defence

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Defence Australia wants to know what we think. Help me tell them.

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Ladies and Gents, occasionally we have to use the tools the system has given us to agitate some change. That time may be now...

Defence Australia is calling for submissions from the community to inform the Defence White Paper, which will guide Australia's Defence spending for the next 20 years. 

They want the community to send in thoughts - and if you have ever wished you could change the way Defence spends their money or thinks about things, this is the opportunity you have been looking for.

It is so important for marginalised and minority voices to be heard in this sort of forum.  I'd like to make sure, in whatever way I can, that these voices are heard.

Therefore, if you want to write a submission (or a short paragraph showing your feelings!), check out the links below:

WHITE PAPER (What on earth a 'white paper' is...)

COMMUNITY CONSULTATION (Some info about the consultation process)

PUBLIC SUBMISSIONS (Where you make a submission)

2014 PAPER (What the 2014 paper said).

If you don't want to write your own submission but want your voice heard, email me: yassmin@youthwithoutborders.com.au and tell me what you think, or we can have a chat in some other way.

Make sure your voice gets heard. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Links, Links, Links – 4th February 2013

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Illustration: Rocco Fazzari

The belief that stars are born not made is demonstrated by the portrayal of genius in the media and popular entertainment. Higher achievers such as Mozart and Michelangelo are shown in plays and movies as having prodigious abilities from their earliest years, their talent the result of possession of some mysterious in-built gift. The role of studying and working at mastering anything – art, craft, intellectual pursuits or sport – is glossed over or ignored.

The Conversation on our obsession with natural talent and whether that is harming our students.

 The WSJ on the concept of “The Guerrilla Myth".  Very America Centric but interesting points.

Unconventional wars are our most pressing national security concern. They're also the most ancient form of war in the world. Max Boot on the lessons of insurgency we seem unable to learn.

Creating Links is offering a Cert IV in Community Culture…check it out here! 

Perhaps in future, spy training and learning spy tradecraft should be part of the journalist school curriculum?

On a slightly different note:

The truth is that there will be a million people in your life who actually don’t love you, whose dismissal of your feelings or tendency to ignore what you want are rooted in genuine apathy. They are everywhere, and make navigating our emotional lives even more complicated. But there are also many people who do love us, and who want to show us, but just may not be able to do it in the way we most want to hear. And it’s important to distinguish between the two, to look at the things people are actively doing for us and take account of the things we’re lucky to have in them. Because we are lucky to have love — in any of its forms — and no way of saying “I love you” should be forgotten about.

The Thought Catalogue on The Different Types of Love.

Zakia Baig’s story… Giving Australian’s an opportunity to share their story with the Prime Minister through the SBS program 'My Community Matters’: A great story about an Afghanistani Hazara woman doing fabulous things for her community here in Australia.

The importance of a deepening of our relationship with China cannot be overstated.  Australia releases it’s National Security Statement.  In between the lines is a distinct push and pull between our traditional roles as America’s allies, and the reality of our demographics.