Cronulla: Only people can stop John Howard's mob

Now that racist violence has broken out in Cronulla (southern suburb of Sydney), Australia's reactionary Prime Minister John Winston Howard must be made accountable by the citizens.

We can not expect the media to do it because of the high concentration of media ownership among Howard-supporting conservative owners. (According to Reporters Without Borders in 2004, Australia is in 41st position on a list of countries ranked by Press Freedom.)

The first thing he must do is publicly condemn John Stone (former treasury secretary and National Party senator) for his article 'Some will not integrate' and Stone's statement: "I am thinking of founding the Queen Isabella Society" -- referring to Isabella of Castile, the notoriously cruel ruler of Spain who, with her equally horrendous husband Ferdinand, created the Spanish Inquisition, ordered 150,000 Jewish subjects to convert to Christianity or face expulsion, expelled Muslims, and so on.

Queen Isabella is a heroine of the Neo-Nazi Stormfront organisation (see this discussion page) for "liberating" Spain from the Muslim Moriscos (one of history's bloodthirstiest chapters of two-way oppression and racism).

Then sack Alby Schultz

Then he must sack Liberal backbencher Alby Schultz who told The Australian: "We've got to tighten up on the way all people that come into this country -- particularly those people coming from a country with a history of anti-Christian behaviour -- apply for citizenship".

Of course, neither of these men is responsible for racist violence, and John Howard's statement today that "Australia hasn't suddenly become a racist country" is risible (see pix). It has long been a racist country. Today, December 12, happens to be the anniversary of anti-Chinese riots that broke out in Australia in 1860, leading to the dreadful Lambing Flat Massacre of 1861.

Then, in the early 1890s, John Norton (a prominent publisher and long-serving Member of Parliament) and the Anti-Chinese League helped organise a march of tens of thousands (sources differ, perhaps 50,000) of Australians through the streets of Sydney with the purpose of kicking Asians out of Australia. Even the motto of The Bulletin (Australia's best-known magazine) was "Australia for the white man", and writers like Henry Lawson wrote terrible racist things with impunity.

John Howard uses race to divide and rule

Then, let us not forget Howard's own Children Overboard scandal, his MV Tampa scandal, and his SIEV-X scandal, all predicated on using latent and actual Australian racism as a wedge issue in order to attain and extend personal, party and class power.

There is more, much more, that can be told of appalling racial violence in this country, almost always manipulated by cunning politicians to entrench their power by the old "divide and rule" tactic. As John Lennon wrote, "Only people know just how to change the world", and only people can force John Howard's distasteful extreme right-wing government to change and rein in those who sow division in society for whatever sick purposes. Howard will definitely not do it unless forced, and that means relentless pressure from all quarters.

Howard incites Racial Hatred with Racist Laws
Race Riot Nationalists spread to third Sydney suburb
"Ugly face of racism in Australia'' -- Premier Morris Iemma
Pacific Highlander blog on Australian Racism

Tagged: australia, cronulla, racism, islam, muslims, human+rights, muslim