Submission to the Australian War Memorial

I believe the proposed changes to the Australian War Memorial threaten the very purpose for which it was built.

As a former teacher/ teacher educator, I am writing this submission because I passionately want Australia to be a force for good in the world: our children and young people to be peacemakers and peace-builders. I want them to have the opportunity to commit themselves to work for justice and peace, within their families, their communities and between nations. Above all to understand the utter futility of violence and war.

This Memorial, as Lord Gowrie said at its opening in 1941, carried the hope that it would not only record heroic deeds, but also remind future generations of the brutality and utter futility of modern war. "If the fallen are not to have died in vain", he said, we should be prepared to make any sacrifice to put an end to the obscenity of war, and declare "Never again, never again"

To tarnish a shrine that was built to honour the dead and affirm their hope for peace, a shrine which has led generations to contemplate the suffering and waste of war is to me and very many Australians an abomination.

The question we should ask is does this extraordinary enlargement, costing a vast sum of money, making possible the display of giant killing machines like fighter-bombers and tanks, strengthen our national commitment to work for peace. Or will this planned display of such weapons instead teach our young people that war is acceptable, a normal and even glorious part of our history? The not so hidden curriculum then is that military masculinity, or being like a soldier, is to be a 'real man', a man who is prepared to use violence rather than one who has learned how to resolve conflict non-violently.

I find it obscene that Australian taxpayers money is to be used to build this showroom for the giant Arms Traders, the war profiteers: among them Lockheed Martin, and Boeing, manufacturers of nuclear weapons. We are funding a theme park in which to worship the god of war rather than a shrine in which to weep with the suffering and commit ourselves to peace.

The National Capital Authority will ultimately be held responsible for permitting this violation of the War Memorial, the desecration for many of a sacred space at the heart of our national capital.

How much better instead to be spending half a billion dollars on an ANZAC Centre for the Study of Peace, Conflict and War as proposed by the ANZAC Commemoration Committee.

I believe the proposed changes to the Australian War Memorial threaten the very purpose for which it was built.

As a former teacher/ teacher educator, I am writing this submission because I passionately want Australia to be a force for good in the world: our children and young people to be peacemakers and peace-builders. I want them to have the opportunity to commit themselves to work for justice and peace, within their families, their communities and between nations. Above all to understand the utter futility of violence and war.

This Memorial, as Lord Gowrie said at its opening in 1941, carried the hope that it would not only record heroic deeds, but also remind future generations of the brutality and utter futility of modern war. "If the fallen are not to have died in vain", he said, we should be prepared to make any sacrifice to put an end to the obscenity of war, and declare "Never again, never again"

To tarnish a shrine that was built to honour the dead and affirm their hope for peace, a shrine which has led generations to contemplate the suffering and waste of war is to me and very many Australians an abomination.

The question we should ask is does this extraordinary enlargement, costing a vast sum of money, making possible the display of giant killing machines like fighter-bombers and tanks, strengthen our national commitment to work for peace. Or will this planned display of such weapons instead teach our young people that war is acceptable, a normal and even glorious part of our history? The not so hidden curriculum then is that military masculinity, or being like a soldier, is to be a 'real man', a man who is prepared to use violence rather than one who has learned how to resolve conflict non-violently.

I find it obscene that Australian taxpayers money is to be used to build this showroom for the giant Arms Traders, the war profiteers: among them Lockheed Martin, and Boeing, manufacturers of nuclear weapons. We are funding a theme park in which to worship the god of war rather than a shrine in which to weep with the suffering and commit ourselves to peace.

The National Capital Authority will ultimately be held responsible for permitting this violation of the War Memorial, the desecration for many of a sacred space at the heart of our national capital.

How much better instead to be spending half a billion dollars on an ANZAC Centre for the Study of Peace, Conflict and War as proposed by the ANZAC Commemoration Committee.

I believe the proposed changes to the Australian War Memorial threaten the very purpose for which it was built.

As a former teacher/ teacher educator, I am writing this submission because I passionately want Australia to be a force for good in the world: our children and young people to be peacemakers and peace-builders. I want them to have the opportunity to commit themselves to work for justice and peace, within their families, their communities and between nations. Above all to understand the utter futility of violence and war.

This Memorial, as Lord Gowrie said at its opening in 1941, carried the hope that it would not only record heroic deeds, but also remind future generations of the brutality and utter futility of modern war. "If the fallen are not to have died in vain", he said, we should be prepared to make any sacrifice to put an end to the obscenity of war, and declare "Never again, never again"

To tarnish a shrine that was built to honour the dead and affirm their hope for peace, a shrine which has led generations to contemplate the suffering and waste of war is to me and very many Australians an abomination.

The question we should ask is does this extraordinary enlargement, costing a vast sum of money, making possible the display of giant killing machines like fighter-bombers and tanks, strengthen our national commitment to work for peace. Or will this planned display of such weapons instead teach our young people that war is acceptable, a normal and even glorious part of our history? The not so hidden curriculum then is that military masculinity, or being like a soldier, is to be a 'real man', a man who is prepared to use violence rather than one who has learned how to resolve conflict non-violently.

I find it obscene that Australian taxpayers money is to be used to build this showroom for the giant Arms Traders, the war profiteers: among them Lockheed Martin, and Boeing, manufacturers of nuclear weapons. We are funding a theme park in which to worship the god of war rather than a shrine in which to weep with the suffering and commit ourselves to peace.

The National Capital Authority will ultimately be held responsible for permitting this violation of the War Memorial, the desecration for many of a sacred space at the heart of our national capital.

How much better instead to be spending half a billion dollars on an ANZAC Centre for the Study of Peace, Conflict and War as proposed by the ANZAC Commemoration Committee.