The Australian Federal Police today came one step closer to being directly responsible for the death of at least one more Australian citizen. I've already made my feeling clear here, but the disgust and shame has reared its ugly head again with the news of the dismissal of the appeals of three of the nine.
Growing up, I was fiercely (maybe foolishly) patriotic, believing in the ideals of a "fair go" and "look after your own". Shit, when I was a kid, I thought it was a national custom never to "dob in your own". Over the last decade or so (coincidence?), I have gone from proud to disillusioned to embarrassed to downright ashamed to be an Australian. I know that it is usual to lose SOME of your ideals as you grow older, but to have them ripped from you and torn up in front of your face and danced on is surely more than we should have to bear? This is no longer the place I grew up in, nor the place I hoped my children would grow and prosper in. I can only hope that those that come after us will look back on this era as something to fight against, as a good "bad example".
I just pray that the deaths of these foolish young Australians is not part of that example.
Oh, how do you sleep?
Oh, how do you sleep at night?
-John Lennon 1971
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