WATCH: A US Journo Called Our Refugee Abuse Crisis The Hell Out On ‘Q&A’

Look, the issue of offshore detention isn’t exactly new ground for Q&A, but tonight’s rendition of the impassioned panel show was unique. 
Not only did a Coalition senator typify the almost resentful attitude the government seems to have towards whistleblowers, but an esteemed third party was on deck to call absolute bullshit on that destructive stance.

On the topic of last week’s 4 Corners investigation into the way detention on Nauru basically erodes the souls of young detainees, Liberal senator Arthur Sinodinos said that if workers on the island can’t square their conscience away with the work they do, they should just resign.

“I think people who feel very strongly that they can’t work there because of their conscience, because of what they’ve seen, well they can resign, they can come back and talk about what they’ve seen,” Sinodinos reckoned, implying anyone who questions their work remove themselves from any position where they can directly affect change. 

In response to that blatantly hands-off approach to fixing this crisis, and our political establishment’s pathological blame-shifting, American journalist Christine Dolan offered some objective third-party real-talk. 

Not only did she represent an impartial observer to our system, but her previous work documenting the exploitation of children after turmoil in the Balkans gives her a pretty solid foundation to say “it’s about time that everyone gets their heads out of the sand and understand if you have a policy that says you’re not going to take in boat people, ok, that’s fine.

“That doesn’t mean that you get to justify children being abused at a detention centre.”
In her view, it’s patently ridiculous that our political system seems content to handball the issue while people under our care undergo immense suffering. That’s a pretty reasonable take, in all honesty:

Source and photo: Q&A / ABC / Twitter.

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