IN THE MOST RECENT AUSTRALIAN Census, I registered myself as ethnically Australian, non-religious in outlook. Despite my stereotypically Irish name and culturally Catholic background they’re the most accurate descriptions of how I live my day-to-day life. This morning, though, I spent outside the office of my local Member of Parliament, there to take part in a battle of rent-a-crowds, and received a short sharp lesson in—for lack of a better phrase—the genealogy of my morals.

“Tolerance is Our Demise”. Marrickville’s Convoy of No Confidence, 1 September 2011. Image copyright Anthony Albanese MP.

Communication of one’s primary political motivation doesn’t come much clearer. Nor do explicit repudiations of mutual respect, the ecumenical Golden Rule, or, as it immediately occurred to me, Luke 10:36: I’m apparently much more Catholic in the makeup of my non-religion than ever I gave myself credit. Welcome to Marrickville—neighbours? Wipe your feet on civil society as you come in.

In a week when the High Court has thrown out the deterrence from the country’s approach to asylum seekers, it’s both refreshing and depressing to have a basic ideology of intolerance embraced so unambiguously. You can report contact and engagement with your enemy.

At some point you reflect on just what kind of person would feel unashamed to hold up a sign against the basic idea of tolerance, in public. Once you’ve got to there, all you can do is shrug, head down the road to the intersection of Marrickville and Illawarra Roads, and get yourself a pork or meatball roll. For $5.50, you get a crispy white roll, spread with pate and mayonnaise, and stuffed with a shallot, some coriander, two or three squashed Vietnamese pork meatballs that have been stewing the bain-marie most of the morning, sprinkled with pickled carrot and thin sliced onion.

Damage to the heart has been rather a theme for the day, I think.

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