Australian PM Attacks Free Speech – Drags Nation Lower

I’m trying not to put “political” rants up on this blog as much as I used to but sometimes things happen that leave me gasping with incredulity, or saddened so deeply it hurts. In fact, I’m showing incredible restraint since so much of what Australia’s present government is doing makes me feel that way. I could have chosen any number of topics for this rant – the government’s relentless attack on the renewable energy sector, their endless whittling away of civil liberties, their ideologically-driven attempts to privatise our health system and our education system – but it was their recent attack on freedom of speech that was the straw that broke my back this time.

There’s a TV show here called Q&A and it is produced and broadcast by the ABC – Australia’s equivalent of the BBC. It’s a silly, trivial show in which (typically) people of different political backgrounds as well as celebrities and media types discuss current affairs. I don’t watch it. Every moment of it I’ve ever seen leaves me despairing and sickened – although it is generally considered one of the more “intelligent” talking heads shows on the telly. I don’t watch any of them.

This week, they had a member of the Liberal government on the panel. For overseas readers, the Liberals in this country are like the American Tea Party. They’re dominated by Christian zealots, they believe in small government, they hate welfare, they believe in laissez-faire economics and have a “Devil take the hindmost” attitude to the poor, the sick and the underprivileged. In the audience was a young Muslim, a man who had been tried and acquitted of terrorist crimes and who had served time for threatening the life of an ASIO officer (Australia’s secret police). Part of the format of the show is to take questions for the panel from the audience. Eventually the terrorist guy got his turn and he and the government guy had a bit of a slanging match.

This is all in the context of new laws that were recently introduced here to remove citizenship from people who have acted on behalf of certain proscribed terrorist groups if that person has dual citizenship (and would not, therefore be rendered stateless). It’s the kind of law this government loves. It plays to the ignorant and stupid in their fan base. They get to puff out their chests and say, “If you want to fight for terrorist organisations overseas, if you want to attack Australians at home, we don’t want you here!” Never mind engaging in debate, never mind understanding the reasons, never mind that this kind of thing is disguised racial hatred and religious intolerance, never mind that only a handful of people are ever going to fall into this category so it’s a massive beat-up over next-to-nothing. None of that matters. What matters is winning votes from the far right of the population – a very large minority in Australia.

The government guy told the terrorist guy he’d like to see him personally thrown out of the country. The terrorist guy said that, as an Australian, he’d like to see the government guy thrown out. The government guy said the only reason the terrorist guy was still here was because the laws he’d been charged with weren’t retroactive. The terrorist guy said it’s attitudes like that that are driving Muslim youth to support ISIL. Both of them were puerile and childish and very, very stupid – although, I have to say, the government guy came across as far more stupid and aggressive than the terrorist guy who was at least trying to make some kind of a point.

After the show, all Hell broke loose. It went out late in the evening. By 9am the next morning, the head of the ABC had apologised to the nation for allowing this terrorist guy onto the show. The Prime Minister, Tony Abbott, gave a press conference asking why the nations public broadcaster was giving a platform to terrorists and wanting to know whose side the ABC was on. The Murdoch press – which, in Australia, is comprised entirely of the most awful right-wing tabloid rags you’ve ever seen (and, yes, I include the Australian) – went wild with full-page idiot-friendly headlines such as “Terrorvision” to the effect that the ABC was providing succour to terrorists and attacking Australia. In Australia, the Murdoch press is rather like state-run propaganda. The government actually consults with Murdoch on major policies and feeds his media empire information exclusively and often before government backbenchers hear it. (Actually, it’s more like the other way around. This government is the executive arm of a number of large corporations, including News Corp.)

What I heard on Q&A was a couple of bigots being rude to one another (I’ve watched the excerpt after the event). What I heard from Tony Abbott was a clear and dangerous attempt to shut down the ABC – one of the few media outlets that does not simper and pander to his government the way he’d like them all to – disguised as nationalist bullshit. What I heard from Rupert Murdoch and his gutter press was a clear attempt to undermine a competitor – and support their friends in government – disguised as moral outrage. The whole thing was disgusting from beginning to end. Just utterly disgusting.

I despair of this country. Political debate here is pathetic – as you’d expect, when there is almost no independent media and virtually no opposition in parliament. There is no working democracy here any more and morality has been completely replaced by economic theory.