The NSW government has brought in new laws for the World Youth Day for the Catholic Church, with the Pope’s visit.
The powers allow police to stop and conduct searches of people they believe are causing an annoyance or inconvenience to World Youth Day pilgrims during the event later this month.
We do have a right wing Catholic led State government in NSW. They really wanted this event to occur, despite many objections by various sections of the community.
Christians protesting, say incorrect Catholic teaching, could be arrested and fined $5500 if the protest was not officially sanctioned by police.
Current laws would have sufficed. They sufficed during the Olympics, Gay Mardi Gras etc. Why this new law for this event?
Greens MP Lee Rhiannon said it was unacceptable to give powers to police that would allow people to be arrested for “causing annoyance”.
“The police can successfully manage the one million New Year’s Eve revellers on Sydney’s harbour foreshore each year, so clearly there is no need for these excessive powers,” she said in a statement.
“These draconian powers are not about managing public safety.
“This is about shutting down protests and quarantining the Pope and visiting Catholics away from messages that World Youth Day authorities don’t approve of.”
(Don’t mention the Spanish Inquisition, as Monty Python was known to say in jest.)
A semantic point first: we oughtn’t concede Rome’s presumptuously vain exclusive arrogation of the term Catholic.
Secondly, any large gathering of enthusiasts might potentially pose miscellaneous security challenges within the remit of governments to address in either an ad hoc or systematic manner.
With respect to particular powers in question for this specific event, it could well be that operational reasons prevent full initial disclosure of HMNSWG’s rationale for acquiring said powers. As it happens, the post-September-11 climate could imperceptibly tip the balance on some of these questions.
Irrespective of any specific objections we might have, conduct which disturbs the peace of our polity is inadvisable.
As it happens, the post-September-11 climate could imperceptibly tip the balance on some of these questions.
Yes indeed - a badly worded t-shirt could surpass flying a passenger plane into a tall tower. At last we now have conclusive evidence that “the pen IS mightier than the sword” !
Can I say that as a Catholic I am not over impressed by World Youth day, having attended one ...a glorified expensive jamboree and fo a disaster for Cardinal Pell to ask Archbishop Jensen to house our young people!
Yiu see niot every personal decisoon of a Pope is a wise one...infallibility is strictly limited and the choice for having a world youth day does not come under that charism. howver it is a personal opinion and I may be wrong.
in fact i wish he would stay in the Vatican and spend a lot more time on appointing better bishops. and ensuring Catholic educational institutions from the smallest primary school to the highest University teach the Faith.. I wish he would apoint more bishops like Dean Jensen...not slaves to political correctness..telling it like it is.
I knew I should have run this as its own thread! I like Kevin Goddard’s suggestions of an ambiguous T-shirt (from the other thread!)
After hearing about this outrageous situation, I am now considering getting a t-shirt made up with “LUTHER WAS RIGHT” printed on it. If I was challenged by the state sponsored canonical thought police ( accompanied by Morris Iemma’s Spanish Inquisitors ) , they would have to prove in court that I was not referring to Superman’s arch-villain Max Luther - which is the legal advice that I have received from a mate at Iguana’s.
Can anyone else think of any other ‘ambiguous’ double meaning quotes that could be printed onto t-shirts at this time - to avoid being flung into the clanger ?
Anyone else up for some ‘civilised’ civil disobedience ?
Hey Dave, did you see this article in the SMH last week ?
smh 23 June 2006 ‘entertainment’
The email jokes about the prayer-fest have only just begun. Among those doing the rounds recently was a spoof ad for animal sponsorship, done in the tug-at-the-heartstrings style of appeals to save our furry friends. This was the slogan: “Sponsor a lion for World Youth Day. 300,000 Catholics. One stadium.”
then look at the thread : “Eternal damnation should be enough” ( Tuesday, July 01, 2008 at 05:00pm )
Please note the warning : “ T-shirts with this slogan will now be illegal “.
But what about bumper stickers ? Or anonymously placed telegraph pole posters ? Creative minds ( and naughty ones ) are working overtime - even as we speak !
I think that by and large, the WYD thing is a good thing. But these police powers are not!
That the right to protest is curtailed in such a way harkens back to the bad old days of Bjelke Peterson et al.
Good on the Chaser for saying it won’t stop them!
SMH today:
THE prominent Catholic priest and lawyer Frank Brennan has condemned new police powers for World Youth Day as a “dreadful interference” with civil liberties and contrary to Catholic teaching on human rights.
The Catholic Church yesterday stood firm behind the State Government’s laws restricting annoying and inconvenient public protests.
.........
Dr John Sweeney, the co-ordinator of research at the Edmund Rice Centre, said Jesus Christ had paid the price for saying what he thought and the right to free speech needed defending.
“It would rather be like Jesus calling for a police escort on Palm Sunday. Obviously, he wouldn’t and when Jesus went into Jerusalem people yelled out things the religious leaders in their time didn’t like and they rebuked Jesus and he said he couldn’t quieten his supporters.”
Hi everyone,
Clearly the NSW Government’s ham-fisted specific laws for WYD are a public-relations mess for the Roman Catholic Church and the NSW Government.
Unfortunately, I suspect it is also be negative publicity for other churches, who will be tarred with the same brush in many people’s minds....
Clearly the NSW Government’s ham-fisted specific laws for WYD are a public-relations mess for the Roman Catholic Church and the NSW Government.
While I’m not too fond of RCWYD on roughly the same grounds that I wasn’t all that keen on the Sydney Olympics (finding both rather tacky and prone to exaggerating the economic gains to NSW from ephemeral tourism; at times, I’ve been inclined to suspect that the deity most celebrated from this event would be Bacchus), when such mass influxes of people occur it still strikes me as prudent for our governments to implement measures designed to suppress connected disturbances.
July 3, 2008
TELL people what they can’t do, and they will surely go ahead and do it.
Barely 48 hours after the Herald revealed that protesting, skateboarding or even wearing a particular T-shirt could result in a fine of $5500 if it annoys a pilgrim during World Youth Day, hundreds of people have designed T-shirt slogans in protest.
Thousands more have voiced their opinions through online polls, blogs, letters and talkback radio. And more than 500 media outlets worldwide have run stories about the controversial regulations. Most people were opposed to any intrusion on civil liberties.
“I am a Catholic and will be participating in the WYD,” wrote Andrew on an smh.com.au blog. “I think these laws are stupid and ridiculous.”
Others cautioned people against directing anger towards participants.
“Your beef should be with the Government, not the pilgrims,” Graeme wrote. “Anyone who wants to use this as an excuse for pilgrim bashing does not deserve to be called Australian.”
More than 90 per cent of 10,000 respondents to an smh.com.au poll opposed the laws.
Now some Catholics are getting annoyed. They’re even annoyed at Guy Sebastian’s involvement. “… no one has stopped to ask what he actually practises. He’s not Catholic - he’s from the Hillsong Church and there’s a big difference… “
Faithful get annoyed over merchandise
Jonathan Dart
July 8, 2008 SMH
THE first of the annoying T-shirt brigade has arrived at the official World Youth Day merchandising tent.
Alan Hockey and Michael Gravener - who help run the Share the Meal charitable group at St Vincent’s Catholic Church in Redfern - said yesterday that they wanted to voice their protest against the commercialisation of World Youth Day.
Mr Gravener inspected official “I Love Jesus” T-shirts while wearing an orange T-shirt he had bought online, saying: “Where is Jesus in WYD08?”
“This is actually one of the first times I’ve actually seen Jesus mentioned in the whole promotion of the event,” he said.
Mr Hockey said he would not buy any of the official merchandise.“They’re selling Guy Sebastian CDs but no one has stopped to ask what he actually practises. He’s not Catholic - he’s from the Hillsong Church and there’s a big difference. We’re Catholic and we will protest against anything that doesn’t put Jesus at the centre of the faith.”
Meanwhile, the owner of a shop selling protest T-shirts has received a telephone death threat.
Tim Boffa, of Bang-On T-shirts in Bondi Junction, began selling shirts emblazoned with the word “Annoying” after laws were introduced giving police powers to crack down on protesters at World Youth Day.
His shop is displaying a mannequin dressed in an “annoying” T-shirt, with the face of the Premier, Morris Iemma.
He has not had a police visit but he said someone rang threatening to kill him and his family and burn down his shop. “I find that really weird, because I haven’t said anything to criticise the religion or the event or the Pope. It’s a protest against the [new] laws.”
But what I would really like to do if I were in Sydney and had some time to spare would be to hand out extracts of The Bill of Rights and the Act of Settlement.
Mr Hockey said he would not buy any of the official merchandise.“They’re selling Guy Sebastian CDs but no one has stopped to ask what he actually practises. He’s not Catholic - he’s from the Hillsong Church and there’s a big difference. We’re Catholic and we will protest against anything that doesn’t put Jesus at the centre of the faith.”
First they came for the Jews
and I did not speak out
because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for the Communists
and I did not speak out
because I was not a Communist.
Then they came for the trade unionists
and I did not speak out
because I was not a trade unionist.
Then they came for me
and there was no one left
to speak out for me.
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