“A clash of ideas leads to conflict” by Kirsty Mendelson
Student Reflection, Hampton Park University News
Kirsty Mendelson is a student representative of the Politics and Media unit
As a proud student of the prestigious Hampton Park University, I recently participated in the student demonstration against the deregulation of university fees. My friends and I joined a mass of discontented students who marched from Spring Street towards Parliament House. Of great concern was the fact that the recent government wants to introduce deregulation which means that universities can charge market-fee for their courses. We believe this is a part of their right wing conspiracy whereby market forces are used conveniently as a means to entrench class differences. Contrastingly, many of my fellow students believe that education must be accessible to all members of society at an affordable price, irrespective of class and background.
I guess, we are lucky that in Australia we can air our differences. We believe that a healthy clash keeps democracy alive.
So we marched.
How very different it is for those living in countries like Egypt where members of the Mohammed Sisi government and the judiciary scorn the rule of law. The government stands for a secular state and supposedly a “democratic” one. Anyone who appears to be linked or defends the opinion of the Muslim Brotherhood is immediately sentenced to death irrespective of the evidence. The Muslim Brotherhood believe that the state should follow Islamic laws. Mr Peter Greste, the Australian journalist, was recently sentenced to seven years in prison for “doing his job”. This is a clash not only of ideology, but also of culture and religion. It is also a political clash – freedom versus state control.
(I mention this because our Political and Media Unit recently screened Bruce Beresford’s Paradise Road, which deals with just this very issue.)
I mention this because as student representative of our Political and Media Unit I have recently coordinated a series of lectures focused on “War, Peace and Progress”. History and politics lecturer at Hampton Park University, Professor Caitlin referred to the Los Angeles Times correspondent, Megan Stack, who received a number of awards for her courageous coverage of the wars in the Middle East post September 11.
Throughout her articles on war, Stack draws attention to the devastating difference in views and values between the two religious groups, the Sunnis and the Shi’as which continue to dominate Middle Eastern politics. Whilst they both agree on the fundamentals of Islam and share the same Holy Book (The Qur’an), but there are differences mostly derived from their different historical experiences, political and social developments, as well as ethnic composition. They differ as to who should succeed the Prophet. The Sunnis argue that the Prophet chose Abu Bakr to lead the congregational prayers as he lay on his deathbed. The Shi’as’ believe that Muhammad, on his way back from his last Hajj, proclaimed Ali the spiritual guide and master of all believers.
Due to this religious and political conflict, there has been constant sectarian violence which has destroyed the lives of entire communities.
Often the more entrenched the differences, the greater the violence.
I was shocked at the plight of Raheem, a Shiite teacher and Megan’s driver and guide, who could not pursue his career because of his ethnic background. He refused to join the Baath party, which was necessary to advance in his profession as a teacher in the army. “It was a compromise his conscience would not let him make”. (67). He went to Yemen to work, “languishing in financial exile for nine years”. Secretly he welcomed the US invasion as retribution for all his hardship. Even despite his personal and family sacrifice, Raheem stoically attempts to cope with the consequences.
Whilst thankfully we are not dominated by ethnic differences in Australia, the looming confrontation over climate change provides a clear clash of ideology and views and values. For this reason, I have joined The Protect the Environment group on campus and have participated in a few student rallies.
What really irks us, is that while our environment literally burns, the powerful, the wealthy, and many billionaire-miners are dictating to the rest of us commoners their priorities and peddling their misinformed views. Scientist and former Australian of the Year Tim Flannery captures the heart of the problem when he states, “there’s a lot of money on the other side (the coal and mining industries) – billions of dollars of vested interests and they are quite keen to keep people misinformed”. He sarcastically reminds us, they are like the pesticide industry telling us how great pesticides are.
Misinformed indeed.
Just as Galileo challenged the status quo during the 16th century, and stated that the earth was round (not flat), so too have many politicians and climate-deniers been labelled “flat-earthers”. Tim Yeo, chairman of the United Kingdom’s parliamentary select committee on energy and climate change, described those who question the science of climate change as “the flat earthers of the 16th century”.
Recently, Lord Deben criticised Mr Abbott: “Australia’s Mr Abbott is not talking about leaving a better world than before. That is not Conservative. And it is a distorted market that makes people rich today at the cost of people tomorrow.”
Sadly, our government leaders believe that the environment is just “changing”. They would rather quote Dorothea McKellar (“Australia is a hot country: always is and always will be”) rather than the 300 scientists whose informed views were included in the 2014 Inter-government panel on Climate Change which concluded that man-made events are catastrophically changing the environment.
How such views differ from Professor John Broome’s, the consultant to the IPCC report, who said that our actions should not morally harm another person.
Such a clash is often the case when new ideas challenge the status quo. It’s also the problem when the small guy comes up against those who seek to protect their wealth and power.
So we marched.
Evidently, the debate in Australia reflects that between scientists and creationists, which alarms Adam Frank, professor of physics and astronomy at the University of Rochester. He believes that the climate deniers take “pages from the creationists’ PR playbook” and manufacture doubt about fundamental issues in climate science that were decided scientifically decades ago. He defines “creationism” as a minor current in American thinking, that has been rebranded as “creation science” and has infiltrated classrooms across America. It is “transparently unscientific” and sets out to deny evolution at the highest levels. States such as North Carolina has banned state planners from using climate data in their projections of future sea levels. ,
It would be funny if it wasn’t so serious. It was only a few hundred years ago when Galileo was silenced because his views challenged that of the church’s and science was censored in a very heavy-handed way. The Inquisition bred fear throughout Europe as one million people were executed as heretics, such as Giordano Bruno (1548-1600) who supported the Copernican model of the universe.
In 1614, the Dominican friar, Tommaso Caccini, a fire-and-brimstone preacher, in Florence condemned Galileo, and took to the pulpit. He condemned the blasphemous views of Galileo that the cosmic model could be described in mathematical language, and that without knowing this language it was impossible to comprehend the universe. Setting up a clash with the mathematical genius, Caccini said, “Geometry is of the devil and mathematicians should be banished as the authors of all heresies”.
Caccini’s sermon led to Galileo’s first direct clash with the religious authorities. They condemned Galileo because he placed science above the interpretation of Scripture (the bible); he continued to write in Italian so as to reach as many ordinary people as possible and insisted upon supporting Copernicanism. Even worse, he challenged the nature of the Eucharist which is fundamental to Catholic dogma.
This conflict reminds me of that between the creationists and the scientists, and the church is once again trying to occupy centre stage with the debate, as it did in 1632.
Bertolt Brecht’s depiction of Galileo highlights his dilemma: protection of his body of work or yield to the instruments of torture. The church fundamentally feared a change in the status quo. Any change, they thought, would empower the peasants. If they started talking about the phases of Venus, they would of course start to question the work of God. Once the earth started turning, they would not see God as responsible for all miracles.
And just a final point, if you think that the power of the Church after all the commission into sex scandals is dwindling, just ask Father John Reynolds. He is a well-known local priest who was recently defrocked. He was treated worse than the paedophile priests because of his desire to include same-sex parishioners and was prepared to support women priests. He did not last long. Viva the church. It believes that marriage must be reserved for a union between man and woman.
So we marched.
Don’t be surprised if this Government, the creationists and the billionaire-miners start believing all over again that the earth is flat, that the P&O cruise liners will be falling off the edge of the earth.
So what was that about a clash? Perhaps we need to start asking how to overcome the clash. If they are caused by deep-seated differences, resentment and fear, then we need to work towards tolerance and acceptance.
During his recent visit (May 2014) to the Middle East, Pope Francis appealed to Israeli President, Shimon Peres and his Palestinian counterpart, Mahmoud Abbas at the end of a two-hour evening service to relaunch the Middle East peace processs. Focusing on peacemaking as a mature, sophisticated and compassionate response to conflict, he said, “Peacemaking calls for courage, much more so than warfare. It calls for the courage to say yes to encounter and no to conflict; yes to dialogue and no to violence; yes to negotiations and no to hostilities.”
Pope Francis, who made the surprise invitation to the two leaders during his trip to the Holy Land last month, said that the search for peace was “an act of supreme responsibility before our consciences and before our peoples” and noted that millions around the world of all faiths were praying with them for peace.
“We have heard a summons and we must respond. It is the summons to break the spiral of hatred and violence, and to break it by one word alone: the word ‘brother’,” the Pope said as Peres and Abbas listened intently and read the live translations.
So perhaps that’s the answer. “Brothers”.
And we kept marching – this time for peace and brotherhood. And meanwhile the rockets soar to and from the Gaza strip.
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Return to Summary: Conflict of Ideology; new ideas and change