Consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds...

(old anarchist saying)

Well, no hobgoblins here! As you can see. Sorry for my ridiculous inconsistency on this Substacking caper. The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. 😞 And I have been busy revising my manuscript. (And getting some wonderful feedback, thank you thank you wonderful readers.)

But here I am, with another instalment of 5 things:

1. Is it really ‘anti-democratic’ to protest a genocide? Some comparisons to the moratorium marches in the 70s. And a handy link to easily and quickly send emails to MPs.

2. A lovely review of The Age of Fibs - yes, it’s still doing it’s little book-thing out in the world.

3. My latest favourite gadget.

4. A poem in Cordite, and a link and code to get 50% off Cordite books till Friday.

5. ‘What the Water Told Me’ - something beautiful to take with you into the week.

   
   1.

So in the past week politicians, including our PM, have been joining with the conservative media in condemning the Palestine support protests and sit-ins as ‘disruptive’, and saying elected Senators [ie from ‘the Greens political party’*] should not be encouraging people to protest and that to join protests is ‘anti-democratic’.

Have the ALP forgotten their history?

Part of what swept the ALP to power in 1972 was that key Labor politicians like Dr Jim Cairns took to the streets with hundreds of thousands of other Australians — people deeply distressed and disgusted by the then-Lib government's support for an unjust war. A war in which villages were being bombed and children were having their skin burnt off from napalm.

So…

— the Vietnam war protests were also said to have 'divided' nations and communities and families.

—And one of the tactics of the then-ruling class was to constantly focus on the occasional violence or property damage at these demonstrations in order to condemn the campaign itself, and thus divert attention from their own policies and actions (and the blood on their hands). Even though most demonstrations were peaceful in intent, and those using more dramatic methods were a minority, and increasingly so as the years went on.

—Indeed the demonstrations became more peaceful when larger numbers of people attended, because it became harder to use force against them which often generated the violence, and because the few more-violent elements were drowned out by the peaceful demonstrators. So more people protesting is actually a good response. And it is good to encourage more people to join.

—It is impossible to protest wrongs without upsetting anyone. A big accusation against the anti-US-War protest movement was how it compounded the trauma for returned soldiers - often young conscripts who were not the real enemy but caught up in it. Unless they too joined the demonstrations, they were likely to feel extremely hurt to see and hear people saying they were wrong to fight. For some this really was traumatising. But they did have a choice how they responded to the protests. And protesting was still the right thing to do. 
/

TL;DR -- the American-Vietnam war was immoral. It was right to protest it.

"If you don't want Hamas to take the centre of the field, then [we have to] take the centre of the field, and fight for the Palestinian people" -- but if we stay silent because 'it's too complicated' or 'we can't be political' (as organisations) then we leave a vacuum. 

-- Maher Mughrabi on Q&A. The whole of his response is excellent and worth watching at the Insta link below.

djsaif82

A post shared by @djsaif82

And here’s an interesting report in the Age from May 8th 1970 about the first Moratorium March.

I am hugely grateful to those going to the Palestine support gatherings week after week. And for those inconvenienced by sit-ins, yeah, war is a bit of an inconvenience.

Sunset in Gaza, back in 2020. Photograph via @Omar_Gaza on Twitter

Here’s a link to APAN with some suggestions for taking action. And they have an email campaign going using Dogodder software, where you can either use their email text (takes less than 2 mins) and then put in your postcode and it will automatically be sent to your local MP, your State Senators, and to the relevant ALP Ministers (all with one click). Or — even better — you can or change the text and the subject line to your own and just make use of the software. So convenient and easy, and you can use it each week if you like. Keep the pressure on.

Here’s one of my emails:

Dear Senators / Hon. Members,

Most Australians are heartbroken at what is happening in Gaza (and the West Bank) and I hope my email helps to give support to any campaign within the ALP to be on the right side of history and stop arming and supporting the murderous Israeli govt regime. The time to act was years ago, but it is not too late.

I do understand that the ALP is in a difficult situation, but this is the humanitarian and ethical issue of our lifetime, and I urge you to support the ICC's rulings.

It will be very hard for a lot of people to actively campaign for Labor at the next election with this glaring omission in taking ethical strong action now on such a deeply important issue.

Thank you.

Beth Spencer

2.

Such a lovely surprise to discover this terrific review of The Age of Fibs from The South Sydney Herald late last year.

"...The Age of Fibs is a cracker of a book – hard to pigeonhole with its blend of forms and focus, but full of delights, which meant I got to the end and wanted to go for the ride again..."

(And such great company to be reviewed with! Read all five reviews here --
https://southsydneyherald.com.au/five-aussie-authors.../ )

3

My favourite new gadget — cube timers :

You just pick them up and plonk them down with the time you want at the top and it will set it going. Not a loud alarm so you need to keep it nearby. But very handy if you are someone who forgets to do something a minute after telling yourself to do it (eg put detergent in the washing machine once it has filled with a bit of water, and only remember when you hear it go onto spin)… Or if you like to focus your brain on a task or do a writing sprint for 20 or 30 or 60 mins. (I need to set one now so I don’t spend forever obsessing over this. )
I got mine from ebay here and here .

4.

I had a little poem in Cordite TREAT issue recently, edited by Tricia Dearborn. You can read the whole issue online here. Also Cordite has an amazing 50% off book sale until this Friday the 14th June — grab a bunch of poetry books for $10 each! Just put the code WINTER at checkout.

And finally

5

An image from Frida Kahlo — What the Water Gave Me.

Have a great week… or month, or year… depending on when I next get it together to do one of these.

Remember if you don’t want the emails you can set it up in your Substack App to receive them in the App and read them there at your leisure. And then you can comment, or give it a 👍 or ♥️, or read other bits and pieces. Or subscribe to or follow other interesting people.

There’s a relatively new ‘Notes’ section on Substack, modelled on the old Twitter format, and it is a much more gentle world than the more established social media sites. So far, anyway, or at least in the little corner I inhabit. So check it out.

Thank you hugely to those who read this far!!

xxx Beth

ps if Substack adds little promos saying upgrade to paid subscriber, just ignore them. There’s no paid version of this newsletter. It’s just me saying hi for now.