the australian constitutional thingy

rc-am rcollins at netlink.com.au
Tue Nov 2 14:22:51 PST 1999


hey catherine and rob,

catherine wrote:


> i've spent quite a bit of time in the last week trying to drag a more
> sophisicated position out of myself on the issue (and as i said above i
can
> not blame the ad campaigns) and i don't know that i have one
> i am beginning to expect the referendum is about ingrained cultural
> positioning

i doubt whether any position's going to be particularly sophisticated at this point, least of all mine. my attachment to britain is non-existent, so my reaction to that is non-existent also. i was interested yesterday to hear that a few vietnamese- and chinese-australian organisations have been saying that their members are afraid to vote 'yes' to the republic in case they'll be seen as "disloyal". i don't know how widespread this is, but it was interesting, since it's not a reaction i've felt. so yes, i agree, it probably is about ingrained cultural positions. my deeply-ingrained cultural position tells me that anything less than exiling a monarch or beheading them is not enough, but i can't even quite manage to think of the windsors as 'our monarchs' we should be beheading.


> so in fact perhaps i'd like to talk about it
> but i'm stuck on one question -- why vote no?

perhaps because i agree with peter costello that dissonance is a likely result of a 'no' vote, and unlike costello, i think that's a good thing. the ALP is getting worried and trying to buy a temporary 'yes' vote with the promise that if we vote 'yes' we'll get another constitutional convention when (here's the catch) elect them again. and for sure, spoilt ballots will stack up on the 'no' side, but i suspect this means that they're a yes-to-a-republic-but-not-this-one vote that can't quite stomach playing footsies with the loony right monarchists. i don't think i've ever come across so many cultural throwbacks all at once -- i just love the bit about the weimar republic, it's my favourite fear-of-the-masses line posing as populism.

rob wrote:


> Waddabout the
"tell-'em-where-to-stick-their-ugly-mean-little-preamble-and
> -writing-'What-on
earth-makes-you-think-we-give-a-fuck'-under-the-republic
> -question" ideology?

heh heh. do the censorship laws apply to ballot papers?

i think whether there's a 'yes' or 'no' on the republic question, the preamble ... yuk. since i just won lotsa money on the melbourne cup, i'm confident enough to bet that the preamble will get up. you're right, catherine: a fucking awful prospect.

for a bit of constitutional ripping,

Angela _________



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