Outrageous assault

On the right to protest.

The Grand Inquisitor, aka the Pope, arrives in Australia for World Youth Day soon and the NSW Government has seen fit to slide in regulations preventing the local citizenry from ‘annoying or causing inconvenience’ to those involved.

Police have stated that ’organisations planning to campaign during World Youth Day events they need to have placards, banners and T-shirts pre-approved or risk losing their protest "rights" - even those groups representing victims of sexual abuse by Catholic priests.’

Under whose definition ‘annoying’ might be isn’t clear and thus paves the way for wholesale pandemonium. Why? Because Aussies don’t like laws that are petulant, disrespectful and unnecessary.

There’s also the caveat of shielding His Nibs from ‘things that might offend the Pontiff’s eyes’. What? The homeless? People abused by the Church? Poor fashion sense? A beautiful woman? How precious can he be?

And here I thought he was for all Christians, not just those who worship at his feet with glorious adulation.

Repugnant, draconian and unnecessary, critics say. President of the New South Wales Bar Association Anna Katzmann said on the ABC news service, “They are repugnant for two reasons. First of all the Government has by-passed the normal parliamentary scrutiny that would be available if they were introduced by an Act of Parliament. Secondly they are an unreasonable interference with people's freedom of speech and movement."
In the Sydney Morning Herald today, a poll lists 90 percent of voters as against the new laws – and I’m one of them.

Were does the government get off suggesting a law needs to be introduced to stop people from ‘annoying’ a select group of radical fundamentalists? If they’d done nothing, the populace would leave the Christians alone. Instead, anyone wearing a t-shirt or waving a banner deemed annoying can find themselves arrested and fined $5500!

To enforce the law, the local State Emergency Service and the Rural Fire Service have been empowered to detain those deemed causing an ‘annoyance’ to World Youth Day participants.

As a way to cause resentment, the law is outstanding; and provocative. Given the Aussie way of mocking those in authority (Australian troops in WWI were described as lacking in discipline for failing to salute superior British officers – one wag reportedly said: “when I see a superior officer, I’ll salute him!”) the result may well be mass protests and ‘annoying’ t-shirts.

There is nothing an Aussie likes more than taking the Mickey out of someone and there is no better target, nor one more deserving, than the Church.

Here's an example of what might be considered 'annoying' in a t-shirt:

(The t-shirt reads: The Pope touched me - curving over a map of Australia - Down Under - with a finger pointing up to South Australia.)

It’s all even more outrageous when you consider the people of New South Wales handed over $95 million dollars for the event, that there will be unprecedented road closures, that the Sydney racing industry had to be moved to allow the Pontiff and his followers space and will lose money hand over fist because of it, that Catholic paraphernalia will adorn public places, that the transport system will be gummed up by obsequious youngsters and that the law covers about 600 spots around Sydney.

So… who, exactly, is being inconvenienced and annoyed here? Why, everyone in Sydney!

There is no reason to afford the Pontiff special treatment, because he ain’t special. There is no reason to shield the man from the realities of everyday life here in Australia. There is no reason to offend the majority of the population. There is no reason to annoy or inconvenience us.

And there is absolutely no reason to introduce regulations that infringe on a person’s legitimate right to protest.

To quote Dom Knight from his blog: …there are few things more annoying than a law that says you can't annoy people.

As far as I'm concerned, if you don't like our laid-back ways, our occasionally irreverent humour, our welcoming ways: stay in Rome with the sycophants.