Flag Burning Kits

Via Tim Blair and Week by Week


Two days, two stories of the nutty left in Australia. Resistance propose to aspiring socialist the emergency flag burning kit. Comprised of an Australian Flag, lighter, fire lighting Cube and the kind of pamphlets you see clogging campus bins in the lead up to any National Day of Action. In case of emergency, or a spontaneous protest against anything, crack out the FBKs.

Resistance, the youth wing of the Democratic Socialist Party (UPDATE: my mistake, they have renamed to the Democratic Socialist Perspective, still DSP though) was the domain of Kylie Moon, a young woman who has written for the Green-Left Weekly (that should be enough, but I'll continue), and involved with the Books Not Bombs (BNB) movement. Anyone remember chair-throwing at the (so called) peaceful protest around the Sydney Town Hall?

Resistance was also thought to be involved with the flag burning of Australian and US flags outside Union House in 2002. The headlines were grabbed by Lizzie O'Shea's, whose sister Louise, was involved with the disturbance at Kerry Packer's funeral (see previous post). These two incidents are more related than at first glance, as the plot thinkens ever so slightly. To the question of burning the flag itself, I think it's an affront to the country. Laws to jail people who burn it is a little too strong, but it should be strongly condemned publicly as unacceptable. It's also unacceptable to encourage people to burn the flag by selling these kits. I won't be purchasing a kit, but I liked Tim Blair's advice to "hang the flag, torch the crap". At $5 it will rank along the more premium items on the Resistance table, amongst the badges, flyers and books. Will they have a half price sale during the year? I might pick one up for the sake of it. Just to show my grandkids how zany the left were in my time.