Firefighting chiefs face making very difficult decisions

As the NSW bushfires burn on, social media and The Australian’s comments sections display increasing criticisms of back-burns that fail and destroy more property as a consequence (“NSW fire-fronts ‘uncontrollable’ as state braces for heatwave”, online, 17/12).

Granted, on a serious day with heavy fuel loads, a back-burn is a gamble, balancing the risk of the fire escaping versus the benefit of saving properties. The firefighters in command are stuck with an awful choice.

If they don’t back-burn, those properties are gone. If they do back-burn and fail, those properties are gone. But if they backburn and succeed, those properties might be saved. Put yourself in their shoes; it’s a very frightening place to be.

But never forget that the nightmare comes, not from failed back-burns, but from a refusal to manage forests as once they were managed, with frequent fuel reduction burns. We are now reaping the fruits of the green “fight for the forests”, the active and intentional shutdown of past forest management, and the discarding of hard-won knowledge and experience. For nearly two decades now, fires of this magnitude have become a case of when, not if, as demonstrated by the alpine fires of 2003, and Victoria’s Black Saturday in 2009. We don’t seem to be learning.

Tim Fatchen, Mt Barker, SA

At least 56 people have been cautioned or charged with 71 bushfire-related offences (“Police set to charge a dozen with arson”, 18/12).

So when will Adam Bandt and the Greens give up their accusations that it is all due to climate change?

Anthony Wood, Epping, NSW

Shy voters have emerged

Paul Kelly (“Recast right has a better read on class and culture”, 18/12) reminded me of an observation made by journalist David Penberthy: “I have long had a theory that the best way to work out what Australia thinks is to watch an episode of Q&A. When the audience is cheering and hollering in mad approval at a point one of the panellists has just made, you can rest assured that the opposite sentiment is the one held most widely and strongly in Australia.”

What we witnessed in Britain last week was the phenomenon of the shy voter. In the US and Australia and now in Britain, the Bradley effect also came into play. Named after a 1982 Californian governorship race anomaly, where white citizens were hesitant to admit to not voting for an Afro-American candidate who subsequently lost, the theory postulates why there is often such a discrepancy between what voters say they will do on election day and what they actually do in the voting booth.

In the Australian context, admitting that you disagree with unbridled immigration, Australia Day protests or gender fluidity, immediately puts you in the deplorable basket of being a social conservative and thus supposedly on a par with the other knuckle draggers who crawled from under a rock and are worthy of a good egging.

Peter Waterhouse, Craigieburn, Vic

Genocide in China

The internment of Uighurs in China is a serious concern. Any attempted cultural destruction of an ethnic, religious and political groups by any government must be seen for what it is — first stage of genocide.

China has been targeting Muslims via a campaign of torture, surveillance, and to strip the Uighurs of their right to practice their religion.

A state has the right to protect itself from terrorism, but it does not have the right to commit cultural and religious genocide.

The cure and prevention of genocide is for all communities to take action. All governments should take political actions to prevent any form of genocide. Inaction leads to complicity resulting in complete or partial destruction of an ethnic group.

Michael Wohltmann, Greenwith, SA