Ampersand 2019

s a r n d e p m A Trinity Grammar School’s Literary Magazine A forum for the best writing produced by Trinity students in 2019

d n a s r e p m A 2019

Earlier this year, The Age newspaper reported that, according to the Victorian Curriculum and Assessment Authority (VCAA): ‘there is limited opportunity in the current VCE English and EAL (English as an Additional Language) Study Design to explore the craft of writing, and to focus on writing for different purposes and audiences, and in a variety of forms.’

1 This came as somewhat of a shock to me as that has not been my experience at Trinity!

The completion of Outcomes in the three strands of the VCE English curriculum requires students to read a wide variety of text types. In order to attain a high standard of achievement, students need to be familiar with different genres and to consider the intention of each writer.

Students learn to understand that no text is constructed in isolation; every word, every image, every symbol has a purpose and students are expected to interpret and analyse the ways writers of novels, poems, and plays, the directors of films, and the creators of websites and advertorials all use language to convey their views to their audience. Not only this, but students themselves produce writing for

different purposes and audiences in a variety of forms.

Such writing includes speeches, journal entries, essays, narratives, scripts, persuasive letters, descriptive passages and many other kinds of texts.

Listen to interviews with professional writers and, overwhelmingly, they will say that they are voracious readers and have been so since early childhood. While an absence of such an innate passion for reading does not necessarily preclude strong writing skills, a love of the written word certainly seems to help children to develop as writers. A quick survey of all those who entered pieces in this competition revealed that the majority love to read. A love of reading is one of the greatest gifts we can hope for our children to have. Escaping into a book is different from sitting down with a film or television show; a book requires the reader’s imagination to do the work. It is a chance for the reader to involve themselves actively in the world created by the writer, to bring it to life in their minds, if you will. To help nurture a love of reading in students, Trinity has fantastic, well-stocked libraries in both the Junior and the Senior Schools. The English staff are constantly seeking ways to encourage boys to read through programs such as DEAR (Drop Everything And Read!), by role-modelling good reading habits and by introducing their classes to a mixture of classics and contemporary texts. Within the covers of this magazine, the evidence is clear: Trinity boys write in a plethora of styles and genres.

The pieces published here represent this year’s top entries in the annual Ampersand Writing Competition. Alongside the boys’ writing are photographs, artwork and designs entered in the Mitre Photography and Design Competition, as well as pieces produced in general Art classes and for VCE Visual Arts subjects.

I hope you enjoy this year’s edition of Ampersand.

Siobhan Latham Ampersand Editor 2019

Ru a r i Joh n s on - Ye ar 7 2 A m p e rs a nd 2 0 1 9

1 Carey, Adam https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/vceenglish-to-be-overhauled-after-review-finds-creative-writing-not-taught20191002-p52x23.html

Contents

Creative Writing ‘And besides, the way the world is lately… the tensions – it’s enough to make cracks appear in anyone.’

4

Turning Points in History – Trayvon Martin

28

Andrew McCormick, Year 9

What is History?

5

30

Harry Johnson, Year 7

Ved Jithoo, Year 12

The Drowning Dog

7

Wretched Poetry

Stephen Mack, Year 11

The Pains of Regret

9 10

Forever 12 13 15 17

Luke Ehlert, Year 7

Today’s Turning Point: Partisanship, Democracy and the Lessons of History

19

David Dodson, Year 9

39

Lachlan Chen, Year 9

Refugees Commit Crimes

41

Hamish Galbraith, Year 12

20

Not So Fast…

43

Peter Roberts, Year 12

To Live in the Moment?

23

Hamish Galbraith, Year 12

Materialism – Exploited

38

Speech 40

Andrew Lim, Year 11

Evaluate the effective use of power by two or more states in the pursuit of their national interest

Aden Wilmshurst, Year 9

Of Weather and School

Ryan Dear, Year 9

Expository and Analytical Writing

36

How Far I’ve Fallen

David Dodson, Year 9

The Arrival that Never Came

Zac Kamateros, Year 10

The Wrath of Time

Andrew Zhang, Year 7

Two to Twelve

34

Andrew Lim, Year 11

Fragile 35

Mike Zhou, Year 12

It Rained and I felt So Guilty

33

Stephen Mack, Year 11

Time is…

Andy Kim, Year 12

A Pure Moment

Poetry 32

45

Will Browning, Year 11

A Fair Go and a Fighting Chance 25

46

Andrew Lim, Year 11

Calvin Blair, Year 11

Why was Stalin able to achieve total power in the USSR by the end of the 1920s?

Aden Wilmshurst, Year 9

Comic Strip 26

47

Salvation 47 Calvin Blair, Year 11

A m p e rs an d 2 019 3

Creative Wr iting

Ch ar l e s W h i te - Year 8

I s aac S pr i n g - Year 7

4 A m p e rs a nd 2 0 1 9

‘Yeah, yeah, I’m alright, I’m alright,’ I try to let my breath out slowly, my heart is beating faster than Pharlap’s after the Melbourne Cup. ‘It’s just like I was back there y’know?

Some godforsaken jungle, bullets whizzing around.’

Francis opens his mouth, but for once is silent.

Ve d Jitho o, Year 12

‘And b e side s, the way the world is lately…the tensions – it’s enough to make cracks app ear in anyone.’

Sweat. It streams from my hairline down my temples. It drips slowly into my eyes. It gradually soaks my uniform and pools in my boots. The strap of my Owen gun digs into my neck, chafing more skin with every aching footfall.

The heat of the jungle is incredible. The humidity worse than the St Kilda bathhouses on a January day. I crane my neck, trying to catch a glimpse of the Bougainville sky, but there’s just more green. It’s bombs, not light that penetrate this dense canopy. The column trudges along the rough path, no-one speaking. Until Johnson up the front mutters a quiet expletive. A sound. ‘Pfhht’, like a kid shooting a spitball. Johnson looks down at the rapidly growing stain on his shirt and grunts, surprised. He takes two more steps then crumples like tinfoil.

Suddenly the jungle is filled with screaming from all sides.

Our boys shout to take cover. The Japs come pouring out of the bushes, swords flashing, rifles aflame, screaming their damned war cries. Someone, somewhere is crying out in pain. I try to lift my gun but it weighs a tonne in my hands.

I try to run but my feet are rooted to the spot. I open my mouth to scream but the sweat fills it. I am drowning.

Someone is shaking my shoulder. I spring upright, flailing and gasping, my mouth opening and closing like a fish on the pier moments before its brains are dashed out. I open my eyes and the jungle melts away into the walls of Rowena Parade. Francis is sitting on the edge of the bed like Dad used to whenever one of us had a nightmare. In fact, he’s wearing one of Dad’s suits too, plenty of space for his shoulders to slouch inside the ill-fitting shirt.

‘You alright, Kip? Looked like you were having a nightmare.’

That’s Francis for you. No prizes for stating the obvious, mate.

He’s got no idea what to say, I realise, it’s not as if he was over there.

Eventually he clears his throat and speaks, ‘Well I was about to head down to the baker’s, then off to work.’

I tell him I’ll be a bit longer before I look for jobs at the RSL. The door slams shut behind Francis as I look around our room. It seems exactly as I left it, down to the last speck of dust. My army bag sits in the corner, like a huge khaki grub spilling its guts out onto the floor. It’s when I look over at Ma’s bed that I realise everything has changed. I’ve changed. The war did that, probably. One too many buddies blown to pieces and you just can’t see the world as sunshine and daisies anymore. The old Kip would’ve cracked a joke to lighten the mood; but I left him behind on some jungle path in Borneo.

I peek into her room as I head down the hall. Bad move Kip. If life was a chess game this’d be checkmate for you.

I’m half expecting to see her lying there: hair in a cloud on the pillow, sleeping blissfully, like an angel. Instead it’s like I’m in the back alley and Mac’s just landed a good one in my guts. I sink to the floor, my hand on the doorframe sending slivers of peeling paint fluttering to the ground.

They coat the floor like ash. I rock forwards, forehead touching the floor, the grit sharp against it. An unfamiliar wetness tickles my face. I had tried to forget, tried to get lost in the war. All that brought me was more pain. Now I’m back and the hole in my heart is still here waiting to swallow me whole – my escape attempt in vain.

‘Connie,’ I whisper, ‘Connie, come back please.’

The sound of Francis coming up the stairs startles me.

Click, click, creak, click.

‘Kip? Not still in bed, are we?’

I scramble up from the floor; no use him seeing me like this.

‘Nah I’m just in here,’ But the catch in my voice gives it away. I try to brush it off, smooth as a gravel road, ‘Gee Francis, you never fixed that up.’ I point to a crack in the wall.

A m p e rs an d 2 019 5

Francis stands awkwardly, his expression inscrutable.

‘Yeah well, there’s been a lot to do the last two years, ‘specially after you ran away to the army when Ma died.’

The silence is as lethal as a Japanese bayonet. The venom in his voice surprises me.

‘What did you just say?’

Regret flashes across Francis’ face and he stammers something. But the gloves are off now; it’s out in the open where it belongs and we will settle this like men.

‘Ran away? You don’t know what you’re talking about.

You’ve no idea what I’ve seen, what I’ve lost, what they made us do.’

Francis swallows and straightens up; he’s not going to back down. Well bravo, Sir Francis. Finally grown a bloody backbone, have we?

‘Yeah, I’ve been here alone, picking up the pieces. You were of no use in the inquest, when half of Melbourne was running Connie’s name through the dirt. You barely lifted a finger to help Ma and the moment she died you buggered off for the great big adventure. You never could handle any responsibility and it’s been up to me for two years to rebuild everything.’

He stands there, breathing hard.

‘Francis,’ I say in that low, deadly tone the old Kip never had, ‘You’d best take that back if you know what’s good for you.’

We’re almost nose to nose now, rage making us quiver like street dogs in the wintertime. Then I see the paint on the ground, the ashes. Shame tempers anger and suddenly it hits me like a ruckman when the whistle goes. I look into my brother’s eyes. He’s all I have left. He sees it too.

D ante S i c ci t a - Year 9

‘Francis… I-’ ‘Shut up Kip.’ He says as he pulls me into an embrace.

Dad, Ma, Connie, they’re never coming back. It’s just the two of us now. Neither of us says anything, the silence broken only by a distant tram’s bell.

We stay like that for a while.

S am Ch i n - Year 9

6 A m p e rs a nd 2 0 1 9

Stephen Mack , Year 11

The Drowning D o g I have always had a weak heart. Ever since I was young, I have been easily perturbed by the most unstartling of things and was often prone to bouts of panic. In addition to all of this, I also possessed an incessant stutter for which I was mocked and derided, and despite the patient efforts of a speech therapist, it seemed intent on continuing to plague my existence. In short, my temperament was incurably ill-suited to human society, and it was for this reason that I kept away from the world, shying from school and social gatherings and preferring to spend my time alone in the forest by our house.

It wasn’t a dense forest, but the trees provided sufficient cover for me to play by the river undiscovered. By the time I had finished my first year of school, the forest had very much become a kind of sanctuary and a place of innate fantasy into which I confided all my secrets and inner musings. I knew every tree and every stone and could safely navigate my way through the brush, even on dark nights, through sheer force of memory. There was always a sense of calm and security there, and if I closed my eyes and let my reveries guide me, the forest seemed eternal; the same roots always writhed beneath my feet, the rough caress of the bark felt familiar on soft hands. The creek rippled gently, and birds nested their young in whispered song. This was a place where all was right with the world.

As I grew older, my old corner of the woods ceased to interest me as it once did, and I expanded my territory at a very gradual rate, exploring further downstream where the ground was flat, and the trees weren’t quite so many.

About half a mile down, there was a grassy clearing where the stream had become wide enough to skip stones and go fishing, and there was an old wooden bridge I was fascinated by. It was a peculiar sight; a monument of man existing where I believed no-one to have gone before. But it was isolated and dilapidated and otherwise unclaimed, so I soon accepted it as my own: another landmark to fill a mundane world of fantasy.

My fixation on this object only grew, and I became curious about the opposite bank and wanted to explore more of this

Co n n o r Mago utis - Year 10

uninhabited world. I once tried this, only to retreat after a rotting wooden board nearly gave way beneath my feet. I hence deemed the bridge unsuited to crossings.

There was one boy who came to frequent the land across the bridge. He couldn’t have been much older than me, perhaps one or two years. Even for his age, he was quite tall and strong, and although his blond hair and blue eyes indicated a certain innocence, I was always wary of him. His confidence frightened me.

He was always eager to greet me, and twice proposed the audacious suggestion that we play together, but my resolute timidity was my only reply. I cannot tell you why I was compelled to silently spurn him in this manner. In truth, I was always quite lonely and lived as somewhat of a pariah due to my stutter; had I the conviction, perhaps we would have become close friends, and I much happier for it.

Nevertheless, I opted to retain the river’s breadth between us, perhaps due to the fear that he too would reject me.

Perhaps I was blinded by some form of envy for his easy smile and gentle swagger. He was intensely likeable, and I hated him for it.

His approach was relentless, however, and conceive my horror upon finding him fishing atop that wooden bridge; the same bridge that I was unable to cross. I deemed that place no longer safe and ceased my regular visitations.

A m p e rs an d 2 019 7

It was winter when I plucked up the courage to re-visit the old bridge. It was as intact and undisturbed as it had remained in my memory: a bastion against the blustering, heaving winds from upstream. I had wandered down there on an ominous day. The river had grown wider, with the snowfall on the mountains causing the water to ride further up the banks, and the winds were heavy and cold, the river twisting and convulsing under the bleakness of the season, which certainly did not augur well for the day to come. It was a strange day to be out, but I spotted the blond-haired boy downstream, now in the throes of adolescence and much taller than I remembered him. It was not long before a new interloper approached: a girl walking a small dog emerged from over the hill, and disturbed by this strange and unrecognised presence, I hid further inland.

It was not long before I heard something hit the water and a soft squeal shortly afterwards. I ran back towards the river and the sound. The girl from earlier stood with her hands over her mouth in shock, staring intently at the icy waters.

A wooden plank floated in the current.

Briefly examining the bridge, it appeared that the rotting board had finally come loose and fallen into the water.

However, something else floundered about in the river. A small creature with golden fur was barely keeping its head above the water, thrashing and flailing its slight forelimbs in a futile effort to swim.

It was the girl’s small dog, no more than a year old, and by no means in possession of the necessary strength to free itself from the current and return to safety. Its large eyes were dominated by dilated black pupils, eyelids squeezing open and shut as it bobbed above and below the water. It gasped for breath each time it broke the water’s surface; a shrill whimper could be heard before the river’s arms dragged it back below. The most painful aspect of the affair was the desperate gasp the creature would make just before it sank below the surface, no doubt swallowing the river water as it did so. I was overcome by a profound sense of hopelessness. That dog would surely be drowned.

The girl from the other side was deeply affected by the torment of her dog, and I felt immense pity towards her, having to watch her beloved pet be torn away, further and further down the river until the little furry head was visible no more. She soon caught sight of me, and with pleading eyes and fervent words, she shouted across the river, her voice breaking from fear and worry. She was almost in tears.

‘Save him! You can save him! Get in the water! Save him!’

8 A m p e rs a nd 2 0 1 9

J o e l Tayl o r - Year 7

Despite her prayers, I remained paralysed and transfixed by the horror of the scene. I knew I could have done something; the dog was not far, and I was a capable swimmer, but I remained frozen by fear. She stared, her eyes widening and her shouts reaching a crescendo as she realised that I was doing nothing about her poor dog. But I could no longer hear her over my deafening panic and watched her mouth move from the corner of my eye.

A flurry of movement and splash of the current interrupted my trance, as the boy downstream leapt into the water to save the helpless animal. It was a marvellous sight. He had discarded his shirt and trousers in an effort to better traverse the water, leaving bare skin to shoulder the blunt waves and bitter cold. He glided through the water faster than the dog and the current, and in an expert manoeuvre, tucked the puppy beneath one of his arms and swam back with this burden. The girl greeted him on the other side, tears of relief streaking down her cheeks. He smiled, ever charming, despite the wet and cold. The dog coughed up water, but soon recovered as best it could. I assume it survived.

I ran from that place forever that day. The forest had become haunted by the near death of that dog. An unsettling revelation had fallen upon me in that moment. I never tried to save that dog. And he, that other boy, did so without hesitation. Was it a matter of temperament? A key difference between our persons? One boy a hero, the other a coward – both rendered this way through unpitying and uncontrollable fate. Oh, what I would do to have been born like him: able and righteous and worthy. But I knew I would never be able to save the dog. To be like that boy. Hearts are unchanging things, moulded by infancy and forged in childhood. This is a distance that will remain between us forever, and I cursed it on that day, and I curse it still now.

The drowning dog was saved by courage; the boy was made deserving by it, and I was cursed without it.

Andy Kim, Year 12

The Pains of Re gret I can see it in his eyes. He’s thinking the same thing I’m thinking, but I’m sending wireless signals to him with my eyes. I heard King Kong can do that without even trying.

Don’t say it Francis. Don’t bring it up.

What are we going to do for money?

And all I can see is Francis’ dirty little nose, and I’m breathing right down his throat, my hands around his collar. He’s limp and doesn’t even fight back; it’s as if he expected it. That just makes me angrier so I swing him around so that I can sink my fist into his snobby little face but I lower my arm. I can’t hit Francis. I can’t hit him. Ma’s dealing with enough already.

I sit back down but silently I’m shaking in fury. I didn’t need another reminder that Dad’s not here anymore today.

I was already feeling like hurling when I woke up. The empty chair at the head of the kitchen table is enough. I might burn it later because I can’t bear to see it every day as I eat breakfast. But I know I won’t be able to. That just feels like I’m burning Dad in my memories.

That’s what hurts and burns my insides right now. I didn’t say goodbye to him. On account of a book. A stupid book about the African tribes hunting the gazelles to offer them up as a bloody sacrifice for their Gods. But it seems like the African tribes have speared my heart instead. Now I’m bleeding. Forever. And Dad’s not coming back home to patch it up.

I’m not going. I thought I could, but I can’t. Dad’s lying in the cold earth, worms and all other nasty, wicked things in that dirt eating his skin. But Francis and I, sitting there like good little boys at our good little desks; it’s as if nothing ever happened. I can’t bear the thought of learning about Julius Caesar when Dad’s not going to quiz me on it at the dinner table later. What’s the point? I don’t see any reason for me to stay. Dad’s gone and he’s never coming back, and it’s this school which kept me too busy from basking in Dad’s energy, Dad’s warmth, Dad’s tenderness. I didn’t even say a proper goodbye. All because of the bloody Africans.

Education. Going to school. Brothers. Rise and Fall of the bloody Roman Empire. It’s all rubbish.

The stench of the old books in the school library makes me want to throw up now. It’s the old parchment smell I breathed in and felt content with just a week ago, but now it’s as if I’ve caught a whiff of that thing called tobacco. It penetrates my nostrils and makes my brain all fuzzy. It is those damned words which kept me from saying a proper goodbye to Dad that morning. I didn’t even see him leave, but he probably hoped I’d say, ‘Have fun at the Argus today, Dad.’ He probably wished I’d leave the world of the African terrains, and come back to Rowena Parade to look up at my father leaving for work.

Who am I kidding? I knew he wished for me to look up at him. Even just once. And yet I still refused to. The book was just too interesting.

Th o mas McMi l l an - Year 7

A m p e rs an d 2 019 9

Mike Zhou, Year 12

A Pure Moment Charlotte’s holding a gold chain with some sort of crystal swinging at the bottom. She says it’s a special pendant from Mum that has the mystical ability to predict pregnancies, however, in my eyes, it’s maybe – no, certainly – a glorified rock. It’s dull. Inanimate. End of story. I can’t believe that even when there’ve been monumental medical breakthroughs by specialists who have devoted their lives to research, Charlotte decides that she’s pregnant because of a ‘holy rock’. By the looks of things, she’s showing symptoms that she’s turning into a cavewoman. My progressive sister is regressing all the way to the Cretaceous Period. Is it too late to save her?

After I explain to her why the rock is a gimmick and a pregnancy kit isn’t, I ask the most important question.

Who’s the father? I grip my wine glass, like I’m waiting for my mid-semester grades for Psychology. It feels like waiting for the result that would determine whether I would become a run-of-the-mill psychologist or a wellestablished, successful psychoanalyst. I take a small sip and wait attentively, staring at her like an eagle eyeing its prey.

Charlotte nods remorsefully.

Craig. Bloody Craig. How pathetic? Seriously. Hello, Charlotte! What’s going on? This is worse than any gossip story ever published in The Women’s Weekly. She describes herself as having a body of a living goddess but she’s somehow stuck with a guy like him. Really? Craig?

A bass-playing health-food guru and new age hippy. The fact that he can even get his stick hard surprises me. If that Neanderthal passes the loser genes that turn my niece or nephew into a groovy, free spirit baby, God help me.

It takes me a few minutes to process her response, but I still don’t believe she’s pregnant. Her pregnancy is only an assumption. There’s no evidence, no factual proof. I turn on the television, hoping she will be hypnotised by evil corporate overlords, and leave to buy a pregnancy kit.

She’s progressive for sure. Name the newest and most trending diet, and I bet you she’s on it! I mean she works at a store that only sells organic, gluten free, low-fat, no-sugar, low-salt, dairy-free lactose-removed products. Moreover, they only hire employees who live by a non-sexist, non10 A m p e rs a nd 2 0 1 9

A l e ss an dro S pi n aze - Year 8

ageist, anti-conservative, socialist-ordained, gender-fluid lifestyle. What do you expect? In fact, I think Charlotte and her health-food cult ought to have a holiday in the seventh circle of hell. They deserve to fry in a pool of industrial vegetable oil – along with chips, spring rolls, onion rings, Chiko Rolls, and – if I’m in a reckless mood – Mars Bars.

What I don’t understand is how you could be so forwardthinking that you forget about yourself? I guess the more you look forward, the less you see in the present.

As I walk on the unpaved footpath, I feel the movement of gravel through my shoes. Above me, the stars shine in the night sky, desperate to become the next sun. I look above and stare at one, and I feel a small surge of energy pulsate through my eyes and wander into my soul. It rushes through my body and forces me to consider, how does she feel? I was the one she contacted. I was the one she trusted.

I was the one. Reality slaps me in the face. She’s about to have a baby, and she lives in a share house, has two casual jobs, no qualifications or money and most importantly has an eternally broke, desperate, nineteen-forever, bassplaying boyfriend. I sympathise with her, I really do. I’m a young, independent, modern professional, who’s ambitious and has money for society’s luxuries and respect. Maybe she’s right about everything, my cynicism prevents me from being happy.

With the pregnancy kit under my arms, I run down Chapel Street, take a right on Toorak Road and turn into my studio apartment, in front of the Route 58 tram stop. The next challenge, the stairs. By the time I reach the top, I’m moaning and groaning, and my clothes are drenched in sweat. I swear it’s the fastest I’ve ever run in my life. A sub 30-minute mile for sure! I open the door, throw Charlotte the kit and demand she follows the directions. I stand outside the bathroom. She takes forever; it feels like I’m waiting an eternity. Peeing on a stick, how hard can it be?

She comes out and I snatch the blue-lined stick from her.

She’s pregnant.

‘I want to see Mum!’ screams Charlotte all of a sudden.

‘See Mum? Really? They’re at Uncle Frank’s. It’ll need to wait,’ I say incredulously.

‘No! I need to see her now!’

My heart stops. I feel a tremor of unease.

‘Oh my God… Dad,’ I murmur in shock.

Are you serious? This is next level insanity. Mum and Dad instilled core values in us, such as: love, respect, honesty and sincerity, however, in a situation like this, I was begging her to think about it for a while. Surely, she recalls the time Dad chased her boyfriend with a five iron for not using a condom. I mean what’s he going to do when he finds out? I urged her to keep it between us. A secret. Sister to sister. Her persistence, however, was like the Dog on the Tuckerbox, she wouldn’t budge or take no as an answer. It was her decision, not mine, and I respected it.

Charlotte and her health-food brigade annoy the bejesus out of me. There’s no doubt about that. Why do I put up with her? Family. Love. Respect. Upholding the Westaway name. That means something for sure. We make mistakes and have our differences, and at times we want to kill each other – but we get things right. We get our priorities straight. Through all life’s splendour, all its problems, highs and lows. It’s time to drop the cynicism, drop the criticism – now is the time to stand up and be counted as a Westaway, as a sister and a friend. We’re family. We’re twins. That’s all that counts. A pure moment – I hope I can be pure.

To m Bowman - Year 11

Nat h an Mu i r - Year 12

A m p e rs an d 2 0 19 11

Andrew Zhang, Year 7

Fo rever I fixed my gaze onto the blood on the wall in front of me.

The metallic smell of it filled the air and engulfed my lungs.

It slowly dripped down, rubbing a stain across the cracked plaster, filling every gap, once yellowed with age, with a new fresh colour of crimson red. No matter how much I tried to take my eyes off it, they stayed glued on, not budging a single bit, not moving an inch. My body stood deathly still, as if I had become a statue. The clock struck an hour to midnight, but the ringing of the rusty bell was completely lost to my concentration on the blood. I followed a droplet as it plummeted to the ground, its shape slowly changing as it fell through the air. The moment the tip made contact with the ground, the world around me shrivelled up, and went black.

The world was spinning, and my eyes couldn’t seem to concentrate. I sighed in relief as the dizziness slowly disappeared. And then, all of a sudden, the impossible happened. I found myself staring into my brother’s eyes.

My little brother. My everything, who had died ten years ago, only a toddler. His eyes, emotionless, stared back into mine, and didn’t even blink. In tears, I ran up to him, and wrapped my arms around him. But my arms only went through him, and his eyes only followed me. It was like he was an illusion. I slumped against the wall, not realising that the blood was dripping onto my back.

A hand suddenly wrenched me by the collar and pulled me up to my feet, which were now shaking from misery, confusion and surprise. I slowly turned around and stared into my mother’s eyes. Unlike my brother’s, her eyes were softer, but not as soft as they used to be. She looked me in the eye.

‘Dawn, it wasn’t your fault. It never was.’

I tried to get rid of the lump in my throat, but it seemed it would never go away.

‘Listen to me. I need you to take care of your father. That’s all I could ever ask from you. He’s broken. And, Dawn, always take care of yourself. Don’t let what happened to us happen to you.’

12 A m p e rs a nd 2 0 1 9

S u h an ayan Pi rat h e e pan - Year 7

I nodded, despite not really understanding what she meant.

That’s when I went back to that moment, that moment my life had fallen apart. When my mum had saved me from the speeding car, pushed me out of the way and onto the footpath. When a crimson red pool had stained the dusty grey tar of the road, and left a runny track on the grooves of the rubber tyre. I remembered staring into my mother’s unmoving eyes, trembling in her limp body. I remembered holding my brother’s hand, spending the last few minutes of his life next to him. He had died a toddler, not knowing what the pain was, or what it would lead him to. But I knew, and mother knew too. As the sirens of the ambulance flooded the area around me, I blocked them out. I wanted to cherish these last moments, keep them close to me.

Forever.

That’s when I snapped back into reality. My mum and my brother weren’t in sight. The crowd of people weren’t in sight. The speeding car wasn’t in sight either. Everything had disappeared. Except for one thing. The voice telling me it was my fault. I knew mum would have wanted me to move on, and forget about the past, but I never truly could.

Deep down, I knew I was the one to blame. The blood on the wall, dripped down my back and onto my arm. Tears slowly formed at the edges of my eyes and made their way down, doing nothing but making me more regretful by the second. The blood dripped onto my fingers, staining my skin and leaving a sickly cool sensation that seemed to last forever. And when the clock struck midnight, I realised the pure truth. The blood was on my hands.

Forever

‘Tom,…I…I don’t know what you want me to say.’

David D o ds on, Year 9

It Raine d and I felt So Guilt y It rained when I told him. Big, fat droplets fell from the sky, loudly pinging on the roof of the laneway cafe. It was clichéd, the sky reflecting my feelings, an obtuse visual metaphor. I didn’t want to ramble. I didn’t want to rush. I wanted him to understand. I had the puffer clutched in my hand, just in case. I didn’t want to use it though: I didn’t want to be that weak in front of him. His face still hadn’t reacted, shown any sign that he’d heard me. Maybe he still thought I was garbage, thought that I was a terrible person, weak and ignorant. Did he understand what he meant to me, understand that any kind of reaction was better than no reaction I mean please just say you understand what I’m going through say that you’ll forgive me for the awful thing I did to you say that– I need my puffer. I’m rambling, losing control of my thoughts. I’m not going to use it yet. I can’t appear to be dependent, to be that weak in front of him. I’ll just be that fragile, untrustworthy ex-friend who couldn’t even put up with the schoolyard bullies. Maybe he feels bad. Maybe he was planning to forgive me, to accept me back into his life.

Maybe the stars have aligned in an aberration and the world is perfect and the future looks good and I’m happy and I’m popular and I don’t fear that I’ll be abandoned or tossed aside every second of my – Breathe. Just breathe. It’ll all be over soon, one way or the other. He’s doing that thing where he just stares slightly below your chin, rather than looking into your eyes.

Shuffling his feet back and forth. I feel so sorry for him. It’s all my fault. How could I ever expect him to forgive me? I just need him, my one friend, my lifeline, my ‘I…’ I just wanted him to decide. Hate me or befriend me: forgive me or desert me. What I’d done was awful, but I just need him. I feel so empty and alone without him. ‘…’

Just a breath. Is that all? Goddamit, I need my puffer. I’m not an addict. I’m not dependent.

He sounded more confident than I thought he would, more annoyed than sad. Honestly, I just want him to say something, even if it destroys me. Obviously, I’d prefer him to forgive me, for us to be friends again, but perhaps that is asking too much.

‘I…I’m sorry. You know I’d never intentionally out you like that. I didn’t think it would – I just didn’t think.’

He’d heard me. People say the eyes are the gateway to the soul. I looked into his soul for the briefest of seconds, and he looked into mine. I saw anger, mistrust. What did he see?

‘So – what do you want from me? You ruined me! You took my private life and threw it out for everyone at school to see. How can you expect me to forgive you?’

How could I expect him to forgive me? In truth, I couldn’t.

He had the right to be angry. I needed him to forgive me; I needed his companionship. I needed him to help me get through every long day.

‘James…I’m…so sorry. I didn’t think. You know it’s not a problem for me, right? Love is love, or whatever. I…I was just so naïve. I thought everyone agreed. I just didn’t imagine the ignorance, the hate. I can’t expect you to forgive me, but I can’t bear not talking. I can’t bear not being friends. And I want you to understand what I go through. What I put -’ ‘So, it’s about you now?’

‘No, of course it’s not. It’s just, this has been hard on me too.’

He laughed, but there was no humour in his voice.

‘It’s been hard on you? I know how you told people, and I know why you told them. Cal told me. What happened to you wasn’t even that bad. You’re just weak.’

He called me weak. That’s what he saw in my soul: weakness and dependency. God, I need relief. I need the puffer, the key to my escape; I need that rush. I can’t handle what I did. I grabbed the puffer, and without thinking, without even bothering to care that James was judging me, was disgusted in me, I took a breath.

I rushed into the change room. I needed to get dressed quickly.

I threw on my shirt, hastily buttoning it up whilst putting on my shoes. I pushed my tie all the way up (may as well look presentable). I was dressed in two minutes flat. Just as I was about to leave the room, Sam came at me out of nowhere.

A m p e rs an d 2 0 19 13

‘Oi! Where do you think you’re going?’ he said, blocking the doorway, silence falling over the crammed change room. ‘We haven’t had our chat.’

‘Screw you,’ I said. I wasn’t in the mood. Things to do, places to be.

‘That’s no way to speak to a friend. Where are you going?’

This kind of thing is normal, just some ‘friendly banter’. And then somebody called out – ‘Probably off to screw James.’

Mild laughter. I wanted to yell so badly. God, this wasn’t right.

These people, why do they think it’s okay to joke about things like that?

‘Is that so?’ said Sam, a smug grin on his face. I just wanted to hit him, make him see how this hurt James.

Sa mu e l M i tc h e l l - Ye ar 8

‘Don’t say things like that,’ I said, calling down from the moral high ground.

Then I went to leave. And Sam threw me into a wall. And he broke my spirit. And I just wanted to leave. And he said that I could leave if I told him everything. And I really just wanted to leave. And because I’m dumb and selfish and stupid, I told him everything. And then – I breathed out. Narcotic Bliss. A small relief from my dependency on him. I’d wronged James in a way I could never understand. I’d destroyed something good, perhaps the only good thing in my world.

‘I’m sorry. What I did – when I look back now, it breaks my heart. I was just…so afraid of those idiots.’

James was looking just below my eyes again.

‘Maybe one day I’ll forgive you. But not today.’

Tom O l d a l e - Ye ar 1 2

14 A m p e rs a nd 2 0 1 9

And without another word he left, left me alone with two half-drunk coffees on a Formica table in a dingy alley. What part of this was fair? I had it bad as well. Could he not see that? This is what Sam did, what they all did. They tore us apart like toys, picked us up like their childhood figurines and smashed us into each other. Never once did they get hurt. But we got hurt, and yet we didn’t fight back together.

We fought with each other, blaming each other, rather than them. It wasn’t right. I was bullied for nothing. He was bullied because of me.

I was just another Sam to him. That thought broke me. It kept raining and I felt so guilty. I had torn apart my lifeline, the thing I depended on. God, I need my puffer.

Ryan D ear, Year 9

Two to Twelve In the year 2018, the Doomsday Clock read two to twelve.

The Age of Man appeared to be drawing to a close and world peace seemed further away than ever. The Doomsday Clock symbolised the chance of a man-made global catastrophe, ever more likely as the clock drew closer to midnight. Conceived by Martyl Langsdorf and her husband, physicist Alexander Langsdorf, who worked on the Manhattan Project and helped found the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, the Doomsday Clock was first depicted on the front cover of the Bulletin in 1947. It has featured on the Bulletin’s cover ever since. The Doomsday Clock was conceived in response to the threat to world peace brought about by the development of nuclear weapons during WW2.

As the Clock draws nearer to twelve, it raises the obvious question. Is world peace ever achievable?

It is now 2072, the world is not a pretty place. Human avarice triggers war after war. Nuclear weapons aid human greed, allowing nation after nation to be pulverised. The Doomsday Clock has been forgotten by most; however, a select few like me still believe that the clock has merit. My name is James Wilfred Einstein and I am the great, great, great, great grandson of Albert Einstein, one of the most the brilliant minds of all time. Like my distant relative, Albert, science is a passion of mine and time travel is a specific field I have been working in for many years. Ever since 2018, when I was 20 years old, I have dreamt that world peace would occur. Unfortunately, recent events have destroyed this dream. The Doomsday Clock now reads one to twelve, suggesting that a global catastrophe is imminent.

Bursting with excitement, I pull up at my laboratory in Los Alamos, New Mexico. I enter the laboratory’s restricted area. My time machine, shaped like the Doomsday Clock, sits waiting for me. I first constructed this particular Doomsday Clock at the age of 20, in an attempt to alert people to the likelihood of a man-made global catastrophe.

Now, in 2072, as a result of technological advancements in cosmic string theory, I have finally been able to create my time machine.

D arcy Wau gh - Year 7

My time machine may be the key to world peace. After much consideration, I have decided to travel back in time to December 6, 1941, four years before the first nuclear weapon was tested by the United States in New Mexico on July 16, 1945. My objective, after initially entering this time period, is to prevent the development of nuclear weapons.

To facilitate this, it is necessary for me to infiltrate the top-secret Manhattan Project, located in Los Alamos, New Mexico, where nuclear technology was developed.

Unlike my distant relative Albert Einstein, who aided the development of nuclear weapons by signing a letter to President Franklin Roosevelt urging the atomic bomb be built, I will attempt to do the opposite. My aim is to prevent the invention of nuclear weapons.

In order to travel back in time, I will have to wind the hands of my time machine clock back to the exact time the Doomsday Clock read in 1941. However, in 1941, the Doomsday Clock hadn’t been invented! As a result, in order to pin-point the exact time, I will need to predict what the Doomsday Clock would have read in this particular year if it had been in existence.

I sit in front of my time machine, praying to God, pleading for my prediction to be correct. I take a very apprehensive step towards my time machine, as this is my first foray into time travel. I grasp the minute hand, forcing it from its position at one to twelve, to four to twelve. Everything turns silent. Thirty seconds pass then an excruciating sound pierces my ear. The process seems to take hours.

A m p e rs an d 2 0 19 15

Then finally, the whirling begins to cease, the excruciating sound begins to fade, and I find myself lying face down in what feels like hot sand.

I dizzily bring myself to my feet. I take twenty seconds or so to gather myself, finally glancing around. I breathe an immense sigh of relief, eventually realising where I am.

Fortunately, I programmed the time machine to bring me back in time to the exact location of my laboratory in Los Alamos, New Mexico, which is where the Manhattan Project was situated in 1941. However, no obvious signs identify the year in which I currently find myself.

I strike out in search of information. The town of Los Alamos is, not surprisingly, in better shape, than the Los Alamos of my time. The buildings are intact and everything appears to be peaceful. I round a corner and spot what seems to be a newspaper on the ground. I quickly snatch it up and read the date located under the title. It reads December 3, 1941. I breathe a deep sigh of relief. My hard work and persistence has paid off and maybe, just maybe, my dream of world peace would become reality. All I have to do is sabotage the entire Manhattan Project, which will prevent the development of nuclear weapons. I laugh cheekily to myself: ‘How hard can it be?’

The Manhattan Project’s exact location is secret; however, it is believed to be situated at the northern end of town.

After a good 40-minute walk, I reach the northern end of Los Alamos. After searching for many hours, something peculiar catches my eye. A commotion is taking place, 50 metres down the road, near a rather large building. A small group of people is yelling, screaming and physically abusing one individual. ‘Why you bastard? Spilling our information to one of your Japanese friends, you scoundrel!’ Then they start kicking what appears to be a small East Asian man multiple times in the stomach until he is almost unconscious on the ground. The group then leaves by entering the large adjacent building.

I follow the group of men into the building and hide behind what appears to be a large cupboard. I peer around the corner. The four men who viciously attacked the Asian man are discussing with a scientist how to start the process of creating nuclear weapons. I sneak past the wardrobe, into a large room. My heart drops as I see the men and the scientist heading towards the room in which I am currently located. I sprint around, frantically attempting to find a decent hiding spot. I slide under a table with a long table cloth; I am out of sight. At this very moment, the group of men enters the room. I reduce the sound of my breathing and listen to their conversation: ‘Now this piece of machinery in the centre of the room is most significant

16 A m p e rs a nd 2 0 1 9

to the entire project. It splits atoms.’ The scientist went on to give a brief summary of how the machine works.

Fifteen minutes later, the five men exit the room. I take a deep breath to compose myself, carefully moving from my hiding position to the centre of the room. I stare at the machine, trying to devise a plan to destroy it. I look around the room, searching for anything that could produce considerable force. The only thing that could be of use is a fire extinguisher. I seize the heavy metal object, raising it high above my head. I aim for what looks like exposed mechanisms. I bring the fire extinguisher down with huge force. Immediately sparks fly. I smash it against the machine, 10 maybe 20 times. Suddenly, an alarm begins to ring. This, I realise, is my cue to get out fast!

I sprint as fast as my legs can carry me, not looking back once. I reach my time machine, grasp the minute hand, moving it back to one to twelve. After what feels like hours of pure pain, I arrive back home. I am buoyed by the hope that nuclear weapons have disappeared; however, when I open the door of my laboratory to look outside, I witness the eerie image of empty streets and silence. Not a soul in sight. I wander down the main street, bewildered. A newspaper, floats in the air, as if it has been waiting for me, ready to confirm my worst fears. The newspaper is dated May 5, 2072, making the news four months old. It is titled ‘Man-Made Plagues’. I flick through the newspaper, which lists all the cities affected by the man-made plagues. I turn to the last page and unfortunately, my worst fear has come to fruition. The town of Los Alamos has been wiped out. I may have stopped the invention of nuclear weapons, but another, equally potent threat to world peace has emerged.

Biological weapons have spread disease and destruction across the planet. Man’s self-destructive nature cannot be altered. Is world peace achievable? I rush back to the time machine…

Ch as e Cai - Year 8

And I had a feeling I would be quite busy the night the Titanic neared the icebergs.

Luke Ehler t , Year 7

The Arrival that Never Came They should have known something was going to happen.

Several messages, warnings from other ships. It was directly ahead of them. They should have shelved their pride and turned. They should have known that even the RMS Titanic couldn’t withstand the might of an iceberg.

It happened at night, when only the crew were awake. All of the guests were asleep, either in the fine apartment-sized buildings of the first-class passengers, or the modest rooms of the second- and third-class guests. I could see their dreams. Many were uneasy, a dream of the ship sinking, or a horror from the deep ascending and mutilating the ship.

I could not change these dreams, I could only see them. My only power lies in collecting the souls of those who depart from the world. I have been on this sorry planet from the start. I will not cease to exist, unlike so many others whose souls are now mine. Only when Death ends will I perish.

I have been called many things – Satan, the Grim Reaper, Hades – I am all of them, yet none of them. And I have a job to do. Don’t ask me why, it’s just how it is. I watch over the world and collect the souls of those who can’t go on.

The captain thought he had everything under control.

When he went to bed, I knew the crew didn’t stand a chance. Their orders were to carry on, straight ahead. Right into the iceberg.

I don’t know why. Perhaps the captain had thought that the ‘practically unsinkable’ Titanic would plough right through it. After all, the manufacturers of the ship had told him not to worry, that the Titanic was made to withstand that kind of obstruction. So they carried on.

When they saw the tiny iceberg floating on the surface of the water, the crew laughed. ‘The Titanic could shred that into a million pieces with the slightest nudge!’ they jeered. But they couldn’t see what I saw. They couldn’t have possibly seen that the iceberg scaled about 100 feet underwater. They couldn’t possibly know that their pride and joy, the most powerful and luxurious ship in the world, was hopeless against the properties of ice.

At the very bottom of the Titanic were 14 compartments, underneath the third-class rooms and the boiler room. Any four compartments could fill up with water and the ship wouldn’t be damaged. They were the ship’s main defence against icebergs. As the ship and the iceberg collided, though, a gash was torn in the side of the Titanic. Water flooded the compartments, crashing through, slowly filling every single one. The sound was deafening. But I watched silently as the water coursed through the 14th compartment, and into the boiler room.

There were 15 men in there, working the enormous fires that fuelled the ship, when the water started to flow into the massive room.

One man, evidently the leader of the group, yelled ‘Grab the buckets, we got a leak, boys!’

The others ran off and soon returned with pails in their arms. They started casually shovelling water into them.

I waited patiently. As the strength of the water flow increased, their urgency went with it, and soon they were wading into the freezing cold water. All around the room, fires were being extinguished by the constant torrent of water.

‘Run!’ One man yelled. The men desperately scrambled to the doors, swimming as hard as they could in now shoulderheight water.

D a rcy Va rg h e s e - Year 9

‘Close the watertight doors!’ screamed the leader. As the men struggled towards the doors, another worker paddled to the control panel and slammed a button. The watertight doors started lowering slowly. But then a sudden gust of A m p e rs an d 2 0 19 17

icy water sent the men tumbling across the room, away from the now nearly closed doors. The men picked up their pace, holding on to their last reserves of strength. But their efforts were in vain. The doors closed with an ominous clang, leaving the men trapped.

The men froze where they were for a moment, pure, unmasked fear and horror etched into their faces as they realised that their chances of survival were hanging on a thread.

‘Oh no!’ one man said.

‘Up the ladder!’ another cried, and the men, desperate to find a way out of this danger, propelled themselves toward the ladder on the other side of the room, currently unaffected by the current of water.

A few moments later, most of the men had grabbed the ladder and started to haul themselves up, but the first man wasn’t even halfway up when a section of the wall suddenly collapsed and landed in the shoulder-high water with a tremendous splash. Water surged through the widened gap in the weakened structure of the wall, throwing the men around the room as the water twisted and churned, collapsing in on itself. The men on the ladder redoubled their efforts, trying to reach the top, but the water level was rising faster then they could possibly climb, and soon they were submerged with the others.

And outside, I collected the souls, one by one. Finally, after ten minutes struggling against the tsunami, the last man was hurled against a wall, his back breaking instantly. I felt him weaken, and then, slowly, I reached in and took his soul for my own. Finally, as the water started crashing through the third-class rooms, I knew that tonight Death would have its hands full.

Campb e l l Re eve - Year 9

Zach Ch e n - Year 9 18 A m p e rs a nd 2 0 1 9

Expositor y l a c i t y l a n A and Wr iting

D an i e l K i n g - Year 8

Da nny Vu - Ye a r 9 A m p e rs an d 2 0 19 19

Andrew Lim, Year 11

To day ’s Turning Point : Par tis anship, D emo cracy and the Le ss ons of History History is oft seen as an unchanging record – a list of events long since past, of battles fought in dusty tomes to protect ideals etched in unchanging stone. But such turning points in history, far from being the inanimate retellings of times long gone, are the very challenges that face the modern world today. The legacy left behind from today’s decisions – the story told of here and now – will become the decried or praised history of tomorrow.

The world stands on the cusp of change – between a society of division, partisanship and authoritarianism and one of unity and democracy. But analysis of previous turning points in history may show a path forward for the many turning points of today.

It is necessary to consider the pressing issue of partisanship. In today’s modern political context, democracies across the globe are being pushed to extreme views. According to the Australian Election Study (AES), between 1996 and 2016, the percentage of Australian politicians declaring themselves to be moderate went from almost 40% to 10%1. A similar shift can be seen throughout the electorate, with self-described centrist voters decreasing by 12% over the same period.2 Support for political fringe and single-issue parties is at a record high, with Pauline Hanson’s One Nation, Nick Xenophon and others commanding an increasing share of political power. While some declared the 2018 South Australian election to be showing a change in this movement, the minor party lower house primary votes remained at a record-high number. It is increasingly clear that Australia

is moving further and further to opposite ends of the political spectrum. But it is not limited to Australia. In Britain, the traditionally centre-left Liberal Democrats, who have maintained a key place in the centre of British politics since the 1800s and once were strong enough to form government, have lost much of their power, reduced to a mere 11 seats in the House of Commons.3 In the United States, meanwhile, a sitting president divides even the judiciary, traditionally above party politics, into ‘Obama judges’ and ‘Trump judges’, attacking the very foundations of a rule-of-law based democracy.4 But there is a parallel in contemporary history for such hyper-partisanship. In the late 1700s, as the American Revolution took hold, professing radical ideas like fundamental human rights and autarchy, the world found itself at a turning point – between democracy and autocracy. The political landscape within democratic America itself was torn apart by partisan infighting. Two major parties were formed – the Federalists, standing for strong centralised government control; and the Democratic-Republicans, standing for individual liberties and freedoms. The atmosphere was akin to today’s politics. Both parties used fearmongering and personal attacks, helped by a polarised media – the Federalists, led

by Alexander Hamilton, scaring the public by depicting

Har r y Newman - Year 7

1 Harris, L., & Charlton, A. (2018, April 2). The fundamental operating model of Australian politics is breaking down. The Sydney Morning Herald. Retrieved from https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/the-fundamental-operating-model-of-australian-politics-is-breaking-down-20180322-p4z5o9.html 2 ibid.

3 Parliament of the United Kingdom. (2019). Current State of the Parties. Retrieved from UK Parliament: https://www.parliament.uk/mps-lords-and-offices/mps/ current-state-of-the-parties/ 4 Durkin, E. (2018, November 22). John Roberts chastises Trump for criticising judge who blocked asylum order. The Guardian. Retrieved from https://www. theguardian.com/law/2018/nov/21/john-roberts-chief-justice-trump-obama-judge

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, promoting an ideal of cross-party unity.

This illustrates a principle missing from modern politics: despite the mud-slinging, insult-based, partisan atmosphere of the time, those in it ascribed to a higher ideal. They believed, at least in their rhetoric, in a society free from partisan fighting, understanding the inherent failure of a system rife with it. Today, such vision is sorely lacking in our leadership – and historical example seems to illustrate its paramount importance to the resolution of such partisan fighting.

A l ex I n g p e n - Ye ar 7

the Republicans as ruthless heralds of a reign of terror and public disorder; while the Republicans decried opponents like President John Adams as ‘crippled and toothless’5 through their newspapers. When General George Washington denounced such polarised politics in his Farewell Address of 1796, the Democratic-Republican Aurora newspaper declared Washington’s Farewell Address to be the ‘loathings of a sick mind’.6 In some cases, this could even become violent, with Aaron Burr shooting and killing Alexander Hamilton in a duel over Hamilton’s alleged declaration that Burr was ‘dangerous…[and] ought not to be trusted with the reins of government.’7 Despite such a polarised political arena, however, many of the key figures stood, at least publicly, against hyperpartisanship, warning against its many dangers. Indeed, in the Farewell Address, Washington declared that ‘the spirit of party…kindles the animosity of one part against another [and] forments [sic] occasionally riot and insurrection’, denouncing it as a ‘frightful despotism’ 8. The bitterly divisive election of 1800 was filled with both partisan bickering between major parties and intra-party politics within Thomas Jefferson’s Democratic-Republican Party.

Yet in his inaugural address as president in 1801, Jefferson declared that ‘we are all Republicans, we are all Federalists’9

But what is so fundamentally wrong with partisanship and a polarised political landscape? After all, some would posit that such a divided society may even be part of a healthy political system, allowing for simple and easy choices at the ballot box.

However, the consequences of such a society can be severe.

A divided society provides a perfect breeding ground for autocracy and the destruction of a democratic, free society. Returning to the 1700s, this was acknowledged by Washington in his Farewell Address, when he stated that party tensions ‘incline…men to seek security and repose in the absolute power of an individual’10. Take, as another example of a turning point, the aftermath of the French Revolution. Following a period of unstable democracy, as France suffered through the Reign of Terror and its bloodshed and violence, the French people took respite in the military coup d’état of Napoleon Bonaparte. Indeed, the revolutionary general Marquis de Lafayette declared, in a letter to then-US-Secretary-of-State James Madison, that ‘there is in France Such [sic] a disgust of freedom’11.

That is, when party tensions become too volatile and uncontrollable, the public tends towards a stable sort of authoritarian leadership. In 2018, an ANU study revealed that 33% of Australians considered a ‘strong leader who does not have to bother with parliament and elections’ as a ‘very good’ or ‘fairly good’ idea. 12 In America, a 2017 study found that 29% of

5 Heineman, B. W. (2011, September 9). The Origins of Today’s Bitter Partisanship: The Founding Fathers. The Atlantic. Retrieved from https://www.theatlantic. com/national/archive/2011/09/the-origins-of-todays-bitter-partisanship-the-founding-fathers/244839/ 6 ibid 7 The National Archives and Records Administration. (2019, January 18). Enclosure: Charles D. Cooper to Philip Schuyler, [23 April 1804]. Retrieved from Founders Online: https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Hamilton/01-26-02-0001-0203-0002 [Original source: The Papers of Alexander Hamilton, vol. 26, 1 May 1802 – 23 October 1804, Additional Documents 1774–1799, Addenda and Errata, ed. Harold C. Syrett. New York: Columbia University Press, 1979, pp. 243–246.]

8 Lillian Goldman Law Library. (2008). Washington’s Farewell Address 1796. Retrieved from The Avalon Project at Yale Law School: Documents in Law, History and Diplomacy: http://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/washing.asp 9 Lillian Goldman Law Library. (2008). Jefferson’s First Inaugural Address. Retrieved from The Avalon Project at Yale Law School: Documents in Law, History and Diplomacy: http://avalon.law.yale.edu/19th_century/jefinau1.asp 10 Lilian Goldman Law Library, 2008, Washington’s Farewell Address 1796 11 The National Archives and Records Administration. (2019, January 18). To James Madison from Lafayette, 1 December 1802. Retrieved from Founders Online: https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Madison/02-04-02-0176 [Original source: The Papers of James Madison, Secretary of State Series, vol. 4, 8 October 1802 – 15 May 1803, ed. Mary A. Hackett, J. C. A. Stagg, Jeanne Kerr Cross, Susan Holbrook Perdue, and Ellen J. Barber. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1998, pp. 166–170.]

12 Hutchens, G. (2018, October 17). A third of Australians in favour of authoritarian or ‘strongman’ leader, study finds. The Guardian. Retrieved from https://www.

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respondents showed some support for a ‘strong leader’ (sans Congress and elections) or ‘army rule’.13 These again seem to illustrate the worrying tendency for society to slip into autocracy and dictatorship in the presence of party politics.

be many more to come. But now, at this turning point in history, the question lies ahead as it has before: Can today’s world forge itself stronger amidst the flames of hatred and sectarianism? Or will it simply melt away before an apathetic society?

It would be remiss to ignore also the effects of other kinds of sectarianism, which often tie into partisanship.

Here a further historical parallel can be drawn. In the 1960s, at the height of the civil rights movement, two alternative approaches were taken to the appalling treatment of African-Americans across America. One method, spearheaded by Malcolm X, saw white America as the epitome of evil, espousing and teaching to his followers, famously, that ‘the white man is the devil’. 14 In stark contrast, Dr Martin Luther King Jr recognised that simply spreading hatred of ‘the other’ would not produce pragmatic results. During the March on Washington, he acknowledged ‘we cannot walk alone’, declaring a dream that the nation might become ‘a beautiful symphony of brotherhood’.15 However, of the two, Martin Luther King Jr, unlike Malcolm X, was able to secure considerable progress in America, directly leading to the Civil Rights Act of 1968. This all illustrates the importance of a bipartisan approach, even in a deeply divided society: that sectarianism – whether it be along party lines, whether it be along racial lines, whether it be along religious lines – can be combatted effectively through an approach of tolerance and bipartisanship.

The answer is still to be written.

Thus, historical example seems to consistently show that the turning point of today’s democracy is far from unique.

It demonstrates that a deeply divided society can lead to a quick slide away from democracy and into autocracy. It also showcases that a vision beyond partisan bickering, as well as an approach of tolerance to all opponents, no matter their backgrounds, are needed to combat polarisation and factionalism.

And so, we must ask ourselves: what kind of society are we? Is this the sort of society where hyper-partisanship and ideological posturing reign supreme over pragmatism?

Is this the sort of society where tyrants can take root and grow? The great radical experiments of democracy and freedom are not over yet, nor will they ever be. The cycle of history repeats itself from time to time – there have been tyrants, partisans and ideologues before, and there will

J ame s Ral l i s - Year 8

Max Bu ckl ey - Ye ar 12

theguardian.com/australia-news/2018/oct/17/a-third-of-australians-in-favour-of-authoritarian-or-strongman-leader-study-finds 13 Drutman, L., Diamond, L., & Goldman, J. (2018). Follow the Leader: Exploring American Support for Democracy and Authoritarianism. Washington, D.C.: Democracy Fund Voter Study Group.

14 Lusher, A. (2016, June 5). ‘The white man is the devil’ – what the Nation of Islam taught Muhammad Ali. Retrieved from The Independent: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/muhammad-ali-nation-of-islam-michael-parkinson-interview-who-were-elijah-muhammad-a7066301.html 15 King, M. L. (1963, August 28). ‘I Have a Dream,’ Address Delivered at the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. Washington, D.C., District of Columbia, United States of America. Retrieved from Stanford University | The Martin Luther King, Jr. Research and Education Institute: https://kinginstitute.stanford.edu/ king-papers/documents/i-have-dream-address-delivered-march-washington-jobs-and-freedom

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Hamish Galbraith, Year 12

Evaluate the ef fe ctive us e of p ower by t wo or more state s in the pursuit of their national intere st A border of 1,420km separates the two powers of China and North Korea, but, in reality, these states are worlds apart, largely due to the effectiveness of their use of power. China has been far more effective in their use of economic power to achieve their national interest priorities. In recent years though, North Korea has been increasingly effective in their use of diplomatic power compared to the US, as shown through their improved relationship with that nation.

Despite the growing power of North Korea, China is still dominant as they can utilise their power more effectively, especially their military power, to influence the actions of other global actors to achieve their national interest priorities.

China’s superior production capability relative to North Korea grants them significantly more economic power to influence the actions of another state through finance and trade. China currently engages in trade and investment agreements with over 100 states globally and maintains bilateral free trade agreements with 14 states, whilst North

Korea has no free trade agreements and trades almost exclusively with China. China currently exports $2.41trillion USD of goods and services and has a trade surplus of $870billion USD. Comparatively, North Korea exports a mere $1.74billion USD and maintains a trade deficit of $1.98billion USD. China’s massive trade volume and the dependence of many states, including North Korea, on trade with China, grants them huge amounts of economic power which they can use to influence the actions of states.

They can use this power to achieve their national interest priorities. China effectively utilised their economic power through the enforcement of United Nations sanctions against North Korea, achieving their national interest priorities of improved international standing and national security. In 2017, China restricted all imports of coal from North Korea, as well as ordering all North Korean businesses operating in China to cease operations within 120 days, crippling the North Korean economy. Despite China’s economic prosperity being impacted by decreased exports, they increased their national security and ensured their continued sovereignty as North Korea ceased their missile tests. North Korea’s lack of trade agreements gives them limited economic power and hence limits their ability to achieve their national interest priorities. North Korea’s lack of trading partners and ability to influence their actions meant that they were unable to persuade trading partners, mainly China, to continue to trade with them despite the sanctions. This decreased their economic prosperity and regional relationships, showing that North Korea was ineffective in their use of economic power in their pursuit of their national interests.

In recent years, however, North Korea has become increasingly effective, when compared to China, in their use of diplomatic power in their relationship with the United States. Since the beginning of the Trump presidency in 2017, the China-USA relationship has continued to

Fi nn Ro bins o n - Ye a r 12 A m p e rs an d 2 0 19 23

sour, resulting in a trade war between the two states. The trade war was initiated by the US in response to what was described by US Trade Representative, Robert Lighthizer, as ‘unfair trade practices by China… including but not limited to the theft of US intellectual property’. The US imposed $50-60billion USD of tariffs on Chinese goods. China responded by imposing tariffs on 128 American goods and services. The failure to reach a diplomatic foreign policy agreement with the US shows a decline in their regional relationship. Lawrence J Lau, a Chinese economist, believes that the tariffs ‘will wipe one-half of a percentage point from Chinese GDP by 2022’, a loss of more than $19billion USD. This highlights the failure of Chinese diplomatic power as they have failed to achieve a positive regional relationship and economic prosperity and hence have used their power ineffectively to achieve their national interests.

In contrast, under Trump, North Korea and the US have strengthened their diplomatic and regional relationship through summits held in 2018 and 2019 in Singapore and Hanoi respectively. These summits highlight the increased diplomatic power that North Korea now has and its effectiveness in achieving national interest priorities with regional relationships. In terms of their use of diplomatic power and their relationship to the United States, it is clear that in recent years, North Korea has become more effective in achieving their national interest priorities.

and economic prosperity through the resources that the South China Sea possesses. Whilst the coercive threat of the North Korean military continues to grow as the size of their military increases and they grow as a nuclear threat, they still lack the effectiveness of the Chinese army. During their nuclear tests throughout 2017, the North Korean army was ineffective against the coercive force of the People’s Liberation Army and the 300,000 Chinese troops moved to the North Korean border, which proved sufficient to convince North Korea to cease their provocative nuclear tests. The inability of the North Korean army to deter this force on their border shows that military power is not yet successful or effective at helping North Korea achieve their national interests. This highlights that whilst the influence of the North Korean military and their power is growing, shown through the influencing of Chinese actions, China’s military power remains dominant in achieving national interests.

Despite the rising power of North Korea, China remains more effective at using their power to achieve their national interest priorities, especially when it comes to their effective use of military power. Whilst North Korea may continue to increase their military and strengthen diplomatic ties with other global actors, China continues to use their power more effectively and hence is able to better achieve their national interest priorities.

Whilst North Korea continues to expand its power, it lacks the military power of China and hence is still unable to achieve its national interest priorities as effectively. China has the biggest military in the world with 2,035,000 active personnel and a further 510,000 in reserve. Comparatively, North Korea has the fifth largest military force with 950,000 active personnel, and 7,620,000 reserve troops, mostly in the form of paramilitary troops. North Korea’s ‘Songun’ or ‘military first’ policies have played a key role in the recent increase in the size of the North Korean army, the world’s largest per capita. Despite the large size of the North Korean army, the Chinese military remains far more effective in their capabilities. This was highlighted

by China’s actions in 2013 in the South China Sea as they established military bases on islands such as the Fiery Cross Reef within the Philippines’ territorial waters as defined by UNCLOS, demonstrating the legitimate authority that the Chinese military is able to exercise. The ability to claim the Spratly Islands gives China a legitimate claim to more than two million square kilometres of ocean, holding an estimated 11 billion barrels of oil and 190 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. The effectiveness of the Chinese military and their military power helped China to achieve their national interests of both national security D o mi n i c Man n - Year 12

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Calvin Blair, Year 11

Materialism – Exploite d In a world with increasingly effective and targeted advertising, and a generational shift to a more self-centred manner of thinking, consumerism is running rampant.

Yet, the value of material possessions is quickly degraded, with the seeds of discontentment rapidly growing into consuming ideals.

In Western society, materialism prevails as the preeminent ideology, particularly as we abandon religious beliefs in exchange for idolatry. In this material-led value system, the worth of an item is oft calculated by the value that society has placed on it. It is driven by the greed and envy of others, the ability for it to be coveted by one’s friends or society. The idolisation of possessions as the societal norm leads to the competition of who can acquire the most things, rapidly diminishing the value of the objects attained.

Money is an example of this, for numerous studies have shown that the happiness brought by wealth increases up until about one million dollars, whereafter, dissatisfaction increases. Once one is able to take care of the day to day costs of living, such as the mortgage, school fees, insurance, the quintessential material possession no longer drives happiness. However, as coveting goods permeates the fabric of Western society, the greed for more still exists. Once one has gained something, it has value for a short while until we, once again, become aware of what we do not possess; current possessions are bitter reminders of what we are yet to have, instead of what we do have. Only those objects that stand as mementos of disparate significance can stand the battering and weathering of the sands of time.

Advertising plays a large part in the perpetuation of the vicious cycle of lust and bitterness. Discomfort and distaste with one’s current lot in life becomes acute when confronted with what one does not possess. As people try to fill a void in their lives with goods, a void created by the abandonment of religion and society, there remains a longing in people’s hearts that is easily exploitable.

Adverts and corporations promise to fill the void, and replace the bitterness of one’s possessions with the sweet bliss of new items. With the increase in the technological

Ae n gu s O’Byr n e - Year 9

ability to connect with people on an unprecedented scale, advertising has become more direct and precise at driving daggers of lust into the vulnerabilities of our hearts. It has expanded its reach, intruding into people’s lives more than ever before, ensuring that we are always acutely aware of that which we do not possess. It allows advertisers to continue to prey on and profit from society’s obsession with consumption. They ensure that material possessions cannot bring contentment, at least not for long periods of time.

However, the desire to fill a gaping void in our lives with goods, because that is the socially agreed upon method for filling it, traps people into lives enslaved by that which they idolise. As society instructs them to turn to material possessions, they turn away from societal connections and religious beliefs. These are the things that often leave a hole in our lives, abandoning the human need for interpersonal connections, frameworks that yield satisfaction. In the plight of incompleteness, turning to the amassing of wealth traps us in short, but unfulfilling sprints to bursts of pleasure. Many people in capitalist societies are incredulous and amazed that those living in abject poverty can attain happiness and contentment; it is because they are freed by the relationships that they have in their lives.

They are not trapped by dissatisfaction nor by the envy that opposes the noble actions people aspire to.

It is not a lack of willingness to be free and noble that prevents people being so, but the preoccupation with the Sisyphean task itself.

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Aden Wilmshurst , Year 9

Why wa s S t a l i n a b l e to ach ieve tot a l p owe r i n t h e US S R by th e e n d o f t h e 1920 s?

After Vladimir Lenin’s death in January 1924, there was a period when senior figures in the Communist Party of the Soviet Union contended for the leadership. As this political struggle went on, the Party’s unlikely General Secretary, Joseph Stalin, began to rise to power. Stalin, the son of a shoemaker and a cleaner, grew up in a small town in Georgia and Russian was not his first language. His main opponent, Leon Trotsky, was Lenin’s right-hand man during the Civil War, so many believed that he was the appropriate successor. Stalin was considered such an unlikely leader that historian Isaac Deutscher describes him as having been a ‘grey blur’ prior to his rise to power. However, Stalin still managed to achieve total power through his ruthlessness, Trotsky’s mistakes, Stalin’s manipulation of and power over others in the Party, as well as pure luck and external factors.

Joseph Stalin was undoubtedly a ruthless, tactical and persuasive leader, which aided his rise to power. According to Professor Paul R Gregory of the University of Houston, ‘power struggles [would] be won by the most ruthless contender’, so a candidate’s ruthlessness in this period of history was evidently a key factor. Stalin’s ruthlessness was displayed when he ‘gradually squeez[ed] out his Party rivals’ by ‘outmanoeuvring’ them. Stalin eradicated many of those who posed a political threat, including Zinoviev, Kamenev and Trotsky, by ‘turn[ing] them against each other’ and allowing them to wipe out each other as potential candidates. These men greatly underestimated Stalin’s power of manipulation and ruthlessness. It is through the fact that he ‘cunningly manipulated the various groups of the Politburo’ that he could vitiate the effectiveness of his opponents’ campaigns, or even end them. An example of this was when he convinced Zinoviev and Kamenev to publicly criticise Trotsky at the 1924 13th Party Congress, precluding Stalin from having to make any public criticism himself. Stalin’s persuasiveness was further exhibited when he convinced the Party’s Central 26 A m p e rs a nd 2 0 1 9

Committee to not publish Lenin’s last testament, despite his wife’s pleas for them to do so. This testament contained severely damaging criticisms of Stalin by Lenin, including a description of him as ‘too self-confident’ and suggesting that ‘another man’ be appointed. It is through Stalin persuading the Central Committee to not publish this detrimental testament that his opponents were prevented from achieving an advantage, as Lenin’s opinions were valued greatly. His ability to ruthlessly manipulate and manoeuvre the Party to negate the threats of opponents and to make sure that the politically catastrophic testament was not released illustrates how Stalin’s rise to power was effective and unwavering.

Trotsky’s campaign was crippled by a number of mistakes, including the fact that he did not go to Lenin’s funeral and that he naively believed he would not have to fight for the leadership of the Party. While a large number of leaders of the Party went to Lenin’s funeral and carried his coffin, Trotsky failed to appear. Trotsky was recovering from an illness and had been given the wrong date by Stalin; however, his absence sent a message that he was not close to Lenin nor keen to carry his legacy and, his ‘apparent snub of the late leader was never forgotten’. Another significant mistake of Trotsky was his complacence and underestimation of Stalin. Firstly, Trotsky failed to fight for the release of Lenin’s last testament, which would have benefitted him greatly. Trotsky was naïve and unprepared for attacks by Stalin, Kamenev and Zinoviev, as he was deemed the likely successor. They attacked him for his past criticisms of factions of the Party, which eventually led to him stepping down as Commissar for Military and Naval Affairs in January 1925. This event ‘marked the beginning

A l ex Zh e n g - Year 9

of the end of his influence in political affairs’, and the most startling aspect of this event was that Trotsky barely fought to keep this position. This was because he believed that he could simply wait for the right situation, yet it never arrived. These mistakes and weaknesses of Trotsky led to his downfall and exile and contributed to Stalin’s eventual rise to power.

It was also due to Stalin’s control over and manipulation of members of the Party that his campaign prevailed. In his capacity as General Secretary, Stalin was responsible for the workings of the Party, including officials and personnel.

As discussed by Victor Serge, in his 1937 book, From Lenin to Stalin, Stalin had ‘pack[ed] all the Party secretariats… with his creatures’. As Stalin had given a large number of Party officials their jobs, they were therefore loyal to him.

This meant that Stalin was popular within the Party, giving him a significant advantage. Prior to becoming General Secretary, Stalin had been the Commissar of Nationalities, where he managed relations with minorities and regional areas. In this role, he was also able to gather support from members in regional areas, through his advocacy for ethnic minorities. Furthermore, Stalin had the backing of many in the secret police force of the Soviet government. He was particularly close to three senior members of the force, including Felix Dzerzhinsky, whom Stalin referred to as a ‘devout knight’. Stalin’s support from many powerful officials contributed to his rise to power.

A certain level of luck and external factors also helped Stalin achieve power in the USSR. One occasion where luck helped Stalin was when Trotsky was recovering from an illness, so could not go to Lenin’s funeral, hurting his image greatly. Although Stalin was cunning in giving Trotsky the wrong date, he was also lucky that Trotsky was not even in Moscow at the time, as he was in the Caucasus, and sick.

Another external factor that aided Stalin’s ascent was his wife’s death. Stalin was in grief and angered by the death

Han We n K h aw - Year 8

of his first wife, so distraught that he was quoted saying that ‘with her died my last warm feelings for humanity’.

Many credit this event to have contributed to Stalin’s ruthlessness and hunger for power and it is considered a significant turning point for him. This illustrates how there were external factors that assisted in Stalin’s rise to power.

Although Stalin was not the discernible successor to Lenin, he still managed to achieve total power in the USSR by the end of the 1920s. He did this through his own ruthlessness and power of manipulation, and was aided by Leon Trotsky’s mistakes. His control over a large number of members of the Politburo and the relationships he had cultivated with others, as well as external factors and luck were also contributing factors.

Bibliography Carrol, M (2010, July 6), Joseph Stalin’s rise to power: facts more intriguing than fiction Retrieved from https://www.uh.edu/news-events/stories/2010articles/July2010/070110PaulGregory.php Evans, Jenkins. (2001) Years of Russia and the USSR, 1851-1991 London: Hodder Education Laver, J. (1991) Russia, 1914-41 (history at source) Kent: Hodder and Stoughton Ltd Lynch, M. (2008) From autocracy to communism: Russia 1894-1941 for OCR London: Hodder Education Montefiore, SS. (2007), Young Stalin London: Phoenix National WWII Museum New Orleans. (2018, September 12). Trotsky’s struggle against Stalin. Retrieved from https://www.nationalww2museum.org/war/articles/ trotskys-struggle-against-stalin Roberts, G. (2014, November 8). Stalin’s staying power. Retrieved from https://www.irishexaminer.com/lifestyle/artsfilmtv/books/stalins-staying-power-296688.html Serge, V. (1937), From Lenin to Stalin UPI Archives. (1953, March 6). Josef Stalin was one of the most ruthless and cold-blooded leaders in recorded history. Retrieved from https://www.upi.com/Archives/1953/03/06/Josef-Stalin-was-one-of-the-most-ruthless-and-cold-blooded-leaders-in-recorded-history/7420410824161/ Year 9 Resource Book 2019 Webb, K. (2015) Russia and the Soviet Union Melbourne: Cengage Learning Australia

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Andrew McCormick , Year 9

Turning Points in HistoryTray von Mar tin On February 26, 2012, at 7:16 pm, in Sanford, Florida, one gunshot was fired, sparking not only public outrage, but also one of the most influential black rights movements since Martin Luther King Jr and the 1960s. The death of Trayvon Martin was the start of a progressive movement to raise awareness of the injustice in the lives of many black Americans. Trayvon Martin, an innocent 17-year-old African-American male, was shot and killed by George Zimmerman, triggering an onslaught of political unrest aimed at the American justice system and discrimination against minorities. The main reason that this trial drew so much attention is that ultimately the killer, George Zimmerman, was found Not Guilty.

after comparing statistics of black men to white men killed.

For example, out of the approximately 326 million people living in the United States, 13.4% are black, in other words around 44 million people. So, for every white individual shot dead there are two black individuals shot dead. This disparity highlights the institutionalised racism black people face from birth. Black Lives Matter stated that it was ‘working for a world where black lives are no longer intentionally and systematically targeted for demise.’

This exemplifies how this shooting catalysed a change in the mindset of many Americans. It was a point at which ‘We [The Black Lives Matter group] began to understand the power of disruption’, enabling their plea to be heard.

This movement was not only revolutionary in its quest to extinguish this kind of prejudicial behaviour throughout the United States, but also in the way it understood the impact a voice like Black Lives Matter can have.

With many existing groups also trying to help bring about social change, the NAACP created a policy to change state legislature. This policy, while consisting of many provisions, raised four key issues: repealing stand-yourground type laws; creating law enforcement accountability through effective police oversight; improving training and best practice for community watch groups; and mandating

Social activism of this kind is not a new thing; however, after the Trayvon Martin Case, it became more urgent than ever. The popular phrase ‘Black Lives Matter’ became ubiquitous after the trial; the phrase is often used to exemplify the fact that the death of innocent black men and women can no longer be tolerated. The National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People (NAACP) created a policy to push for legislative action to reduce the likelihood of this happening again. The NAACP also stated ‘one time is too many times’ alerting the public once again to the fact that if this issue was not rectified, these crimes would be normalised. But that wasn’t all.

At Union Square in New York City, a peaceful march was held; it was nicknamed the ‘Million Hoodie March’ because Trayvon was wearing a hoodie when he was shot. This turning point in history triggered the largest black rights movement in America since the boycotts of the 1960s and ’70s.

Because of George Zimmerman’s acquittal, public outrage was universal within the black communities in the United States. This outrage gave rise to the Black Lives Matter movement, which outlined the need for equality and declared that the death of innocent black men and women would no longer be tolerated. The catchphrase Black Lives Matter began when people noted how a racial bias existed 28 A m p e rs a nd 2 0 1 9

A n drew Ye an g - Year 8

law enforcement data collection on homicide cases involving people of colour. The stand-your-ground law in Trayvon Martin’s case was the difference between judicial action and getting off without charge. As well, the NAACP made a statement when the shooting first happened stating ‘one time is too many times’. Five words that changed the view of many people. It created an idea that while we allow innocent men and women to die because of the colour of their skin, we are making a statement that this is tolerable.

The group also stated ‘If we can end practices like racial profiling and remove misguided “stand-your-ground” laws from the books, we will make all community members safer.’ This shows the impact this shooting had on safety and the opinions of the community. By supporting this, the NAACP has helped show the power of voice and how much of a positive turning point for racial stereotyping this could be.

But the protests and public outcry did not end there, with hundreds of people of mixed races attending the Million Hoodie March in New York City out of support for the Trayvon Martin case. With the political climate beginning to change and the president weighing in with his opinion of the case, many people gathered in New York City for another uprising. Nicknamed the Million Hoodie March, this event was all over the global news and tried to creat political havoc within the justice system. The best example of the determination the families and supporters of the cause had was when Trayvon’s mum said ‘We’re not going to stop until we get justice for Trayvon.’ And she wasn’t wrong – to this day annual marches are held in support of Trayvon Martin. This support helped to reduce the racial bias amongst police officers even in the past six years.

Jord a n C u s i n ato - Year 8

Throughout history, crimes, acts of hatred and discrimination have been prevalent; however, these crimes can actually lead to peace and inspire the rejection of destructive beliefs and ideologies. Civil uprisings like those in the 1960s and cases such as Trayvon Martin’s, spark revolutionary change in mindset and serve as a wake-up call for many people within the justice system. This incident caused the beginning of the ‘Black Lives Matter’ movement which is the current largest black rights group in America.

Dozens of local marches were conducted; the Million Dollar Hoodie March was the largest and caused the shut-down of many New York streets. When the unrest was nearly over, Trayvon’s mum made a remark that will forever be engraved in many people’s hearts: ‘He was just a child’. For the movement for racial equality in the United States, the death of Trayvon Martin was the most significant turning point of the 21st Century.

A n gu s W i cks - Year 12

L au re n c e Mo rde n, Year 7

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Harry Johns on, Year 7

What is History?

In 1861, E H Carr published a somewhat controversial book, proposing correct procedure and answering the question: ‘what is history?’. This book was contentious as it discussed uncertain topics such as ‘an historian and his facts’ (referring to the importance of factual information and primary sources to the modern historian), ‘history as progress’ (discussing the progressive thinking of historians) and ‘the widening horizon’ (of history and its future).

What is History? explores the complex relationship between an historian and his facts. Carr is shown to have a strong belief in the interpretation of primary sources over the collection of them. We can see his disapproval for the collection when he says, ‘the impatient scholar seeks refuge in scepticism’ (referring to the lack of indepth interpretation and instead, settling on an ‘on the line’ interpretation of the source) This method of ‘interpretation’ is shown throughout this book to give a false sense of meaning to the source and misleads many who believe this to be an efficient method of analysis. Some would consider Carr to be a ‘factual extremist’ (referring to his disbelief in the complacency a fact can engender). To him it was indicative of the progression and efficiency of history that a fact was questioned, analysed and explored deeper through contextual information. His statement ‘First, get your facts straight. Then plunge at your peril into the shifting sands of interpretation’ shows his belief that facts are a necessary component of history, but also that he only truly values those bold and brave enough to seek refuge in the unknown and capricious grounds of interpretation. To Carr, it is analysis of primary sources, not the accumulation of them, that leads to the dynamic and multifaceted embodiment of history. His strong belief was that the interpretation of facts was more important than their convenient collection and the complacency they provide.

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To m Ch adwi ck - Year 8

E H Carr had a modern view of history as a progressive concept. He was aware of the way it had changed throughout his lifetime. The two main differences he finds in history over the ages concern the historian and the information. This refers to the key component-based functionalities of history and the way their changes can affect the meaning and progression of history as a whole. Carr believes an historian is constructed by the interpretations they make. He believes this is an unchanging rule that has been and will continue to be one of the most relevant ‘rules of history’. His understanding of the historian’s importance is apparent when he says: ‘study a historian to study his findings’. The historian who interprets the source has a selective choice of the information he extracts from it. Secondly, the information provided to historians has changed drastically. Modern historians have access to fewer concrete primary sources without the bias raised around the topic supplied by historians before them. He states: ‘few facts have been passed through time without bias’, showing how crucial it is for the modern historian to seek out the ‘rawest’ material in order to build a less biased and more contextualised opinion on the source.

Finally, Carr has a strong and distinctive belief in history as a ‘snow balling’ concept. This refers to the revolutionary findings that take place in the absence of certainty and clearly shows that he believes a true historian values not their individual discovery, but the impact on future historians and history as a whole. He considers any belief other than this to be synonymous with complacency. It is believed by Carr and many other renowned historians, that a historical discovery proves a ‘blank canvas’ for new historians, those that are brave enough to question, interpret, analysis and discover for themselves. This what E H Carr would classify a ‘true’ historian to be. We can see Carr’s strong affirmative belief regarding this topic when he writes: ‘Historians can only hope their discoveries will be superseded’. This shows that Carr holds this process to be admirable and thinks this should be an end goal for an historian. It would be easy to hope your discoveries will ‘go down in history’ or be remembered forever; however, according to Carr, this is a complacent, selfish and unrealistic belief held by ‘sceptical and regressive historians’. It is also the belief of Carr that history will never be complete. He has an overarching, puzzle-like concept of history, that it is the historian’s input that leads us one step closer to this seemingly infinitely-pieced puzzle. History can never be complete, yet so many feel the need to attempt this impossible challenge. In the same way, an historian can only hope to contribute to this puzzle by leaving their mark but ultimately, they must accept and look forward to their puzzle piece being removed and superseded with one that better fits the gap that is their expertise. It is this progressive and forward-thinking mindset that has guided history through the ages. This shows the infinite mass of history and its endless future of monumental importance.

Be n Li n de man - Year 9

E H Carr was an inspirational, forward-thinking and progressive historian. Thus, his book What is history? reflects those same progressive views and insights. It is a landmark in the acceptance and views of modern-day historians providing an in-depth analysis of the future, functionalities and the creation of history throughout time.

D e cl an J e n ki n s - Year 9

A m p e rs an d 2 0 19 31

Poetr y

Ye ar 1 1 Typ o graphy Pr i nt maki n g

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Stephen Mack , Year 11

Wretche d Po etry Thought rends and kicks and writhes in pulsating neurons, Synapses leaking onto circuit boards.

Expanding, bloating, displacing, crawling Into the mouth like a parasite to be expelled Where it ruptures, birthing itself from the orifice.

It tastes of garbage and blood.

I retch it onto the page, and it stains and splatters and spills; Sprouting, breathing, smelling of nothing but a prosaic mind And the grotesque, unmoderated, uncultivated cognition from which it was conceived, And it means nothing; Immature scrambles of letters and sounds.

Scars and sutures on pointless paper.

Another waste of my goddamn time.

J o shu a Zh o u - Year 12

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Andrew Lim, Year 11

Time is…

Time is that eternal companion which knows and loves and cares From day of meeting ‘til day of parting its shadow is always there.

It knows your innermost secrets, but never stands to tell.

It never speaks, never stops

Time is that stalking predator

just listens day by day.

It but only walks with a commonplace gait

Time is the thing that wallows in its vast soaring sky – in its vast deepest darkness – Untethered from you and I. One may find one lost within it or lose one found without it To seek, to know – to understand: meaning sans purpose, purpose sans meaning would drive many a traveller mad.

Time is the thing that flies, not on a wing but perhaps on a prayer; in fleeting moments of joy and love in unending spells of pain and despair.

It winds and spirals and twirls then falls, crashes but never burns.

It unfurls itself amidst the flame a friendly wind-gust lifts it high

always one foot behind, taking us slowly but firmly towards an inevitable demise It never rushes, never runs for why disturb its prey? but keeps course all the same.

Yet our time is what we make it from morning to night each day.

It guides through life, robs at death waits then sprints, flies then crawls as it winds its unknown way. onwards together, forwards apart, headlong through the fire; knows no pain, feels no doubt: There but for now goes time.

sends it back from whence it came to greater pursuits in greater times up among the lofty skies.

Nat h an Be n -D avi d - Ye ar 8

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Zac Kamatero s, Year 10

Fragile Pleasures of a normal man denied Paranoid publication shall not hide Sinister smiles disregard, disengage Lost and insecure, it’s a new age The treachery disintegrates, my choice Sedated unknown reality, but a voice The surface of serenity has been breached A barrel of smiles cannot be reached So, I suffocate what’s mine And support the gradient, so divine Unheard angel has been neglected My frozen window reflection is affected The monster under your bed will get you (Eventually)

Zach ar i as Lydo n - Year 7

J e r way Zh an g - Year 10

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Aden Wilmshurst , Year 9

The Wrath of Time A young boy.

An innocent young boy.

Without a worry in the world.

Playing cricket; Bowl, Hit, Catch.

Without a worry in the world.

His mother watching on from afar, Proud of her strong little boy, Her little boy with big dreams; Never destroyed.

A boy excited for the future.

A boy, Happy, Trivial concerns.

A boy, Washing his glossy black hair in the shower, His mother always calling it ‘his best feature’.

School holidays, The end coming closer, His worst enemy, What he truly fears; The first day back at school.

The boy, Whose life is as perfect as he knows, Whose life will get worse, Who spent his time playing cricket, Whose mother was so proud

36 A m p e rs a nd 2 0 1 9

An old man.

A tired old man.

With the world’s weight on his shoulders.

Searching for a job; Find, Hope, Disappointment.

With the world’s weight on his shoulders.

His son watching from beside him, Confused by his bizarre antics, His tired father with big dreams; Constantly shattered.

A man yearning for the past.

A man, Stressed, Devastating problems.

A man, Whose son plucks out his white hairs, To fight against perpetual aging.

Time, The end coming closer, His worst enemy, What he truly fears; Death.

The man, Whose life was as perfect as he knew, Whose life had gotten worse, Who could no longer play cricket, Instead playing through his son

The boy, With the worries of which ice-cream flavour to choose, The worries of which friend’s house he should go to The world of a boy, Blue skies.

The sun shining comfortably, Simple, relaxed The boy’s world, An open field.

The boy, Oblivious to the world’s hardships, In a bubble of naivety.

Whose life is perfect.

The boy, To become the man.

The same person, The same birthday, The same love for cricket, The same dark brown eyes, The same big dreams.

Their only difference?

The wrath of time

The man, With the worries of how to put food on the table, The worries of whether he could pay next month’s bills The world of a man, Clouded by stress.

The pollution of constant disappointment, Surrounding his everyday The man’s world, A box closing in.

The man, Recognising the struggles of life Open to the world’s wrath, Whose life is full of flaws.

The man, Was once the boy.

The same person, The same birthday, The same love for cricket, The same dark brown eyes, The same big dreams.

Their only difference?

The wrath of time

Ya’r u b A l Wardi - Ye ar 9

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David D o ds on, Year 9

How Far I’ve Fallen O’ silent watchman, O’ veiled trailblazer.

You are the light, the light I must follow.

I follow you with my hands bound, bound to the back of your acolytes.

I follow them on the path, the path above the abyss, the total darkness.

The light is blinding, it eclipses all feeling, all thought.

It is too bright it sickens me.

I stumble, I fall on the path trodden by many, fall to the ground, fall from the edge, fall into the nothing.

They still grip me, hold me in chains, dangle me like a puppet.

But I’m away from the light, and the dark feels better.

I reach out blindly, a refreshing blindness of excitement, of blissful ignorance and total solitude.

The chains still bind me, but I sway.

I grip something; more real and more full than anything before.

I recognise it, the fruit, fruit forbidden, fruit of evil and temptation and spite and freedom.

I take a bite.

And now I don’t know if I’ll go back.

I don’t know if I can.

How far I’ve fallen from the path, so far that the plants grow wild and free, unafraid of shame or holy wrath.

How far I’ve come.

38 A m p e rs a nd 2 0 1 9

J ame s Ch ar l e swo r t h - Year 8

D o mi n i c Li n g - Year 7

L achlan Chen, Year 9

Of Weather and Scho ol If I were to describe a day at school I’d call it unexpected, unique and erratic A familiar experience to Melbourne weather The forecast tells tall tales glorifying The patters of rain and gusts of wind Or a lucky day, clear sky at twenty-six Mostly wrong, misleading information Always differing to reality Politics and weather, polls and forecasts – perhaps a familiarity?

Sometimes with violent and turning winds Or awful flooding downpour Worse still extreme heat, pollution, humidity

Et h an Or r - Year 9

But when night falls, the day is lost in memory, for Under the umbrella or bunkering in bed and hidden at home Is familiar space, love, warmth and shelter

S o nny Z ha ng - Ye a r 8

To m G u t te r i dge - Year 12

A m p e rs an d 2 0 19 39

Speech

Mi ch ae l S aki n o fsk y - Year 12 40 A m p e rs a nd 2 0 1 9

Hamish Galbraith, Year 12

Refuge e s Commit Crime s Refugees commit crimes. Refugees take our jobs. Another Sudanese gang attack in Melbourne. Muslims are terrorists.

These are racist headlines that we, as Australians, have become all too familiar with and have shaped our views as a nation. How much truth do they really have though?

Do you know how many terrorist attacks have been committed by Muslims on Australian soil in the past hundred years? One. One terrorist attack carried out by a Muslim person in the past 100 years. In fact, only a small percentage of all Australian crime is committed by those of Middle Eastern descent and even less than that by refugees from African nations such as Sudan. Yet all we hear is that refugees commit crimes.

This xenophobic thinking has led to Australia accepting just 17,000 refugees or 0.07% of all the world’s refugees. This is despite being the sixth largest country by area and the seventh least crowded country on the planet with just three people per square kilometre. This is compared to the 118 people per square kilometre in Syria, yet people still claim that we simply have no space or resources to care for these people.

Today, I will be advocating for vast increases in Australia’s refugee intake, and will be highlighting the indisputable benefits that increasing the refugee intake presents.

Close your eyes for a moment and imagine you are Ahmed, an 11-year-old boy, fleeing war-torn Syria, crossing the Mediterranean Sea by boat. It is freezing. As you close your eyes, you think of your destroyed home. Home, the term seems so foreign. You wonder, will I ever find a safe place that I can finally call home? As the waves repeatedly beat the weak hull of the boat, it slowly capsizes, tipping you out into the freezing waters. As you cling to your lifejacket, begging it to help you stay afloat, you realise that many are without because they had to be bought in Libya and because the smuggler promised that the boat would be safe.

He promised. With each rolling wave you see your parents slowly disappearing towards the horizon.

Refugees go through all that suffering and struggle, yet we still claim we have no room, or they don’t need to come here and are just seeking to ‘take our jobs’. This point of view is outdated and lacks basic understanding and consideration, failing to take into account the statistics or economics surrounding the decision. Currently, Australia accepts just 17,000 refugees every year, a mere 0.07% of our overall population. If we were to increase this percentage to just 1%, we would take in more than 230,000 more refugees annually. It is at this point that many people jump straight to the ‘We don’t have room argument’. It is true that our cities continue to grow exponentially and that by 2050, 10 million people will call Melbourne home, but the rural areas of our countries are crying out for a workforce.

In rural centres across Australia, there is a massive labour shortage and job surplus. ABS data shows some industries are reporting job vacancies as high as 44%, whilst a 25% job vacancy for professionals and managers has left many residents short of luxuries and even basic needs as businesses close due to a staff shortage, causing people to flood back into the cities in search of work.

A refugee workforce of 250,000 people per year, people who are keen to work and pay back the country which has given them a second chance – a chance to build a new life – sounds like the perfect solution to this problem.

It also demonstrates the lack of understanding inherent in comments about refugees coming to take our jobs and fill up our country. Figures from the Department of Immigration suggest that almost a third of refugees are professionals who have trained in a particular area, whilst a further 25% are the skilled trade-qualified workers that a growing regional Australia needs. The increase in professionals, such as refugee doctors and lawyers, in regional and rural areas would give inhabitants of those areas better access to vital resources, increasing their standard of living. The Australian Government could offer a modified New Start allowance to refugees on the condition they remain in regional areas. Assimilating refugees into Australia will not only help the economy through taxes and spending it will also save the government over $1 billion in the operating costs of offshore detention centres.

The offshore detention of refugees is not only morally corrupt, but also illegal. Under Article 14 of the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, everyone has the right to seek asylum and the 1951 Refugee Convention prohibits states from imposing penalties on those entering ‘illegally’ who come directly from a territory where their life or freedom is threatened. Australia is a signatory to both these agreements and hence has an obligation to follow these laws and accept refugees.

A m p e rs an d 2 0 19 41

The prevailing views that Australia is full and unable to accept the refugees are outdated and it is clear that we have the capacity to accept these refugees fleeing struggle and likely death. The narrow-minded views that many Australians have are the final remnants of our xenophobic roots that must be cast aside if we are to progress as a nation. Australia is not only well positioned to vastly increase our refugee intake, but we are morally and legally obligated to act. And the time is now.

There are a million ways to justify your fear. There are a million ways to justify your words. But the body of Ahmed being laid upon the sand. Tell me, how do you justify that?

Ravi n du Kat u gampal a - Year 7

Lo n g Ngu ye n - Year 12

42  A m p e rs a nd 2 0 1 9

Peter Rob er ts, Year 12

Not So Fast …

Look at this. This is a photo of a sea turtle that should be alive. If it weren’t for the lightweight plastic bag previously provided free of charge at most supermarkets, this sea turtle would be alive. From this, is it not clear that this murdering bag deserves the ban it is receiving? This is shocking. Disgust. Guilt. These are the emotions that we feel when we see photos like this. But making sweeping environmental policy decisions based on emotions, rather than careful scientific analysis, is a very effective way of making the problem that you set out to solve, a whole lot worse.

350 300 250 Energy (MJ)

Recently, the Victorian State Government decided to implement a ban on lightweight single-use plastic bags, with the intent of completely phasing them out from all retailers by the end of 2019. Coles and Woolworths have both already carried out this ban, offering thicker 15c plastic bags and canvas bags as alternatives. The ban, although seeming like a grand victory in the war on waste, is actually doing more harm than good. For every part of their life, through production, use and reuse, and finally post-use, the traditional lightweight plastic bag is more environmentallyfriendly than its supposedly greener canvas counterpart.

Energy required to produce 1000 bags

200 150 100 50 0 Canvas Bags

Plastic Bags

Firstly, I’d like to contrast the environmental impacts of the production and supply of plastic versus canvas bags.

In production, canvas bags increase the strain on our already CO²-saturated atmosphere. This graph shows how much energy is required to produce comparable amounts of plastic and canvas bags. This fourteen-fold difference transfers directly into carbon emissions. When compared to plastic bags, the process of creating canvas bags is a carbon pollution pumping disaster.

can only really be used once or twice before being thrown away. But how many times must a canvas bag be reused to justify the enormous environmental costs of its production and distribution? Well according to a 2009 study from RMIT, a ‘green bag’ must be re-used 104 times in order to have a lesser impact on global warming than the traditional plastic bag. Two years of a weekly shop. Most canvas bags would either become ripped, torn, mouldy or misplaced before reaching 104 uses. It is near impossible to use a canvas bag enough times to warrant the astronomical emissions resulting from its production.

Let’s move onto use and reuse. This should be where the canvas bag cleans up; they’re multi-use, right? Well, yes, but the lightweight plastic bag is also reusable. For years, people have been reusing their supposedly ‘single-use’ plastic bags as bin liners. In South Australia, when the plastic bag ban was implemented, purchases of bin liners increased. Instead of reusing their shopping bags, people began purchasing truly single use bin liners. Plastic bags

Post-use. Whether plastic or canvas, bags will ultimately live out their life, before ending up by some means in landfill. As you can probably see, canvas bags take up about nine times as much space in landfill as plastic ones.

In fact, plastic bags only make up 0.3% of landfill. In a landfill situation, plastic bags are almost no nuisance at all, compared to their larger, bulkier canvas alternative. A lot is made of the plastic bag’s questionable biodegradability. And A m p e rs an d 2 0 19 43

yes, plastic bags are not good at breaking down. However, they only pose a problem if they’re disposed of badly and end up where they shouldn’t be. If disposed of properly, plastic bags are no more harmful than things that take up far more landfill space. Every single plastic dashboard on every car. Look at what you’re sitting on. That’s going to go to landfill one day. And it’s going to take a lot longer to biodegrade than this. If you’re concerned about the permanent nature of plastic, and that is a reasonable concern, targeting the plastic that makes up 0.3% of landfill is frankly farcical.

I can hear you all saying, but Peter, the dead turtle is still a problem. More broadly, the toxic impacts of plastic bags on ocean life and the oceans themselves is something we need to fix. And I completely agree! But the solution is not to ban the plastic bag, it’s to make sure it doesn’t end up in the ocean. There are three things we must do to ensure this is the case. Firstly, we must ensure that plastic bags in Australia are disposed of responsibly. Then, we need to go overseas into other less developed nations and assist with the responsible disposal of plastic bags. Finally, we must support ocean plastic clean-up projects.

There is a bigger picture here. We as humans are prone to acting when stimulated by negative emotions. We see photos like the one I showed and we respond and react.

But visceral spurts of emotion-driven actions are not what is needed to save this planet. Neither is corporate virtue signalling. We need long-term, scientifically tested and scrutinised, dare I say, boring, solutions. Our sympathy to strangled turtles is not going to prevent the impacts of climate change. As humans, we must do our best to focus less on our feelings toward environmental issues, and more on scientific solutions that will truly make a difference.

If not, we will continue to waste resources and efforts on ineffective solutions to phantom issues, whilst the truly alarming environmental harm we are causing to our planet remains unaddressed.

Thank you.

V i su al Co mmu n i cat i o n an d D e si gn Un i t s 3 an d 4 p roje ct

44 A m p e rs a nd 2 0 1 9

Will Browning, Year 11

To Live in The Moment?

There’s no time like the present. Live in the moment! Que sera, sera. Focus on the now and #love every moment!

I’m sure you’ve all heard this kind of language, whether it be on your Facebook, browsing the internet, or in a library’s self-help section, next to the books about the ‘importance’ of star signs, or why we should all subscribe to a Neolithic-caveman inspired six-grain diet. It’s the latest millennial mindset: to live in the now, be present in the moment, and do away with overly-stressful planning and prior preparation. And while it’s a sure-fire way to absolve yourself of all your stress and forget about your troubles, I would argue that this increasingly-popular mindset actually ends up contributing to problems it’s supposed to solve.

You see, the key to leading a successful and fulfilling life is organisation. And the key to organisation…is you guessed it…taking a ‘big picture’ mindset and planning for the future. Because our lives aren’t well lived if we come to school for six lessons a day, go home and sleep. The way to have a truly fulfilling time at Trinity, and indeed the world, is to do other activities. Sport. Music. Public speaking.

Anything that pushes you outside your comfort zone and fills up your calendar. And it’s simply impossible to lead this kind of life if you just stick your head in the sand, refuse to plan anything, take everything as it happens to come along, and claim it’s all under the banner of some magical life innovation of ‘living in the moment’. Because propagating this kind of mindset is synonymous with absolving an individual of any need to plan, to think for themselves, to actually have some kind of structure in their lives. It simply encourages people to become mindless, hedonistic pleasure-seekers who are hooked on instant gratification. Rather, I would argue that the achievement of meaningful goals is what brings true pleasure. I want you to reflect on these three questions: How do you want to look back upon today? How do you want to look back upon this year? How do you want to look back upon your life? The answers to these questions, no, how you want to be able to answer these questions, is the best way to inform your

decisions in the ‘now’. Not just some superficial, impulsefollowing whim. We need to focus on the long-term, meaningful direction in which we want to steer our lives.

And that requires forward vision. Which is not located just in the here and now.

But it’s not just forward vision that living in the moment obstructs. It’s backwards vision. Living entirely in the present hamstrings our ability to inspect the past. In the words of Spanish/American philosopher George Santayana: ‘Those who forget past mistakes are doomed to repeat them.’ Or, perhaps more relevantly, in the words of aspiring young Australian philosopher Will Browning: ‘Those who refuse to accept the existence of past failures because they can’t cope with the vast expanse of their own inadequacy, and who instead choose to follow a path of blissful hedonistic ignorance……are also doomed to endlessly repeat their mistakes because of a chronic inability to learn from them!’ Improving on past performance by learning from your mistakes is an integral part of becoming a better person. So, it’s very confusing, and slightly concerning if I’m being honest, that so many people seem content so simply block out their mistakes under the false guise of ‘being present in the moment’. Now let’s be clear here – it’s absolutely fine to make mistakes; in fact, I believe that doing so is actively healthy, because mistakes give us a great opportunity to improve ourselves. But I also believe that refusing to acknowledge failures and pretending like they don’t exist, is not only grossly hubristic and unbearably conceited, but literally slows the development of humankind as a species. It is a dangerous place to be where we are applauding those who do not strive to improve themselves and those around them. By living in the present, we effectively shut down our ability to appreciate or learn from the past.

I’d like to leave you tonight with a metaphor. Life, ladies and gentlemen, is like a pen on a page, endlessly flowing from one place to another. And while you can’t change what you’ve already written, you have total control over where to move the pen next. If you limit yourself to living entirely in the present, you will only ever be a simple dot on a page, totally unplanned for, totally meaningless, and forgotten as soon as the pen moves onwards. But, but, if you expand your mind to contemplate where you’ve been, and the words you’ve already written, you can comprehend exactly the story you want to write from here on in. So, stop – take a look up the page at your life story. Think about what you want to look back upon today, this year, and your life. And go and write it.

A m p e rs an d 2 0 19 45

Andrew Lim, Year 11

A Fair Go and a Fighting Chanc e What sort of a world are we? Do we believe in a go for everyone – in a world that creates opportunities for all who work hard and play fair? When we turn on the news, we discuss big issues of finance: banks bailed out, corruption laid bare, and inverted yield curves. But we must not forget, amidst the jargon, the little stories – of fathers and sons, mothers and daughters, lives lived, and lives lost. We must remember the millions of people our financial system fails every day. Because their lives are under attack and they deserve better.

They deserve the strong regulatory agencies that can keep irresponsible banks in check. They deserve to know that their government is working in their interest and not that of bank lobbyists. They deserve a fair go and a fighting chance.

Let me start with a number. $120 billion. That’s how much was stripped from Aussie taxpayers and given to the big banks to bail them out in 2008. No strings attached.

No questions asked. No new rules or regulations to stop reckless behaviour. Just some free money. And what’s worse, the policy was put in stone. Today, the riskiest business on the planet – banking – is the safest business to bet on. Why? Because banks around the world can act irresponsibly while the good times roll on, safe in the knowledge that, when the waters get choppy, they can take money from the taxpayer and keep on going.

Once upon a time, the banks were taken to task after any recession. ‘You can have the bailout money,’ we said, ‘but we’ll need to see change.’ Boards were overhauled, reviews pursued, and major shake-ups initiated. But not anymore.

Today, as we bail them out unconditionally, we give them a licence to do whatever they want. And it impacts the ordinary Australians.

Take David Harris. A 30-year old roofer. A problem gambler.

In April 2016, he was working overtime – day in, day out – to pay off his $27,000 debt. And he went to the bank. He

46 A m p e rs a nd 2 0 1 9

D avi d Cl ar k - Year 12

begged them to stop increasing his credit limits. He told them of his addiction and his catastrophic debt. But they simply loaned him more and more money, and then refused to let him try and pay off his debts and cancel the card. His plans, his ambitions, his hopes – sidelined to make a small proportion of a tiny profit increase.

And he wasn’t the only one. Millions of Australians’ dreams suffered under irresponsible lending practices, with banks who sold loans to people in debt, who forged documents to make people’s credit history look better, who used bogus indicators to target our most vulnerable, rather than protecting them.

Is it any wonder that we now see ourselves teeter-tottering towards a recession of our own?

The fact is, there’s precedent for it. Looking beyond these antipodean shores, let’s take a look at the good ol’ US of A. In 1792, less than a decade after the nation’s founding, Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton had to bail out the country’s banks from a credit freeze. There starts an American cycle ringing like a gong through history – boom then bust. Boom then bust. Every 10 to 15 years, a catastrophic failure that targets ordinary people. It reaches its crescendo in 1929: The Great Depression.

What happened then? New regulations. Oversight. Big new watchdogs to keep banks across the world in check. They made sure that it was safe to put money into banks, that they wouldn’t be reckless, that they played by the rules. And for 50 years, all was well. Not a single true financial crisis.

Then came the 80s. ‘Red Tape – it’s too much’; ‘Let’s get rid of the bureaucracy’ – the watchdog gets depowered, cut down. And the result? It smacks the US in the face – the Savings and Loan crisis – 700 banks crash out. Ten years later: Long Term Capital Management goes under – taking down assets across the globe. We go on and on – Enron falling apart; the GFC; till today. But Australia hasn’t learnt these lessons.

How many people need to suffer? A million? Ten million?

A billion? How many before we realise that banks need regulation – that without it, we all suffer the effects of boom-then-bust, boom-then-bust?

Our regulatory agencies are asleep at the wheel. They’re undermanned, underfunded, underpowered. For years, APRA and ASIC were enough; they kept our banks in check and folks like you and me from being swallowed whole.

But today, they have gone into a great slumber. Under the Turnbull Government, ASIC lost $26 million. Their culture

has changed too, as they make behind-closed-door deals with the banking industry, putting the banks’ interests above the people they purport to serve.

And perhaps the response to all this should be cynicism.

The game is rigged. The army of suits and lobbyists will always win – there’s no point in trying to fight it. Perhaps the response is bigotry – we must blame the other, turn this into a war of them and us, create a scapegoat to distract us from reality.

But we must believe in the fair game. All of us. We must believe in equality. In opportunity. In a world where everyone, all 100%, can work hard and reap the rewards of it. Because the moment we stop believing in those lofty values, we may as well wave a white flag at endemic corruption.

Let us go forward together. Let us reclaim middle- and working-class dreams for all Australians, not just a few.

Because if enough are willing to fight for a promise of tomorrow, if enough are willing to use their democratic voice to fight those who would seek to drown them out, and if enough see the need to bring banks into line, the dream of a brighter future can, and will, live on.

Salvation

Cal vi n Blair - Year 11

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Ampersand 2019

4 0 C h a r l e s S t r e e t , Ke w V I C 3 1 0 1 w w w.t r i n i t y.v i c . e d u . a u