Before fulminating about Israel Folau, Peter FitzSimons should review his past comments

Peter FitzSimons should review some of his previous comments before beginning another rant over Israel Folau. Picture: Mark Wilson/Getty Images

Dear Sir,

How dare Catalans Dragons player Israel Folau not take a knee for the noble Black Lives Matter movement? It takes my breath away. Why won’t he act the way I think is proper? Perhaps I need to write more columns about him. But I’m so angry I’d have trouble conforming to a word limit if I listed everything he does that upsets me.

Peter FitzSimons

It is, of course, Folau's absolute right not to "take a knee" with the other 25 players.
It still takes my breath away regardless.
Seriously, Israel?
The downside of expressing solidarity with a movement that believes we are all equal, & deserve equal treatment would be . . ? https://t.co/TD60J7G1HL

— Peter FitzSimons (@Peter_Fitz) August 2, 2020

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Dear Peter,

It takes my breath away too. Why won’t Folau support a peaceful movement that has destroyed property, burned buildings, looted countless businesses, wants to abolish the police, and is founded on Marxist principles? Beats me.

Your unequalled insight into Folau is not disputed. To quote from your column last December “As one who has followed the issues closely … and who has written and ranted about it extensively, I am more aware than most of the damage he [Folau] has done, the hurt he has caused …” Modesty is but one of your many admirable attributes.

You now want to list all of Folau’s faults in your column, but by the time you have plugged your books, dropped the names of who you and the wife hobnobbed it with on the weekend, reminded readers you were the only Australian rugby player sent off for “violence” against the New Zealand All Blacks, casually mentioned you are a pro chancellor at the University of Sydney, alerted us to your being a friend and acquaintance of prime ministers and premiers, let us know that you were approached to run for the seat of Warringah, told us yet again that membership numbers are “surging” at the Australian Republic Movement (of which you are Chair of course) – truth is, there is not enough room to do your outrage justice.

One further piece of advice: before fulminating about Folau any further I would recommend you review your various stances on players using the field the advance their ideologies. You in 2011 on Denver Broncos quarterback Tim Tebow and his habit of thanking Jesus Christ for his achievements: “Go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen.’’ You in 2018 on former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick: “A nation which prides itself on the right to freedom of speech … can’t claim to actually live by those values when it so severely punishes one of their own when he exercises that right …” You in 2019 on about Rugby Australia’s move to dismiss Folau over his social media posts regarding damnation for gays, drunks, fornicators and liars “This is not an infringement of your freedom of speech, but what you got is you don’t have freedom from consequences.” You in 2019 on NRL indigenous players’ refusal to sing the national anthem (“Bravo” for “making a stand”).

Bravo the Indigenous All Stars, making a stand on the national anthem, backed by the likes of Laurie Daley and Mal Meninga#auspol https://t.co/KWB5hoCf49 via @smh

— Peter FitzSimons (@Peter_Fitz) February 23, 2019

You would have great difficulty in explaining these inconsistent stances, not to mention trying to reconcile them with Folau’s non-participation in the latest feel-good fad. To use a sporting analogy: it is reminiscent of a certain former Wallabies player and his ill-advised decision many years ago to start a blue with the French team. It ended very badly for him. Let’s just say he was full of energy, flailing, determined to land his punches – none of which connected.

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Dear Sir,

I am a 16-year-old student who seeks your advice about an international excursion my school is planning for next year. As part of this we will be visiting various monuments in Washington DC, including the Lincoln Memorial.

Although I look forward to this, I realise at my age I have a lot to learn about how to react in unforeseen situations. For example, I admit to liking ‘Make America Great Again’ caps. Am I correct in saying the First Amendment of the American Constitution gives me the right to wear this cap in public? Also, what should I do if I am standing at a memorial minding my own business and some Native American man goes out of his way to beat a drum inches from my face while he eyeballs me and wails continuously? Rather than react to his provocation, should I just chill?

Michael

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Dear Michael,

Thank you for your email. I am concerned, however, at the language of your hypothetical as well as the implied premises, not to mention your political inclinations. As ABC journalist Ellen Fanning, co-host of The Drum, has observed, even the mere wearing of MAGA caps is “divisive” and the cause of “tension”. You know, much like women provoke wolf-whistling by the provocative way they dress.

I wonder how much of the tension at the Lincoln Memorial arose as students were wearing “Make American Great Again” hats;Emblems of Trump who is seen as divisive and disrespectful on race. Statement of Nick Sandmann, Covington Catholic High School junior. https://t.co/6hZ819Yyib

— Ellen Fanning:Journo (@ellenmfanning) January 23, 2019

I find it difficult to believe your average 16-year-old would not know what to do in these circumstances. To suggest the correct response in that hypothetical would be to “just chill” is indicative of your toxic masculinity and Trumpian aggression. Enough with your sophistry about the First Amendment. I know full well what hate speech is, whether express or implied. You would probably claim that it was a natural reaction to smile in bemusement, knowing full well the enormity of your actions.

To answer your question: the correct response would be to burst into tears, discard the MAGA cap, get on your knees and acknowledge your privilege. Later, you should write effusively about your awakening. Talk about how the beating of the drum and the Native American’s singing hypnotised you, cleansed your soul, and took you to a pre-Columbus land in which indigenous people lived in harmony with the environment. To reiterate: WHATEVER YOU DO, DO NOT SMILE.

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Nicholas Sandmann – the Covington Catholic High School student vilified by leftist media last year in what became known as the Lincoln Memorial confrontation – is not just smiling; he is laughing all the way to the bank. Last month the Washington Post agreed to settle his $250m defamation lawsuit. This was on top of CNN’S settlement of Sandmann’s $275m lawsuit in January.

He and his classmates were falsely accused of surrounding and taunting Nathan Phillips, a Native American man and purported Vietnam veteran, in Washington DC. In selectively edited video excerpts, Sandmann, then 16, was portrayed as a menacing bully who confronted Phillips while the latter was peacefully playing a tribal instrument.

The truth was that just prior to the incident the group of students had been racially abused and taunted by a group of protesters known as the Black Hebrew Israelites. In response the students cheered and chanted to drown out these insults. Phillips, having decided to get involved, walked to the students, and stood directly in front of Sandmann.

“They (the students) were in the process of attacking these four black individuals,” Phillips later told Detroit Free Press. “The looks in these young men’s face … if you go back and look at the lynchings that was done (in America) … and you’d see the faces on the people … The glee and the hatred in their faces, that’s what these faces looked like.”

But the video showed the students were doing no such thing. Nor was there any evidence to corroborate Phillip’s claim he heard the students chant “build the wall”. What of the claim that Phillips is a Vietnam veteran? He later “clarified” for a forgiving media he was actually a “Vietnam-era” or “Vietnam-times” veteran, having served in the Marine Corps Reserve from 1972 to 1976 and never having deployed overseas.

This was put down to a transcription error. Had journalists done their job properly, they would have quickly ascertained Phillips was an inveterate liar and a perpetrator of what is known as “stolen valour”. In 2008, while officiating at Arlington National Cemetery, he referred to when he came “back” from Vietnam, saying “People called me a baby killer and a hippie girl spit on me”. There is undated footage of him on YouTube (9.45-10.30) saying “I’m a Vietnam vet” who served “in theatre”. In 2018, Phillips told Vogue Magazine “I’m from Vietnam times. I’m what they call a recon ranger.” In fact, Phillips’s military service consisted mostly of carrying out reconnaissance on refrigerators as a technician.

The media’s motive was simple: by portraying the students as MAGA racists and bullies they could by extension attribute their actions to US President Donald Trump. In their eagerness to do so they came close to destroying an innocent adolescent. Celebrities and commentators alike joined in the throng. Sandmann and his family received death threats. Why? Because he had worn a MAGA cap and smiled.

But all that was drowned out in progressive outrage. The ABC’s then Washington correspondent Zoe Daniel tweeted “This is truly awful” in response to the false reports that the students harassed Phillips. The Sydney Morning Herald reported that Sandmann’s face bore “a relentless smirk”. Peter FitzSimons, a columnist of that newspaper angrily tweeted this was a case of “Sneering punks disgracing themselves, their school and their country”.

This is truly awful. https://t.co/TaqaRLSPtR

— Zoe Daniel (@zdaniel) January 19, 2019

Only days after the incident, Michael Rowland of ABC TV News Breakfast described the expression on Sandmann’s face as “pure hate”. His co-host Lisa Millar said of Sandmann “It’s this shot here that bothers me the most I think – he’s sort of standing in his [Phillips’s] face – trying to – it would appear he’s trying to intimidate”.

#TUCKER WOW !! Covington Student sues NBC over it's media coverage. #TICKTOCK #BREAKFASTNEWS #AUSPOL National Broadcaster put this rancid stuff to air.
Michael Rowlands Lisa Millar and Some token American. SHAME ON THEM. #THEDRUM #MELBOURNE pic.twitter.com/k0zHYHHkCM

— Jill ❌ (@Havingmysay2) May 3, 2019

“All of this on the backdrop of two years since President Trump was inaugurated,” said Millar. “You know where I’d build that wall,” asked Rowland. “Right around that [Covington] college.” There is a wall all right, but it surrounds the ABC mindset. As columnist Gerard Henderson observed in this newspaper last week, the ABC has for nearly two years refused to correct this report.

The final word on this affair goes to Guardian columnist Jason Wilson. When doubts about the authenticity of initial media reports emerged, his reaction, in what is perhaps described as an act of Orwellian comedy, was to write that “liberal media has almost completely backed away from their initial, justified take on the story”.