But Messina, they are NOT far right. I thought we had agreed this.
So I believe using them as an example is a falsehood. We can agree that they are conservative. And they are undoubtedly conservative. But using them as an example of far right is dishonest, in my opinion.
Just because they are conservative, doesn’t make them uninterested in women’s rights. And it doesn’t mean they are not focused on women’s rights and girl’s rights as being significant issues to be debated and improved.
And this is where I find your attempt to harden the point they are not officially affiliated rather contrary to the point of the discussion. There is an undeniably strong connect between the Liberal Party and the National Party in CPAC.
And this year, would you agree that the majority of the politicians or ex politicians speaking that are Australian, are from those parties? Yes or no?
Is it that you believe those parties are not interested in women’s and girl’s rights?
I believe, I have already said what I think about invited speakers and whether they should be considered aligned with CPAC’s views. I will cut and paste it here for convenience.
“So what do I think? I think that if a group doesn’t have experts within to speak about a topical issue, then going to experts with direct experience is a good thing. I think all people in the world should be seeking to better understand the issue. And that even if the group has opposing views to you, if you are invited to speak and have a chance to change people’s understanding of an issue. Even if they are politically opposed to you, you should be able to do so without the abusive tactic of being forever labeled as being aligned with that group.”
”It is an abusive tactic to label someone speaking to a group or on a show as being somehow politically aligned to a political movement they do not support.”
I am going to add that if you mean to categorise this group as ‘far right’ because they are the most extreme right wing that you can think of having events discussing current topics needing debate, perhaps this is why we keep speaking at cross purposes.