Sue Neales, Mercury
SO what is stopping the openness, tolerance and willingness to make amends exhibited over all these issues, being extended to other debates that are of such paramount importance to Tasmania?
The Tasmanian community, and its politicians have shown they are all mature enough to have a serious public debate on important issues — among people with enormously divergent views — and still end up with results that are acceptable and welcomed by most.
Whether on compensation for stolen generations or laws for same-sex couples, there has been little sense of the bullying, polarisation and victimisation that so hurts the long-running debates surrounding, for example, forestry.
Yet views held by some in the community were no less strong, especially relating to homosexuality. But there, a relative calm has followed the community deliberations and decisions.
Is it the prevailing business culture of Tasmania?
Is it that the major corporate players in the state need to be dragged kicking and screaming into the more tolerant business culture now accepted as the norm among big companies on the mainland, for whom listening to community views and being part of a wider community is a regarded as a natural and integral part of day-to-day business?
Or is it impossible to have intellectual debate in Tasmania, where the players can agree to disagree, where mindsets can be changed or adjusted in a fair exchange of ideas, on issues and industries that are so central to the state’s economy and jobs?
Is debate and radical social reform acceptable only when it does not carry a financial and economic imperative?
