The following has come to my attention…
News Ltd today reported that organisers of the Big Day Out at Homebush had decided they would confiscate any flag or bandanna featuring the national symbol at the gates.
Event organiser Ken West was quoted as saying fans’ behaviour last year in the wake of the Cronulla riots and the recent ethnic violence at the Australian Open tennis tournament had forced his hand.
“The Australian flag was being used as gang colours. It was racism disguised as patriotism and I’m not going to tolerate it,” Mr West said.
BDO organisers issued a statement this morning saying the flag was not banned, but they said they did not want concert-goers taking it into the event.
“We are not banning the Australian flag but are simply discouraging its use for anti-social purposes at the Big Day Out,” the statement said.
Consequently I offer the following:
Your country, your flag, your choice. Available in three versions on a variety of items.
If these are “gang colours”, then I’d suggest your best option would be to either join it, because it’s a damn big “gang” with a history of “rumbling” the living puss out of others who “dis” them, or you stay the hell off their “turf”.
January 22, 2007 at 2:50 pm |
Snerk – well, Murray, mebbe I should get two, one blue, and one red.
Readers – confused by the comment? Ah, then, click here.
January 22, 2007 at 2:51 pm |
Murray, yer no fun. Don’t allow html?
Okay, then – copy and paste this: http://www.thedonovan.com/archives/2007/01/red_ensign_blog.html
January 22, 2007 at 2:52 pm |
Oh, for pity’s sake, Murray – can’t put in html, but it auto-discovers? Sheesh!
8^)
January 22, 2007 at 3:18 pm |
Don’t ask me man, I just work here.
January 22, 2007 at 3:24 pm |
I can’t even spell THLM
January 22, 2007 at 6:58 pm |
It is of course the mother of all beat ups. A perfectly reasonable request from Ken West that people leave the flag at home as last year it was the centrepice of quite a few ugly incidents post Cronulla. It pretty much goes without saying that the only people who see a need to wrap themselves in the Australian flag are poor delude youth seriously in need of a brain transplant. It’s music festival for fucks sakes, whatever happened to the youth of today if this is the typoe of agenda they subscribe to. One small step away from Hitler Youth and the black shirts.
I suspect the recent BDO in Auckland wasn’t overrun with fuckwits wrapping themselves in the NZ flag.
Think about it…………something for Kiwis to be proud of …..you haven’t gone down the track of ugly jingoistic racist ‘patriotism’ which is at the base of this.
“Patriotism is the last refuge of the scoundrel”
Never a truer word spoken
January 22, 2007 at 7:19 pm |
“Patriotism is the last refuge of the scoundrel”, interesting comment “Australian Patriot“.
I can tell you that no one told Kiwis to leave their flags at home. I can tell you that the “ethnic violence” at Cronulla was not the result of the Australian Ensign being displayed and was the direct result of the intolerance, racism and aggressive behaviour of Muslim youths because here we don’t dance around the real ugly truth of the matter.
I can also tell you the first time the New Zealand Ensign was raised in battle, what date it became our official flag, what the preceding flags looked like, why they are the colour they are, exactly what proportion and degrees higher than the its opposite number the smaller star on the New Zealand Ensign is.
The so-called “ethnic violence” at the tennis was Serbs and Croats (fuck me theres THAT group again), If there were any flags there Australian in nature I didn’t see them.
I can also let you know that your linking people who chose to display their national flag with Hitler Youth and Fascist Black shirts (two groups my grandfather had cause to exchange rounds with a while back) is deeply ill-informed and grossly offensive.
I can also tell you that that if you try to stop me displaying my flag any time anywhere I like, I’ll fucking take you down.
I’ve been to many countries and almost all of them have Commonwealth Graves. There lay Australians and Kiwis who died – most very young – so assholes like you could link their surviving mates Nazis because they have pride in the nation and its symbol.
Charming.
January 22, 2007 at 7:52 pm |
To avoid confusion, this is my site. I don’t provide it as a free venue to bigoted name calling scum to peddle their own social agenda. You don’t get to use it.
Go cry about your free speech now whilst defending the suppression of others peoples right to display their own flag.
Somewhere else.
January 22, 2007 at 8:45 pm |
‘…Patriotism is the last refuge…’
What a complete load of crap!
It could only come from the sort of cunt that can’t tell the difference between patriotism and fanatasism.
We could use a bit more flag-waving in NZ- we have much to be proud of. The Aussies are not afraid to be proud of what they are, Americans even more so. The ‘tall-poppy’ crowd think this is arrogance- to think yourself good- even better than others. And for all their faults, they are better than so very many others.
Despite what the wankers that feel we must feel guilty about EVERYTHING that makes us what we are would have us think…
January 22, 2007 at 9:30 pm |
“Australian Patriot”?
Patriot my arse–you sound like the kind of lefty bedwetter who stands for nothing, knows nothing and is worth nothing.
If you regard standing up for Australia and what she represents as “ugly jingoistic “patriotism” then I suggest you fuck off to somewhere more congenial to your slimy preferences.
Say, Fwance or Lebanon.
January 22, 2007 at 9:36 pm |
Thats some nice bitch slapping boys.
BTW AP the last three people who just smacked are real patriots, the ones who put themselves in harms way under those flags that seem to make you soil your nappies. Not keyboard plastic patriots.
And yeah we’re like this in person too. Only more so.
January 22, 2007 at 11:33 pm |
Wrapping yourself in the flag to commit crimes is quite a bit less than patriotism. It is in fact the opposite.
I believe i have the right to flags. That doesn’t include the right to racism or other stupidity. Don’t confuse the two.
January 23, 2007 at 2:21 am |
I always have a problem with this kind of thing.
First, the language. If you’re going to call people jingoists then do it already. Don’t try to add that connotation to nationalism. If you’re arguing from principle than bloody well do it. Don’t be meally mouthed about it. Bring the thunder and deal with it, or stay on the sidelines. I really do hate this ’saying without saying’ passive agressive bs.
Second, so you have a group of Skinheads, essentially, show up carrying the national symbol, and act like the assholes they typically are. So then you punish everyone else and say that the national symbol is akin to racism and jingoism? Yeah, that’s really a mature attitude and sol’n. Stuuuped. Doesn’t even adress the real problem. What a bunch of ‘but we’re doing something about the problem’ cya nothing that one so often gets from gov’t. All show and no substance. But the right people have their egos stroked and fears assuased. Joy.
Let them fly the flag. It’s a nice one. Nationalism is not the refuge of scoundrels, as Mill said, but jingoism definitely is. Don’t confuse the two—as Mill did. Oh, and tossing quotes like that without reflecting on the FULL meaning is a sign of shallow and reflexive thinking, of sheepledom.(Bah.)
January 23, 2007 at 3:27 am |
Patriotism is the last refuge of the scoundrel
That’s Samuel Johnson, by the way. AP didn’t make it up himself.
Isn’t the Big Day Out an Australia Day thing? Tsk tsk, mustn’t show patriotism on Australia Day. That would be vulgar!
January 23, 2007 at 9:33 am |
Nothing could be further from the spirit of the BDO than a gaggle of rabid aussie patriots waving their flag. In fact nothing is more annoying at a concert than idiots with banners and flags who insist on hoisting them aloft thus ensuring all those behind see nothing else. U2 at telstra stadium was completely riuned by a bunch of drunken Irish fans who held banners and their dumb flag over their heads for virtually the entire concert thus preventing all of those behind from seeing a fucking thing.
It’s perfectly understandable that a dweeb like yourself Murray with low self esteem and a severe anger management problem is going to rally around the flag. You can almost guarantee flag bearing patriots are going to display the same sociopathic tendencies whatever country they inflict themselves upon.
January 23, 2007 at 2:01 pm |
I think the organisers put their heads out way too far in banning the Ocker flag from the premises (I believe they’ve backed down since).
But to everyone here for whom the flag is sacred – you are presumably appalled when it is put to some ignoble & possibly reprehensible use?
January 23, 2007 at 2:33 pm |
The “backdown” is a half arsed revisionism attempt to do what they planned to do but do it without being burned at the stake.
The information I’ve received from media in Australia is that this is simply an attack on the Australian flag by pc liberals. Unacceptable. If their concern is security then the solution is more security, not less flags. They – as with their suspeciously chummy comentors here – have linked the flag, patriotism and displays of the same with the hitler youth, fascism and sociopathic behavior. No how long would anyone stand for that sort of crap talk if we said the wearing burkas promotes suicide bombings?
Llew the flag is like free speech. It belongs to everyone, including and possibly especially the people we don’t like seeing with it. Shit I get to watch assholes like the national front and destiny church waving my flag. Thats such a thrill ride. I get to watch such brains trusts as tama iti denegrate mine even though its supposedly protect by law. So do mum dad and the kids get to wear an Aussie flag sticker to a concert? I’d have to say thats a stupid bloody question, wouldn’t you?
The problem is not the flag. The problem as always is specific people. They have to be dealt with, not what they’re wearing. If we took the same approach with terrorism we would do what? Ban Muslims? Weeee there we go.
If people break the law you deal with them. You can not and will not prevent bad eggs by being bad eggs by taking something off them. Thugs are thugs and they’ll find an excuse and way to do what they want regardless of their cultural background, race or nationality.
I would point out that the Japanese flag of WWII is unchanged and is connected by many with the brutality of their aggressive expansionist war in the Pacific and mainland China. Yet not banned although you could make a case for it being associated with violence without breaking a sweat.
This kind of sledgehammer approach will only fuel backlash. If you want more skinheads being assholes and making life unpleasant then this would be the fastest way of doing it.
To much “multi-culturalism” and “inclusiveness” seems to consist essentially of the suppression, restriction and exclusion of Anglo-Saxon culture in countries peopled in the majority by Anglo-Saxons.
Problem = security issue. Solution = increased security measures or less flags.
You do the math.
January 23, 2007 at 5:27 pm |
It’s perfectly understandable that a dweeb like yourself Murray with low self esteem and a severe anger management problem…
I do not think low self-esteem is one of Murray’s burdens. And as for anger management — bah! He manages to be angry nearly all the time! Doesn’t seem to be a problem for him.
February 2, 2007 at 10:36 pm |
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