Friday, December 02, 2005

"And His Ghost May Still Be Heard. . ."

Australians are a sentimental lot; they cannot resist a sympathetic law-breaker. From bushrangers to army deserters to drug traffickers, if they display some act of plain human decency, Australians will admire and even adore them.

Maybe it's the recognition of "There but for the grace of God, go I". Put in the same desperate circumstances, might I not have done something similar? Killed the cop, gone AWOL, smuggled heroin? And then, when faced with the consequences of my actions, would I still have performed as well as they did?

So we have Ned Kelly as an iconic figure of nationhood, and John Kirkpatrick Simpson as a war hero, and now we have Thuoc Van Nyugen - martyrs all to our belief in one another's basic human qualities of self-sacrifice and mateship.

3 comments:

teddlesruss said...

i'm sooo sorry for van, because the penalty really is archaic and barbaric and even a little arbitrary.

but i'm sooo glad also for the message sent to wannabe drug mules everywhere, and the fact that several kilos of drugs didn't make it to ruin more lives than just his family's.

very mixed feelings indeed...

Anonymous said...

i miss you guys!!!!!
Canadian Winters suck!
how is the wee internal prawn?
lol
it's keeet

ToxicPurity said...

Ted:

Van knew he was breaking the law. The irony is that it wasn't Singapore he was attempting to smuggle drugs into but *Australia*. It's his mother I feel for. Now, what is Australia's stance going to be on the Bali 9?

Keet!

When are you coming back? The Bubzilla's doing fine. Real soon now, his Dad will upload pics and maybe a video of the latest ultrascan, and then you'll all see for yourselves :)