Thursday, January 19, 2006
Peter Debnam and the race card
This sorry issue seems to have plenty of fuel left to burn yet.
On one hand, today saw what appears to be a fairly blatant instance of White favouritism, with this 33 y.o. Anglo guy getting bail. Ironically enough, in mid-December:
Opposition leader Peter Debnam said the Government needed to act decisively to ensure bail was refused to anyone involved in the riots.
So Debnam’s words are good enough to see this non-Anglo *16* y.o. guy refused bail, over what appears to be mainly a matter of property damage (although the driver of a car whose windscreen was smashed did sustain minor cuts to his arm).
Meanwhile, this evening’s “Today Tonight” and “A Current Affair” programs both led with video footage apparently showing young men of middle-Eastern appearance bashing an Anglo-looking man at the so–called “revenge attacks” on the evening of December 12 (a day after the Cronulla riot). The gist of both programs was, in a PR coup for Peter Debnam, that police had for weeks withheld this video footage – which showed about ten perpetrators, none of which have apparently yet been arrested – out of ethnic sensitivity, or some other murky motive.
Not sure if someone has made this point in the discussions of Debnam’s intemperate baiting at Larvatus Prodeo or Catallaxy, but I reckon another reason that Debnam is ludicrously wrong-headed is that almost all the “revenge attack” crime concerned property damage only (the video footage shown tonight being very much the exception).
Compared to the random attempted murder of anyone with dark skin, car windscreens and panels are pretty small beer. Plus the location the damage mostly happened – Maroubra, where any freestanding house costs at least $1m – makes me heart bleed for the afflicted, NOT.
This sorry issue seems to have plenty of fuel left to burn yet.
On one hand, today saw what appears to be a fairly blatant instance of White favouritism, with this 33 y.o. Anglo guy getting bail. Ironically enough, in mid-December:
Opposition leader Peter Debnam said the Government needed to act decisively to ensure bail was refused to anyone involved in the riots.
So Debnam’s words are good enough to see this non-Anglo *16* y.o. guy refused bail, over what appears to be mainly a matter of property damage (although the driver of a car whose windscreen was smashed did sustain minor cuts to his arm).
Meanwhile, this evening’s “Today Tonight” and “A Current Affair” programs both led with video footage apparently showing young men of middle-Eastern appearance bashing an Anglo-looking man at the so–called “revenge attacks” on the evening of December 12 (a day after the Cronulla riot). The gist of both programs was, in a PR coup for Peter Debnam, that police had for weeks withheld this video footage – which showed about ten perpetrators, none of which have apparently yet been arrested – out of ethnic sensitivity, or some other murky motive.
Not sure if someone has made this point in the discussions of Debnam’s intemperate baiting at Larvatus Prodeo or Catallaxy, but I reckon another reason that Debnam is ludicrously wrong-headed is that almost all the “revenge attack” crime concerned property damage only (the video footage shown tonight being very much the exception).
Compared to the random attempted murder of anyone with dark skin, car windscreens and panels are pretty small beer. Plus the location the damage mostly happened – Maroubra, where any freestanding house costs at least $1m – makes me heart bleed for the afflicted, NOT.
