Current mood:

pissed off

Have one for Australia.
Today I discovered a full page ad in the Herald Sun (page 14 of 25/4/06) that dumbfounded me in its audacity. I couldn't decide whether to be outraged or amused. It was written and entirely funded by Gary Johnston, a private citizen who claims to be affiliated with no political party or special interest group, and it has a website address one can visit for more information. Anyway, here is the advertisement.

The website is the bizarrely named http://www.play2upnow.com.au There are two versions of the ad on the website. The one I haven't linked to directly has the addition of a disturbing tagline: "Your child could be dedicated to the ANZACS who never came back" and says that we can "give some meaning to all that senseless death" by having 2.1 children instead of 1.7.

First of all, I resent and completely reject the idea that my duty to my country is to act as a baby factory to keep the population going. Please note that the ad, written by a man, specifies birth rate "per female," not per person, couple, family or household. But that's an issue that we've seen surrounding shrinking birth rate moral panics for some time. The message behind this ad seems to me to be far more insidious and offensive than simply suggesting it is a woman's duty to give birth.

Centring the campaign around ANZAC day and the idea that we need to replace Australian men who died at war, and the children they never had a chance to have, is not only using sneaky means to guilt people into having more children, it's also attributing creepy motives to increasing the Australian birth rate. Is Mr. Johnston suggesting that we should be boosting the population because Australia needs more cannon fodder? If all I have to look forward to for my children is sending them away to die in wars I don't agree with, then this ad makes me feel even more secure in my decision not to have children. I'm not just protecting myself from a life of childcare I expect I would neither enjoy nor be good at. I am choosing to protect my unborn offspring from being used as human shields - or worse, offensive weapons - by their government.

The disclaimer at the bottom of the ad says that "the writer acknowledges that immigration is an essential part of this country's population but that immigration should augment our population, not dominate it." I wonder how he feels about international adoption? Would babies from other (often overpopulated and disadvantaged) countries be Australian enough for him?