While the battle between pedestrians, cyclists and skaters drags on, the Almighty Car drives on its merry polluting way and consumes more space than all three.
As per capita Greenhouse emissions are an international disgrace because of our car dependence, yet what encouragement is given to alternative transport? Cyclists/skaters are forced onto the footpaths because we endanger our lives every time we ride, whether through cars ignoring us or people unthinkingly opening their doors as we ride down the thin strip of road we are allowed. Although bicycles are the most efficient form of transport yet invented, cyclists have frequent Near Death Experiences. We have to breathe noxious fumes (which impair the intellectual growth of children), while drivers rocket around in a tonne of metal run on irreplaceable fossil fuels.
Unlike Armidale, the ACT or Amsterdam, we have no bicycle paths. Public transport is pathetic. We seem to be losing, not gaining, pedestrian crossings. Our taxes subsidise car drivers, either through road maintenance necessitated by their heavier impact, car "parks" that consume public space, or the government-supported car industry. The latter, with their multinational henchmen in petrochemicals and the military-industrial complex, start wars and spill oil with impunity.
We can spit the automotive dummy. Car pools, bike lanes and paths, driver education campaigns, more buses and trams, skate parks and pedestrian malls can all improve our quality of life. And we'll breathe easier.
Marty Branagan
Lismore NSW
Ending the cycle of violence
As a Jewish group working for a just and peaceful solution to the conflict in the Middle East, we are concerned at the continuing cycle of violence in Lebanon, Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories. As Jews with our history of injustice and persecution, we are particularly conscious of that inflicted on others, especially when it is done in our name.
The vastly disproportionate onslaught by Israel against Lebanon in response to Hezbollah bombings on northern Israel has not stopped these attacks — the overwhelming majority of the victims of Israeli bombings have been civilians. On the contrary, Israel's response has greatly expanded the scope of the violence.
This display of Israeli military might seems more driven by the need to calm Israeli fears prior to an election than the aim of resolving the conflict.
A blind response born of fears from a Jewish past can only lead to an ever increasing cycle of violence against Israel. Such responses also deny basic human values of peace and justice.
Security and the right for Israel to exist cannot be achieved by denying the same rights to Palestinians and Lebanese. The underlying cause of the violence is the continuing occupation by Israel of the West Bank, Gaza, southern Lebanon and Syria's Golan Heights. Ending the violence by occupied peoples can only be achieved by an end to the occupation of their lands. A lasting peace can only emerge on a basis of mutual security and respect.
An enduring peace requires:
- withdrawal of Israeli and Southern Lebanese Army troops from southern Lebanon, cessation of Israeli bombing in Lebanon, and corresponding cessation of attacks on northern Israel by Hezbollah forces;
- withdrawal by Israel from the Golan Heights and corresponding guarantees of Israel's security from attack by Syria or its clients;
- an immediate start to permanent status negotiations with the Palestinian National Authority based on a commitment to an independent Palestinian state in all the territories occupied by Israel in 1967, including an equitable solution to Jerusalem, a settlement of the rights of refugees and release of all political prisoners.
Vivienne Porzsolt
Shalom Salaam
Australian Jews for Peace Justice & Reconciliation between Israelis and Palestinians
Abortion
I wish to contest the view of Dr Tuntuni Bhattacharyya (GLW #222) who stated that "it was in the late 19th century that women initially demanded the right of voluntary motherhood."
Anthropological studies show abortion to be widespread in ancient and pre-industrial societies, throughout the world, throughout history. Australian Aboriginal women use numerous abortifacients, there being at least five known remedies in Northern Australia alone. In Thailand, Malaysia and the Philippines, village abortionists still continue their traditional technique of abortion by massage. Back in the Ancient Greece and Roman days abortion was accepted during the early days of pregnancy.
Even the Catholic Church condoned abortion up until the fetus became "animated" by the "rational soul", some forty days after the conception of a male fetus and ninety days after the conception of a female. American and English common law dating back to the 13th century tolerated abortion up until the pregnant woman first feels the fetus move, about 20 weeks.
The Catholic Church did not initiate the repression of abortion, which was first restricted in Britain in 1803. The USA followed. But abortion was so accepted by society that midwives, who performed abortions as part of their regular practice, continued to practice openly, and juries refused to convict them. It wasn't until 1869 that Pope Pius IV declared all abortion to be murder.
Women have been making decisions about the number of children they wish to bear a lot more than the men in control desire you to know. Women should re-gather lost ways and not depend on permission from the paternalistic minders.
(Adapted from The New Our Bodies Ourselves by the Boston Women's Health Book Collective.)
Grusha Leeman
Fannie Bay NT
[Edited for length.]
Century Zinc
The Queensland Government's attack upon Aboriginal communities in the Gulf area is predicated on the need to rush into an arrangement with CRA so that the Century Zinc Mine can go ahead. It is very reminiscent of Queensland Government actions to dispossess the traditional owners of Weipa, Mapoon and Aurukun in the early 1960s.
As in the early 1960s the Government's campaign is based on a number of false assumptions, namely: that Aboriginal people have no legitimate claim to the land; that Aborigines are simply an impediment to progress; that Aborigines are not Queenslanders; that there are no significant environmental issues which still need to be addressed and that failure to mine immediately will weaken Australia's economy.
If the minerals stay in the ground until the social and environmental questions can be adequately addressed then Australia will be richer not poorer because we will not lose the sea grass beds on which dugong, fish and prawns depend. Given that the amount of silver, lead and zinc in the world is decreasing, the later we mine the better the price we will be offered.
Forcing Aboriginal people to rush into an unjust agreement will lead to further pressures on their communities which will produce similar social dislocation to that which has occurred at Weipa, Mapoon and Aurukun. Paying for social rehabilitative measures will not fall on CRA but directly upon the Aboriginal community and Queensland taxpayers.
In the 1960s politicians on all sides of the house received preferential share options in return for their betrayal of commonsense and the Aboriginal people — I hope Borbidge is clever enough to ensure that politicians at least get some benefit from his current efforts.
Dr. John Tomlinson
Senior Lecturer, School of Social Science
University of Newcastle
Anzac Day
For a Japanese who has an Australian family, Anzac Day is the most gloomy day of a year not because Australia fought Japan but all other wars it has had. Ironically enough Australia's war against Japan is the only war I can accept as "self-defence". Why could Sudan, Boer, I-he-chuan's Uprising of 1900, Maori Uprising, Europe's War, Korean Civil War, Malay and Gulf War be wars to "save the country"?
Including the war against Australian Aboriginals, all of them were imperialism, imperialism and imperialism. No honour. No glory. I, too, have respects for the war dead, no matter soldiers/workers or civilians of all the countries including Japan and Australia — not heroes but victims. Australia, too, is rewriting its history but for what?
Kenji Tanaka
Sydney