SBS journo fired over Anzac tweets

By Rashida Yosufzai
April 26, 2015, 3:08 pm
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An SBS journalist has been sacked for making disrespectful comments about Anzac soldiers.
An SBS journalist has been sacked for making "disrespectful" comments about Anzac soldiers.
SBS says a sports presenter who made highly inappropriate comments about diggers was fired because audiences could no longer respect or trust him.

The multicultural broadcaster on Sunday sacked football journalist Scott McIntyre for a series of tweets on Anzac Day that Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull described as "despicable".

McIntyre began his tweets on the centenary of the Gallipoli landings by criticising what he said was the "cultification [sic] of an imperialist invasion".

"Remembering the summary execution, widespread rape and theft committed by these brave Anzacs in Egypt, Palestine and Japan," he said.

SBS managing director Michael Ebeid on Sunday labelled the remarks inappropriate and disrespectful, saying they breached the broadcaster's code of conduct and social media policy.

"It's not tenable to remain on air if your audience doesn't respect or trust you," he said.

Besides causing outrage on social media, the tweets also caught the eye of the minister, who said it was difficult to think of anything more offensive or inappropriate.

"Despicable remarks which deserve to be condemned," Mr Turnbull tweeted.

While the minister was unavailable for comment following McIntyre's sacking, his Liberal colleague Jamie Briggs applauded the decision, saying the comments went beyond being offensive.

However, some criticised SBS for firing McIntyre, including journalist Hugh Riminton, who is also a board member of Soldier On, an organisation that supports injured soldiers.

Riminton said the tweets were untimely, immature and in one case offensively wrong.

"But lest we forget, Our Diggers also died for free speech," he said.

Human rights commissioner Tim Wilson said McIntyre's freedom of speech was not being curtailed.

"We're talking about political interpretations of history and that is open for debate," Mr Wilson said.

"And he will be judged very harshly."

https://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/27357696/sbs-journo-fired-over-anzac-tweets/

Free speech brah.

Not in this country mate. :-$ :-$

A genuine fuckwit finally exposed for his underlying hate of Australia

didn't realise this was already posted. I only really visit the Australian Football Forum. He deserves to be fired for not knowing enough historical fact and argument.

Free speech means that you can speak without fear of violent retribution, not a guarantee that your stupidity will not have repercussions.

He deliberately insulted his audience, SBS put it nicely when they stated that his position was untenable once the audience doesn't trust or respect him.

Wonder if he'll be offered a job at the guardian or the abc

you're making quite a presumption there son

you want to live in a country where a journalist cant publicly express his opinion without being fired for it?

oh well, I guess we already do huh

what kind of standards of reporting should we expect from such conditions?
oh thats right, the network and in this case government line is toed on the big issues.

dissent for pointless political footballs is only allowed to create an illusion of balance.

A truely ODD character, should have made a FFT account and stayed off the Tweeting.

Huge slip up and I personally never liked anything he brought to the table football wise.

http://www.smh.com.au/national/sbs-presenter-scott-mcintyre-sacked-over-inappropriate-anzac-day-tweets-20150426-1mtbx8.html

But some commentators defended McIntyre's right to free speech. Ten News' Hugh Riminton tweeted that the presenter's comments were "untimely, immature and in one case offensively wrong. But lest we forget, Our Diggers also died for free speech."

Riminton is on the board of charity organisation Soldier On Australia, which supports Australian servicemen and women who have been physically and psychologically wounded in conflicts.


Edited by MUNRUBENMUZ: 26/4/2015 10:20:27 PM

Now if only channel 10 had the guts to fire bolt as well.

Wow...can't say anything about the cock sucking ANZACS these days.

My biggest issue is that most of his points are unsupported by historical evidence. That is something a journalist should be fired for.

It does raise the issue of what does constitute free speech in our society.

What he said was very ill considered and confrontational, particularly with the timing, but it does highlight a weakness in when, where, how and why comments can be made on any topic. Must we all hold the same views? Only say what we think people want to hear? It would be a sad place if that was the case.

Overall though, if he potentially contravened his employment contract then it would make sense for him to go. I tend to also agree that he did not seem to bring a lot to the table for our code, which is solely from what I had observed, but in this instance it is a pity that he took the action he did on a special day of national rememberance, especially with many unsubstantiated comments. .Poor form.

Edited by heart_fan: 26/4/2015 10:38:08 PM

The Roar

Self-loathing left-wing shit stain, got what he deserved.

Edited by Captain Haddock: 26/4/2015 10:40:46 PM

Argh fuck it.

It's all too hard.


Edited by MUNRUBENMUZ: 26/4/2015 11:45:48 PM

Precisely, but freedom of speech doesn't require historical/scientific evidence does it? Perhaps we could put this one down to journalistic integrity.

I wonder where the Wapanese will end up next? The paradox of the old mate 'whitey' McIntyre. Constantly on the look out for a new culture as a surrogate. Only to find out that his newfound refuge is less accepting of him than his native country, Australia. :oops:

Always thought he was bland on podcasts and his highlights work was poor.

Either way, can't be too upset with this outcome in this day and age of social media shit storms.

-PB

Edited by paulbagzFC: 26/4/2015 10:54:50 PM

Funny thing he was very anti Japanese in that article about Arnold in Japan.
ALsoi supporting the Palestinian team I thought the Ottoman empire was unpopular in that region.

hehe no ones mentioned SBS have a limited budget now and culling him is opportunistic, which means they can keep the many shit guest hosts they have that all dribble the same shit like parrots. So he's just collateral, one of the many parrots

Lesamundo and Foz always got the maximum introspection out of the games. All these gits do now is ramble, and they seem hell bent intent on keeping Zdrilla despite whoever else gets the chop. They should just do an Aussie abroad segment and drop the useless crap :)

He has free speech. He clearly exercised that right when he sent the tweets. That doesn't mean there aren't reprocussions for what he says or does.

No it isn't.

McIntyre referred to the Australian public as poorly read drinkers and gamblers, deliberately insulting words against his audience.

He made several stupid claims that are not supported by historical evidence and others that are just plain wrong. Widespread rape by the ANZACs in Japan? No, they were our allies in WWI and Australian soldiers have never fought in Japan. The closest they have ever come is being based in Japan after WWII as part of the British Commonwealth Occupation Force.

McIntyre was not fired for airing his opinion, he was fired for violating his employers policies on a Twitter account that stated he was an SBS employee. He caused a huge PR disaster for his employer and damaged their brand. Anyone in any industry would get the sack for that, it is what adults call consequences, being a journalist does not give an automatic exemption.

He was never a good journalist and has gone downhill of late. Has anyone here ever read one of his articles and gained any insight at all? No, half the posters on here do a better job. SBS should take the chance to give his position to someone who actually understands the game and has something to offer us as football fans. Kate Cohen would be a good place to start.

What an appalling excuse for an ill-educated, sucking at the public teat, lieing, piece of trash.

Hey, I'm just excercising my imaginary right to free speech and I'm sure he'll be the first one to honourably line up and defend me!

:p



Edited by SWandP: 26/4/2015 11:16:31 PM

+1. Said everything I wanted to say but probably better.

my first problem with his reading of history, he described the allies attack on the Ottoman empire as a imperialistic venture. Well WWI was a monumental clusterfuck caused by a whole bunch of crazy little things, no one thing was to blame and no major player was free from blame. The Ottomans were a major player. Attacking the Dardanelles was a decent military strategy. It wasn't imperialistic. Other attacks on the Ottoman's holdings elsewhere could be described as imperialistic but not the Gallipoli campaign. That was meant to knock the Turks out of the war quickly and resupply Russia. Hell if it had of succeeded the Ottoman's might have kept their hold on the middle-east, we wouldn't have had Sykes-Picot and we might have avoided many of the world's current issues. Then again, those issues could well be worse.

The conduct of the ANZACS in WWI was sometimes less than exemplary. At other times it was exemplary. That was the nature of warfare. And still is. Again there were no 'good guys' in WWI. The whole thing was a mistake and all sides were responsible for atrocities/war crimes.

He then jumps into WWII and seems to paint the Allies and the Australians as 'bad guys' in this war. Well that is very wrong. The allies killed millions of civilians in indiscriminate bombing campaigns in all theatres of war, used racial profiling to round up citizens into internment camps for national security and then employed the deadliest weapon then known to man killing tens of thousands in an instant. Yet the allies were, without a shadow of a doubt, the good guys in that conflict. Undeniably. If you decry the horrors of one side you should not disregard the horrors of the other. The Japanese had been raping, pillaging, subjugating and murdering millions of people throughout Asia in their imperialist campaigns for 35 years or more. How are allied crimes more important to note than those? There would be very few Westerners who would even know the names of more than 3 Japanese war crimes. Hell I would be impressed if anyone could name 3 off the top of their head without help.

But a hell of a lot of people know the crimes of the Allies but we don't celebrate the crimes. We celebrate the sacrifice, the noble intentions and try to keep alive the memory of how bad war is SO IT NEVER HAPPENS AGAIN! So that regimes like Imperial Japan's can never again brainwash a nation into thinking war could bring glorious honour to empire and family.

Scott just flew off the handle because he probably heard some stupid yobbo shout something stupid and ignorant about Arabs and terrorism and foreigners etc. Scott then decided to respond by showing his own bias and ignorance.

Langan

beat me to it and put it better than I could have done. Outstanding post. Very measured and you've basically nailed it.

Attacking the Dardanelles was a great idea. If it had worked, it would have ended the war much earlier and there is a very decent chance there would not have been a Russian Revolution (contentious, but I've studied it in some detail at undergrad level). At least not a Russian Revolution at that point in time.

The problem was it was so poorly executed.

Although I feel a bit sorry for Scott McIntyre, he should have known better. And his post was ill-informed.

However what I would like is for the Australian public to actually become slightly more educated about the role of their troops in the First World War. Most of us were basically raised to believe that the Australian and New Zealand troops were somehow victims of a British conspiracy in which British casualties might as well have been non-existent. It's utter crap. British casualties far outnumbered Australian ones.

Not that we should forget, the sacrifices of those in Gallipoli, but we shouldn't fetish it, as we seem to do. Australian troops actually genuinely did make a genuine difference on the Western Front and, in some quarters, don't get enough praise for that. Having said that, I've read of Australian troops essentially committing war crimes on the Western Front. And nobody ever talks about that.

Exactly this.

There should also be no talk of lack of free speech cause that's what he did. He's not in jail or anything. He got fired. Biiiig difference.

Don't get me started on how bad Australian schools and teachers teach history. If that was done better we wouldn't have problems like this. A lot of essential facts simply aren't known. Very few Australians would be able to tell you that WWI was started when a guy named Archie Duke got hungry so he shot an ostrich. I mean everybody should know that.

Very nice informed post =d>


There isn't any "good guys" in any war. Just some worse then others.


Here you go...
1) The Rape of Nanking.
2) Slave labour and abuses during the building of the Burma and Thailand railway.
3) The Massacre of Manila.

Perks of being on the side of the victors.

:lol:

Absolutely garbage. No chance of it working.

Stop swallowing the propaganda.

http://www.abc.net.au/pm/content/2015/s4220857.htm?site=westernvic

MARK COLVIN: It's become almost commonplace to talk about the incompetence of the allied generals and strategists at Gallipoli, and the futility of the operation itself.

Winston Churchill recognised the terrible losses he'd caused by resigning from government and going to fight in the trenches.

What's been less discussed is the futility of the strategic vision behind the Gallipoli adventure in 1915.

In Gallipoli, The End of The Myth, the historian Robin Prior says that needs to change.

https://www.awm.gov.au/education/talks/gallipoli-end-of-a-myth-launch/

His research shows that even a complete victory in the Dardanelles would have achieved exactly nothing in terms of the war's big picture.

Professor Prior spoke to me this afternoon.

ROBIN PRIOR: It's a disaster because even if the allies had been victorious at Gallipoli, nothing would have followed, the war would have gone on. The main army of the main enemy in that war was the German army and it happened to be on the western and eastern fronts.

MARK COLVIN: Let's just background it a bit, the idea was to push through the Dardanelles, get into the Black Sea and then move up the Danube and establish a second front against the Germans?

ROBIN PRIOR: That's right, the armies that landed at Gallipoli weren't themselves going to push trough to Constantinople, they were going to get to what was called The Narrows, knock out the Turkish force and sweep the minefields that had been preventing the fleet from getting through.

The fleet would then proceed to Constantinople, the Turks would surrender and then the British and French then would proceed to Constantinople, form a coalition of Balkan states and they would advance up the Danube attacking Austria, Hungary and Germany from the rear.

MARK COLVIN: So it's a soft underbelly strategy, it's an idea that you can distract the Germans from the western front and make them send lots of divisions down south and east?

ROBIN PRIOR: That's right, you will make them… weaken the western and eastern fronts and if you're not successful there, that means you'll be able to break through in the west.

MARK COLVIN: So what's wrong with that strategy?

ROBIN PRIOR: Almost everything. The coalition of Balkan states is the main problem, we're talking of Bulgaria, Romania, Greece, Serbia, even Montenegro. The problem is with the state of their armies in 1915, they were little more than peasant levies. They had very few machine guns, very little artillery. The Romanians were pumping out just two shells per day from their one shell factory.

MARK COLVIN: Two shells a day?

ROBIN PRIOR: Two shells a day.

MARK COLVIN: And anybody who knows anything about the First World War, knows just how many shells were expended every hour.

ROBIN PRIOR: In the opening bombardment at the Somme for example nine months later, the British fired 1.7 million shells, which proved not to be nearly enough at the German defences. So two shells per day is not a lot.

Their artillery was joined by oxen, they had very few aircraft and the additional problem is that all these states hated each other much more than they hated the Austrians, Hungarians and the Germans.

MARK COLVIN: And you're saying that the political work hadn't been done to form a - what we would now call a coalition of the willing?

ROBIN PRIOR: This would have been a coalition of the very unwilling indeed and the diplomatic work had not been done. Bulgaria inclined towards the central powers, which in fact they joined later in 1915. Romania inclined towards the Entente.

MARK COLVIN: And for people who don't know the central powers were Germany and Austria, Hungary.

ROBIN PRIOR: Germany, Austria and Hungary. Romania inclined towards France and Britain and there had not been any spade work done to get these countries to form any kind of uniform policy.

MARK COLVIN: And Greece, Macedonia - the countries that made up the former Yugoslavia are notorious. That's where we get the world Balkanised from isn't it?

ROBIN PRIOR: It is, it is. I mean Greece is a good example. The king was pro-German, the prime minister pro-ally, so how that would have played out is very murky indeed.

MARK COLVIN: So essentially what you're saying is that even if on the very first day, the Turks had simply surrendered, it would have achieved nothing?

ROBIN PRIOR: It would have achieved nothing. Even supposing you could have got this coalition of rag-bag armies together, the communications up the Danube Valley consisted of a couple of narrow gauge railway lines. We're speaking of a million men here, they could have hardly been supplied with that sort of rudimentary infrastructure.

MARK COLVIN: And again for people who haven't really studied the First World War, railways are the absolute key to most of the successful operations in it.

ROBIN PRIOR: Yes. I mean why the western front for example was where it was, was that three or four million men on either side could be supplied by the sophisticated railway system of north-western Europe. That's why the western front was there.

Why the other fronts were not as well populated was that it was impossible to supply the troops.

MARK COLVIN: How should we be commemorating Anzac. Do you have any problems with what's happening on Anzac Day this year?

ROBIN PRIOR: Look not particularly. Some people are worried that it's militarizing our society, I don't see that. A lot of people are interested because they have relatives who fought there, grandparents, great-grandparents, great-uncles. It's part of that wider genealogical movement in that sort of sense.

MARK COLVIN: So when we stop for a minutes silence on Anzac Day, what will you be thinking of? What should we be thinking of?

ROBIN PRIOR: I'd be thinking that there were a lot of brave men who gave their lives at Gallipoli and elsewhere so that we could be free to choose, in fact whether we go to dawn services or not, live the sort of lives that we're living now.

MARK COLVIN: But they did so in what was, as a piece of warfare, a completely futile operation?

ROBIN PRIOR: Absolutely. You can have futile episodes in war without necessarily the war being futile itself.

MARK COLVIN: Robin Prior, Visiting Professorial Fellow at the School of History at the University of Adelaide. And you can hear a longer version of that interview on our website from this evening.

Sandakan, POW ships, Changi Singapore massacres I meant, Batam.

That's 4. Do I get a skippy badge?



Edited by MUNRUBENMUZ: 27/4/2015 09:50:35 AM

Totally agree with this. I like the opinion pieces on The World Game website, whether they're written by Les, Fozz, Tim Vickery, Vitor, or whoever else. But I read some of Scott's work, and it bored the shit out of me - so I just bypassed his articles. Same goes for whenever he appeared on "Shootout" whenever Les or Fozz weren't present.

And yes, Kate Cohen would be a fantastic addition!

Scott MacIntyre lives in Asia? frequents their ?

I tell you what he seems to be caught up in the differences between cultures. I hear people here talking about 'freedom', 'freedom of speech'. Well I tell you one thing - between every different culture on earth there are levels of this between every culture, ASIAN cultures are the worst and it seems he's been hanging out their too long if he's screaming from the inside out over twitter over the many differences between Aussie culture and especially Asian's who are more withdrawn and lack any opinions and tend to keep them locked up in a box to save face and improve status.

Poor MacIntyre,

WOW!

4 billion people summed up in a part sentence.

442 delivers once again.

Pretty sure Highkick is Filipino lol.

-PB

Just a few more. This list is just a small sample:

Testing of chemical and biological weapons on civilians in Manchuria.
Wholesale kidnapping and exporting Korean women to prostitution "comfort centres' throughout the Empire.
Execution of Allied airmen routinely upon capture.
The use of civilians as training aids to "blood" new soldiers. Locals in occupied areas were simply taken and tied to poles and used for bayonet practice to teach novices how to kill. This was widespread in China.
Rape, murder and mutilation of the native peoples of Milne Bay. Cutting the breasts off native women was commonly reported.
Murder of two Catholic Nuns near Kokoda by cutting their throats. Killing of a priest out of hand after he tended some wounded.
Slave labour of Pacific Islanders to suport the landings along the New Guinea coast. Executed and beaten regularly.
Murder of an 11 year old boy at Rabaul (along with his mother and father) for suspicion they may have had a hidden radio.
Murder by bayonet (in pairs) of Australian Soldiers after they surrendered on New Britain.
Murder of Australian Soldiers by drowning through caging in cane baskets left in the tidal zone in Dutch East Indies.
Murder and torture of Australian wounded in Malaya by throwing them into a hole (caused by a failed attempt to blow a bridge), pouring petrol upon them and then burning them alive. Their ashes were used as fill.
Murder of Australian wounded by bayonet and the machine gunning of their attendant nurses after capture. (Read story of Vivian Bullwinkel).
Beating prisoners of war with wooden clubs for the crime of catching cholera. (Diary of Weary Dunlop).
Systematic starvation by refusing to provide rations for sick POWs. No work, no rations.
Over .25 million Chinese killed on the Burma railroad - starved, beaten and diseased.
The Bataan death march.
The ordering of the civil population of commit suicide instead of surrendering and the impressing of 1500 school children to bear arms against the Allied landing at Okinawa.
Indiscriminate bombing of civilian areas as they advanced simply to cause terror.
Transport of prisoners in overcrowded ships, where prisoners were locked in holds, with no food, little water and no fresh air whilst being transported through tropical destinations to slave labour roles in Japan.
Deliberate sinking of a correctly marked and lit hospital ship off Brisbane.

Ahhh I could go on but I get depressed,

Horrific stuff. ^^

However in the interests of fairness.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allied_war_crimes_during_World_War_II
http://listverse.com/2012/12/14/top-10-allied-war-crimes-of-world-war-ii/
http://www.veteranstoday.com/2014/10/19/british-and-american-war-crimes-during-world-war-ii/

Just a sample of many.



Edited by MUNRUBENMUZ: 27/4/2015 11:51:11 AM

He probably would have gotten the sack soon enough anyway with SBS pulling back on its football coverage. But yeah, pretty stupid because no other network will ever touch him now.

can we please give highkick a filter before he posts asking are you sure you want to post this

congratulations you win the prize of the most cretinous post ever on this site. And you were up against very stiff opposition.
I hope you proudly wear your 'I'm an ignorant tosser t shirt'
Try thinking for yourself instead of parroting murdoch and the liberal party's jingoistic crap.
truly pathetic.


Edited by calciopoli: 27/4/2015 12:17:00 PM

Care to go into a little more detail fucktard

-PB

Why would I not post it?

I know Asian's mate, been married to one for 7 years, they never speak their minds it's frustrating.

McIntyre sounds like a frustrated little man. More so now :D

No wonder why he is annoying.

Even betterer. One = 4 billion.

How good is this bloke?

Bloody legend.

dont make it about Liberal or Labor. they're both equally fucked up as one another.

OK so if I am sticking to the theme of this thread, which has quite a victim feel to it, ANZAC's being the victim of McIntyre's just upsetting comments. OK I understand how you would put my comments under some generalisation category. But seriously, I am not, many Asians are like this. If you did some actual intelligent research into this you would find out.

Even the Aussie converted ones are annoying frustrating like this. Just nod your head and say yes.

Well cobber I lived in Singapore for 3 years so whilst I don't have the amazing breadth and depth of experience as you do, of marrying an Asian lass, I would consider myself moderately well versed to offer an opinion on a small sub-set of Asian peoples.

Which, you'll note, I haven't.

Happy marriage???

What's wrong?
White Australia unable to handle a few truth bombs?

Just go out there to the accessible areas of the city of Sydney

White Australia doesn't want to be seen there, yet they hold the dominant voice

Highkick , ive never come across anyone that lacks judgement on just about anything and i think you are the first. :lol:

Wow that escalated slowly.

Cannibalism of Australian soldiers in Kokoda.

if he is god help me. Makes us filos look bad:lol:

Poor Highkick.

Just enjoy him. Don't take it too seriously.

Stay tuned for Scottys defence of cannibalism

got a few more pages out of it at least

its not like he's the first

Scott McIntyre as a professional should have known the timing was beyond poor and to use twitter were being able to explain context is near impossible was foolish in the extreme .. tis hard to fathom how he would make such a call in the manner he did... he got what he deserved ...

I thought it was too their own??

not saying I agree or disagree with what he said, however if he wanted to make a point this was the best way to do it



Edited by ricecrackers: 27/4/2015 01:48:59 PM

As in they ate their own soldiers? They may well have, but they definitely ate Australian soldiers too. Its likely this was at least partly motivated by the fact they were starving, although I've also read other reports that say they had plenty of food.

Think about the concept of urban space in Australia, its prodominantly occupied not by White Australia

Case in point, lets go on a day trip to Eastern Avenue down Sydney University, one of Australia's most crowded places

I don't mind truthbombs and I don't mind people questioning what ANZAC day has become or our part in wars, but the tweets were pretty nonsensical. Look at them individually and point out where the truth lies. The mostly white, binge drinking gamblers is about the only one that really hits home - hell, I am one of them.

I find it kind of amusing that someone who wants to downplay the story of Anzacs would then imply so arrogantly that we had any part in Hiroshima or Nagasaki; as far as any history I've been taught, these were decisions far removed from Australia's sphere of influence. He can defend such a comment with the fact that he added "Allies" but he's clearly trying to make a ridiculous link.

The thing is, it takes something like Anzac day for the White Australians to come out, especially in the urban spaces (like Sydney), but for the most of the year, they are nowhere to be seen, as these urban spaces are taken up by the Asians and Indians, which is an inconvenient truth to Australia's multiculturalism, in that it is multicultural, WITHOUT the White Australian culture - which ironically is seen to be the dominant culture, when they are nowhere to be seen, (ie theyre the ones that drive cars and live out there in the Suburbs), whereas the cosmopolitans take bus and trains, and live next to bus stops/ train stations

Think about it - the Cronulla riots, a gathering of all the dickheads (who happened to be white, looking for a fight), or even the Reclaim Australia rally is what we've been accustomed to associating with Australia's white culture, or go to watch an AFL game, V8 Supercars, or Rugby League game. Theres just this - "I'll be here in this corner, and you can be there instead" mentality

The concept of 'this is what we fought for' on Anzac day fades with all this cosmopolitanism. When the majority is nonplussed / ambivalent about the whole concept of anzac day, and the only thing they complain about is how they didnt get an extra day off for a public holiday.

Incorrect. This whole 'unaustrayan'/doesnt love austraya horseshit was a product of john Howards government. (Gleefully continued by T Rabid) It was a part of his culture wars at the ABC etc. in an attempt to stifle any objective criticism of his often draconian policies and it has partially succeeded in dumbing down political and societal discourse going by the drivel on display here.

Oh, and this->

you can sit down now

They're both fucked just not equally.

Can I just say I am really enjoying the depth of thought on display in the Anzac day threads.

I was almost sure most of those questioning aspects of Anzac day would be howled down in a hail of "it's UnAustralian, how dare you!!!!).

There has been a little bit of that (and you know who you are) but there's been heaps of others that have put their 2 cents in that have been well articulated and worth a read.

My estimation of some of the posters here has gone up quite a lot over the last few days.









And then there's highkick.

Fark she looks daft.
You miss the point, being a Muppet and gallivanting around in war zones all dressed up is ridiculous, but it is not the same thing as as seeking to label those who criticise Australia or government policy as unpatriotic. ](*,)

Poor highkick. Leave him alone. ;)

which party would you suggest Michael Ebeid supports?

Is there a more un patriotic nation than Australia?

I mean we're a fairly young nation and being an island we've been lucky in that we've been relatively untouched by war, have never had to fight for our independence, and we've lived off the teet of England and then the US for a very long time. We lack a real national identity and the few things that one generally associates with this identity are dismissed as bogan or in the case of the "ANZAC Spirit" critiqued by the social media intelligentsia.

It just seems there's such an elitist element that makes their voices heard on social media around any Australia Day or ANZAC Day that like to think you've got to have a southern cross tattoo and a drinking problem to call yourself a patriot, but honestly what do we have to be ashamed of for being proud of your country? Obviously there have been plenty of negatives in our nations history but that's a universal problem, there have also been a lot of good things over the years that we have to be thankful for, I just don't see the point in living in the mistakes of the past at the expense of enjoying the present.

I just think that for all the fuss that gets made about how much we carry on about our 'significant moments' like Gallipoli, not enough is made about how critical we are of ourselves as well. I'd hate to see how fucking pessimistic our society would be if we actually had a rap sheet of injustices as big as a nation like Germany or the US, we'd never hear the end of it, but if they can pick themselves and be proud of their heritage it's an absolute travesty that so many Australian's are unable to do so.

funny how this thread got moved twice

its caused a stir with 442 mods too :)

McIntyre was strange, constantly talking about how Australia insults Asia whilst failing to balance his arguments. His viewpoint was not one from Asia but simply a bitter and uninformed indiviual.

this thread is red hot :lol:

As what the iron lady once said: "there is no such thing as a country"

Nationalists looking to cling onto an identity based on wartime commemoration are barking up the wrong tree

Theres no thought of Anzac day the other 364 days a year in the concept of fighting for 'our way of living', yet this message gets reinforced every year even though the veterans are long gone

Although thats what history is, holding on to stuff in the past, for as long as we remember it, its human nature

ah touché

it helps been far away from everything.

as for the southern cross tattoo i genuinely think people woukd think twice about getting one out of fear for being classed a bogan. 10 years ago i remember people being proud as punch for getting one and would show it off at every turn....not so much now though.



Edited by Socawho: 27/4/2015 07:27:35 PM

Unlike some here I am proud of the fact that some Australians aren't so blinded by the lottery of birth that they are willing to look critically at the country we inhabit.

I'd say it's the mark of a mature person and a nation to be introspective.

insulting the dead on a day for remembering isnt mature but just plain stupid. theres nothing wrong to debate the issues he has raised but hes made more enemies due to the timing regardless of whether he is right or wrong. what he did was similar to crashing someones funeral, you just dont do shit like that...for a start its disrespectful and secondly hes shown to everyone he lacks any common semse. so if you think thats mature then you need some etiquette lessons son.



Edited by Socawho: 27/4/2015 08:56:42 PM

Calm your farm sunshine. My comments were in relation to Fredsta's comments not McIntyre's.

An interesting perspective.

http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/tv-and-radio/scott-mcintyre-being-sacked-by-sbs-is-a-dreadful-move-for-freedom-of-speech-20150427-1mu6re.html

I'm not swallowing the propaganda. I disagree with Prior on this matter. He's generally pretty good. I saw him take part in an excellent ABC programme the other night. He was right in saying that Australians have basically glossed over the involvement of other nations in the Gallipoli (never mind the fact that Australian casualties were far fewer than British ones, for example).

But it's not propaganda to suggest that the aim of the Gallipoli campaign was good. Forgetting all this guff about whether Eastern Europeans would have found themselves sucked in, without them, if it had worked, the Allies would have controlled the Dardanelles and opened up a much quicker and more efficient supply route to Russia. Russia was really struggling in the First World War. Having said that, the Russians were an absolute menace to the Germans. Even after the February Revolution, the Russians made some real damage on the Eastern Front with various offensives. I'm not suggesting they were organised or well-drilled, because they mostly weren't. Nevertheless they were, or could have been, a force to be reckoned with. If the Russians had been better supplied, that would have caused absolute carnage for the Germans. The Germans would probably have found themselves in a similar situation to that which they encountered with the Russians in the latter part of Second World War.

Prior's view, imo, is too one-dimensional. He focuses on the fact that the Germans were the main enemy so we ought to have been engaging the Germans in battle. War isn't at all dissimilar to a game of Chess. There are all manner of things going on at the same time. Plenty of different variables. If you find a great way to prop up Russia, by defeating the Turks, then you apply the most immense pressure on Germany.

Edited by quickflick: 27/4/2015 11:31:12 PM