Cultural Challenges For Us All

This blog is a response to contemporary challenges in the West to democracy, to freedom and to civilised values.

In the title I use the Indonesian spelling “Demokrasi” because Indonesia is steadily democratising after centuries of colonial and authoritarian rule. Meanwhile, in my country of birth, Australia, in recent decades, crucial underpinnings of humane culture like the publicly funded lying in period for new mothers disappear without debate while new types of human rights abuses arise.

In Great Britain the Defence Minister has been forced to resign this year after it became public that he had repeatedly touched a woman’s knee in 2002 – 15 years ago.

In America attempts to protect women from sexual assault and harassment at Harvard University have lead to the use against students of procedures which four Harvard feminist professors have described as: “so unfair as to be truly shocking.”

To paraphrase Edmund Burke: “All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good people to do nothing.”

That is why this blog exists. (The posts in this blog are authorised by Geoff Fox Maribyrnong, Victoria)

Geoff Fox, Java, 9/11/2017