Refugee Camp in the City, Glebe Park until 6pm

Ralph,
You couldn’t have looked up the law yourself?
Tell me Ralph, what does PhD (post 21) stand for?
What was your thesis in matey?

Really, is it? Even it was, just because ‘it’s law’, doesn’t mean that it makes sense.

The PC has good numbers on labour market outcomes for unskilled migrants, and they aren’t positive.

So it’s appropriate then that the hard earned taxes of plumbers and miners is used to support people who adopt here on discretion? Ohh that’s right, these dumb proles need educating, then they’ll know the elites are correct.

and most refugees who are unskilled bust a gut to succeed here. they are grateful that we let em in, they don’t expect much in return. and then we incarcerate the illegal immigrants in detention centres and make them feel sub standard. Illegal immigrants come here because they want a new life. some are doctors, dentists, etc, but they aren’t recognised by the australian industry bodies as such until they pass examinations.

I do not agree with incarceration in a detention centre. I do agree to sending them back from their point of origin if there is a plausible reason for doing so. (criminals especially)

refugees in other countries will sometimes join the ranks of the poor and are treated as another poverty stricken person. They get displaced by famine, war or disease, and people who once were proud members of the community are reduced to terrible conditions and lives.

I have a couple of friends from uganda. The things that they speak of from a perspective of conditions, leaving their families etc are really horrible.

Thumper,
Yep. I’ll not start quoting chapter and verse because I don’t have the relevant info here (I am at work after all) but it’s both Australian law and part of several UN conventions that we’re a signatory to.

Ralph, we accept refugees because it’s Australian law that we do. Don’t like it? Move to a country with different laws. Oh, hang on, that’d make you a refugee….

Ralph said :

Despite your foppish attempts at trying to insult me, you still are yet to provide a single credible argument for us accepting hoardes of unskilled migrants.

How else are we supposed to protect ourselves from the Germans?

Loose Brown said :

Well, it seems that the refugee camp in the city has sparked a lot of debate and discussion – therefore doing quite a good job!

Agreed + 2. That’s part of the job done…

Yes, I agree!

Well, it seems that the refugee camp in the city has sparked a lot of debate and discussion – therefore doing quite a good job!

And if you’re REALLY interested, slip your details to Johnboy and I’ll be in touch.

Three post nutbag??

However, on topic, if anyone is out there who has the skill sets of an interest in migrants, gathering and recording stories and facilitation (all of mine in spades, but I’m away this weekend more’s the pity), I’m in the market for someone to help out with some Sudanese oral history collection this weekend. I’ll post more details here when I speak to their contact — I only got this call late last night as the SIMS challenge was coming to an end — but if you have half a mind to be involved with this, keep that mid to back brain.

I know lots of people in this field, but time’s not my friend (when is it?) and today could just all go pear-shaped. And I hate the taste of pears.

Ralph you motor-fopper, I don’t need to and won’t.

This is a thread about MSF which is not about accepting migrants.

I have my views about the points you raised but for now I’ll keep my own counsel.

As I was telling the boys down at the ABN during one of the SIMS challenges a couple of weeks ago, I live by 27,000 guiding principles of which this is merely one:

“Never argue with an idiot. They’ll just drag you down to your level and beat you with their experience.”

I employ that to many on this site.

Have a great day, Ralph and enjoy your weekend. Really.

Despite your foppish attempts at trying to insult me, you still are yet to provide a single credible argument for us accepting hoardes of unskilled migrants.

@ EIAQJOS: Yep, what I said @ #37.

For maybe only the third time in my life I’m going to use this god-awful initialism/acronym.

* Deep breath; c’mon Overheard, you can do it. Focus. Here we go. *

LOL

OK, I need to go and shower five times.

Ralph said :

We have enough problems with our own natives in the NT, and we still can’t fix that properly. And you people are wanting to ship in hoardes of others? Fair dinkum.

I tried to ship in a dozen crates of Native Australians from Sumatra. Unfortunately they’d shipped all of their stock to a zoo in Launceston.

The people of Melbourne should be more concerned about the amount of Canberrans who migrate to Fitzroy every year.

Eyeball In A Quart Jar Of Snot said :

Ralph said :

Did they mention the Sudanese gangs we now have wandering around Melbourne and Western Sydney?

Yeah, Melbourne and Sydney are being overrun with violent Sudanese gangs torching the village people and raping their women like a herd of invading Nords.

How un-Australian of them.

You make a lot of curiously meandering, economical and cryptic sense, Snot. Like a cryptic crossword, the clues aren’t always obvious, but the realisation is all the more rewarding once finally arrived at.

Kudos.

Ralph said :

Did they mention the Sudanese gangs we now have wandering around Melbourne and Western Sydney?

Yeah, Melbourne and Sydney are being overrun with violent Sudanese gangs torching the village people and raping their women like a herd of invading Nords.

How un-Australian of them.

Ralph said :

We have enough problems with our own natives in the NT, and we still can’t fix that properly. And you people are wanting to ship in hoardes of others? Fair dinkum.

If you run, Ralph, you might be able to catch up with that point you just missed. If you read the follow-up post and associated comments, taking care to sound the big words out, you might…. oh, actually, no you probably won’t.

I LOVED the analogy of your nickname with the magazine of the same name above. Superb.

Another simplistic and banal analogy, sepi. Comparing situations that are within our direct control as opposed to things that aren’t.

We have enough problems with our own natives in the NT, and we still can’t fix that properly. And you people are wanting to ship in hoardes of others? Fair dinkum.

Any suggestion that middle Australia needs educating, cause if they were educated, then they’d know that ‘we are right’, is clearly elitist.

What a shame it wasn’t set up at Floriade … Middle Australia is the audience needed …

Emlyn, if you are a lifeguard in charge of one end of a pool, and you see a toddler drowning up the other end, would you just let them drown, cos saving them is the other lifeguard’s job? Or would you hop in and fish them out?

Refugee camp in Glebe Park? What a load of bollocks. Why not pour water over a few people and pretend a tsunami happened as well. Whip out the blow dryers and we’ll simulate a cyclone.

Yes, MSF do great work but FFS if you want to get a feeling for how a refugee camp works go and visit one. This will work only for those bleeding hearts who can tear up and say that shared the experience but managed to pop back into the office to tuck into the custard tarts at morning tea.

And yes, I have worked as a peacekeeper so I know how it works

Aurelius said :

Actually, we do have an obligation to take in refugees. It’s part of the international law we signed up to.

Presumably, you are unable to quote the exact law you are hinting at?

I presume, because in fact Ralph is correct and you are wrong, even though you are obviously Politically Correct, and he is not.

Is Political Correctness a worthwhile substitute for the Truth, though, I wonder?

Overheard said :

People who “pretend to support refugees”. That’s pretty brutal.

It’s brutal because it makes me angry, but I wasn’t trying to be personal – please don’t take it that way.

On the one hand we have a bunch of nutty halfwits trying to help break the Bakhtiaris (and other fake refugees like them) out of detention.

On the other we have a trickle of people arriving in the Northern Territory complete with suppurating bayonet wounds and tales of village exterminations in West Papua by the indonesian army with never a word from the media or these supposed refugee advocate groups.

Just remember – over a period of 24 years, 1/3 the population of East Timor was murdered, and very very few East Timorese women and girls were spared additional assaults.

I’ve never understood why nobody cares about our own, genuine, refugees? And why they are treated so appallingly when we should be helping them? And the contrasting deluge of support for illegal immigrants trying to manipulate our Asylum laws?

I have a feeling there is some deep and dogmatic sense of denial amongst these middle-class (and otherwise very nice) leftists which prevents criticism of Indonesia.
They even blame Siev X – which sank well within Indonesian waters – on Australia (???bizarre), which is a horrifying accusation. Siev-X was a people-smugglers’ boat, operating with the connivance of Indonesian authorities – but its *our* fault?!?!?!

Anyway, my whole point is we should try to not confuse the desperate plight of genuine refugees with the illegality of economic migrants who can afford to pay people-smugglers to get them into AUstralia.

And MSF do bloody great work.

I’m really pleased you decided to run with this story.

: )

sepi said :

And perhaps if we helped refugees more once they got here, they would have less social issues.

sepi, you’ve been an inspiration. I was sitting here in my glass and steel tower, oblivious to the glorious day outside when at just after 4pm, having read your comments, I thought, “$#@! it — the training schedule and policy document and some other crud I was working on can wait. And I told my colleague I was taking some time out and I slid down to the Refugee Camp in the City, spoke to the staff, got their OK to take some audio and pics, did the tour, and I’ll post a story tomorrow.

It was very different to what I expected. It was very factual, very empathetic, very illuminating, very informative. But there wasn’t the emotion I was steeling myself for, now was there any hard sell or ‘please make sure you take our brochures away’.

I have to correct a few fallacies my first post might imply.

MSF deal wholly and soley with internally-displaced persons. If there’s any relocation across borders, that’s up to UNHCR and IOOM — read my story tomorrow for the English translations.

From my read, they do a power of good for people who have little else. I’m not about to quit work(s) and head off to Dafur or Sudan, but I now know more about them.

Thanks to Thud and others for illuminating my understanding, and apologies for the furphy about the boat people which though part of the refugee general picture, it has no place in the MSF story.

It’s singing time. Adieu. Tot ziens. Auf wiedersehn. Ciao. Mabuhay. Merhba. Later.

That’s wonderful, Thud.

: )

That is not an easy thing to do on so many levels. People like you are a real inspiration! I am not in a position to work there right now, although I hope to be one day….

Poor Gramps, eh?

*chuckle*

I am glad to see the majority of people on this website have made valuable comments..

It is a pretty cool organisation: http://refugeecamp.msf.org.au/ – http://www.msf.org.au/

I have taken the time out of my life to spend not money but time working in developing countries, and would recommend to anyone to donate their time to a good cause, because in some respects its far more valuable than your money.

Ciao,

sepi said :

The people running the ‘refugee camp’ in glebe park are back in Australia after working in refugee camps overseas.

Good on them.

– Overheard – how does one volunteer as a language tutor – is that what you do?

Hi, sepi, I posted this link above: http://www.cit.act.edu.au/about/centres/vocational_college/amep/

So Ralph’s got a PhD. Yeah, I can think of several lines to crack but frankly, you’re not worth the brain space.

As expected I won’t get back to take the tour, but there’s still a couple of hours for anyone else thinking about it. Take pics if you are.

And perhaps if we helped refugees more once they got here, they would have less social issues.

Actually, we do have an obligation to take in refugees. It’s part of the international law we signed up to.

Yeah mannnnnn….. Progressive thinkers, not blinkers and all that…..

For your information, I have a PhD.

The people running the ‘refugee camp’ in glebe park are back in Australia after working in refugee camps overseas.

Good on them.

– Overheard – how does one volunteer as a language tutor – is that what you do?

Ralph, isn’t that one of those completely useless non-intelectual magazines, you know the one thats full of crap?

It would appear that you have a completely blinkered view on life, as you make the kind of statements I would expect to hear from a completely inexperienced and and under educated individual. This is a modern world that needs progressive thinkers not blinkers.

Get with the program… take a good look at yourself as your dying tribe ain’t to cool…however I understand that poeple like yourself feel the need to complain about others, as you have difficulty accepting your sad lonely under educated existence..

PS. the world expects more of you as a human being..

So it’s probably reasonable to assume that the people running this leftist propaganda exercise don’t have jobs?

Great to hear they’ve converted you into a bleeding heart. Australia has absolutely no obligation to be bringing these people into the country (cue yammering about UN refugee conventions etc). What we do take should be kept to an absolute bare minimum, with the emphasis being kept on skilled migration.

It’s doubtful whether these people will actually ever end up paying tax in this country, and will probably end up being another drain on society. Did they mention the Sudanese gangs we now have wandering around Melbourne and Western Sydney?

^^ Yeah, I don’t transmit EVERY cogent thought I have, just most of them. And I’m the king of the ill-considered throw-away last comment. Sue me; it’s a newsy-blog-bulletin board, not my Masters in International Policy.

If I continued with the 27,000 page thesis running through my head, EW, it would include the fact that this is at least a vehicle for raising awareness of the plight of refugees in general, probably to some who have no idea at all, and might — just might — have their horizons broadened a little.

I’m no flag-waver for MSF; I don’t even donate to them. My charity cash goes 95% to another unrelated cause I’ve spoken here of elsewhere. After I’ve paid off CSA every fortnight and pay for considerable transport costs to see my kids interstate.

People who “pretend to support refugees”. That’s pretty brutal. I don’t know if that was even peripherally aimed in my direction, but…… nah, bugger it. I just spent five years of my life giving up my time for a series of students and you know what, that’s about a microscopic, infintesimal contribution compared to thousands of others.

Just be careful who you slap with your sprays about ‘people who pretend to support refugees’. And IF (I repeat, IF) you work for an aid agency or NGO, that’s fine and dandy and commendable, but just remember you’re pulling a salary for that while others are piling their contribution on top of their day jobs and already possibly fuller than full lives.

“genuine refugees” — I learnt in spades that you can make easy judgements about who’s a “genuine refugee”, but one of my guiding principles in life (and I have 27,000 of them) is to constantly ask myself: ‘What if I’m wrong?’

“Whatever happened to critical thinking?” It’s digesting the outcomes of the Brownlow Medal, checking out what Jessica Goode’s wearing tonight, and seeing if Bazza, Shazza, Kazza and Dropkick are right for the barbie and a few tinnies in front of the footy on Sat’dee arvo. Oh, and Tezza said there’s some bunch of tents set up in Glebe Park; might pull in and have a decko after I go to the bottle-o…

“(Highly recommended for the ‘blow them out of the waters/push them back into the ocean’ brigade.)”

Deary me, whatever happened to critical thinking?

Refugees, as depicted by MSF, are displaced persons who have fled war, famine, persecution (etc…) and who are homeless and almost entirely without resources.
Australia is one of the very few countries in the world with a formal refugee resettlement program, and this program sees us resettle over 10,000 of these people every year. If other countries pulled their weight, the millions of refugees living in such camps in Africa would dwindle overnight, allowing Australia to concentrate on refugees from our region instead (Burmese, West Papuans, persecuted christians in Indonesia and Malysia, Pacific Islander climate refugees, etc…).

Meanwhile, comparatively well-resourced economic migrants pay people smugglers to ferry them illegally into Australia. Genuine refugees could *never* afford to be people-smuggled through Indonesia, and in any case, the UN convention on refugees defines what is a refugee, and people who arrive here illegally via Indonesia do not meet that definition (look it up).

What really confuses me, though, is when genuine refugees *do* arrive in Australia (fleeing documented Indonesian army atrocities, for example, or just general religious persecution) – they seem to attract no sympathy whatsoever and the Australian Government makes political decisions on their disposal without any real dissent or protest by those who normally pretend to support refugees.

Maybe all these supposed supporters of “refugees” in reality are superb pragmatists and covertly recognise that people with the education, money and initiative enough to get to Australia off their own bat will be far, far more likely to become useful members of our society than the pathetic dregs of humanity who are resettled here by our refugee program?

Granny said :

Good on you, Tracker!

: )

+1. Two thumbs up and an elephant stamp, Tracker. If you’ve got enough interest and time, please post a story. Just because you’re new doesn’t mean your opinion’s any less valid.

But if not, I’ll see how I go tomorrow — tiii-i-i-ime’s not on my side (no, it ain’t).

Ah, Jaysus, meeting from 1-2pm — faaarrkk! Worse than I thought. Anyone else?

Good on you, Tracker!

: )

Did the tour today.

I’m new here, so my recommendation won’t carry much weight, but nonetheless I give it full praise, a real motivator, and eye opener (I thought I was informed before, but it’s really cool hear first hand stories etc, from aid workers).

Go check it out.

Nevertheless, you have managed to raise the profile of the refugee issue in this forum.

I really do think you should submit a story on it. Do the tour and write the story. It is a good story and so many will not hear it at all.

In any case, Gungahlin Al’s post really moved me and I have donated now.

Nah, there’s no hope for me, Granny.

The verb ‘to [my surname] means:

1. to drop a song lyric casually into a conversation;
2. to (without your asking) correct your text for spelling, grammar, punctuation and formatting; and
3. to give a 20,000 word answer when about 200 would probably suffice.

Had the first post made it, you would have all been [surname]-ed. And Bob knows you have been on other threads. Maybe even this one.

War and Peace is one of my favourite novels, so there was hope for your ill-fated post!

*chuckle*

Happy to tell anyone more about it in detail offline as it were.

Others will know about Migrant Resource Centre and other migrant-related services that would welcome volunteers with open arms.

[Ctrl+a, Ctrl+s] [Post]

Aurelius said :

At a recent gathering of a political organisation I may belong to, someone there said he was searching for volunteers to help teach some newly liberated (from the concentration camps) refugees to learn to drive.
It prompted a discussion about how those of us who welcome such people to Australia can go about doing something real to help the newly arrived.
Does anyone know?

Oh dear, maybe everything does happen for a reason.

I’ve just written a post longer than ‘War and Peace’ about the Adult Migrant English Program, but though I thought I’d had the presence of mind to copy and paste it lest I lost it, this is all that’s left in the buffer:

http://www.cit.act.edu.au/about/centres/vocational_college/amep/

As for the rest, it went up in a puff of ‘Error connecting to database’ and HTTP 500 or whatever.

[Ctrl+a, Ctrl+s] [Post]

At a recent gathering of a political organisation I may belong to, someone there said he was searching for volunteers to help teach some newly liberated (from the concentration camps) refugees to learn to drive.
It prompted a discussion about how those of us who welcome such people to Australia can go about doing something real to help the newly arrived.
Does anyone know?

Al, I’m a beefy, boofy bloke but I had tears streaming down my cheeks and had to really take a couple of quiet moments before going to quiz the staff on the subject of internally-displaced persons in Colombia. I used to tutor someone from Colombia (not very successfully — his English was about as good as my Spanish, i.e. nada) and now I feel very chastened for not having had more patience.

On the bright side, we did have one lingua franca: the World Cup (forget which year) was on at the time! So when all else failed, I’d say: ‘televisionista’ (or something) and we’d go through some basic sentences. ‘Ronaldo passes the ball TO Denilson’. ‘Denilson gets the ball FROM Ronaldo’. ‘Ronaldhino has gone down IN the penalty box. He is being a total “TOOL”.’ Next week, we’ll discuss ‘minimum contact’ and ‘simulation’.

True!

ABC 666 reporter did a live cross yesterday to Ross Solly.

She started off “I’m actually having some trouble composing myself so I can talk to you Ross…”

So apparently as Overheard has said it is actually quite confronting.

Yes, I did visit the link and am considering donating. It is a fantastic idea!

Ah, if I had my camera with me I would have, Granny. But not only do I not have my normal tools of trade with me today, I zipped out of the house this morning at some ungodly hour like an excited little terrier so fast I even left my personal mobile phone at home (avec le camera). So I couldn’t even take 2 mega-pixel snaps on my phone.

The link should give you a good idea, and for all I know (since it’s been up and open for a few days), this may be old news to some as the press may have already been reporting on it.

Slight stuff-up in the title might imply it closes at 6pm today, but it’s there ’til tomorrow (Thursday 24 Sept).

It was especially poignant as I have in the past been (and will again be) a volunteer migrant English tutor with the CIT, and I’ve tutored a couple of refugees, one whose story would just make your heart break in two. (I may have mentioned that before elsewhere — stop me if I have.)

Hopefully going for the full tour tomorrow if I can swing it.

Walked past on Saturday and nearly went in but the beer was calling at the Craft Beer Festival.

Damn – I’m shallow.

I would have come out, Overheard, but can’t take Violet out with this cough in case it develops into a chest infection which could be dangerous.

Perhaps take some pics to share with those of us who can’t make it ….