White supremacist neo-nazi group ‘Stormfront’ hero Andrew Bolt, is now by inference arguing that Rudd had lured the latest batch of boat people to what proved ultimately to be the death of some of them because Rudd had scrapped John Howard’s blatantly racist Temporary Protection Visa (TPV) program. According to Bolt’s twisted logic, the scrapping of the TPVs was an open invitation to those wishing to seek refugee status in Australia should continue to do so.
Bolt, as well as others, thinks these people are ‘illegal immigrants’, but are they? Surely coming by boat as they do without visas seeking refugee status makes them, well… refugees. Illegal immigrants are those that have come to Australia with the intention of coming here to live but arrived here by pretending to be something they are not – like tourists. At least so-called ‘boatpeople’ have no pretensions about who they are. Of course, if they happen to be white Zimbabwean farmers tossed off theirs farms there’s no problem getting settled into Australia – even for those that arrive here on tourist visas – all they have to do is get in touch with the local Farmers Federation office on arrival and they’ll handle the rest. But if you arrive here as a very desperate and genuine refugee from Iraq or Afghanistan or wherever on a leaky boat then don’t expect any sympathy from the likes of leftover White Australia racist loonies like Andrew Bolt.
Freedom of speech is one thing but to abuse it in order to peddle Howardesque Nazi-like racist propaganda is something else. Even Murdoch should realise that this revolting and blatant racist brings nothing but disrepute to Australia in the eyes of the rest of the world.
Monday, April 20, 2009
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
They're not refugees if they come from Indonesia.
ReplyDeleteRefugee law states that your fourth, fifth, or sixth safe port of call means you're not classified as a refugee.