this post was submitted on 15 Sep 2023
117 points (94.7% liked)

Australia

3605 readers
69 users here now

A place to discuss Australia and important Australian issues.

Before you post:

If you're posting anything related to:

If you're posting Australian News (not opinion or discussion pieces) post it to Australian News

Rules

This community is run under the rules of aussie.zone. In addition to those rules:

Banner Photo

Congratulations to @[email protected] who had the most upvoted submission to our banner photo competition

Recommended and Related Communities

Be sure to check out and subscribe to our related communities on aussie.zone:

Plus other communities for sport and major cities.

https://aussie.zone/communities

Moderation

Since Kbin doesn't show Lemmy Moderators, I'll list them here. Also note that Kbin does not distinguish moderator comments.

Additionally, we have our instance admins: @[email protected] and @[email protected]

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] [email protected] 19 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Calling someone a racist is a pretty serious accusation, and a direct attack on that person. Are we really surprised someone will bristle at the accusation? Or dislike the fact someone is dismissing their views outright based on such a generalisation?

[–] [email protected] 17 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I don't think anyone is surprised at the fake outrage. It's textbook right wing politics to claim the moral high ground after rightfully being called out. If you think this is just some lazy dismissal on the part of Langton though, you are clearly very uninformed about who she is and her life's work.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (3 children)

fake outrage.

See, you're doing it yourself. You don't get to decide if their outrage is genuine or not.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I'm not sure what you're trying to debate here. Manufactured/fake outrage has been a key right wing tactic for years now, you would have to be extremely ignorant about modern politics to be unaware of this.

We are not talking about the feelings of innocent individuals - that is a smokescreen created by the right to engage their base. Again, this is textbook modern right wing politics. They redirect everything into a personal attack on their voting base, even when the statement they are reacting to was clearly directed at a system or institution. Look at these quotes:

Langton's original quote:

"Every time the no case raises one of their arguments, if you start pulling it apart you get down to base racism – I’m sorry to say it but that’s where it lands – or just sheer stupidity.”

Ley's response to the quote:

Marcia Langton, a member of the referendum working group appointed by the minister, has accused no voters of opposing the referendum because of base racism or sheer stupidity.

The Australian's original response:

No voters branded ‘racist, stupid’ by prominent voice campaigner Marcia Langton”.

They are changing the comments from an attack on the campaign, which is run by political organisations, into direct attacks on individual voters. The Australian retracted its headline and ran corrections in later articles because it knew that directly lying about this put it at legal risk. This is not "genuine" outrage. It is calculated, manufactured, fake outrage generated by conservative politicians and media to confuse and agitate the general public.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

They decided to fake their own outrage when they decided to pretend the accusation is more inappropriate than the behavior that drove the accusation.

As an participant in the national dialogue it is absolutely my responsibility to identify when people are not being honest in conversation and to respond to that and not to their superficial presentation.

I don't decide if they're genuine or not I decide if I believe they are genuine or not. I don't have to presume they are acting in good faith or with honest intentions. They have not earned that benefit of the doubt.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Outrage at the accusation of racism would require an understanding that racism is abhorrent. From the likes of Dutton, many of the figureheads of the reactionary No campaign, and from the commentators amplifying this supposed outrage from The Australian’s pages we have years - often decades - of behaviour and speech which suggests they do not possess that understanding.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

You're not just accusing them though, are you? You're accusing everyone who disagrees with you a racist.