King charles Heckled in Australia

[Albaamy121]

Did anyone see that King Charles was heckled in Australia this week by an Australian senator, Lidia Thorpe.

She shouted at him "you are not my King, this is not your land, you have stolen our land".

Any thoughts?

I didn't see any thread on it, so I started this one.

On her Wikipedia page, under the section "controversies" there are a lot.

Saying direct action and protest makes someone seem dumb is an asinine comment.
Direct action and protest is an important part of a democracy. You may not agree with the protest against Charles, but to condemn all protest and direct action is gob smacking.
The suffragettes achieved vote for women both through campaigning and influencing, and through direct action and protest. Suffragists had been campaigning and influencing for many many years with zero impact until suffragettes started to also employ the use of protest and direct action.

I agree she has the right to say what she want and protest.

I wonder does she want repatriations from the UK

Australia voted to not be a Republic didn't they.

So she needs to get her fellow politicians to agree on being a republic first.

I wonder why Australia don't want to become a Republic? They are such an independent country

Lidia Thorpe is a virulent misogynist.

She has form for pretending to oppose UK imperialism (which is fine to oppose if you can do so in accurately and equitably) as an excuse to silence and marginalise women, including - and some would say especially - indigenous women.

The clip I've linked is her attempting to shut down a public forum for women organised by a British activist, Kellie-Jay Keen, who ran a series of events across Australia and NZ simply giving space for local women to come and speak about the debilitating and increasing sexism of society and politics in Aus and NZ.

Now, you may say why should a British woman come and do this, and I'd agree with you - except that this particular woman was invited by local indigenous womens' groups, among others, who had tried and failed to get any respect or space to speak (they had previously been literally shut down and pushed out by male supremacists, and the local press failed or openly refused to cover these instances) speaking out on their own, and so in desperation they found someone with success abroad who they thought might cut through the insanity.

Thorpe can certainly say what she wants, but if you're going to judge her please do so in context. She is a regressive force in Australian politics. Women are human, including indigenous women, and are fully entitled to all of the rights granted to Australian citizens, now as much as ever. Thanks for reading this; it matters.

It's silly to shout things at Charles when he has no say whatsoever in whether Australia is a Commonwealth realm or not. That's a matter for the politicians, and as long as Charles is King of Australia, he has a duty to visit. Don't yell at the figurehead, he has no power to change the set-up! The Australians should lobby and campaign to the relevant politicians. It's very bad form to take it out on Charles when he has made the effort to visit, while going through cancer treatment.

He has good "resting unbothered face".

He looked totally unbothered when he was being shouted at

A referendum was put to the people in 1999, and the majority voted to stay rather than become a republic.

1999 Australian republic referendum - Wikipedia

The referendum to become a Republic was 25 years ago and initiated by a Prime Minister who supported Australia remaining as part of the Commonwealth. The way that the referendum was worded made it nearly impossible to vote in favour of a Republic

Charles doesn't have power to change anything,

but he could say sorry for wrongs done in the past.

Australians didn't vote to not become a Republic. We rejected the republican model being offered at that time.

It’s complicated but the referendum on the republic failed because (a) most referenda fail in Australia because of the requirement to attain a majority of votes in a majority of states, (b) the model put forward was unpopular, (c) it didn't have bipartisan support and no referendum has passed without bipartisan support (d) Australians don't like referendums in general, especially ones on largely symbolic issues, the referendum to insert a preample to the constitution that happened at the same time also failed and (e) the monarchs generally stay apolitical and things run smoothly ao not much momentum for a change.

That’s fundamentally inaccurate. The suffragettes movement was held back by years by their direct action. What made their claims persuasive was the acts of women in the First World War. Their direct acts made people (men) believe they couldn’t be trusted with the vote, whereas their actions in the war persuaded the holders of power that they could.

I’m not saying people shouldn’t protest, but historically, it has been an unsuccessful way of engendering change. Co-operation and calm rational actions have been the changing forces.

I wonder how his tour is going now.

I think he’s off to the pacific islands and they love the royals over there.

The whole tour was very well received. I think he's in Samoa now.

She should probably have said King of Britain, to include Scotland and Wales.

I can't see anything much about the rest of his Australian tour online.

All of the news stories are focusing on Lidia Thorpe.

Ah well. Onto Samoa

If she thinks hes a coloniser, why would she say the correct term though.

She probably didn't say "King of Britain" as she sees Scotland and Wales as colonies

That really is inaccurate. Although I accept it is the populist history they teach in schools. The real history is far more complex and nuanced.

Of course it’s more nuanced than I can write in one paragraph. But it’s more nuanced than “shouty women got the vote”.

He could, but no countries ever apologise to countries they've wronged. I don't know if that's because it makes them look weak or something. There were many European empires and none of them have ever issued apologies. Holland hasn't apologised for colonising parts of Africa. Spain hasn't apologised to the South American countries, etc. If every country apologised to other countries for all the things they've done, it would go on forever. Germany would be apologising for the next half-century!

I think countries take the view that the things that happened were a very long time ago and were not the fault of anyone alive today, and that it's all ancient history.

Does anyone think that the King should maybe apologise more for the wrongs done by the UK Royal family in the past. He's never really said anything about tj

I was just watching a popular rish podcast.

And the presenterd were saying that they want repatraitions paid and an apology made by the UK royal family, for the colonisation of Ireland , and for the Irish famine genocide. Which were both caused by the UK. I know that's a pretty popular opinion in Ireland

I think a lot of relations would be smoothed between countries if the UK Royal family did apologise for things that happened in the past.

Thats not correct.

A German president apologised to Poland for the Nazi atrocities committed in world war two.
He said

"I bow my head before the Polish victims of German tyranny and I ask forgiveness." in 2019.

King Charles has never even acknowledged things that have happened.

Many countries have apologised to other countries for wrongs. It happens all the time.