It’d be neat if all Aussies could say hello here. Add me as a friend on Mises.
I’m living in Melbourne by the way.
W00t! I’m a Sydneysider myself. Living in Brazil at the moment but plan on returning this year.
Any Mises Institutes in oz, btw?
Yep I’m here. [:)]
With my Mises.org books in the mail.
I’m not Aussie, but can I still say hewwo?
It’ll be interesting to see how many are actually lurking around.The media in Australia seems incredibly biased towards the state…I can barely read the paper anymore.
Perth here.
Hopefully we’ll be able to do something about that. [:)]
Look at it this way. You fellas are the vanguard of Australia’s intellectual revolution. [:)]
Hello folks. Melbourne here.
Has anyone else noticed that the guy named Conza is kind of a buzzkill?
Yeah, what is his problem? lol [:D]
Yeah there is also Frank Shostak, Chris Leithner, Chris Brown and Ben O’Neill.
Another positive way to look at things is that we have far less statists / socialists to overcome.
I’m from New Zealand, which is (as I’m often told) ‘close enough’.
ANZACs, free movement of peoples, same heritage, same basic culture.
They are right.
Hi there Conza88 and all! Steve here from Brisbane.
We have less statist/socialists? Compared to what? We seem to have a Hayek-hating socialist despot as a leader at the moment. I don’t hear too make folks saying “no please, please don’t send me the $900”. And I certainly do hear folks saying “but of course the government should subsidise child care”. This applies to much of the “middleclass welfare” such as the family payments. I also hear outrage that the government hasn’t already coffed up for maternity leave - I mean, after all, all the other socialist countries have it! :). Australians seem to barely think about these issues and when they do I guess they console themselves that “the rich will pay”.
Sorry, feeling a bit dark today as the government just effectively admitted to encouraging a whole bunch of folks into buying a first home at the beginning of the first recession for 18 years. What’s more the IMF say it’ll be long and deep. I imagine that the government will now avoid the “D” word for a few months (that’s D for depression, not deflation).
lol yes. The comparision was to the United States. See our population totalling roughly 20 million and theirs is roughly 300. But yeah, I know what you mean. We haven’t got an open tradition of Individualism, but I think there are a lot of people out there who have never been offered the message of Liberty and that are open to it. Ron Paul woke a lot of people up and it’s our job to further the cause.
[:)]
We are indeed the “lucky country”, in the sense that without our abundance of resources we would be well and truely in the shitter by now. We may have less to overcome as far as sheer numbers go, but on a per capita basis, I have no doubt in my mind that Australians are far more statist than Americans.
We don’t even have a Bill of Rights! In other words, our constitution offers no protection of rights and freedoms. We’re just lucky the state hasn’t decided to take more away (so far).
Same problem here in Canada mate. I love how our government likes to revise our Charter of “Rights and Freedoms” on the fly, as though fundamental rights change over time.
Sedition laws.. no way of succession with the States… yeah I’m sure we could both go on all day about it.. [+o(] lol
The average citizen is a middle of the roader from what I see. They think Communism / Socialism is wrong & doesn’t work but so is extreme capitalism etc. It is the false left / right paradigm in action.
I think there is a lot of room for success, with a third party candidate - integrity, honesty, intelligence, charisma (Replica of Ron Paul essentially) who could help spread the message & kickstart a revolution.
The starting point is getting the remnant together. Which should be taking place shortly. Then systems are go! [:D]
That’s what I’ve observed too. Although there are still far more socialists than libertarians, just look at the green movement…There was an article in the paper today by the leader of one of these groups arguing that we need to lower Australia’s population from 21 million to 7 million if we’re to have any chance of saving the environment. She suggested a 1 child policy, enforced by the state.
For some reason these radical leftist arguments make the paper, but libertarian ones get filtered out by the editors.
To succeed in Australia I think we need a very moderate approach…we have to start slowly. Perhaps just critiquing individual policy decisions, avoiding any mention of anarchy or even minarchy. Any kind of ‘radical’ thinking is sure to end the debate there and then for most Australians.
My two cents.
If you self-censor, you have already lost. You can present a positive, inspirational case without compromising on radicalism. In fact, that is what libertarians worldwide need to improve upon. Making radical thinking simple, digestable, enjoyable.
Stake out a position, and don’t move back to the middle. You will draw people to you. Unlike socialism or progressive statism, the message of liberty has real power. It explains the world and the activity of man, without making it about shame or guilt. It encourages people to be their best not their worst.
I agree with liberty student.
The moderate approach has already been tried by our two “free-market” think-tanks - the Centre for Independent Studies and the Institute of Public Affairs. They have failed miserably.
Everyone thinks of them as “conservative” think tanks! Do we really want to be known as conservatives?
No! We want to be known as libertarians - anti-war, anti-State, pro-market. Do not be afraid to be radical. In the long-run, it will be more effective.
Murray Rothbard wrote an essay about precisely this topic, however I can’t be bothered digging it up…
By the way, a bill of rights is not a libertarian measure. All it does is shift the power of decision-making to unelected judges.
Moreover, it has no affect on the upholding of human rights. America has the worst human rights record of ANY Western nation, yet it’s also the one with the Bill of Rights supposedly guaranteeing fundamental freedoms.
All a bill of rights does is make citizens complacent.