Peter's right, those lawyers don't measure up as 'Australians'
Peter Dutton is right. Those immigration lawyers representing asylum seekers are unAustralian. They don’t stand with us. They don’t stand for us. They undermine the very idea of what it means to be Australian.
Unlike Governor Phillip, they did not dispatch marine corps patrols into the wilds of Botany Bay, there to kill as many of the local people as might suffice to "spread an exemplary terror among the natives".
Unlike John Macarthur, late of the $2 note and celebrated father of the Australian wool industry, they did not launch a military coup against the lawful government of the colony to protect their private commercial interests.
Unlike Lachlan Macquarie, sent from London to restore the authority of the Crown in the wake of that rebellion, they did not hang the bodies of the Aborigines from trees on the edge of the settled areas, as an example to their displaced kin that a new people have taken dominion here.
Unlike the squatters who pushed out beyond the boundaries of settlement, they did not massacre the tribes living on the land they stole.
Unlike the diggers on the goldfields, they did not riot against the Chinese.
Unlike the state and Commonwealth governments, they did not steal the children of Indigenous families for more than 100 years.
Unlike the farmers of north Queensland, they did not enslave Melanesians to work on their sugar plantations.
Unlike the landlords of Sydney and Melbourne, they did not turn out tens of thousands of families who could not pay their rent during the Depression.
Unlike the governments of that time, they did not order police to open fire on unemployed men occupying vacant rental properties in protest.
Unlike the bishops and archbishops and cardinals of the Church, they did not protect and even promote generations of sexual predators who raped and ruined the lives of thousands of children.
Unlike successive governments, they haven’t abrogated their responsibilities under international law to provide protection to those fleeing oppression.
Unlike those same governments, they haven’t demonised the powerless, the hopeless and the wretched of the Earth.
Unlike Peter Dutton, they haven’t targeted a hundred of the most vulnerable human beings in this country for politically motivated persecution.
So, no. He’s right. They don’t really measure up as Australians.
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