links for the week

[tielan]

A links dump. The top one is the most recent one I read, and it's mostly about Australian politics, but an interesting dive into the new politics happening around our 'wealthy electorates dumping the conservative party' trends.

The Colour Of Money: Are the teals, representing some of the nation’s wealthiest electorates, our best hope for addressing inequality?

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A bunch of old links:

guns and uvalde
I don't just want fewer guns, I want a community that cares for me

How To Reduce Shootings...back in 2017: still relevant today

Church Pew Weddings

Indian migration in Australia: Indians will shortly outnumber Chinese as the largest migrant group to Australia.

Websites as bad architecture: what lies beneath - and oh do I feel this as someone who's had to deal with website management through the ages...

The Unmasking Of Evangelicalism: all the shit from those chickens coming home to roost.

Rethinking Evangelicalism: does British Evangelicalism have its own set of problems? Oh yes, absolutely. On the other hand, the toxic cocktail of religious dogma, capitalist prosperity gospel, and Christian nationalism is still marginal here, so maybe we have less toxic options than American Evangelicalism. Something which I would have liked to point out to the American Evangelical guy who got pissy when I noted the issues US Evangelicals were facing.

There are more, but they're not presently detailed and I want to re-read them before I post them.

Comments

[lilysea]

The article about migration from India to Australia is interesting (and hopeful)

I saw an article this year on ABC news about how Australia used to be the #1 preferred country for migration from India, but recently Australia is now third-preferred, after Canada and Germany, with the reasons cited by Indian migrants for no longer choosing Australia being

a) Australia does not offer family reunification visas for grandparents, only for parents and children;

b) it is very difficult for doctors, engineers etc to get their Indian university qualifications verified and certified for Australia so that people can practice professionally;

c) racism by white Australians towards Indian migrants.

Given Australia's low birth rate and ageing population, and our shortage of staff in many professions [including but not limited to medicine] I would like to see Australia welcoming migrants from India as much as possible, especially [but not only] migrants with professional university qualifications.

I really think Australia needs to shift away from a 1950s/1960s mindset of "we're doing people a favour by letting people migrate here" to a mindset of "with an ageing population and a low birth rate, we need to woo prospective migrants, *especially* doctors, nurses, teachers, aged care workers and other staff for whom there is a worldwide-shortage.

[lilysea]

I think this might be the article that I saw, talking about reasons people choose not to migrate to Australia,

the fact that Indian migration to Australia was down, whereas Indian migration to Canada was up,

and that Australia needed to adopt a mind set that skilled migrants were a scarce resource who should be wooed and courted and have their migration pathway made as smooth as possible, because the UK and Germany certainly are doing so

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-02-16/australia-skilled-migrant-cap-indian-racism-jobs-family-reunion/101726700

[tielan]

Yeah, I can't say I'm surprised. I wonder if any of it is going to change going forward under a Labor govt? (Although the issue of a housing shortage is not going to get better under increased immigration, especially given the current policies in place or the ones being bruited about.)

[lilysea]

Well, if we could entice some skilled builders that might help somewhat in the long term - one of the many issues contributing to the housing shortage at the moment

is that there is currently more demand for building in the building industry

than there are skilled builders to DO the building...

(This is particularly visible in towns where lots of housing was lost at once due to floods/fires but there aren't enough skilled builders. But it's also an issue even in major metropolitan cities at the moment)