Rogue Senator Lidia Thorpe Finally Suspended

Yesterday in the Senate, Senator Pauline Hanson attempted to table a document that questioned the eligibility of Senator Fatima Payman to sit in parliament. The issue is that Senator Payman, leader of Australia's Voice party, a party that she founded only in October after leaving the Labor Party in July, is a dual-citizen, as she was born in Afghanistan. Her family fled the Taliban when she was five years old. Even though she became an Australian citizen in 2005, according to Afghan law, this does not automatically revoke her Afghan citizenship. She says she approached the Afghanistan embassy in Australia in 2021 to renounce her citizenship, but the embassy could not proceed as it had no contact with the Taliban government.

In Parliament yesterday, Senator Payman was angered that Senator Hanson tried to table the document. She said things such as, “All that Senator Hanson does in this place is spread hatred and spread division because that’s what she’s made to do here. It’s outrageous. It’s beyond comprehension. I think you’ve got better things to do than worry about section 44 here when there’s nothing to see. The racism and comments and quotes that you've made in the past… Somebody bring the dictionary, because Senator Hanson does not know the definition of racism. The fact that you would say, just weeks ago, to Senator Faruqi, ‘Piss off back to Pakistan,’ means you’re not just vindictive, mean, nasty; you bring disgrace to the human race.”

While Senator Payman was attacking Senator Hanson, Senator Lidia Thorpe thought she better say something, as she seems to love being in the spotlight. She said to Senator Hanson, “You’re a convicted racist!” Yes, this is what our taxpayer dollars pay for. Senators accusing each other of racism.

Remembering, that all Senator Hanson wishes to do is table some documents.

Anyway, at some point during the proceedings, Senator Thorpe tears up Senator Hanson’s motion and throws it at her, with Senator Thorpe storming out and giving the middle finger to the Senate. Again, your taxpayer dollars are paying for all this.

To cut a long story short, the Senate have suspended Senator Thorpe for the rest of the year, which is just today to be fair, a single day.

The majority of senators voted to suspend Senator Thorpe, with the notable exception of the Greens and Senator Payman, with Green’s Senator Larissa Waters explaining their decision not to kick out Senator Thorpe. She said, “We do not think that the behaviour of Senator Thorpe, in tearing up the paper and sending that in the direction of Senator Hanson, was a behaviour that we would like to see repeated. It's not a behaviour that we think is appropriate. We also do not think that the approach of denying her for an entire day the ability to exercise her vote in this Senate is an appropriate and proportionate response to that action.”

Oh, why not? Can you guess? “Let us all reflect on how we behave, but let those of us who live with white privilege remember that institutionalised racism doesn't affect us as it does people of colour… I'm sure anyone who was in the chamber would realise that the behaviours that were undertaken this morning came about following an attempt by another senator to exclude a different senator of colour, and it was in the context of a debate that had racially charged overtones. I acknowledge that, in a proceeding taken by Senator Faruqi, Senator Hanson has recently been shown by a court to have breached the Racial Discrimination Act. That is the context in which we have approached our response to today's behaviour.”

So basically, the Greens who claim to be against violence against women, don’t want to suspend a senator for a single day who clearly assaulted another senator by throwing paper at her, because essentially, they disagree with her politics and label her a racist. And of course, they can’t help but refer to “white privilege” and “people of colour”. They’re always labelling everybody else racist, but they can’t help but refer to everybody in terms of race. Actually, they’re the racists, and they’re a bunch of hypocrites.

Unsurprisingly, even though she was suspended, Senator Thorpe snuck into parliament anyway, with her shouting, “Free, free Palestine! From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free!” She also added, “Australia is a very racist, divided country. We want our land back. We want our babies back, and we want the king to just f*** off!”

So yes, this is what your taxpayer dollars are paying for.

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Allégro by Emmit Fenn