artofjournalism

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No way could you come away from Selma with a whitewashed version of MLK’s message of liberation. Throughout the film, King specifically names the racist power structure as a problem, decries police brutality and the murder of black people, and calls for systemic change. King was, among many other things, an uncompromising black leader – something that a lot people in Hollywood and beyond clearly still aren’t comfortable with.

  'Controversy Aside, Is The Martin Luther King Biopic ‘Selma’ Any Good?' by Jim Poe.

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Foreign Aid’s Role In War And Peace.

My article was originally posted in UWA's Pelican Magazine.

Type "Foreign Aid" into Google and you'll get a whole bunch of different messages. You'll get links to Australia's foreign aid page at australia.gov.au, to Wikipedia’s entry on foreign aid, news articles about foreign aid in general, and some with the headlines "Foreign Aid Overhaul To Squeeze More Value For Money", "Who Profits From Our Foreign Aid?" and "The shame that is Abbott's foreign aid policy".

Foreign aid is a topic that has different opinions vying for prime position on the Google results page. Foreign aid, or Official Development Assistance (ODA), is money, food, or other resources given or lent by a donor country to a recipient country (Bilateral) or to a multilateral development agency like the United Nations (Multilateral). There are many criticisms of foreign aid including its ineffectiveness and its inability to overcome an unjust international economic system. On the other hand, you have defenders passionately rebutting the critics’ claim. Yet at the core of things, no one denies the importance of aid in humanitarian crises.

The history of foreign aid is an interesting one. Australia’s aid programme started before World War II when the government gave grants to Papua New Guinea, then administered by the Australian government. When Commonwealth leaders met in Colombo, Ceylon, in January 1950, they launched the Colombo Plan as a venture for the economic and social advancement of the South and Southeast Asian region through bilateral aid. Australia also hoped that the Colombo Plan would allow the United States to be involved in the region, cultivate diplomatic and commercial relations, support Japan’s rehabilitation and allow the US to play a part in the Cold War.

 This isn’t the first time that a country used their foreign aid plan to promote diplomatic and political aims during times of conflict. Countries often use foreign aid in times of conflict to promote values of "democracy, human rights, and development", with the belief that if these values are promoted, then the more stable and peaceful the world will become. This was an underlying theme of American foreign policy during the Cold War when foreign aid was used to promote democracy and the idea of free-markets. America was concerned about the “expansive tendencies of the Soviet Union”, and felt that to help regional security within western and northern Europe was to promote the integration of Western European economies. By promoting the integration of Western European economies, it backed US State Department official George F. Kennan's call for "long-term, patient but firm and vigilant containment of Russian expansive tendencies" and America’s political interests in the region.

 Theories underpinning development and foreign aid have changed quite dramatically over the years. The 1950s and 60s saw a focus on modernisation through a ‘one size fits all’ linear, economically centred development philosophy. The 1970s to the present time saw it change to widespread structural economic packages applied to the ‘developing’ world by global economic institutions to a more complex and culturally sensitive human-rights based approach. These changes have been largely in response to a significant increase in the amount and sophistication of empirical evidence from poverty-stricken regions of the world detailing success and failure of various programmes. Our understanding of poverty and its underlying factors has improved immeasurably.

 In our modern age of non-traditional security actors and concerns in a post 9/11 world, the political stability and security within our Asia-Pacific region is critical. As Australia lies geographically close to areas of conflict, it is not surprising that our foreign policy, including our foreign aid programme, focuses on conflict prevention, conflict reduction and humanitarian relief, as well as post-conflict recovery and peace building.

We only need to look at our close neighbour Timor-Leste’s (East Timor’s) history to see how successful foreign aid can be in helping fragile countries build up infrastructure and establish peace through community development. Timor-Leste was a Portuguese colony from mid-16th Century until 1975. It was then independent for only nine days before being invaded by Indonesia. After four centuries of occupation, Timor-Leste was internationally recognised as an independent nation in 2002. Timor-Leste’s turbulent history, marked with violence, led to 75 percent of its population being displaced before the UN peacekeeping force could arrive in 1999. Because of this, today 75 percent of East Timorese live in rural areas, and 37 percent live on the extreme poverty line of less than US$1.25 a day.

Since its independence, Australia has been Timor-Leste’s biggest development partner. Our foreign aid has assisted Timor-Leste in improving governance allowing its administration to take increasing ownership for poverty reduction efforts. Through helping Timor-Leste invest in strong governing infrastructure, as well as helping them to build a level of resilience to financial, social and emotional effects of disaster, the aid program is helping to minimise conflict and provide support in restoring the basis for development post conflict.

 Foreign aid helps rebuild communities after conflict and sustainably develops communities during peace however Abbott's drastic cuts are undermining success. The Government’s decision to go through private contractors, Coffey and GRM International, has meant that NGOs overseas have to undercut each other in order for their bid to win funding from the Australian government. By undercutting and undermining each other, the quality of programs enabling the extreme poor to get out of the poverty trap through vocational training, secondary and primary education suffers in a race for efficiency.

 Foreign aid will always play a role in times of war and conflict, but for it to be effective, foreign aid cannot be tied to domestic political concerns and policies but rather consistent and sustainable. As a relatively rich and stable country in our region, Australia needs to show leadership in investing in the security, stability and development of our region. This means keeping to the once bipartisan promise of 0.5 percent of GNI for foreign aid.

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Compare the two phrases: ''asylum seekers'' versus ''illegal maritime arrivals''. The conjoining of ''asylum'' and ''seeker'' is evocative. Who seeks asylum? A human in danger, distress and despair; someone who is hoping to survive on the lee shore of kindness. ''Illegal'' + ''maritime'' + ''arrivals'' = the draining of the human. It is using language to drive and empower ideology. Language shapes public policy and discourse. By changing the terms of reference, Morrison is trying to control the debate. Kon Karapanagiotidis, chief executive of the Asylum Seeker Resource Centre, believes the change in terms is ''profound'' and that Morrison is ''deliberately trying to dehumanise asylum seekers by making them less than human''.

Warwick McFadyen | Calling as it is: the minister for debasing the language | Published on The Age on 26th October 2013

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After research by Die Spiegel, Berlin has taken allegations seriously that the NSA has been monitoring Chancellor Angela Merkel's phone.

"Merkel told Obama that "she unmistakably disapproves of and views as completely unacceptable such practices, if the indications are authenticated," Seifert said. "This would be a serious breach of confidence. Such practices have to be halted immediately."

The sharpness of the German complaint direct to an American president strongly suggested that Berlin had no doubt about the grounds for protest. Seibert voiced irritation that the Germans had waited for months for proper answers from Washington to Berlin on the NSA operations.

Merkel told Obama she expected the Americans "to supply information over the possible scale of such eavesdropping practices against Germany and reply to questions that the federal government asked months ago", Seibert said.

The White House responded that Merkel's mobile is not being tapped. "The president assured the chancellor that the United States is not monitoring and will not monitor the communications of the chancellor," said a statement from Jay Carney, the White House spokesman. (via The Guardian)

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I know that people often like to make reference to 1984 whenever governments do something covertly slimy, but the news that Immigration Minister Scott Morrison is instructing departmental staff to refer to refugees who seek asylum in Australia as ‘illegals’ is about as slimy as you can get.

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GAY marriage has been legalised in the ACT in an Australian first.

This is a huge step towards marriage equality in Australia! Same-sex marriage will be made legal today in the ACT after law-makers safeguard the bill from being struck down in the high court (ie. Abbot-proofing).

Tasmania is planning to introduce similar laws next week, and NSW is making similar plans for a little further down the road.

Go Australia!

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"When I first became Prime Minister, I thought to myself then I don’t need to put in the foreground being a woman. Of course I want to speak for women, of course I want to govern for women, of course I want to do good things for women, but I didn’t think I needed to put it right in the foreground because it was just so obvious, and you know it was gonna be commented on and it was gonna be so much of what came to define my prime ministership without me constantly pointing to it. Then as the days in office went on it just seemed to me increasingly I was getting the burden of this, that sort of you know misogynist underside, and really none of the benefits that could come with being the first female prime minister because I wasn’t putting it in the foreground. So all of this sort of swirled round, obviously I did want to speak to women and we did some policies which were terrific for women, equal pay, social and community services workers and the like. But this was all in and around me, in my head, in the environment, in our politics. And then we got to that parliamentary debate and, I must admit, it was sort of a track point in my thinking, that I thought after everything I’ve had to see on the internet, after all the gendered abuse that I’ve seen in newspapers, that has been called at me across the despatch box, now of all things, I’ve got to listen to Tony Abbott lecture me about sexism.”

- Julia Gillard former Prime Minister of Australia on how her now famous speech on misogyny spontaneously came about. (x) (x)

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Young Iranians combat Netanyahu with ‘jeans protest’ October 6, 2013

One of the crowning glories of Benjamin Netanyahu’s “media blitz” last week, following his speech at the United Nations General Assembly was an interview with the BBC’s Persian service. In an attempt to characterize the interview as historic, the prime minister’s bureau pointed out that this was the first time Netanyahu had given an interview to a Persian-speaking media outlet, addressing the Iranian people directly.

The prime minister’s bureau marketed the interview aggressively. In addition to text messaging journalists direct quotes from the interview and sending out detailed press releases, Netanyahu’s spokespeople circulated video clips from the interview to the Israeli television channels, posted parts of the interview on YouTube, tweeted on it and shared it on Facebook.

To be honest, I was surprised by this initiative. Netanyahu has been giving fiery speeches about the Iranian nuclear threat for 18 years and only now has he found it appropriate to address the Iranian people or try to speak to Iran over the ayatollahs’ heads. But it’s better late than never.

The interview with Netanyahu wasn’t really in Persian. Most of it was simultaneously translated in subtitles. In fact, Netanyahu said about two words in the Iranian’s language: “harf-e pootch,” which can loosely be translated as “nonsense,” and “Sadeh-lowh” - “sucker.”

According to one of the announcements made by the prime minister’s bureau, some 12 million Iranians watch BBC Persian every week. Netanyahu’s words were received loud and clear on the other end, although instead of eliciting positive reactions they spurred antagonism and fury, especially among Iran’s liberal youth who voted for Iranian President Hassan Rohani en masse in the last election.

The young Iranians were not angry over Netanyahu’s strange choice of Persian expressions, rather a single, ridiculous sentence that he uttered in English: “If the people of Iran were free they could wear jeans and listen to Western music.”

Over the past 24 hours, dozens of young Iranians responded to Netanyahu with a “jeans protest” - tweeting pictures of themselves in jeans. Some of them mocked Israel’s intelligence agencies, saying they were so busy with the surveillance of the Iranian nuclear program that they neglected to update Netanyahu on fashion trends in Tehran.

“2day I’m wearing jeans, I can send my photo 4 Netanyahu if his spies in Iran didn’t see people who wear jeans and listen to Western songs by their Iphone!” Sadegh Ghorbani, a young journalist from Tehran, posted on Twitter.

Mohamad Nezamabadi, a student at Tehran University, was even more cynical. “Not only we wear jeans, but also listen to the foreign language musics! I bet he thinks that we ride horses instead of cars!” he tweeted.

It is not clear who advises Netanyahu on Iran’s internal politics, the attitudes of its young or the daily life in Tehran or Isfahan. 

In conclusion, if Netanyahu is interested in contemporary fashion in Teheran, he can enter an album titled “Tehran Street Style" on the image-sharing website Imgur. 

Source

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We witness that there is a relationship between government, media and industry that is evident even at this most spurious and superficial level. These three institutions support one another. We know that however cool a media outlet may purport to be, their primary loyalty is to their corporate backers. We know also that you cannot criticise the corporate backers openly without censorship and subsequent manipulation of this information.

Now I'm aware that this was really no big deal; I'm not saying I'm an estuary Che Guevara, it was a daft joke, by a daft comic at a daft event. It makes me wonder though how the relationships and power dynamics I witnessed on this relatively inconsequential context are replicated on a more significant scale.

For example, if you can't criticise Hugo Boss at the GQ awards because they own the event do you think it is significant that energy companies donate to the Tory party? Will that affect government policy? Will the relationships that "politician of the year" Boris Johnson has with City bankers – he took many more meetings with them than public servants in his first term as mayor – influence the way he runs our capital?

Is it any wonder that Amazon, Vodafone and Starbucks avoid paying tax when they enjoy such cosy relationships with members of our government?

Ought we be concerned that our rights to protest are being continually eroded under the guise of enhancing our safety? Is there a relationship between proposed fracking in the UK, new laws that prohibit protest and the relationships between energy companies and our government?

I don't know. I do have some good principles picked up that night that are generally applicable; the glamour and the glitz isn't real, the party isn't real, you have a much better time mucking around trying to make your mates laugh. I suppose that's obvious, we all know it, we already know all the important stuff like: don't trust politicians, don't trust big business and don't trust the media. Trust your own heart and each another. When you take a breath and look away from the spectacle it's amazing how absurd it seems when you look back.

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Judge dismisses billionaire's attempt to subpoena Steve Pennells to hand over notes relating to her and her family

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Clarke and Dawe - Immigration (by ClarkeAndDawe)

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Politicians are not being held to account, facts are not being reliably reported, extremists and morons are being provided a platform to sell their messages, and our entire society is approaching an election with very little idea of what they are voting on. Lowered standards and growing anti-intellectual sentiment along with a sustained obsession with political correctness are the real destroyers of fact. The truth is, the media needs to forget the adage “everyone has the right to an opinion” and instead adopt “everyone has the right to the truth”.

The Death of Journalism, and the rise of The Newsroom. | The Left Right Think Canvas, 22nd July 2013.

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Fairfax radio presenter Howard Sattler has been sacked after asking Prime Minister Julia Gillard if her partner Tim Mathieson is gay.

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Is this what we’re going to have to put up with? A political debate that revolves around sniggering at women’s body parts and smirks about gay hairdressers?

People will protest that Sattler wasn’t being sexist, because every time someone is sexist in public people protest that they weren’t being sexist. You could ask these people to reel off the number of times that previous prime ministers were asked if their wives were lesbians: in fact you could ask them to specify those occasions on which previous prime ministers were quizzed on any aspect of their wives’ sex lives at all; but they’d be unlikely to take the point, because they are not very bright.

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And suddenly, in a week where things were looking pretty grim for the men of Australia, Chief of Army David Morrison arose to kick some derrière.  I would like to see this played in public at regular intervals, perhaps with a “Men of Australia” introduction. Repeat offenders will have Lt Gen Morrison come around to your house and yell at you until you spontaneously combust.

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What a world where calling out sexism gets you accused of “playing the gender card” or “igniting a gender war”, but rampant sexism from males in politics is allowed to run wild, unscrutinised. 

Just last night, a menu from a Liberal Party fundraising event came into the spotlight: 

Yet this example of vile, horrendous sexism about our female Prime Minister, endorsed by the Liberal Party, gets not even a shred of the outrage that Julia Gillard’s comments did.

What hope do we have in achieving equality when such appalling double standards exist and are promoted by two of the most powerful forces in society: the media, and political figures.

These repulsive examples just prove why sexism needs to be called out.

And until we can do that without being accused of using it in some selfish way and “playing the gender card”, something is desperately fucking wrong.

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What makes a journalist? Now, more than ever, the relationship with the audience – the mythical middle manager, the person trying to make ends meet, the person who was described in a different age as the “man on the omnibus,” the idiot. That’s it. Be an idiot, ask the dumb questions any idiot would ask. But, never, ever treat the audience like fools. Not if you want to be a real journalist.

- The art of journalism: satisfying beginners and expert readers | Sally Baxter, Australians for Honest Politics, 20th May 2013