Let us not listen to those who think we ought to be angry with our enemies, and who believe this to be great and manly. Nothing is so praiseworthy, nothing so clearly shows a great and noble soul, as clemency and readiness to forgive.

Marcus Tullius Cocero

Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. AKA – The Golden Rule

My mother. Her mother ... and so on

If young people today are so bad (eg the Cronulla Riots) then it is because they have us as an example to follow… The debacle in our Federal Parliament over what is a relatively small number of refugees coming to Australia by boat is just shameful. These people are elected to represent their constituents, sure. That does not mean that they lose all responsibility.

The argument that they represent the views of their electorate is a poor one. It is a minority of their electorates who would make the decision themselves to let hundreds of people die when they could save them. But vocal minorities who do not want anyone “to jump queues” get to make the decisions because they get heard in the media. Since when was queue jumping punishable by death? Rather than find a humane and sensible approach to processing people trying to enter the country without a permit (legally by International conventions Australia has signed up to), the political parties prefer to allow hundreds of people to die. Why? Sadly it is to score political points and nothing more. May history condemn you, who by your failure to act humanely, cause others to die.