SILENCE ! SHUT UP ! Or Else....

It is not all gay conversation and getting high on fine Ale in the Tavern. Sometimes there is an air of disquiet. Nay, despondancy.  As it has been this week. A sombre mood wafted through the doors  from locally down in the Hillary Village below and from the Big Island to the north and from overseas, as told by several customers who dropped by. They were in need of a few pints of Grace, perhaps intravenously.

Me too. It had me hopping around, I can tell you.

First it was the local events and my friend Graham told a wearying tale. He was followed by the lovely, feisty Miranda Devine with her horror stories; and she in turn by a new customer, Penny Nance.  Penny was beside herself.

We live in an unprecedented age of Communication, but the forces from guess which depth of the Abyss are trying - and succeeding - in stifling debate and forcing distress, dismay, SILENCE and attacks on the very security of people all around us. That is to say from the ordinary man-in-the-street to our Institutions of Higher Learning and down even into the lower reaches of out childrens' schools. 

Look into the Abyss and the Abyss will Scream back at you.

Let us take each in turn.

My friend Graham Preston, a calm, quiet, caring and courageous man came down from Queensland. Let him tell us what happened:

It was quite a day today in Hobart. I arrived outside the abortion "clinic" at 7.45 and who should show up about ten minutes later but 'the shouting lady'. As she came rushing up from behind me she said, I've got 15 minutes before I have to catch my bus, and then proceeded to stand spreadeagled directly in front of me using a scarf to try and stop people seeing the signs.

She wasn't shouting though which was good and I said to her, so I see you are still opposed to free speech. She said she was not against free speech, just against people telling lies - she claimed that the 8-week-old baby in the photo I was holding was just a "zygote". She needs to check her facts however as the zygote stage is just the brief very first period of fertilisation after the sperm has penetrated the egg.

During all of this Penny and her husband Ray, the two local supporters (from Geeveston, about an hour south of Hobart), who had contacted me and were prepared to risk arrest, arrived. Penny was born with a condition that means she is a very tiny lady but as I found out, that certainly doesn't deter her! Penny stood between Ray and I holding the baby photo with her head just poking over the top. The opposition soon left and .. 

we had a couple of people stop and give some words of encouragement which was good.

About 8.20 a tv cameraman arrived and soon after the first police car pulled up. A policewoman asked us if we realised we were within 200m of an abortion clinic (200m?!) and were we going to move away? We said we were not going to move and she and her partner went back to the car.

Then another couple of cars arrived and there was much discussion amongst them. A policeman went into the clinic and then came out to us and said that the clinic hours were 9.00am to 5.00pm and we could not be there during those hours. If we didn't go then we would be arrested. Again we said we would not be leaving.

Police cars came and went and there was much more discussion. Then at about 9.15 a group of about six police, including a senior officer, walked up to us. We were again told that we were within the 150m exclusion zone and we would be arrested if we did not leave immediately. 

I said, how could we be arrested for promoting the Universal Declaration of Human Rights? 

Are you saying that Article 3, 'Everyone has the right to life' is an anti-abortion statement? 

..and the policeman said, Yes. 

I said, Good, I will be glad to hear you say that in court. 

He then said that we were all under arrest and that we were to go to the police cars. At that point, I wished we had someone taking photos for us. Penny, whose eyesight is not good and who has some difficulty walking stopped at the gutter before stepping into the road. Ray was holding one hand but she asked if someone could hold her other hand. The senior policeman was standing next to her so her took her hand as she crossed the road. It would have made a great picture.

We were taken separately to the main police station and I did not see the others again. Penny and Ray were processed quite quickly and were allowed to leave. I was locked in a semi-underground caged holding cell for an hour. Then I was taken inside and told that I had two outstanding charges against me as well as the charge arising from today. I replied that I did not have any such charges but they said I did and showed me the charge sheet. Rather incredibly two charges had been laid against me for when I was outside the "clinic" on September 5 and 8 last year. 

(This was after the police offered no evidence against me at the trial on September 4.) 

I was not told at the time I was being charged and nothing was ever sent to me to say I had been charged! Apparently the hearing for this was supposed to have been held in March but since I hadn't heard about it I naturally hadn't shown up!

Anyway, the police say I now know about the charges so I am still facing them. Incredible. 

So I was told I was going to be held until I went before a magistrate to see if I would be given bail. 

I was taken off, strip searched and held in a cell for four hours. 

I then got to see a duty solicitor. She said that the police were willing to give me bail on two conditions - one that I not go back within 150m of the place until after the hearing and two, that I agree with a residency requirement - that is that I agree to reside at the place where I am now staying in Hobart until the hearing as I am considered a flight risk due to not showing up for the hearing in March!!

If I didn't agree to those terms I would be held in custody until the hearing. That was a bit of a shock - as nice as Tasmania is, I'm not too keen on staying here for months and overstaying the hospitality I've been given! So I managed to do some fast talking and the duty solicitor said she would go back to the prosecutor but she didn't like my chances. Thankfully however the prosecutor had some good sense and I was granted bail and I can now stay either at this address or my home address in Brisbane.

So I got out about 4.00pm to be confronted by a couple of reporters and camera crews. I did an interview but as far as we can tell it has not been aired. I then contacted Penny and Ray. Unfortunately we have been given different dates to appear in court to give our pleas - theirs is May 25 and mine is June 17. I presume they will require me to be there because of the mess-up. We'll have to try and get our court appearances on together. We still have not got the lawyer situation sorted out - a different QC has indicated interest, which is really good, so I will have to get in touch with him. We are still needing a solicitor which is really important.

Just last week I received a call from the Right to Life group in the ACT to tell me that there are plans for a 150m bubble zone to be introduced there around places where abortions are done. So, just as we expected, this law is likely to spread and thus it makes it all the more important that this law is challenged as soon as possible. 

I'm planning to stay on in Tasmania until Monday evening when I have booked to fly back to Brisbane. Over the next few days I will go to places around Hobart (but not within 150m of the abortion "clinic"!) to try and keep the issue alive. We'll see what happens.

Thanks for praying.

Graham

I had been at the same spot, the same day, but at a different time and was not confronted. I have a Rosary and I am not afraid to use it. 

I stood again on Tuesday, as is my usual vigil; in fact I knelt  in the street and prayed.

I stood with Graham again today at a different corner in the city where an occasional encouragement was offered by passers-by amid the sour glances and spiteful remarks, threats and completely stupid epithets shouted at us from cars and pedestrians.

One shakes one's head with disgust at the complete waste of human life and the careless attitudes all around.

Another shaking his head and shouting disgust was a Trades Union 'Heavy', well known in Hobart, who walked by. He was as one can expect. 

The fight goes on.

The Power of the State, manipulated by the creatures of the Abyss, encroach daily on freedom of speech. Here about Abortion. Tomorrow?

And it is not just the State where the Abyss is holding sway and screaming at us, as Miranda Devine told us.

WE all laughed when we heard about the Oxford University feminist conference at which clapping was banned because it might trigger anxiety in certain neurotic individuals. Instead, the UK’s National Union of Students asked the audience to use “jazz hands” to indicate applause, that is, waggle hands about in the air, silently.

 http://blogs.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/mirandadevine/index.php/dailytelegraph/comments/trigger_warnings_of_the_authoritarian_left/

You really couldn’t invent a better parody of new age feminist craziness.

But the problem is that it’s not a joke. 

One of the world’s most prestigious universities had succumbed to the tyranny of “trigger warnings”, which are really an instrument of control for the authoritarian Left.

The aim is to infantilise university students and protect them from anything deemed to cause “offence”, whether it’s the sound of two hands clapping or “domestic violence” themes in The Great Gatsby.

Trigger warnings are just another tool for one group of people on campus to ensure ideas they don’t like are excluded.

We’re lucky a healthy dose of Australian common sense has shielded us from the worse excesses of nanny leftists. But it’s only a matter of time.

There is a new mood of intellectual oppression on our campuses. 

Ideas or speech that might cause offence are shut down.

Those who dare to express offensive ideas or are even suspected of harbouring unsound thoughts are actively persecuted.

From poetry professor Barry Spurr being hounded out of Sydney University to the disruption of a lecture on the ethics of warfare by Lt Colonel Richard Kemp to the ousting of climate sceptic scientist Bob Carter from his adjunct professorship at Queensland’s James Cook University, we see contrary ideas silenced in the very place where they should be freely debated.

Kemp fell victim to the tactic of “no-platforming” imported from the UK, in which protesters deny a public platform to opinions they dislike by kicking up such a stink that the speaker cannot be heard.

In this case Kemp, a retired commander of the UK armed forces in Iraq and Afghanistan, who in the past has expressed sympathy for the Israel Defence Forces, attempted to speak about the ethics of warfare last month, at a Sydney University event organised by the Australian Union of Jewish Students.

He was barely into his speech when a group of pro-Palestinian students forced their way in, screaming abuse though a megaphone and drowning him out.

They stood between Kemp and the audience, yelling “Richard Kemp, you can’t hide, you support genocide”, and made it impossible for him to continue. When security guards tried to eject the protesters, two left-wing academics, Associate Professor Jake Lynch, the vehemently anti-Israel director of the university’s Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies, and senior lecturer Nicholas Riemer, intervened, and tried to “intimidate the security officers into allowing the abusive demonstration to continue,” wrote Kemp.

More to come below on this matter. 

Sydney University is reportedly to send “show cause” letters this week to some of those involved. But who cares. The damage was done.

It’s one thing to protest, it’s quite another thing to shut down a lecture. But Sydney University’s craven capitulation to campus totalitarians was even more egregious in the case of poetry professor Barry Spurr. 

Someone hacked into Spurr’s private email account and leaked private correspondence in which he used politically incorrect slang to describe Muslims, Asians and women. Spurr said the comments were just part of a part of a “whimsical linguistic game” with a friend. But, when published in leftist webzine New Matilda, the private emails were judged racist, sexist, misogynistic and Islamophobic.

Mobs of campus Trotskyists screamed through megaphones outside Fisher Library that Spurr was “racist filth” and a “vile bigot”. They demanded his resignation, descended on his office and daubed graffiti on the door. He was suspended, banned from campus and forced to resign in December. 

When I defended Spurr on Radio National recently I was told by David Hetherington, executive director of progressive think tank Per Capita,.. 

that the university could not tolerate professors who held improper thoughts: 

“In position of social and organisational leadership people are not expected to hold discriminatory personal opinions.”

Hello Big Brother.

One of Sydney University’s most famous academics was John Anderson, Challis Professor of Philosophy from 1927 to 1958, and a champion of atheism and free love. He criticised war memorials and wanted to banish religions from schools. By the standards of the time his views were seen as offensive and corrupting, and there was pressure from the conservative establishment, from parliament and the churches to have him sacked.

To its great credit the university resisted all attempts to silence Anderson. Now the shoe is on the other foot and the Left is found wanting. Unlike Voltaire, if they disagree with what you say they will fight to the death to prevent you saying it.

Students of the future may look back at this age of jazz hands and see the gesture in a more sinister light. Rather than being a thoughtful form of applause, jazz hands are a cartoonish symbol of cultural distress. 

Wave your hands in the air and silently scream.

And overseas? Is there hope there? Not on your life.

Silence it seems is now on the Curriculum at School. 

As Penny Nance told.

What if I told you that pro-lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and questioning (LGBTQ) activists are working tirelessly to infiltrate schools and influence children across the country? 

What if I said activists were taunting and bullying kids in public school and shaming them regarding their religious beliefs that favor traditional marriage? 

Most parents do not want to hear this, but it is a reality they must face. Gay activist are going around you to get to your children, and schools are complicit.

http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2015/04/10/the-bitter-irony-of-the-day-of-silence/ 

The “Day of Silence,” to be held next Friday, April 17, is part of that effort. It is a project of the radical Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN), which is the leading pro-LGBT national education organization working inside schools in all 50 states.

On the Day of Silence, GLSEN encourages students to go to school and remain silent all day. Their website says the day seeks to “call attention to the silencing effect of anti-LGBT bullying and harassment in schools.”   

And therein lies the irony, doesn’t it?

In light of all we know today, how the pro-LGBT radicals are bullying Christians into silence, it is almost comical to hear this propaganda still being peddled to our children. 

If we want to talk about a silencing effect, we can talk about the recent Indiana brouhaha and the ensuing hysteria over Memories Pizza owner Crystal O’Connor telling a viciously deceptive reporter they could not cater a same-sex “wedding” because it would conflict with their religious beliefs. The event included the infamously tolerant tweet from a high school coach in Indiana who said, “Who’s going to Walkerton, IN to burn down #memoriespizza w me?” 

That’ll promote silence to be sure. 

The pizza shop had to close down for several days.

How about the silencing of Mozilla’s former CEO, Brendan Eich? Or the bullying of Barronelle Stutzman, the florist who is at risk of losing everything she has, including her home, her family business, and her life savings, because of her religious beliefs on marriage?

The blatant harassment of Christians has gotten so bad that many — including liberal, pro-gay marriage commentator Kirsten Powers — are starting to wonder, “Who needs the protection here?”

But that’s a rhetorical question. Powers and everyone else know the answer. 

We are at the point where they are ready to put Christians in jail if they don’t abide by the pro-LGBT mantra.

The intimidation in schools is not as militant, but it is just as subversive. One regularly hears stories from both high school and college kids. Concerned Women for America (CWA) has started Young Women for America (YWA) chapters in colleges around the country to help strengthen and equip young conservative leaders. One young lady joined her school’s YWA chapter after an incredibly intimidating experience in one of her freshmen classes.

On the first day of class, the history professor asked students to raise their hands if they supported “gay marriage.”  Most students raised their hands but many didn’t. Then he pressed on, “and who opposes gay marriage?” It took great courage from this young woman to raise her hand. The professor asked the class to have a look. The other students knew that the liberal professor held all the power and their grade. They were afraid. She was the only one to raise her hand.

Of course, this brave young lady heard later from other students in the class who believed like her, but who would never raise their hands.

High school students share similar stories. A young woman named Madeline tells of being shamed by teachers and peers for not wearing the pro-gay marriage lavender t-shirt. Others in her peer group wanted to opt out, but they knew they would catch heat from other students for not conforming. I have even heard stories of kids lying on surveys given in schools about the issue because they are afraid of repercussions from faculty and administrators.

These were all real “days of silence,” and viewpoint discrimination is the program.

Here’s an idea: how about GLSEN doing an effort against bullying, period? We could all get behind that. I despise children being bullied for being “gay” just as much as for being obese or for being from another country, or simply being different or for whatever reason. How about we teach our kids, “Be ye kind one to another.”

But these activists are not interested in stopping bullying — they actually want to bully anyone who dares oppose their opinion, as we have seen. 

The Day of Silence is an opportunity to make sure any other view is completely silenced.

They would use different language, to be sure. They would say they are combating “homophobia.” But they consider traditional Christian teaching to be homophobic, and, therefore, if your child is a Christian, they will be under enormous pressure to ignore their faith in this area or risk intense ridicule and contempt (or, dare we say, hatred).

The most dangerous thing about all this is that schools are complicit in disallowing debate. 

This is why no parent will be notified of this day or most other pro-LGBT activities in advance. The educational institutions are so politicized that they will and must abide by political correctness at all times.

That is one of the many reasons why parents must stay informed and involved in their children’s education. There is an effort to combat the Day of Silence called the “‘Day of Silence’ Walk Out” where parents are encouraged to keep their children home. 

 

Most parents don’t know about it, so we must spread the word. Only by staying involved will we be able to combat these efforts and train our kids to navigate the turbulent waters of today’s increasingly secularized, hostile culture.

I say we replace the “Day of Silence” with a day of kindness in which kids are taught unity and love regardless of viewpoint and not division and political correctness. No one should be silent about that.

As you see, I have little to add to what Miranda and Penny and Graham had to say.

But I pray.

The Crypt calls daily. The song is insistent.

A Time is coming.

The Tavern will NOT remain Silent.

Pax.