Australia sends refugees back to country where they were already tortured.

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I would have thought they'd be sent back to India where they'd been living, especially as I don't think children born in India would be Sri Lankan citizens. Some of the asylum seekers had left Sri Lanka a quarter of a century ago.
 
Australia has always had issues with immigration if you look into history both recent and further back so this comes as no surprise.

I'm never going to go there and spend any tourism dollars you can bet on that.

Also they have a policy of processing out Asylum Seeker offshore in detention centers in other countries Guantanamo Bay style.
 
Omi said:
Our country is shameful at present. The way "boat people" and refugees are being politicised drives me to distraction.
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Labor in power: Liberals use every incoming boat as political leverage to get themselves into power.

Liberals in power: Can't talk about the boats! It gives the people smugglers too much information thus increasing the amount of boats.

It's a fucking joke.
 
DJKhaled said:
Because right-wing jackass' are in charge.



Labor had crap asylum seeker policies, but most of the other stuff they did was alright, nothing the Liberals do is even close to good.
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I don't have faith in either of the two parties at the moment, especially when it comes to social and ethical issues. The most I could see being changed if Labor was elected is the latest budget. They're super fucking safe and it's doing them no favours.

CadetMahoney said:
Australia has always had issues with immigration if you look into history both recent and further back so this comes as no surprise.

I'm never going to go there and spend any tourism dollars you can bet on that.

Also they have a policy of processing out Asylum Seeker offshore in detention centers in other countries Guantanamo Bay style.
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The Government is selling off all our tourism destinations to mining companies anyway so you won't have to worry about that.
 
Arksy said:
It's just that we had a pretty good opportunity for a moderate solution and the Greens didn't want to compromise. That's their right, but doesn't mean I can't be upset by it.
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That is unfortunately their MO :\

CadetMahoney said:
Also they have a policy of processing out Asylum Seeker offshore in detention centers in other countries Guantanamo Bay style.
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There's as much self-harm, but more riots and protests. Also recently a handful of teenagers went on the run because we started rounding up people released into the community and sending them back into detention.

The amount of money we're spending to keep them locked up, and the amount of money someone is going to have to spend to deal with their mental problems when they get out is...
 
BrWc7D_CUAAcQ2S.jpg:large


This would be funny if it wasn't so damn depressing
 
I was always skeptical of all the Australian racism stories you see in the media.

This is pretty shocking, to learn that a majority actively voted for this. And continue to support it.
 
Kenshin001 said:
I would have thought they'd be sent back to India where they'd been living, especially as I don't think children born in India would be Sri Lankan citizens. Some of the asylum seekers had left Sri Lanka a quarter of a century ago.
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You'd think so but we don't have a deal to offload people to India like we do with Sri Lanka so them's the breaks.
 
Fiktion said:
I was always skeptical of all the Australian racism stories you see in the media.

This is pretty shocking, to learn that a majority actively voted for this. And continue to support it.
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Australians are generally apathetic and lazy due to our comfortable lives. Once you start actively informing them of the disgusting shit going on they tend to get at least a little concerned.

So hard to get up off the couch and do something about it though. Especially when the most widespread media spends their time demonising them.
 
Fiktion said:
I was always skeptical of all the Australian racism stories you see in the media.

This is pretty shocking, to learn that a majority actively voted for this. And continue to support it.
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Skeptical? Boy, come visit where I live and you won't be skeptical for much longer
 
reptilescorpio said:
Australians are generally apathetic and lazy due to our comfortable lives. Once you start actively informing them of the disgusting shit going on they tend to get at least a little concerned.

So hard to get up off the couch and do something about it though. Especially when the most widespread media spends their time demonising them.
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The Liberal Party's Newsletter.....sorry, I mean News LTD and Rupert Murdoch see to that
 
Fiktion said:
I guess I just didn't want to believe that a modern culture could be that racist.
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I'd like to believe the majority of Australians aren't racist and it's mostly the old men running the media and government. That can be pretty hard to believe at times though. There are definitely some awesome young people and communities around at least. Someone should put them in charge of the country, they're already more qualified than the current outdated husks.

dejay said:
It's ok - these people were probably sent back because there was only a 49% chance they'd be tortured or killed.

http://www.theage.com.au/federal-po...d-under-migration-changes-20140625-3ast9.html

I don't actually know the threat level in Sri Lanka that Tamils currently face, but it's a fucking terrible policy to try and push through.
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"Hey, that's less than half, pretty good odds!" Tony Abbott.
 
While I disapprove of how refugees are treated, Australia's net migration was 750k from 2009 to 2013.

For comparison, net migration to the US was 5000k in the same time span.

That means net migration per capita was more than twice that in the US.
 
There was huge backlash against a woman who went on a racist rant on a bus two days ago, we're not perfect but we're fairly tolerant as a society.....all things considered.
 
jgminto said:
I'd like to believe the majority of Australians aren't racist and it's mostly the old men running the media and government. That can be pretty hard to believe at times though. There are definitely some awesome young people and communities around at least. Someone should put them in charge of the country, they're already more qualified than the current outdated husks.
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The old racist asshole vote is strong.
 
Arksy said:
There was huge backlash against a woman who went on a racist rant on a bus two days ago, we're not perfect but we're fairly tolerant as a society.....all things considered.
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I think while extreme racism is called out, general, less obvious racism seems a lot more prevalent. The kind of stuff that's only said around family. It certainly makes my family get-togerthers horribly unpleasant experiences. I think if the media wasn't constantly putting its spin on middle eastern and asian people and instead discouraged that kind of attitude it would weed itself out pretty quickly.
 
Fiktion said:
I guess I just didn't want to believe that a modern culture could be that racist.
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The racism here isn't so much out and out racism (although there are those too on occasions) but more xenophobia and just unwillingness to get to know people of color more than necessary. The majority here also don't like it if minorities don't fit into their way of life/culture. They have the propensity of calling these minorities who don't fit "un-Australian", which is just bigotry veiled in nationalism.
 
Arksy said:
There was huge backlash against a woman who went on a racist rant on a bus two days ago, we're not perfect but we're fairly tolerant as a society.....all things considered.
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We are, yet are also voting in backwards, conservative, anti-humanitarian leaders and apathetically accepting policies and behaviours not online what is in the op.

reptilescorpio is right. For all our positive social, economic, and political gains, they've more or less made the populous as a whole apathetic and lazy. It doesn't take much effort to be disgusted and appalled at asylum seekers being sent back to a country that will almost assuredly torture/imprison them, rant about it on internet/facebook/twitter/whatever, then go back to a decent paying job, roof over your head, abundance of food, and affordable services, etc. We're far from perfect and potentially getting worse but as it is middle class Australia is well off and that is a pretty nice cushion against abhorrent shit governments do.

For humanitarian aid however we're an appalling country and deserve to be nothing less than named, shamed, and pressured by the rest of the developed world for our policies and actions. There's no turning back and I can only hope my children will be taught in school how badly the generations before fucked up.
 
Replicant said:
The racism here isn't so much out and out racism (although there are those too on occasions) but more xenophobia and just unwillingness to get to know people of color more than necessary. The majority here also don't like it if minority don't fit into their way of life, have the propensity of calling them "un-Australian", which is just bigotry veiled in nationalism.
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Denying the fact that immigration causes problems is unproductive. In particular people from the middle east do not integrate well. I don't see a problem with picking the kind of immigrants that integrate well into Western societies.
 
Sepp said:
Denying the fact that immigration causes problems is unproductive. In particular people from the middle east do not integrate well. I don't see a problem with picking the kind of immigrants that integrate well into Western societies.
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If they follow the laws of the country I'd say they integrate well enough.
 
Fiktion said:
I guess I just didn't want to believe that a modern culture could be that racist.
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If it was racism Australia wouldn't allow anyone in, which of course Australia does. About 190,000 a year of which the second biggest group is Indians and the third biggest Chinese.
 
Sepp said:
While I disapprove of how refugees are treated, Australia's net migration was 750k from 2009 to 2013.

For comparison, net migration to the US was 5000k in the same time span.

That means net migration per capita was more than twice that in the US.
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And?
 
This is just a wild guess, but I'm assuming the Murdoch media empire plays a key role in this situation in Australia?
 
Sepp said:
I would argue Australia is hardly anti-immigrant given those numbers.
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The argument is that it is anti poor/desperate immigrant.

As was mentioned, if you can come by plane, great. If you can't, the current governmental position is "sod off".
 
CrankyKong said:
Serious question (not supporting the current goverment), but what is the alternative?
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Yeah I don't actually know what the policy should be.

Allowing pretty much anyone through, as idealistic as it may be, isn't sustainable. At least at the rate they were coming in 2012 (17,202) and the first 6 months of 2013 (13,108).

Now, the alternative policy should absolutely not be what the government is currently doing - sticking them into places with horrible conditions and basically not allowing any information of what is going on to reach the public. It's horrible and goes against what our country should stand for.

The Liberal Party have taken the view that the ends (stopping people smuggling - something I agree with) justifies the means (all the horrible crap they do with them once they get here, something I don't agree with).

Can someone explain to me why we can't drastically increase our refugee intake directly at the source?
 
roosters93 said:
BrWc7D_CUAAcQ2S.jpg:large


This would be funny if it wasn't so damn depressing
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If the press had any balls they should have called him out at the first attempt of BS.

"I'm a journalist and I'm here to inform the public, you are Minister and you are here to provide answers. Work that out, bitch."
 
Coriolanus said:
The argument is that it is anti poor/desperate immigrant.

As was mentioned, if you can come by plane, great. If you can't, the current governmental position is "sod off".
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It's not even that though, since thousands of poor/desperate immigrants are allowed in each year. It's the government is anti poor/desparate immigrant who doesn't use the proper channels to enter the country.
 
AxeMan said:
More asylum seekers arrive by plane than by boat.

I guess it's harder to turn around a commercial jet
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That's not really true though. I see that line get said a lot, as if to say "Why do people care about the boats when more people come via plane?"

Since people started caring about boat arrivals (barring the Tampa situation, it was really only in the lead up to the 2010 that this became a national election issue), the numbers are (beginning in FY 2009-10 to FY 2012-13):

Applicants for protection visa arriving by plane: 27,678
Applicants for protection visa arriving by boat: 35,255

http://www.refugeecouncil.org.au/r/stat-as.php

And, for what it's worth, the grant rate for boat arrivals is massively higher than plane arrivals (Around 90% for boats compared to around 45% for planes). So the system presented a very real advantage for those who would arrive by boat, which carried with it a not insignifcant chance of death if the boat sank.
 
I guess I'm in the camp that isn't opposed to controlling migration but is pretty much staunchly opposed to how refugees arriving by boat are actually treated. These conditions are inhumane and now we're not even bothering to process on land apparently? Or at least the government is actively denying/not confirming/hiding information about it for reasons unknown? What the fuck.
 
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