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Today we see a resurgence of digital tribalism, a glorification of disingenuous engagement online and humiliating those of a different perspective. Everywhere we see simplistic and belligerent narratives of ‘us versus them’ over more nuanced explanations that might impart a greater sense of shared humanity and common purpose. So what happened?
The Apology by the representatives of Government was a landmark at the juncture of the road from the past and the path to the future. It defined the harm suffered by Indigenous Australians at the hands of governments obsessed by an ignorant and biased ideology. It also vindicated the Indigenous advocates who had long demanded an end to discriminatory attitudes and behaviour within non-Indigenous Australian society and its institutions.
My ambivalence about philosophy came from my placing a high value on reason and its desire to test its own limits, but simultaneously being inherently suspicious of reasons. They are the stuff out of which the tin-soldiers of isms are created and so often used to patrol the fence that separates acceptable from unacceptable thought.
Avoiding discomfort is a privilege only enjoyed by those who benefit from the status quo, and civility policing is fundamentally about protecting both that privilege and the status quo itself. Confronting the reality of injustice in both our past and our present should be uncomfortable, and no one is entitled to immunity.
It should be troubling for anyone, religious, secular or agnostic, to be told that a human being wields anything approximating to ‘God like’ powers. That very suggestion implies a power unreviewable, unaccountable and at odds with the earthly rule of law.
Jane Austen’s exploration of a narrow social world illuminated issues central to public life in our own world. In particular, the importance of character in building harmony in her domestic world raised questions about its place, presence, and importance in political life today.
There is a great deal of commentary about the growing importance of artificial intelligence, or AI, especially in business circles. To some extent this is a self-fulfilling prophecy — if people think something will have a seminal effect then it probably will. But if the supposed commercial benefits are significant, the dangers are potentially enormous.
Many Catholics will have found the news from Germany this past week painful. A law firm, Westpfahl Spilker Wastl, has presented findings in its investigation into historic sexual abuse in the Munich archdiocese. Running to 1,000 pages, the report is shocking: it lists at least 497 victims for the period 1945–2019 and identifies 235 probable offenders including 173 priests and nine deacons.
One reasonably could ask whether this is the moment to write a book about the potential of Catholic Social Theory to contribute to Australian politics and policy. After all, the Church is still struggling to come to terms with decades of child abuse, hardly a recommendation for social potential. We currently also are attempting to make sense of a Plenary that is both confused and confusing.
In recent years, Australia Day has been a holiday without title. It has been marketed as a day for all Australians, but is held on a date is seen increasingly as the beginning of the dispossession and humiliation of the First Australians. As a result it is generally received as an opportunity to laze around undisturbed by serious thoughts about Australia.
We’ve been in a pressure cooker, these past two years. More than a score of historians had memorably described 2020 as the sixth-most ‘stressful year ever’. Predictions and speculations look ahead; I looked at the past trends of the past two years and make these humble observations. With the stage set for dire times, here are six trends to look for in 2022. Here’s hoping.
When you put rising housing costs alongside stagnating wages, an alarming trend in normalising insecure work, persistent unemployment and underemployment, and statutory incomes that are going backwards in real terms, there’s good reason to be deeply worried about an increase in homelessness.
109-120 out of 200 results.