Our growing crime rate is a sign of an increasingly sick society

After every event involving loss of life or damage to property, we hear our leaders say this must stop. But nothing is done to address root causes.

The famous painting The Scream by Edvard Munch seems as appropriate today as when it was painted in 1893.

The painting reflects the artist’s anxiety for the world in which he lived. The face is an agonised one.

After the atrocities committed against innocent shoppers last week at a Westfield shopping centre in Bondi, and the murders of three innocent women in Ballarat recently, we are all screaming.

The conflicts in Palestine and Ukraine and the loss of so many people at sea trying in desperation to find security and opportunity in another country?

The Scream by Edvard Munch seems as appropriate today as when it was painted in 1893.

Again, you just want to scream.

We have not lived in such uncertain times since World War II. It is almost impossible to predict the future.

Common sense may prevail.

Leaders, as well as all men and women of good sense, may say that the sanctity of human life is the reason to put down arms. Or, sadly, centuries-old hatreds and expansionist desires will continue to explode, taking the world to the edge of a larger conflict.

Another issue that makes me scream is the gross political mismanagement that will impoverish future generations of Victorians.

Federal and state governments are embarking on programs to, in their words, encourage growth by extending massive subsidies to industries they select as part of our future.

Such selective programs are destined to fail in the world economy.

Kerry Packer once famously declared that the federal government does not manage its own affairs very well.

The one thing that is certain is that federal governments have no idea about the principles of the private sector, of competition, and of encouraging the production of viable, long-term goods and services.

Kerry Packer once famously declared that the federal government does not manage its own affairs very well.

Governments should remove the costs they impose on industry. They struggle to create something of worth, to employ people. Yet if governments see you, they will impose taxes and charges upon your business to make it less viable.

Australia is littered with businesses, big and small, that have failed in the past few years.

In Victoria the lights are being turned out in so many businesses because of failed government policies, and increasing debts that the government is attempting to service by taxing people and businesses beyond their capacity to pay. Federally, the government is attacking supermarkets, but Coles pays more in government taxes and charges now than it makes as profit.

Two issues that also make me scream are our growing crime rate, particularly among the young, and the way in which we are dividing ourselves to weaken the fabric of Australian life.

Take the crime rate. It may be the result of many ingredients that we do not fully understand. But it appears that no one is trying to understand.

After every event, be that involving a loss of life or damage to property, we hear our leaders say this must stop. But nothing is done to address root causes. It makes me scream.

Our growing crime rate is a sign of an increasingly sick society in which so many are now scared, not only to leave their homes, but to be at home.

We will never get rid of all crime, sadly, but we can do a lot better.

The increased demonstrations in support of one side or the other for overseas conflicts are also weakening our society.

The crime rate may be the result of many ingredients that we do not fully understand.

Australia will remain strong and independent, not by how many nuclear submarines we may have by 2050, but by how united we are as a people.

Those of us fortunate enough to have been born here, and those who have selected and settled here in Australia, have obligations to work and pull together.

If these shows of intolerance are allowed to continue, the ramifications could be profound.

A friend last week told me of his children who attend a Jewish school. Every morning and afternoon they walk through the gates of that school past armed security guards.

Is that the Australia we have become? What impact does that have on the psyches of those young children?

If Edvard Munch was agonised and was anxious in 1893, are we not increasingly anxious in 2024 about the world we live in, and the country we are becoming socially, economically and internationally?

All in all, it is enough to make you SCREAM.

Have a good day.