Sunday 13th October 1996
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For example, we know that the Chinese Triads are active in Australia... Pauline Hanson has this week been linking them to the issue of Chinese and Asian immigration to Australia. Contracts to kill in Australia do not carry a high price, and I believe that Hanson should seriously consider how she delivers her statements...
Yesterday she said that all immigration to Australia must cease immediately saying, "It is simply crazy to keep on bringing people into this country, especially when so many of them are unskilled and have no fluency in English.
"This does not stimulate our economy at all. All it does is make our welfare bill larger and results in huge amounts being spent on the teaching of English, not to mention the resultant loss of productivity in the workplace.
"Main stream Australia must be allowed to have a say in how this country will look in future generations and now is the time to tell your politicians to start listening or you will throw them out at the next elections."
Ms Hanson said that her redefined immigration policy would be selective and restrictive - "just like Japan's".
"Prospective citizens committing serious crimes would be deported and any property held by them would be seized to defray the cost of deportation."
She attacked the policy which had allowed Asian migration levels to rise.
Yesterday I received the following email on this subject (my original editorial in blue):
On Friday the 8th of March you editorialised;
Now what I cannot understand is that all she did was to quote the facts. Let me repeat that. All Pauline Hanson did was to quote the facts. Facts which have irritated the voting public for years. How does that make her a racist? How does her one letter inflame things? Who are the people doing all the threats, name calling and rabble rousing? I can tell you exactly how this makes her a racist.
Her 'facts', as you call them, include the notion that Aboriginal people receive 'special' and unwarranted benefits. She also wants to stem the 'tide' of asian immigration.
It is a very long stretch of imagination to label these views 'facts'. At best they are opinions, at worst they are completely innacurate comments. Aboriginal people are the poorest, most ill of health subgroup there is in Australia. We invaded and slaughtered them 200 years ago. We stole their land and destroyed their culture. Do we then have a responsibility to them?
Of course we do. As a civilised country we must atone for past evil and right some of the horrific suffering we inflicted. If anything, we have not done enough.
As for stopping Asian immigration; why not all immigration? Why *specifically* Asian imigration. Are Asians somehow worse than Europeans? If that is the view, it is definitely racist.
I find your analysis of news very narrow and possessing little empathy.
Kris Kunze
Brief response
Firstly I have never said that I support Hanson's views on Asian immigration. I do not, but that does not make her wrong, neither does that make her a racist. Her concerns are for her country - more noble than the average bulls*** you get from most politicians whose egos are their number one priority.
Secondly, we did not steal Australia from the Aborigines. There were hundreds of small, remote, scattered and waring tribes that spoke different dialects who did terrible things to each other in times of aggression. The Aborigines died young and lived very hard lives. They are no different from the American Indians, the tribes of Africa or, for that matter, the early tribes in Scotland.
The "white man" has brought them a better lifestyle, and I would suggest, far greater freedom than if, for example, the Indonesians had claimed Australia. Just look at East Timor!
Bluey, the alter ego of Darren Edward Williamson, was found guilty of three counts of stealing from his former boss.
It appears while Williamson worked for Cutting Edge in 1994 he defrauded the company of money.
We topped off the evening at Eve's (restaurant) on the Brisbane river..
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