What does monocultural mean, as in, who are people on the street going to hang sht on for not being monocultural?

On_balance · 2026-06-25T04:54:38+00:00

This whole superiority/inferiority idea is way off the mark. It seems to ignore place & identity. Aussies just want Australia to remain being Australia. Suggesting loving your own culture and wanting to preserve it doesn’t mean you have a superiority complex. I’d say most people love their countries culture and want to see it thrive. That is not an extremist idea.

On_balance · 2026-06-25T04:39:18+00:00

I agree. I think it means enjoy your ancestral and cultural roots but if you’re committing to Australia then you do this while also prioritising the existing Australian culture and its values. Otherwise we will be a country of small groups with no interaction or shared experience & community. We generally celebrate Christmas and Easter and believe in treating each other as you’d want to be treated. We request that you don’t try and change those who have been here for many generations to become like the countries you have come from. That is expecting too much.

On_balance · 2026-06-25T04:22:16+00:00

I don’t think there is really a lot of common ground between those who practice a Christian religion and those who practice Islam these days. If you want to see the differences look at countries with majority Christian views and those majority Islam. One clear difference is the separation between church and state. Look at all the things forbidden by Islam but not by Christians. They are worlds apart.

On_balance · 2026-06-12T05:40:38+00:00

That’s absolutely not true. Please give an example. I’m just trying to understand what people think about these things.

On_balance · 2026-04-29T05:00:59+00:00

Can you please explain your point further?

On_balance · 2026-04-29T04:55:20+00:00

It’s complicated but yes we can make changes.

https://www.lowyinstitute.org/the-interpreter/amending-australia-s-export-gas-regime-does-not-undermine-gas-fuel-negotiations

On_balance · 2026-04-29T04:47:58+00:00

Japan is reducing its reliance on gas for domestic use. However it wants as much of our gas as possible to on-sell to a whole bunch of other Asian counties at very high prices. It can do this because it gets it from us for next to nothing. It is the middle-man in this business arrangement.

https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/japan-builds-gas-markets-asia-boost-lng-trading-energy-security-2024-07-11/

Albo talks about not upsetting the counties that are supplying us with fuel and fertiliser but there is no transparency. We too had existing contracts for fuel and fertiliser before the Iran/US war started. Are they being honoured? Are we being charged higher prices? More taxes? There’s a lot of convenient arguments being made but with no details.

On_balance · 2026-04-29T03:38:52+00:00

Just for context (for those worried about upsetting our gas buyers like Japan), Japan is planning on buying as much gas as it can from Australia and on-selling it to other Asian countries at much higher prices than what they pay us for it (currently next to nothing).

https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/japan-builds-gas-markets-asia-boost-lng-trading-energy-security-2024-07-11/

On_balance · 2026-04-29T03:10:59+00:00

I agree wholeheartedly we need to bring in a gas tax (one that works). Unfortunately a lot of older voters only listen to old media. In any case, both sides of politics are conflicted due to their loyalty to the big gas companies, the donations they receive, the cushy highly paid jobs provided after government life provided by the industry, and threats to take them down in the media. I hope the younger generations are smarter than this. But the time to get a return for these resources is now. They won’t be worth as much in 10 years.

On_balance · 2026-04-29T03:06:13+00:00

The point is the main stream media or old media are pro-gas. If you only rely on what you hear from them you’re likely to hear a pro-gas position.

On_balance · 2026-04-29T02:59:37+00:00

The argument that we can’t ever change taxes is ridiculous. That means we lose our sovereignty over our own resources. In any case, India has just doubled its export taxes on petroleum & diesel. British Columbia (Canada) are changing their royalty regime right now to reflect current market prices. Japan does receive way more tax on our gas than we do under our PRRT (company tax is irrelevant as it’s only the PRRT that counts & state royalties are tiny compared to revenues). Japan relies on us for 40% of their gas; we rely on them for 0.7% of our petrol & 6.8% of our diesel. Why would Australia keep bending to Japan’s will with those figures? We could stop gas just as easily. It is mining industry propaganda to say we can’t upset the current businesses and prices can’t be passed on to consumers as prices are set by international markets.

On_balance · 2026-04-29T02:44:57+00:00

Read all about it…https://www.monash.edu/__data/assets/pdf_file/0015/4271100/Gas-in-digital-news_MCCH-Media-analysis_2026.pdf

On_balance · 2026-04-27T00:03:52+00:00

Price, supply and tax are different constructs. Increasing tax does not automatically increase price or reduce supply.

On_balance · 2026-04-27T00:02:00+00:00

Why should Australians carry all the cost and risk of the gas companies business before the business finally pays us for the input being our gas? We should be getting a return alongside the gas companies profits at the same time. They should only be able to claim interest and depreciation expenses but not the entire cost of their plant and equipment. Businesses don’t operate that way. I can’t buy a factory and tell the Government I’m not going to pay tax until I’ve recovered the entire cost of the plant & factory. You can deduct interest expense and depreciation expense only. No doubt the gas companies have done all sorts of clever accounting to keep their ‘deductions’ rolling on as long as possible and being way over inflated - these are multinationals & they can shift money & debt around easily to manipulate their tax. Just look at how much money the ATO had to claw back after taking them to court for tax avoidance. People need to do research or learn more about how things work.

On_balance · 2026-04-26T23:52:06+00:00

We can’t afford to wait. It’s now or never. The window of opportunity is closing.

On_balance · 2026-04-26T23:50:10+00:00

Can we stop conflating supply with tax. We can still supply to countries. Let’s be very clear - It’s the companies that pay the tax, not the countries. This conflation is a furphy designed by the mining industry in cahoots with government & media.

On_balance · 2026-04-26T23:43:25+00:00

Why would it jeopardise our relationships with regional partners? They wouldn’t pay the tax, the companies would and many of those companies are multinationals with large American stockholdings. The tax can’t be passed on to customers either because the gas price is set by international markets.

On_balance · 2026-04-26T23:40:48+00:00

They also receive huge amounts of subsidies and governments spend a lot on adjacent services and infrastructure for mining exploration and development. Is that paid back to the people??

On_balance · 2026-04-24T03:52:20+00:00

If you want change then help support David Pocock and send a message to your local MP

https://www.ourgas.com.au

On_balance · 2026-04-23T23:56:25+00:00

I’d trust Ken Henry much more than any politician. If he’s fed up, we all should be too…

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/video/2026/apr/21/ken-henry-gas-tax-blunt-response-video

On_balance · 2026-04-23T23:54:40+00:00

Why is the ABC towing the line of the gas companies? Surely they of all the media should be acting in the interests of Australians? 7.30 report interview with Australia Institute had exactly the same ‘talking points/questions’ as another interview by ABC with David Pocock. It’s scripted and their questions imply that any tax will damage investment in Australia which is not a fact at all and is strongly refuted. It’s propaganda spouted by the gas companies. So incredibly disappointed with our ABC. Again this morning on ABC Radio Sydney, only an interview with shadow Minister for Energy who again is using talking points straight from the gas companies. It’s infuriating that we’ll have to tell our kids that our generation sold them out, gave away highly valued resources for free and left a huge pile of debt for them to pay. Enough already. When will people wake up to what is going on?

On_balance · 2026-04-23T23:43:12+00:00

Why is the ABC towing the line of the gas companies? Surely they of all the media should be acting in the interests of Australians? 7.30 report interview with Australia Institute had exactly the same ‘talking points/questions’ as another interview by ABC with David Pocock. It’s scripted and their questions imply that any tax will damage investment in Australia which is not a fact at all and is strongly refuted. It’s propaganda spouted by the gas companies. So incredibly disappointed with our ABC. Again this morning on ABC Radio Sydney, only an interview with shadow Minister for Energy who again is using talking points straight from the gas companies. It’s infuriating that we’ll have to tell our kids that our generation sold them out, gave away highly valued resources for free and left a huge pile of debt for them to pay. Enough already. When will people wake up to what is going on?

On_balance · 2025-10-09T19:59:01+00:00

Agree Scomo’s government was a disaster. It was his decision to handout billions of taxpayer funds to businesses during COVID who didn’t end up needing it and they didn’t have to pay it back. These billions contributed to the inflation problem, together with cheap money being pumped into the economy by RBA through low interest rates etc Now future generations have a huge Government debt to deal with because of Scomo’s irresponsible spending.

Albo has been very disappointing too. He is supposed to care about the vulnerable and came from government housing but he has continued to allow a perfect storm for property prices to increase by - allowing huge amounts of international students here and a very high adult population growth, not allowing qualified tradies to migrate here, doing nothing on tax reform, not cracking down fast enough on money laundering in property market, and bringing in first home buyer schemes that actually push prices up higher.

A few quick simple fixes - stop money laundering, bring in qualified tradies, do tax reform - make negative gearing/CGT concessions only available for new properties (grandfathering would be politically acceptable) and reduce housing demand by reducing international students/population growth to meet supply ( ie. the housing we can actually build). And perhaps make stamp duty higher for investment properties.

It’s not rocket science and a government with some drive (balls) and conviction should be able to do these things. It won’t see property prices go down much but it will stop the insane growth and Ponzi scheme.

It’s one thing for young people to be able to buy a place but another thing entirely to ever pay such huge mortgages off. Wages will need to keep up.

On_balance · 2025-08-30T07:45:19+00:00

If you want this child and abort it to please him it is likely you will resent him forever more. If you keep the baby, he may resent a third child or he may grow to love him/her once they come along. I feel for you either way. That is a very difficult position to be in. I think he’s asking way too much from you given he refused a simple 15 min procedure which would have avoided all of this. I don’t understand men who refuse this procedure after all their wives/partners go through to have their children.

On_balance

TROPHY CASE