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Leftists time and again do not win at the ballot box, so their fall-back tactic in trying to get their way is through street protests and media stunts, these can often involve leftist activists intimidating and even using violence against those who they cross paths with. They have no hesitation in twisting facts and utilising the power of the mainstream media who are only too happy help them spread misinformation.

One of their latest stunts has been with the formation of a homeless tent city in Sydney’s Martin Place which is aimed to draw attention to the supposed homeless epidemic in Sydney. They hoped to be able to generate much public sympathy and cries for greater government action for public housing. They chose Martin Place because it contains the headquarters of many of Australia’s leading financial institutions.

They sucked in the usual leftist politicians such as the Greens and Labor Senator Sam Dastyari who claimed these were the forgotten people. Sydney Lord Mayor Clover Moore claimed she could not take any action to remove the tent city, most likely because she wanted to draw out the stunt in an effort to embarrass the Coalition state government.

But to the state government and the mainstream media’s credit they investigated the background of the alleged homeless people in this tent city and discovered they weren’t as downtrodden as they had portrayed themselves. Many of them were professional protestors who had previously been involved in Occupy Sydney in 2011.

A confrontation between State Housing Minister Pru Goward and the self-appointed Mayor of the tent city Lanz Priestly (age 72, who is actually a New Zealand citizen, a father of 12 who used to be a project manager) exposed the true financial situation of the residents as well as their refusal to accept any offers of help from the state government.

Goward, clearly trying to be as diplomatic as possible, calmly explained that many were not eligible for government assistance because they earned too much money and were not Australian citizens. Priestly rejected the offer of temporary housing, he demanded only permanent housing and claimed that Centrelink benefits were useless because you can’t cook with them (was he demanding a chef for the homeless as well?). No matter how much Goward’s department tried to consult with the residents they still rejected any form of help.

Many would have been much more unkind to Priestly and the residents of this tent city than Goward was in dealing with their unreasonableness. Why should these middle class homeless people be offered greater assistance than many other New South Wales residents living in poverty because they did not decide to participate in a publicity stunt? Mark Latham released a video highlighting that the real homeless people are still out on the streets, not invited to Martin Place by the left.

Now Goward and Premier Gladys Berejiklian have had enough and our now introducing new laws into parliament to give police the power to move the tent city on. Berejiklian said she had no choice because all of her government’s good faith offers were rejected.

But there is another reason why Berejiklian felt she could take this course of action. Because the public weren’t buying these activists’ sob stories. There was no outpouring of public sympathy, demands for greater action of homelessness. Much of the public knew this was a stunt and the more they found out about the background of these people the less they believed their intentions were pure.

Melbourne has suffered from a similar set of professional homeless people outside its Flinders Street station which Lord Mayor Robert Doyle moved on at the beginning of the year. But not before there was a violent confrontation with the police and they have now targeted Robert Doyle at his private residence.

The public have become used to and grown tired of these leftist stunts, they often disrupt ordinary citizens going about their daily business. If these activists were smart they wouldn’t alienate the public in this way, but many of them are of the view that members of the public are compliant in these supposed acts of evil of governments and disrupting their lives is justified.

The left can rage about this issue, refugees, indigenous rights or same sex marriage and create the illusion that many people agree with them, but their activism and stunts continue to fall on deaf years. Thankfully in this case the government has not been intimidated by these activists and have taken action to remove them. If only they would do this on other public policy issues the left rage about and would instead listen to the silent majority’s views.

Author Details
Tim Wilms is the Founder and Editor in Chief of https://theunshackled.net. the Host of Tim’s News Explosion, the WilmsFront interview program and The Theorists with Andy Nolch. He based in Melbourne, Australia where he also conducts field reports.
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Tim Wilms is the Founder and Editor in Chief of https://theunshackled.net. the Host of Tim’s News Explosion, the WilmsFront interview program and The Theorists with Andy Nolch. He based in Melbourne, Australia where he also conducts field reports.