Posts by Joe Wylie
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Why all the invective against Ablett-Kerr? Her job is to give the most effective legal defence that she can for her client. As Dr Sam Johnson pointed out somewhere, it is not the defence lawyer's brief, but that of the judge and jury to judge the guilt or otherwise of the client.
Weatherston's defence team could have fulfilled that duty without assisting in fabricating a cock and bull story about the victim being the author of her own misfortune. They could have explained to their client that subjecting the Elliott family to the resulting trauma was in no-one's interests. Instead they chose to go there, and energetically abetted him in his attempt to mutilate Sophie Elliott's legacy, which seems to have been his goal all along in choosing the defence of provocation.
It's self-serving legal grotesques like that who damage the public perception of the legal system. Along with the inexcusable delays in cases coming to trial they undermine Sian Ellis's efforts to have the judiciary make a constructive contribution to solving the current crisis in the justice system.
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My point, Craig, is that by the time Ablett-Kerr had called the credibility of Sophie Elliott's mother into question, she'd gone way beyond her duty as a defence lawyer, and was effectively making shit up. If you want to defend that, talk to yourself.
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Of course, Angus, you've no contempt for the politicians who've let provocation stay on the books?
Craig, that's me you're quoting, not Angus. I'm not sure what your beef is, but I'd have thought that the reference to a "farcical" trial was hardly an endorsement of the legal aberration that enabled it.
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Second most reviled figure - Judith Ablett-Kerr. For going beyond her brief of providing a defence in this farcical case and, despite her mealy-mouthed protestations otherwise, putting the victim on trial.
Vile, vile, vile. -
I'm so disappointed that everyone seems cool with this abusive outburst. I thought we were better than that.
While I wouldn't phrase it quite like Stephen W, I'm right on with the sentiments. The only thing that exempts Tom S from deserving a therapeutic digital tarring & feathering is the crack-brained stupidity of his racist posts.
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Awesome. I knew I was wasting my fucking breath.
Oh come on Morgan, my comment was posted in good faith. I know it was late, but if you must respond surely you can manage more than a hissy fit.
You describe a fellow counsellor whose "very direct talk" resulted in an eventual breakthrough with a difficult client. I'd suggest that this counsellor was employing more than a mechanical technique of encouraging the troubled adolescent to "own his words". They probably employed a degree of imagination, in order to empathise with where the poor kid was coming from.
This is precisely what Emma invites her readers to do in her first sentence.
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But just as you don't know me, or what is behind my words, I don't know Emma. I don't hear her voice in her writing, or have this implicit understanding of her tone that some of you claim to have. I don't know the first thing about how she lives her life.
I don't know Emma either, but her piece certainly resonated with my own understanding of human nature. It's not clear to me if you're admitting to some kind of perceptual disability, or implying that all who responded positively to Emma's piece are somehow deluded.
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Interesting point George, and one I missed at the time, as I was living in Australia. While there may be further nuances I'm unaware of, the Howard government had so much succeeded in demonising the Tampa refugees that Kim Beazley, the spineless Labor leader at the time, allowed himself to be bullied into supporting their mistreatment for fear of losing political capital.
I know from the first-hand reactions of most Australians at the time that NZ looked pretty good in acting as it did. There was some speculation that Howard might have discreetly stitched something up with Helen. As the Ahmed Zaoui episode showed, she's driven more by politics than principle on the issue of refugee rights. Anyway, taking in the Tampa refugees showed a certain generosity of spirit, and it's a move that we have no reason to regret.
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This is the country that took in the Tampa refugees when Howard was attempting to milk political capital from the issue in "multicultural" Australia. As far as I'm concerned, that's our proud record. Regurgitating Pauline Hanson's talking points here, with suburban crackpot allusions to nonsense such as "destiny", isn't going "out on a limb". It's a one-way hiding to reactionary irrelevance.
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Brilliant Emma.