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Senior correspondent Barry Everingham says something very important has been lost in the Queen’s jubilee celebrations.
by senior correspondent Barry Everingham
Now that the four days celebrating the Queen’s record breaking time on England’s throne are over, perhaps the flat-earthers over at David Flint’s fun-filled ACM offices might just ponder on something that has escaped them recently.
That is: we are Australians — not forelock tugging foreigners.
This was sheeted home when watching the ACM and joint NSW ultra-right wing O’Farrell Government’s service of Thanksgiving at St Andrew’s Cathedral.
First, proceedings started with the singing of the national anthem of Great Britain, which included a verse never heard in England and was full of religious clap trap which might be OK for the Poms who have an established religion but was highly insulting to all non-Christian Australians, who these days seem to be in the majority. In any event, for those in the congregation who were under 40 and who probably had never heard God Save the Queen, the words where flashed onto a huge screen which obliterated the altar.
Second, to add insult to injury, the whackos who organised the event followed the foreign country’s anthem with the Australian national anthem (hello boys! We’re in Australia, you know?!) and again its words were displayed … including a verse never heard and started off with a plea to Christ to make us good. But we are a secular country and we do not have on official religion.
Now that the people who follow the Flint line might just be recovering from their four days of orgasm-like trances, it is surely time to point out a few home truths.
The celebrations in far off England – or “home” as Flinty would like to be able to say, and his followers certainly do – were magnificently stage managed and presented (pity about the weather). In the events department, the British have no peers and it’s hoped the Olympics folk took a close look at how it’s really done.
Had the monarchists for one second thought about the main players in the spectacle, they would realise that in the event of some royal terrorist wipe-out those who survived would be able to pick up where the dead left off and take over.
In other words, while we have this outdated and insulting system, we are stuck with a gaggle of foreigners who – like the Queen and her immediate family – are eligible to be the Australian head of state and then hand over to another foreigner, so long as he or she isn’t a Roman Catholic or a bastard!
Now, before I hear cries of “off with his head” I know the system is being altered, but it hasn’t been yet.
When the Queen goes to that God who whenever her anthem is played is asked to save her, we will be stuck with Princes Charles and his former mistress, now wife, as our king and queen.
Then William and then Harry and down the line it goes — not an Australian in sight or in mind.
Well, the most unpopular member of the royal family, Princess Michael of Kent was a naturalised Australian and she and her husband, the Queen’s first cousin, Michael, have a son and daughter. Michael had to drop off the line of succession because his wife is a Roman Catholic but their children are not, so they remain.
It his high time we reopened the republic debate and got things ready before the day Charles takes over. The leader of Her Majesty’s Loyal Opposition (how’s that for plain stupidity?) will need a bit of convincing — he is embedded in the Flint camp and, as a practising Roman Catholic, his main allegiance is to another German who is resident in Rome. Very pragmatic is our Tony.
If it comes to a secret ballot in the Liberal party, it might be interesting to see how many “Loyal Members” are in favour of not only a republic but gay marriage as well.
Dare you to hold that ballot Tony … go on.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Australia License
7 Comments
Since Barry has introduced the “religious claptrap” angle to his analysis of proceedings, let’s balance it out with an analysis of proceedings from a “religious” angle – but one which Barry’s flat-earthers at ACM, are not exactly likely to hear during a Sunday sermon.
“The book” foretells of a rather nasty beastie headed by a horn that replaced three horns (Daniel chapter 7). That particular nasty beastie has aims of ruling the world. So what do we have in the corner of our “Australian” flag? – yes, the flag of a new kingdom (early 1700′s) that replaced three kingdoms – Scotland, Ireland and England.
And what is the character of that dominating little horn, and its people, according to the book? Well. . . , it says they are POMPOUS! Can we think of any other culture to which that term would apply better than to the UK? – they even have music to celebrate their “pomp and circumstance”.
Run through some standard stereotypes of national characteristics – some of them (we won’t name names just now) are noted for being excitable, others for being rude, others for being arrogant, others for being sly and cunning etc – BUT POMPOUS??! Er, WHO ELSE BUT ….
It seems everyone has picked up on the fact the Jubilee celebrations highlight just how different and how far apart our two countries are in terms of national allegiance and pride. The monarchy with all its trappings is completely out of place in Australia and the monarchy in our political system is nothing but an historical anomaly from another world.
I just read on the UK Independent that HM’s guest list for lunch included Mahinda Rajapaksa, President of Sri Lanka. The story appears under the headline:
As its President dines with the Queen, Sri Lanka’s torture of its Tamils is revealed
A few weeks ago it was ‘King’ Hamad Al-Khalifa of Bahrain. Nice company she keeps.
Well, there is a wee bit of the Aussie about the Queen as she is a FIFO head of state!
Nothing Australian at all just that we are the peasants thats all.
We worship her on our Flag our Flag it’s a joke.
It’s time for Australia now leading the world to stand on it’s own two feet Even Scotland is ahead of us to break the shackles their nearly clear and have their own identity.
So why do we have to bow down to another country that doesn’t even want us or should i say just the minerals and riches that we have.
Time for a Republic now!
Bingo Macster! — you nailed it with this one:
“.. or should i say just the minerals and riches that we have.”
They know we are “Asia’s quarry” — control us, then they control Asia’s supply of minerals and resources, and Asia then has to go cap in hand to them for the resources it needs.
That is ALL we are to them – useful pawns in a global power game.
Great article Barry and we seem to be shouting on top of a mountain where no one hears or cares. We only have ourselves to blame for the “SHE’S RIGHT MATE AND IF IT AIN’T BROKE WHY FIX IT ? Our politicians TALK but lack the guts to openly declare that we are ready to dismantle the royal yoke that strangles us and call for a plebiscite asap ‘DO WE WANT AN AUSTRALIAN FOR OUR HEAD OF STATE “…YES or NO.
Malcolm Turnbull, the Turncoat , is a clear example of a person who was a passionate Republican now advocates waiting for the Queen to DIE . How sad this whole business has become . Remember Rudd. the 2020 summit ? . They wined, dined, and made speeches at our expense . ( the monarchists just keep on laughing….. ) WE , the grass roots members, meet and get speakers from time to time and find it so frustrating that we can only hope that a strong, sincere and passionate member of our Government can begin the debate in earnest. This is not asking for too much ???