsure of who and what
> we are.
>
> There is integrity in our uncertainty. For me, a no vote means that we
> recognise we
> still have a long way to go, and we refuse the banal, bureaucratic, and
> empty
> symbols that are on offer this time around. I will vote no to say yes for a
> better
> Australia.
>
> David Tacey is associate professor of English at La Trobe University.
> E-mail:
> [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
> *************************************************************************
> This posting is provided to the individual members of this group without
> permission from the copyright owner for purposes of criticism, comment,
> scholarship and research under the "fair use" provisions of the Federal
> copyright laws and it may not be distributed further without permission of
> the copyright owner, except for "fair use."
>
> -------------------------------------------------------
> RecOzNet2 has a page @ http://www.green.net.au/recoznet2 and is archived at
>http://www.mail-archive.com/
> To unsubscribe from this list, mail [EMAIL PROTECTED], and in the body
> of the message, include the words: unsubscribe announce or click here
> mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=unsubscribe%20announce
> This posting is provided to the individual members of this group without permission
>from the
> copyright owner for purposes of criticism, comment, scholarship and research under
>the "fair
> use" provisions of the Federal copyright laws and it may not be distributed further
>without
> permission of the copyright owner, except for "fair use."
>
> RecOzNet2 is archived for members @ http://www.mail-archive.com/
-------------------------------------------------------
RecOzNet2 has a page @ http://www.green.net.au/recoznet2 and is archived at
http://www.mail-archive.com/
To unsubscribe from this list, mail [EMAIL PROTECTED], and in the body
of the message, include the words: unsubscribe announce or click here
mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=unsubscribe%20announce
This posting is provided to the individual members of this group without permission
from the
copyright owner for purposes of criticism, comment, scholarship and research under
the "fair
use" provisions of the Federal copyright laws and it may not be distributed further
without
permission of the copyright owner, except for "fair use."
RecOzNet2 is archived for members @ http://www.mail-archive.com/
