RED JOS

1 SEPTEMBER 2006

Letter to The Age:

Steve Biko died in detention in Pretoria, South Africa, on Monday 12 September 1977. The South African Minister of Justice Jimmy Kruger said "his death leaves me cold".

Another time, another place. The Australian attorney-general in 2006, Philip Ruddock, announced at the end of August 2006 that a control order had been placed on Jack Thomas, just days after his appeal against his conviction for terrorism offences had been overturned by the Australian legal system.

It is so easy to introduce legislation after frightening the population by repeatedly saying they are under threat from whatever the government of the day deems politically useful for re-election, but not so easy to get rid of the legislation when a different government is in place and basically accepts the original premise on which it was based.

Australia is rapidly approaching the South African apartheid style legislation of banning orders, re-arrests after release from an initial arrest and ongoing police state manifestations.

The assault on Jack Thomas's liberty after a court acquittal is tantamount to saying the government has the power, and will legislate.

"Oh what a tangled web we weave-------!"

10 DECEMBER 2006

Letter to The Age:

The federal government's behaviour in relation to David Hicks is an international crime and disgrace. It diminishes us all as human beings to live in a country which can be guilty of such human rights abuses and which does not live up to charters to which it is a signatory at the United Nations.

Philip Ruddock's behaviour in relation to David Hicks is sounding very much like that of Jimmy Kruger, Minister of Justice (sic) on the death of Steve Biko in 1977 in South Africa when he infamously stated that "Biko's death leaves me cold!"

Bring Hicks home now! If there are any charges to be brought in Australia - which so far evidence suggests there aren't - then let him be tried in an Australian court. His detention without trial for 5 years is a crime against humanity.

19 DECEMBER 2006

This one DID get published in The Age's Green Guide!!

SBS may finally have lost the plot completely. Tonight (Monday 18 December 2006) the 6.30pm news bulletin had advertisements in the middle of the news. This is intolerable and unacceptable, and SBS has lost another viewer. If I want commercials when I watch tv I can watch channels 7,9 and 10. I choose not to, and SBS will now join that trio. With ABC making sport the main news item, they have lost the plot too!

Thank goodness for www!!!

20 DECEMBER 2006

Well, SBS finally lost me tonight (Tuesday 19 December 2006).

Adverts during the news and Cutting Edge!

No thanks!

Mannie De Saxe

20 DECEMBER 2006

20 DECEMBER 2006

Well, SBS finally lost me tonight (Tuesday 19 December 2006).

Adverts during the news and Cutting Edge!

No thanks!

Mannie De Saxe

21 December 2006

S

I await the spiel with great interest!

M

20 DECEMBER 2006

On 20 Dec 2006 at 15:51, Sally Begbie wrote:

G

Send the speil.

r S

20 DECEMBER 2006

Well, SBS finally lost me tonight (Tuesday 19 December 2006).

Adverts during the news and Cutting Edge!

No thanks!

Mannie De Saxe

21 DECEMBER 2006

Dear Mannie De Saxe

Clearly the festive season is upon us and our best wishes to you. But to more serious matters...

Thank you for your email concerning the introduction of advertising within SBS Television programs. The Managing Director has asked that I respond to your complaint.

SBS has taken this course of action following a great deal of consideration and investigation. It was not an easy decision to make, but the alternative was far less palatable. SBS could continue with its current format, but its ability to commission quality Australian productions and to purchase the world's best films, television programs and sporting fixtures would become more and more restricted due to limited Government funding and the prospect of diminished advertising revenue as a result of competition from Pay TV, the Internet and other media.

SBS obtains about 80% of its funds from Government. But in the May budget SBS suffered a $3m shortfall in its appropriation for this current year (excluding digital transmission and distribution costs) and received no extra funds at all for program making.

The remainder of SBS funding comes from advertising revenue. Even though that amount is relatively small it is vitally important revenue that goes exclusively to the purchase, commissioning and production of programs.

Under its Act, SBS is obligated to operate in an efficient and cost-effective manner and, importantly, it is required to actively pursue funding opportunities independent of Government funding.

Since 1991, SBS Television has broadcast a maximum of five minutes of ads per hour between programs and in natural breaks. This is far less than the average 13-15 minutes of advertising permitted on the commercial television networks.

Until now, SBS has broadcast up to five minutes of ads as well as several minutes of program promotions in a single block between programs, meaning 6-10 minutes would elapse before the next program began. During this time, we consistently lost more than 50% of our viewers. They would simply change channels or switch off.

With smaller audiences, SBS's advertising rates (already well below the commercial networks) had to be reduced still further. The result has been a curtailment of our program-making capabilities because less money from ads means less money for the commissioning and the production of original programs.

Under the new format the maximum of five minutes of ads per hour still applies, but the ads will be spread across the hour in three separate breaks, each containing 90 seconds of commercials. In half-hour programs, there will be two 60-second commercial breaks.

This will restore true commercial value to SBS's ad breaks. By placing short ads within programs, when SBS reaches its peak audiences, our advertising rates can be increased. We estimate that this will raise at least $10m in the first 12 months of operation. All of this additional revenue will go into program making and the commissioning of programs from independent Australian producers.

With this extra revenue we will launch a one hour news program in January that will expand our coverage of international and national news. The bulk of the additional funds will go to the commissioning of quality Australian drama, documentaries and other programs.

By dramatically reducing the time between programs, we believe SBS audiences will be encouraged to stay, especially because the in-program breaks will include program promotions about forthcoming programs. It is important that information about other programs on SBS reaches the largest possible audience. Currently these messages, in the form of promos, are lost in the middle of lengthy and cluttered breaks between programs. Too often our audience tells us they would have watched a particular program "if only I had known it was on". The placement of promos in a more accessible place helps overcome that communication failure.

I understand your concerns regarding in-program breaks, but these changes will enable us to continue to provide our viewers with the highest quality and most diverse programming available on free-to-air television in Australia.

Yours sincerely

Georgie McClean

Policy and Research Manager

28 DECEMBER 2006

S

Spiel - spelt incorrectly by you - not surprisingly - means "a glib speech or story, esp. a salesman's patter". (Concise Oxford Dictionary)

What I was sent was "spiel", no more, no less.

SBS has become a laughing stock - a shadow of its former self.

The federal government has a surplus of 11.5 billion dollars, and SBS resorts to cheap and nasty advertising in the middle of its programmes?

There used to be some excellent programmes on SBS. Now we can have www downloads of material worth watching without the rubbish and the rubbish stories pitched by SBS for those of us who are deemed stupid.

Thanks but no thanks.

M

S

I await the spiel with great interest!

M

On 20 Dec 2006 at 15:51, Sally Begbie wrote:

G

Send the speil.

S

Well, SBS finally lost me tonight (Tuesday 19 December 2006).

Adverts during the news and Cutting Edge!

No thanks!

Mannie De Saxe

8 JANUARY 2007

Dear Mary, Anton, Lee Lin, Rena, Amruta and the SBS World News team,

Thank you all for your presentation of the best news bulletin on Australian television over so many years.

It is with a great deal of sorrow that I am no longer watching the news, because of management's decision to have adverts in the middle of the bulletins. There is no substitute and I will now have to rely on world news via the internet to avoid having my news bulletins interrupted.

Best wishes to you all with an SBS management that has obviously failed in its lobbying of the current federal government for more funding when this same government has a surplus during this financial year of something like 11.5 billion dollars, much of it coming from pensioner taxpayers like me who pay our taxes through gst!

Fond regards,

Mannie De Saxe

21 JANUARY 2007

The South African minister of "justice" (sic)- in 1977, was Jimmy Kruger. Kruger announced that (Steve) Biko's death was caused by a hunger strike - adding, in a phrase that has gone down in the annals of apartheid crudity, that "his death leaves me cold".

The Australian attorney-general Philip Ruddock stated in the Sunday Age on 7 January 2007 - five years after the US bought Hicks from the Northern Alliance for $1000 - that "the US government has given us certain assurances. We expect them to be honoured." Ruddock has further stated that the Government is "deeply unhappy" about the time the process has taken.

David Hicks is showing no sign of mental distress which would affect his ability to face a trial, Australia's foreign minister Alexander Downer has said.

All experts(sic) in their fields - and we anticipate justice and a speedy end to David Hicks's ordeal?

Don't hold your collective breaths!

21 JANUARY 2007

I get it now! Amanda's name is really Blundstone and she has the off-shore solution!

9 FEBRUARY 2007

"Perhaps next time any of our Aussie larrikins who used to be cute freckle-faced little boys travel to the Middle East to take up an apprenticeship in terrorism with the bad guys, they will remember what happened to Hicks!" (Michael Burd, The Age 9 February 2007)

I assume Burd includes all those from Australia who go to "take up an apprenticeship in terrorism" with Israel in its ongoing apartheid-style oppression of the Palestinians?

Mannie De Saxe, Jews against Oppression and Occupation

7 MARCH 2007

This letter was sent to The Age and not published. I don't really wonder why!

In 2005 the Jewish Virtual Library listed 102,000 Jews in Australia, 0.51% of the population. Colin Rubenstein and his Zionist mates need to get their facts right.

Antony Loewenstein put the cat among the pigeons with the publication of his book, " My Israel Question" . Since then many Jews have realized that they can speak out about Israeli oppression and occupation and get their voices heard.

Daniel Lewis (7 March 2007) gets the Australian Jewish population wrong. He says many signatories to Antony's document get letters published in The Australian Jewish News (aka Israeli Zionist Times) weekly. What he doesn't say is that many signatories never get their letters published because the owner and editor disapprove of the views expressed in the letters. This also goes for The Age over letters too critical of Israel of which the editors disapprove.

At the time of writing this letter late in the day on Wednesday 7 March 2007, more than 300 people had signed the document, and more are expected to sign in the next few days and weeks.

And Jason Foster (7 March), many of us do NOT support the two-state cop-out but believe that we need to build the strength of opposition to the Israeli government's continuing apartheid style oppression of the Palestinian people, issues freely discussed in the Israeli media but silenced for the most part by the Australian media.

Colin Rubenstein has got this issue wrong as ever, but gets his views published in newspapers. Antony Loewenstein has gained a voice for many silenced Jews in Australia by getting HIS and our voices heard.

Mannie De Saxe, Jews Against Oppression and Occupation

8 MARCH 2007

This letter was sent toThe Age on 8 March 2007 - it is unlikely to be published either!

UNREPRESENTATIVE SWILL

The claim by two Jewish groups that " The Australian Jewish Community's elected representative bodies are open and democratic, which is why the claims of the so-called "Independent Australian Jewish Voices" should not be treated at face value" is a blatant lie!

Who elected them, who do they represent, and how were the votes recorded?

The Australian Electoral Commission does not have a recording of all Jewish voters in Australia and does not conduct elections to these so-called elected representative bodies. As Paul Keating so infamously said, these bodies are "unrepresentative swill" and are certainly not democratic!

When a Jewish gay group requested affiliation to the Jewish Community Council of Victoria, they were infamously refused - just as John Howard refuses recognition of the human rights of sexual minority groups in Australia.

Jewish minority voices are not heard in this country, and we now have the opportunity of changing all this. We are making progress and our voices will be heard more and more. As of yesterday there were already approximately 400 signatories and the numbers are growing. How many signatories are there in the abovementioned "representative bodies"?

Mannie De Saxe, Jews Against Oppression and Occupation

14 MARCH 2007

On 26 February 2007 I sent the following letter to the Sydney Star Observer (SSO). I thought if they didn't publish it in the weeks leading up to Mardi Gras they would publish it afterwards, but how wrong can one be! The SSO is obviously joining all the other media in self-censorship - and more so of items seen by their editorial board as being "politically incorrect":

Mannie De Saxe, Lesbian and Gay Solidarity,

It really is time for Mardi Gras to take a long, cold shower! The incident at Fair Day involving security and CAAH and the calling of police is a disgrace. An organization which grew out of a grass roots activist and protest demonstration in 1978 during which the police behaved in the most brutal and disgusting way stops an activist group from moving around the grounds on Fair Day with its own political agenda.

If Mardi Gras does this sort of thing on Fair Day the future of the organization looks very bleak indeed.

Next, it would seem as if Mardi Gras will get upset by some of this week's letters to the SSO complaining about the proposed David Hicks float and accusing David Hicks of all sorts of terrible crimes. Maybe the letter-writers ought also to go and have a few cold showers while they contemplate the fact that David Hicks has not yet been tried in a properly constituted court of law, and yet they are saying he is guilty already. What is happening with the Hicks case is representative of what has happened to human rights laws in Australia where there used to be a presumption of innocence until proved guilty.

Will Mardi Gras ban the float?

It would be a good idea if all concerned would go and read Richard Flanagan's book, "The Unknown Terrorist" and think again about jumping to the conclusions they have.

Shame on you all!

Mannie De Saxe, Lesbian and Gay Solidarity (formerly Gay Solidarity Group, GSG)

27 MARCH 2007

On 26/03/2007, at 4:52 PM, josken_at_zipworld_com_au wrote to the editor of the Sydney Star Observer:

Dear Stacy,

..........and I quote: "The Star's letters to the editor are not selected because of political views or pro - or anti-Mardi Gras bias, or commercial interests."

The David Hicks story continues in the letters columns of the SSO - we received the latest issue No. 859 today, Monday 26 March 2007, and I would be interested to know what reason there was for rejecting my letter. It was not too long, didn't have humour (unfortunately the topic is NOT funny), was clear and relevant, gave full name and address of letter-writer and group.

But maybe the politics was too hot to handle???

Anyway, below is the letter once again for you to tell me what's wrong with it. You stated you are always happy to cop criticism during business hours. This will get to you before 5pm today - still business hours?

Regards,

Mannie De Saxe

And on 27 March 2007 back came the following reply!:

Mannie,

If you can't see that we've given both sides of the debate a fair hearing then there's something seriously wrong with you.

Stacy

The letter referred to is above dated 26 February 2007 and sent again on 14 March 2007.

22 MAY 2007

The Age received another letter from me which is, for them, unpublishable, so here it is!:

Alan Freedman denigrates David Hicks and those who support him \par by attacking "perceived enemies" both here and abroad. (Letters, \par 22/5)

\par \par It would be interesting to hear his views on those Australian men \par who go to Israel - a foreign country - to fight against the Palestinians\par - who are not fighting against Australia.

\par \par When David Hicks made whatever decisions he is being accused of \par - by those who haven't even given him the opportunity of hearing \par him in his own country - the countries he was involved with at the \par time were NOT Australia's enemies.

\par \par I think Freedman needs to explain himself in greater detail before \par flinging his loose accusations.

\par \par Mannie De Saxe, Signatory to IAJV, JAOO ( Independent Australian \par Jewish Voices, Jews Against Oppression and Occupation)

15 NOVEMBER 2007

The Age, yet again, sees its way clear to not publish my letters - they are too objectionable for The Age editors, poor dears, who have such sensitive, right-wing reactionary, blimkered views of the world in which we live! Never mind! I WILL PUBLISH MY LETTER!! and here it is:

It was estimated that up to 50,000 people took part in the rally on Sunday 11 November 2007 - "Walk Against Warming". It is impossible to believe that this number of men, women and children would all be socialists (letters 13/11/07).

Ben Coleman suggests that the socialist cause is dying, but doesn't have figures to substantiate his claim. There are thousands, probably millions of people world-wide who may not belong to any specific socialist organisations, but consider themselves to be socialists.

I should know, because I am one of them. I was at the rally on Sunday, and was encouraged to notice that there were so many like-minded people concerned at what our non-socialist politicians and free marketeers around the world are inflicting on us and future generations.

Coleman should remove the mote in his eye and join those who got a great deal of satisfaction from the rally, knowing that we were with so many socialists and non-socialists who know that urgent attention is needed to slow global warming.

28 DECEMBER 2007

Mannie De Saxe, 2/12 Murphy Grove, Preston, Vic 3072

The incarceration of David Hicks in Guantanamo Bay for over 5 years, and the treatment he received there is, mostly, the responsibility of the Howard government.

The editorial in The Age (29/12/07) discusses the disgraceful behaviour of the Howard government, but no mention is made of the disgraceful role the ALP opposition and the media played in this tragic saga, and the blame attached to them because of their silence.

In order to understand the damage inflicted on David Hicks and other US detainees, Naomi Klein's book "The Shock Doctrine" tells of the forms of torture used at Guantanamo Bay and how they came about.

David Hicks and the others have probably been damaged irreparably and our governments and media are directly responsible and should be held to account.

For the new ALP government to support a control order on Hicks similar to the one on Jack Thomas is a black mark on this "new" government, and is totally unacceptable.

18 FEBRUARY 2008

30 years ago, when Neville Wran was Premier of News South Wales, there was a fuel crisis when it was feared the world was running out of oil faster than had previously been anticipated.

Wran reacted to the crisis by establishing the Energy Authority of NSW which had, as one of its mandates, research into alternative fuels for motor vehicles.

I was one of the engineers involved with the establishment of this division, which received funding from the federal and state governments from the late 1970s for research.

We established a fleet of electric vehicles - about 10 altogether - and we called them "The First Fleet". We continued to test electric vehicles until governments decided the crisis was over and the funding dried up in the early 1980s.

Part of our research into alternative energy in vehicles was the use of rape seed oil in diesels. South Africa and other countries were already experimenting, quite successfully, with sunflower oil and other vegetable oils, with a fair amount of success.

All of our research came to an end by 1985, and Australia is now, nearly 30 years later, reinventing the wheel! (Gordon Drennan, Letters, 16/2 and Letters, 18/2) Will we never learn?

Mannie De Saxe, Research Engineer (retired)

15 APRIL 2008

I wrote this letter to The Age newspaper on 15 April 2008, but the editor, Andrew Jaspan, a right-wing reactionary bigot if ever there was one, doesn't approve of the idea that there is anyone out there who would dare to criticise Thabo Mbeki, who, with the aid of his health minister (sic) Manto Tshabalala-Msimang has been responsible for more deaths in South Africa in 9 years over the AIDS crisis that Mugabe has in Zimbabwe in nearly 30 years from murder, thuggery, thievery, AIDS and other associated crimes against humanity, while the world has sat back and watched both countries behave in the most criminal of behaviours without lifting any fingers to stop them.

South Africa is a basket case in a different way from Mugabe's basket case, but the outcomes are the same - impoverished diseased populations and huge criminal classes profiting from a lack of employment opportunities and other social diseases. Educational, health and housing disasters together with an absolute desire to ensure capitalist enrichment and widening of the gaps between the very rich and the very poor assist both countries in their slides to disaster. Both countries could have been models for the rest of Africa, but it was not to be!

No, Mark Brooks (The Age 15 April), NOT Mugabe and Mbeki, monster and monstered, BUT Mugabe and Mbeki, monster and monster! Mbeki has been responsible for thousands more deaths from AIDS than Mugabe has from murders, disappearances and thuggery.

BUT Mbeki is also responsible for Mugabe still being in power by supporting him through thick and thin!

Mannie De Saxe

20 MAY 2008

This was just too much for The Age's letters editor!!:

After 12 long years, the Liberal Party is at last seeing the tunnel at the end of the light!

27 MAY 2008

Back in the apartheid years if one arrived by air in South Africa and landed at Jan Smuts airport, the announcement on the plane said: "We are about to land at Jan Smuts airport. Please turn your clocks back 100 years." This was in the era when the book "Black Beauty" was banned. Ah, yes, Lady Chatterley's Lover too!

In 2008, when landing at an international airport in Australia, the announcement on the plane is similar: "We are about to land at ---------- international airport. Please turn your clocks back 100 years". This is in the era when ANYTHING is banned with the approval of the country's prime minister and other federal, state and local government politicians. This is in an era when anything can be banned and censorship takes hold of the fear-ridden country. Talk about spooks and ghosts!

Welcome to 21st century Australia.

15 JULY 2008

The Age newspaper's blacklist probably has so many names of people whose letters they refuse to publish under any circumstances that it must be quite a problem looking through them every day to ensure no mistkaes are made. In my case, they NEVER make a mistake. However, I have my own letters page and add to it when the usual occurs and my latest letter remains unpublished. This one, as many others, speaks for itself!!

There is a fascinating irony in the fact that those in Christian churches who protest loudly about the ordination of women and gays are dressed in the fanciest of drag costumes.

13 AUGUST 2008

There were many letters in response to Jacqueline Tomlins' article in The Age, and of course, as we know, several don't get published. Here is one of them:

At 81 I have read loads of rubbish in my time, but the homophobic letter from Albert Riley (13/08/08) plumbs the depths.

Riley attacks a lesbian mother because she is not the biological mother of her partner's children, stating that she "chooses to lie to her children".

Does he employ the same argument for hetero people who adopt children? Does he employ the same argument for people who partner with other people who have children, and adopt those children as their own?

These are only two instances of family variations which don't make liars out of the people concerned who are NOT the biological parents of those children.

But I suppose it is all right provided the people involved are heterosexual.

Homophobia is never very far below the surface and our politicians ensure it remains on the agenda as far as same-sex relationships are concerned.

The struggle will continue until we all have equal rights, not separate rights as in apartheid South Africa where it was "separate but equal"! Of course it never was!

Mannie De Saxe, Lesbian and Gay Solidarity, Melbourne

15 SEPTEMBER 2008

I really should know better, but I suppose it is the habit of a lifetime and one not easily broken. My latest letter to The Age concerned two taboo topics for the Victorian government, abortion and euthanasia - look how quickly they killed off the proposed bill recently on euthanasia - althought the abortion bill may actually get through! Here is my latest letter:

My father died at the age of 31 in excrutiating agony from Myasthenia Gravis. When he died in 1930 there was nothing available to treat this disease. His mother died at the age of 25 from a botched abortion. She virtually bled to death. This happened in 1902 in Melbourne. These events are of course not un-linked as they had consequences for all concerned.

At 82 I am fortunate not to have had any life-threatening diseases or illnesses. The same can not be said for countless friends and relatives over the years.

Should my circumstances change I will do everything in my power to ensure that I am not dictated to by any religious right or government organisation as to how I am to die. It is my choice and I will choose.

If euthanasia is required, so shall it be.

As to abortion, women have suffered, and continue to suffer, at the hands of those moralists who would have a say in their situations. Women alone shall decide their fates and it is time the legality of these issues be put to rest by legislative decisions now!

3 MARCH 2009

It doesn't ever get any better! The Age is now - and probably always has been - a cat's paw for the zionist lobby and any criticism of Israel is not to be tolerated, particularly when it recommends a boycott of Israel. It shouldn't, but it does continue to amaze how strong that lobby continues to be despite the mounting evidence of Israel as a state out of control and thumbing its nose at its chief sponsors, the USA!

Peter Rodgers (The Age, 3 March 2009) left out the main item from his article about George Marshall's role as President Barack Obama's Middle East Envoy.

As soon as the United States of America stops funding Israel, there will be peace between Israel and Palestine within a very short period of time.

Various organisations exist demanding BDS - Boycott, Disinvestment, Sanctions - against Israel.

In the end these issues helped bring about the end of apartheid South Africa, which lost an enormous amount of capital as a consequence of BDS.

It may not bring Israel to the negotiating table immediately, but it will certainly hasten peace negotiations.

10 OCTOBER 2009

Letter to the Sydney Star Observer:

On 24 September 2009 ACON held an Honours Awards night to bestow their annual awards for 2009 to Graeme Browning and Ken Davis.

Ken has been one of the leading gay activists for gay liberation and gay rights for well over 30 years and we anticipated that the SSO would acknowledge the awards night with a full right-up of the event.

Instead we get a panel with two small paragraphs and a photo and we are told there are more photos elsewhere in the paper -issue 990 dated Wednesday 30 September 2009.

If this is the best that the SSO is capable of for a report on two of the major players of the last decade and more on the gay activism front, then the SSO is failing the community we thought it was there to serve.

We trust that future reports of events of this nature will be more comprehensive and representative of those who have worked so hard for equal rights for us all, or must we wait for death, as in the case of Henry Collier who was up there with the best of them, for the recognition they so richly deserve?

30 NOVEMBER 2009

Letter to The Age newspaper:

Did we miss the report in The Age about the gay marriage demonstrations which took place around Australia on Saturday 28 November 2009?

The previous day The Age ran it's daily readers' poll asking whether people approved of gay marriage and the result was 18% against and 82% for with over 3,000 votes registered.

So it is rather surprising that the paper did not see fit to report on the rallies around the country.

No wonder the print media are losing favour - anything is news provided it is not about gay, lesbian, transgender and HIV/AIDS issues.

Homophobia is alive and well and living in a newsroom not far from home!

10 MAY 2012

Letter to The Age supplement, the Green Guide, unpublished:

ABC1!ABC1!ABC!1 and the same with the promos - over and over and over again.

The ABC must surely be aware that those who watch its programmes - a diminishing number I would wager - are tired of being treated like a bunch of brainless idiots and expect something better than that with which we are being fed.

The same with radio and other promos where the voice of the announcer is drowned out with music which is so loud, it's deafening. We have complained about this for years and been ignored.

We are relying more and more on DVDs and other forms of entertainment, to replace the vacuous repeats and repeating to which we are being treated.

Grow up - ABC!!!

3 SEPTEMBER 2012

Letter to the Sunday Age on 3 September 2012 in response to an editorial - the letter was, of course, not published!:

Catherine Deveny is right, you are wrong! (editorial 2 September 2012). You stated "Unfortunately, it was an element that marred the series" referring to her persistent assertion that Reith had blood on his hands. Had he? Has he?

On the contrary, it made the series! Reith and Howard demonised asylum seekers with the "children overboard" episode and the media latched onto this abuse and continue it to this day.

Reith has behaved like a typical politician - all spin and no substance - and Deveny cornered him and he wouldn't respond honestly.

"There must be a proper process for deciding who comes in....." - your statement. Now who does this sound like?

There are solutions to the problem, they don't need an Einstein to work out, just some understanding, compassion - and action by a government prepared to challenge the media supported misconceptions about security threats and border compromises.

The media is part of the problem, but could be part of the solution - only they won't do it!

The above letter refers to the second SBS 1 Series "Go Back To Where You Came From!" in which Peter Reith and Catherine Deveny were two of the participants

2 JANUARY 2013

This has been written as a letter to the editors of the Sunday Age and the Sydney Morning Herald in response to their editorial on Sunday 30 December 2012 headed “Show some resolve and give us the politics we deserve”, (link: http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/editorial/show-some-resolve-and-give-us-the-politics-we-deserve-20121229-2c0hl.html?skin=text-only) and what it DIDN’T say!

The letter will doubtless be ignored and so, apart from being published in the blog, it will also be posted on my web page which has letters the media will not publish.

The editorial in the Sunday Age mentions many items about which people in this country have concerns.

These include politicians, equality of opportunity, care for the most vulnerable and marginalised, Peter Slipper, Craig Thomson, asylum seekers, carbon tax, Kevin Rudd, policy, voters, education, health, infrastructure, drugs, and the indigenous population, managing to squeeze them into the second-last paragraph.

I looked in vain through the article and read it and re-read it to see mention of the media for a record of what has been playing out in newspapers, radio, television and on the web where all or some of the above issues have or have not been discussed.

Not a word!

The fact that the media reports what it wants to, how it wants to, when it wants to, and if at all, would give some measure of the responsibility of the media in distortions of the news in Australia.

What about the wars in which Australia is and has been involved, the dollar expenditure on these wars, the loss of lives and damage to the lives of survivors and all their families? To say nothing of what has been inflicted on the countries in which these wars have occurred.

Israel and Palestine don’t get a mention, but then Palestine doesn’t even exist as far as the main stream media (MSM) are concerned. And on that topic, Greens and members of that party have been vilified and denigrated for their stand on the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions movement which was instrumental in helping to end apartheid in South Africa.

And what about Australia’s own closet apartheid issue – or are the Aborigines no longer to even be talked about?

Why is it that investigative journalists on the web have been able to uncover stories relating to the Health Services Union, the Ashby/Slipper/Brough affair but the MSM hasn’t been able to do it themselves with their vastly superior resources?

The MSM are controlled by their owners who are for the most part right-wing reactionary bigots who hire people to do as they are told, toady to their bosses, and generally carry out the discriminatory and biased reporting required by their bosses who want to put in place governments of their political persuasions who will do as they are told, not some wishy-washy pseudo-liberals who work around the fringes and who, themselves are guilty of discrimination in fields which suit their own policies and also accord with the business people whose interests they are protecting.

The editorial mentions voters and says they are more sophisticated than they are generally credited with being and then goes on to simplify the major issues of the day by under-reporting them, distorting their real meanings and also at the same time not reporting on issues that matter and become urgent over time.

The main-stream-media have been guilty of demonising asylum seekers in keeping with the requirements of both major political parties and we are all the poorer for the reactionary outcomes from these reports.

Not mentioned at all in the editorial is a group of people in the community who continue to be discriminated against and are vilified whenever possible. This group of people is part of the gay, lesbian, transgender and HIV (GLTH) communities and homophobia continues to be a major disease in our society, aided and abetted by the MSM.

A society which is ageing and those parts of it which are part of the GLTH group, continue to be treated as if they should shuffle off this mortal coil and stop costing society so much as they age.

Religion and paedophilia which has become so “main-stream” for the moment because of the announcement of a Royal Commission, abortion rights, equality for women, GLTH people, euthanasia, suicide and youth suicide, the main stream media occasionally broaches these topics and then conveniently forgets about them when it suits, and they never get resolved, but continue to fester just below the surface.

The media have shown an unprecedented bias in attacking the government and many members of the cabinet and shown how this bias relates to silences when it comes to the opposition and its ongoing denigration of the government in the opposition leader’s grim determination to bring down the government and become the prime minister. The polls have shown their support for these tactics.

Dorian Gray is seen as never ageing as his hidden portrait shows the ugliness of his deeds. The media’s deeds are hidden as they murder truth, honesty and integrity. Those who want to know what is happening here and around the world, and rely on the media to inform them are short-changed all the time by MSM but now fortunately have alternative means of finding the truth.

Bradley Manning and Julian Assange exposed the truths we have all been denied for so many years and, like most whistle-blowers who are trying to right the wrongs of the societies they live in, they are being pilloried and hounded and prosecuted for exposing crimes which they have not committed, but governments around the world have, aided and abetted by the media who do an excellent job of cover-up!

Talk about censorship and self-censorship!

Welcome to 2013!

16 FEBRUARY 2013

Anonymous letter-writers are so afraid of people finding out their true identities that they haven't got the courage to front up and sign their names to the disgusting letters they write. This one arrived at my house on 15 February 2013 and as can be seen from the layout the person writing the letter has done the best they possibly could to hide where the letter came from as well as their name(s).

One has to wonder at their motivation - is it to intimidate, to vilify, to show their ignorance?

What it shows is their absolute cowardice!

Israel is the 'Canary in the Coal mine' as far as the Islamic World is concerned NOT the problem.

YOU have a history of being a traitor:

To your wife and to your children

You evidently prefer a cat to your children, because you are inadequate as a human and as a father.

YOU or anyone who backs the Islamist cause is a traitor to western society, to women and to children born in the west.

But being a traitor to women apparently comes easy to you. You are a hedonist without shame or guilt.

Being a traitor to children apparently is something about which you don't care and don't give a thought. Again, it comes easy to you.

You try to demonstrate worldly interest in and grasp of politics. But your perceptions are childish, uneducated, and ill-informed.

You are not only a traitor to women and children, you are a traitor to your heritage, and to Jews everywhere, even secular Jews, and to gay, lesbian, transvestite and transgender persons in Islamic countries throughout the world.

You are an immoral and despicable creature who like many others of your kind, have an internet voice. Fortunately, due to your age'; you may not have very long to go before the only legacy you have left is a trail of familial neglect and incomprehensible stupidity.

The postmark on the envelope shows it comes from NORTH---- MAIL CENTRE QLD 4013

6 JUNE 2015

I submitted my response to the Quarterly Essay as correspondence feedback to Karen Hitchcock. Quarterly Essay told me it was too late to get in to next edition.

Dear Mannie de Saxe,

Thank you for your very interesting and informative letter.

I regret to say it arrives too late for inclusion in our published correspondence section - we have just gone to press with the next issue. However, I have passed in on to Karen Hitchcock, as I am sure she will want to read it.

Ken is 92 and I am 88 and we have been together for 22 years. We are gay and were “married” by Kevin Rudd on 1 July 2009 when he refused to grandfather phasing in de facto pensions for newly recorded gay, lesbian, transgender, HIV/AIDS partnerships. As equivalents of married pensioners and now no longer on single pensions, we lost about $200 each fortnightly from our Centrelink pensions.

As gay activists we were known as a partnership and would not have escaped scrutiny from Centrelink if they had started to investigate who were “couples” and who were not.

We moved to Melbourne from Sydney and Newcastle in 2001 after we bought a house in Preston in one of Melbourne’s north-eastern suburbs. We are fortunate to have been able to buy a house and not be renting, so that in our very old age we do not have to struggle with our finances every month as so many other people have to, and while we have maintained reasonable health over time, when one of us has health problems, we do our best to keep up with normal activities as much as possible.

I am our webmaster, and I look after two different web sites and a blog. When we were in Sydney we belonged to an activist group called InterSection, and one of our activities was involved with local government areas and discrimination by councils of their gay, lesbian, transgender and HIV/AIDS (GLTH) residents, where we discovered some appalling homophobia and other mistreatments.

In Preston we found ourselves living in Darebin City Council area, and from about 2003/2004 when we read some council document about inclusion, we decided to see what was going on in relation to the GLTH communities with which we had been active over the years.

and InterSection from Part 3 onwards (this is in www.josken.net), details some of our involvements with Darebin, and their responses over time. Eventually we just gave up!

Recently a few events occurred which have shaken us out of any complacency, and one of these being a major health issue relates directly to Karen Hitchcock’s essay concerning our health care-givers and their co-ordination with each other.

We live within walking distance of Northland shopping centre and we walk from our house to the centre in less than half-an-hour. If we have heavy shopping to carry home, we are able to catch one of 2 buses which drop us around the corner from our house which is just up from the main road, Murray Road. The footpath is uneven and in parts it has lifted, leaving lips which if you are old and your vision is not the best are easily missed and you can trip and hurt yourself badly. Ken tripped over one of these lips but was able to support himself on the house fence closest to where he tripped. His hand was gashed and bleeding, but he had not fallen on the ground and injured himself worse than the bleeding hand. We protected it with a clean handkerchief which one of us had, and when we arrived at Northland we went to the nearest pharmacy and asked them to put a plaster on it. The woman who dealt with us at the pharmacy didn’t put any disinfectant on the wound, but just covered it up with a plaster.

Ken was shaken up by the episode, but by the time we had sat down at our usual café and had some lunch and coffee he was feeling better, we did our shopping, and caught the bus home.

It has taken more than 3 weeks to stop being painful and it is now almost back to normal. We have not yet written to Darebin about the incident but may still be doing it soon.

W e live 2 corners away from the tram stop which is in Plenty Road, near Murray Road. Our trip takes about 45 minutes and we always take something to read for our trips in both directions. We finished our shopping in Bourke Street Mall in the city and crossed to our tram stop outside the old Post Office at the corner of the Mall and Elizabeth Street. The tram was fairly full and no empty seats were visible, so I was making my way to the rear stair well when a man got up and offered me his seat. As I was making my way there to sit down, the tram started off with a heavy jerk and I fell to the ground in the stair-well and hurt my upper arm. I was helped up and sat down in the seat offered and remained there all the way home. Ken had managed to get a seat as we boarded the tram so he was safe from falling.

At every stop-start on the way home, the tram driver jerked the tram so that we thought maybe the vehicle had problems. However, when I wrote to Yarra trams about the incident, it seems the driver was in the clear, I should hold on better, and it seemed it was probably my fault! My upper arm took at least a month for the pain to subside, which is just as well that it ultimately did because little did I know what lay ahead in the health episode which as followed!

Towards the end of 2014 my eyesight had deteriorated sufficiently for me to know that it was time to get my cataracts attended to after years developing but not rapidly. We have both been patients at the Royal Victoria Eye and Ear Hospital, and Ken had both his cataracts attended to within 3 months of each other about 5 or 6 years ago, and I had been told about 4 years ago that I still had to wait awhile.

We went to emergency at the eye and ear and they said to me that waiting time for cataracts was now about 2 years and I should get myself a private ophthalmologist (and thereby hangs another tale for another time!). So we went to our GP and he arranged a referral to an eye doctor who practises not far from where we live, which is of course very convenient for us. She said the first eye was more than ready to be operated on and the cataract was removed in the middle of December 2014. We arranged for the second one to be done in March 2015 and the date was set. Operations are still done by the private doctor at the eye and ear, but of course not on the public health system and I have to pay for them privately.

A week or two before my operation was due, all sorts of other episodes occurred with my health and I started to get very worried – headaches across both sides of my head and across the top, and I felt peculiar and without energy all the time.

The eye doctor said to me when I spoke to her on the Friday, a few days after having had some treatment from my GP that if I was having problems with my reading I was to go in to emergency at the Eye and Ear during the weekend and not waste any time. By the Sunday afternoon we managed to go to emergency, getting there at 2pm and leaving at 7pm, having been attended to almost immediately because the problem was deemed to be very urgent – the proof of which was confirmed a few days later!

I have been treated by our rheumatologist for a few years for a disease of elderly or old people called Polymyalgia Rheumatica and treatment is cortisone-based and I was already down to a maintenance dose which keeps pains away, but does no harm to the system.

What transpired at the Eye and Ear was that there is a possible side effect from Polymyalgia Rheumatica which one in 10 patients may develop, and I was one of them – Temporal Arteritis or Giant Cell Arteritis.

Second cataract operation postponed (sine diem as they used to say in Latin) and full-on treatment for this disease from which one can go blind, have a stroke, have an aneurism and other nasties! My eye doctor and the one that we saw after my biopsy at the E&E said they had caught it in time!

Now we get down to the crux of the story and Karen Hitchcock’s items in her essay relating to this – we are living in an advance technological age where means of communication are as they have never been before. I am in the hands of a GP, an Opthalmologist, a Rheumatologist, the Royal Victoria Eye and Ear Hospital, St Vincent’s Hospital and various Pathology laboratories around the city.

YET THERE SEEMS TO BE NO METHOD OF COMMUNICATION BETWEEN THEM TO KEEP PATIENT RECORDS UP-TO-DATE!! WHAT HAPPENS TO ALL THE DATA-BASES ON ALL THE COMPUTERS AT ALL THESE INSTITUTIONS?

Nobody, but nobody told me about what would happen when my maintenance dose of 2mg per day of Predisolone was suddenly increased to 60mg per day to ward off this new disease with its frightening consequences. The dosage is gradually being reduced to manageable limits a few weeks at a time, but I am suffering the consequences of corticosteroid overdose! And nobody has explained to me what side-effects Prednisolone has on the body!

Ken and I manage to keep going as best we can – at home, trying not to be a burden on limited resources in all these organisations and going into them only when we really feel we need some assistance, and doing things around the house as normal, but it is interesting to not that councils such as Darebin do not bother to find out how their old citizens are doing or whether they would like a little help now and then. Darebin is but one council in Victoria – what is happening in all the others?

In conclusion I would like to say that in a Quarterly Essay such as this one which Karen Hitchcock has written so graphically, she was able to cover a fair amount of ground within her space limitations for the article.

This is what I would like to know – “we are two white Anglo English-speaking, middle class, educated, articulate home owners, living in a culture we both grew up with. What about all the other minority groups such as GLTH, Aboriginal, Cultural and Linguistically Diverse (CALD), African, Asian and others being demonised in our communities such as Muslims? Who is going to help and support them as they are thrown into environments for their aged care which are so often hostile as some any gay and lesbian couples in aged care have discovered over time?

As for financing of institutions for the forthcoming generations of geriatrics, Australia is a wealthy country and the resources are there, but governments wilfully use them for issues of no relevance to our communities, such as military adventures.

We will not be around to know what happens then, but it won’t be pretty for our older people unless they do some strenuous politicking over time.

A thesis and/or a book needs to be written – and urgently!

17 MARCH 2018

I wrote the following letter to the Saturday Paper in time to be in the issue of 3 March 2018 in plenty of time for the Batman by-election due on Saturday 17 March 2018. It was not published, so here it is:

We moved from New South Wales to Preston in Melbourne in 2001. Martin Ferguson was Federal ALP member for Batman with the largest ALP majority in the country.

Ferguson's sellout to big business defied - and defiled - his union connections from his early days. ALP in Batman has been in decline ever since.

Demographics may have changed but people have not forgotten that Paul Keating opened Australia's first concentration camps and the situation has deteriorated with every ALP government or its position in opposition.

Adani hasn't helped their cause and climate change and other related issues don't help either.

Kearney has been made to jump seats from Brunswick to Batman, but the fact that Feeney was shoehorned into Batman from the Senate when a suitable woman candidate had already been found for the election way back in the Feeney transfer days speaks volumes about the current ALP executive.

The ALP has lost the plot.

22 AUGUST 2019

How can Victoria's First Nations have any faith in the Andrews Government's treaty negotiations when they treat traditional owners such as the Djab Wurrung so flippantly. 'We'll arrest you if you don't shut up' or words to that effect.

After more than two years seeking a mutually acceptable route change for the planned duplication of the Western Highway into a freeway, the Andrews government has told the Djab Wurrung there will be no change to the road route.

The freeway will destroy sacred cultural sites and hundreds of tall eucalypt trees to save a few minutes' driving time between Melbourne and Adelaide. Some of these trees may be 800 years old. They are Djab Wurrung birthing trees and connect culture and language with the natural environment. Once cut down, they cannot be retrieved except in the memories of the old people. It's an appalling situation and needs better understanding by the government.

24 FEBRUARY 2020

It seems to me Australia is at fault for allowing the United States to demand that the British Court, which is holding an Australian-born journalist and publisher, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, in London’s Belmarsh prison to be extradited to Washington USA to face charges of espionage.

The Prime Minister must follow Independent MP Andrew Wilkie’s recommendation (The Age 24.02.2020) to lobby the British government to force the court to reject the U.S. attempt to extradite Julian Assange. The fact, stated by Wilkie, that Assange was secretly recorded in discussions with his Australian lawyers by the Spanish security company UC Global --contracted to provide security to the Ecuadorian Embassy, where Assange lived for close on seven years-- and is a shocking indictment! These recordings were passed to the U.S. intelligence according to former UC Global employees.

It’s not good enough for the Australian Foreign Minister to have said that we are keeping close watch on what is happening to Julian Assange. The Prime Minister must step in at this late stage and do as Andrew Wilkie has suggested.

Surely Julian Assange deserves to be treated as one of us by our government and not allowed to be victimised by a vindictive foreign country as the U.S. is proving to be.

25 MARCH 2020

I just loved that news item in The Age (25.03.20) "Australia could face cut-off from trade as lockdown widens."

Now, Australia's stevedoring companies and privatised Ports are demanding the federal government allow the wharfies, marine pilots and other port employees to be classed essential services to keep trade moving both ways.

The bottom line really is in the final sentence of the news item. "After the shutdown on Monday, a European shipping company ceased operations in Australia and sacked its entire Melbourne-based staff" --so reminiscent of the manufacturing workers of the past.

COVID-19 pandemic has shown-up the whole free trade manipulation to be a fraud. When we're finally free of coronavirus, shall we begin to rethink the way the Australian democracy operates? Perhaps the reckoning has arrived.

Our federal government needs to heed former High Court judge, Mary Gaudron, who told the media (front page 02.04.20) that Canberra adopt New Zealand’s approach and set up an all-party bipartisan select committee to provide extra scrutiny of its epidemic responses.

  Gaudron said that it was to ensure accountability and to preserve our democratic principles. She was speaking as a member of a group of six ex-judges convened by the Australia Institute whose executive director Ben Oquist indicated that Australia was in a health crisis and an economic crisis and “we’d like to see if we can avoid a crisis of democracy as well.”

  It seems that these six judges recognise that the Australian Government has a national cabinet with no statutory or constitutional foundation making decisions affecting us all now and for many months and perhaps even years so we need the New Zealand approach.

  A great many of us probably agree and urge extra scrutiny of the Coalition as we face the longest shutdown of Parliament on record.

Mannie and Kendall Present: LESBIAN AND GAY SOLIDARITY ACTIVISMS

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This page was updated on 16 FEBRUARY 2013 and again on 29 APRIL 2020

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