Misery is manifold. The wretchedness of earth is multiform. Overreaching the wide horizon like the rainbow, its hues are as various as the hues of that arch, as distinct too,…
Memory is a funny thing. When I was in the scene I hardly paid any attention. I never stopped to think of it as something that would make a lasting…
Lies, I know, can be so furbished And disguised in gorgeous wrappings That their skinny carcasses Not a soul would recognize. That's what you've been doing now, With your wonderful…
The struggle of man against power is the struggle of memory against forgetting. Milan Kundera One of the first Communist texts I read, following the French edition of Quotations from…
To penetrate the basic human predicament is more important than to fly to the moon Friedrich Durrenmatt Swiss-German playwright and novelist I’ve spent the last few days reading through the…
Business is no place for friends and it doesn’t matter if you’re in Canberra, London, New York or Moscow. Whilst Cathal Lyons as the Managing Partner of Operations and Chief…
Last week, I came across this post by Cate via a mutual friend. I asked if Blak and Black could republish it, to share it with a more diverse audience…
It will be a marvellous thing – the true personality of man – when we see it. It will grow naturally and simply, flower-like, or as a tree grows. It…
I am not pessimistic. I just see everything as it is. When one lives in a society that is essentially not free, it is the obligation of every thinking person…
Last week’s discussion of the Jinn combined with this week’s reading about Heraclitus to reinforce my opinion that the treatment of Ms. King and Lucinda McMillan at the hands of the…
The following verse is to Jean-Michel Basquiat's painting Jack Johnson, 1982 acrylic and oil paintstick on canvas. Jean-Michel Basquiat died at 27 years old from an overdose. He was the…
Yet another explanation needed by Ernst & Young ... In the words of a renowned Australian xenophobe, please explain, Ernst & Young. First, you employ an Indigenous Australian man (aka…
You can talk a mob into anything; its feelings may be – usually are – on the whole generous and right; but it has no foundation for them; you may…
On August 30 last year Blak and Black lodged a petition on the GoPetition website calling for a Royal Commission into the Australian Federal Police (“AFP”). Blak and Black has…
The Samoan Government has announced that Australian Governor-General, Quentin Bryce, will visit the country next week as part of a Pacific tour that also includes Nauru, Kiribati, Tuvalu, the Solomon…
Complicity takes many forms, as discussed in posts by both Bakchos and me. Many believe that silent complicity is the least culpable, but to my mind if the silence enables…
The criminal justice system consists of three main parts: (1) Legislative (create laws); (2) adjudication (courts); and (3) corrections (prisons, probation, parole, fines, community service). In a criminal justice system,…
Yesterday, Thursday I received a phone call from Captain Fred Martens, the man who spent a 1,000 days in jail, having been wrongly convicted of an offence under Australia’s Child…
For some years now I have been considering the concept of complicity. What constitutes complicity, how far does it extend, where does responsibility for wrongdoing cease? You can all blame…
This case arises from the petitioners’ claim that Azzam Rahim was detained, tortured, and killed by “the security forces of the Palestinian Authority” in late 1995, around the time the…