Zanthrus thanks for the rant and personal attack.
Moving on, in your fury to be the first to respond you completely missed my point.
Police do indeed accept risk when they sign up, not sure how you felt my position contradicted that. My whole point is about the law and the powers that these laws ascribe to the government. My point was not to argue who job is the most risky (as it is irrelevant), in fact I was very careful to stay away from this issue.
You stated ‘risk their lives for the community the same as ADF members do’, this is where you are wrong. The risk may be the same by way of deaths/injury etc but the laws that govern each occupation are very different meaning it is not the same. This being the very point I was making, not that emergency services are lesser beings or that the military is high and mighty…..rather they are just different (and its not me defining this difference, its parliament).
Dr Dre, Same point as above. It’s a matter of law and the application of that law. You are correct, ‘no body signs up to the ADF to die’, they do however hand over the control of that choice to the Government. This is where the distinction lays.
Read my point again fellas: ‘When you sign up to the ADF the deal is that you no longer have a say when it comes to being placed in harms way. An emergency services person does not, when signing up make this same agreement, and whilst the numbers may be similar, their death whilst tragic was not part of the deal.’
To be clear and back on topic, I wouldn't take the offer up, but hey if someone else wants to then go for it.
Yep, the skeptic in me knows Virgin didn't do it out of the goodness of their heart. Its Corporate Social Responsibility 101; Do things which appear to be good for society....but only if it is good for our bottom line. People don't get pissy when Qantas buys Brazil nuts from Peruvian farmers and then puts a quasi add in the in-flight magazine explaining how they are doing it to support the farmers...... BS; its for Qantas' net benefit.
The backlash is actually a good thing, it shows that corporations can't take the piss when it comes to national symbols.