A brick through the window

or, in this case, a large stone.

No, it was not this house - and I am thankful for that. It was the house of someone I do not know, a neighbour of someone I do know.  It was flung in with a piece of paper wrapped around it saying, "F.... "No" voter gonna geyu." 

This, it seems, is what the "debate" on the Referendum on an Indigenous Voice to Parliament has descended to.   It has never really been a debate at all. 

The police were informed but have apparently merely shrugged and said they could do nothing about it. That does not surprise me. You would need to catch the perpetrator in the act. This is unlikely at two in the morning.

At the time of the Vietnam war young men were conscripted into the army to serve. It was wrong and the way in which those sent to war were later treated has been utterly disgraceful. My brother did not get called up although he might have been. He took an active part in the rallies and protests. Our parents supported him. I supported him. It had a major disruptive influence on all of us. 

Our loyalty to this country was called into question because we opposed a war in another country. We did have a real brick through the window of the bedroom in which our parents slept. It was a "warning". The police came but they were no help at all. The Senior Cat and my brother boarded the window up and we all went off to school, university and college. The window would have to wait until the next day, a Saturday, to be fixed.

But we came home and found the board had gone. There was nothing there at all to suggest the window had been broken apart from one or two tiny slivers of glass that had been left in the clean up. It was some days before we discovered that a retired neighbour further down the street had come in and done the work while we were out. He made a bit of extra money doing "handyman" work but he refused to let the Senior Cat pay him for anything other than the piece of glass. 

That kind act made all the difference. We felt supported. 

I told the person I know about this. She does not have the ability to mend the window herself but she agreed the neighbours needed to step in. There was no glass available yesterday but one of the neighbours went in and measured up for it. He will get it today. Another neighbour who works as a builder is going to put it in tonight. The elderly couple who live there are hopefully feeling less frightened now. Their neighbours are looking out for them.

Why they were attacked in this way is a mystery. They have not advertised which way they are voting. There is no corflute on their fence saying "NO". There are no corflutes in the street at all - and stone throwing does not win wars.