Is the Human Rights Commission game worth the candle? [With poll]

drfelonious said :

Davo and Jim – how about playing the ball, not the man?

ROFL. Tell you what, if you can get the Australian to start playing the ball and stop playing the man (or as more common recently the women) then I will. See the difference is that I’m not pretending to be a newspaper.

drfelonious said :

The Australian is indeed a right wing paper but on this occasion they have made some very legitimate and well founded criticisms of the overreach (and cost burden) of the ACT Human Rights industry. Where, exactly, have they got it wrong (apart from overlooking the impact of self government in the ACT on funding arrangements)?

Hmmm

Well I have at least two problems with Nick Carter’s argument. The first is he seems to think that we don’t need any statuatory protection of our rights because the Australian sense of fair go is all we need. I would suggest that he takes a TARDIS back to the mid 60’s and ask some aboriginals, women, Chinese-Australians, and children in the churches’ care how well “fair go” is protecting their rights. Secondly he argues that it is a waste of money. Given that Mr Carter doesn’t live in Canberra it is really none of his damn business what we choose to send our money on. In the ACT the Human Rights Commission has tripartisan support and I would guess that if any party tries to run with the platform of getting rid of it they’d lose votes (In fact at the last election the Liberals ran with a policy of expanding the role of the Commission). It’s just part of the “personality” of Canberra and probably reflects the collective personalities of the people who choose to move here. If Mr Carter doesn’t like it then, to quote a philosopher, he can bite my shiny metal arse.

Davo and Jim – how about playing the ball, not the man?

The Australian is indeed a right wing paper but on this occasion they have made some very legitimate and well founded criticisms of the overreach (and cost burden) of the ACT Human Rights industry. Where, exactly, have they got it wrong (apart from overlooking the impact of self government in the ACT on funding arrangements)?

Hmmm

I think there is a lot wrong with the Human Rights act in the ACT.

One of the main problems; this is from a couple of licensed premises in the city, they refuse entry to someone for being intoxicated or wearing the wrong shoes, that person can then go to the Human Rights Commission with a complaint and the licensed premises then has to pay for lawyers, legal fee’s etc. to defend a right that any business should have, being able to refuse entry to people they do not feel acceptable to enter the premises.

It disgusts me.

Jim Jones said :

Ah, The Australian – the right-wing blog that somehow manages to get the other media to slavishly report on it’s bizarre flights of fancy.

Reporting how they want the world to be rather than how it is.

Ah, The Australian – the right-wing blog that somehow manages to get the other media to slavishly report on it’s bizarre flights of fancy.

When you have an article that is factually incorrect (the reference alluded to by johnboy about Canberra being funded by the Federal Government), what can you expect from the commenting peanut gallery?

Roberto, the first, apparently has no idea about the existence of elected shire councillors and council departments, believing every municipality to be run by a benign dictatorship of town clerk and engineer.

Simonzee, the third, sees threats everywhere, and Julia Gillard behind the proposal to increase the size of the ACT ‘government’. Whether pro or anti, it’s the legislature that is proposed to be increased. And weighting the votes of rural residents by a factor of three?

I really shouldn’t have followed that link, should I?