I really did think that climate change was the biggest threat to humanity and the other species on this planet. I’ve mapped the research against observations having undertaken my own investigations. I expect the inherent caution of science and the belligerent profiteering of the private sector would result in the continuing inaction we have, and this would be our downfall.
This perception changed today.
I realised there is a social war taking place. Being detached from western culture for 20 years and being preoccupied with rebuilding my life over the past 3, I haven’t understood what’s been happening but it clicked today.
The Far Right, a school of thought which pledges every heterosexual couple for themselves, might makes right, and holds to a fundamental Christian agenda, is at war with the Far Left, a school of thought which promotes inclusion and diversity to the point where men are women and women are birthing persons, umbrage is law, and the margins occupy 99% of the page.
The West has gone insane.
Both sides promote fascism in their own ways and demand allegiance on pain of social death. No mistakes are tolerated. No wavering from the party line is countenanced. No learning is accommodated. This war is serious.
As far as I can tell, the Right has always been present thanks to intolerant ‘christians’: those who follow the book and ignore the man. Interestingly over the past century, women were on the Left. Battling to gain the vote and have an education and the right of choice over their own bodies, the women’s movement has been instrumental in rights recognition in law. As I support these rights, I am a feminist.
Something very interesting happened over the past 20 years, though. Ru Paul threw drag into the mainstream, a Christian minister and black, Drag Race happily presented diversity and inclusion. Several famous people transitioned from male to female, and the Left took up rights activism. Black Lives Matter further expanded common awareness of rights.
But our western society in Australia has not reached a new equilibrium of mutual respect and recognition.
Several issues indicate increasing tensions: trans women demanding to be identified as ‘women’ only; Indigenous peoples still having lands and seas given to mining companies by the Crown, immigrants receiving benefits above citizens, women receiving untouchable status in society, increasing funding to religious groups by secular revenues, and zero action on climate change.
The Far Right women are furious at being termed ‘birthing people’ and I agree. ‘Women’ means the XX-chromosome biology with the attribute of creating new life. Trans women do not have this biology. The social engagement as a ‘woman’ is fair but forcing women to lose the name ‘woman’ is insane. Trans women have a unique identity which is very different from women as do gender-fluid identities. Let’s be proud of the uniqueness of each.
We marched to force the neoLiberal party to apologise and Labo(u)r finally did and made noises about Statement of the Heart. What has changed? Zip. Studies prove that hybrid economies empower Indigenous communities and that destroying artwork tens of thousands of years old does not help anyone. More CO2 emissions = death sooner. More Indigenous-style communities = survival. Nothing has changed and this is insane. Vote for the Greens, for the granny next door, or some guy in Nimbin: do not vote for the major parties.
Housing crisis and rental crisis. Too many people and not enough homes. More immigrants coming into the country. Unemployment going up, too. What is the possible benefit to society for maintaining immigration under these circumstances? The policy makers with several investment properties and funding from the fossil fuel companies may know. If this were a human right issue, how is immigration more important than citizen’s rights to live and work? How are immigrants’ rights more important than Indigenous rights to live and work and reestablish traditions? They are not. This is insane.
Zero tolerance of violence against women? What about men? How about zero tolerance of violence against Indigenous peoples? Why only women? What are they doing which might require such elevated status? Misogyny is illegal? How about philogyny? What happened to equality and inclusion? What about respect, or common courtesy? This is also insane. How can we destroy the patriarchy by disempowering men who have nothing to do with government policy, banking or the machinations of the fossil fuel industry? Can’t be done. Stupid to pathologise men.
We, western culture, spent centuries separating church and state to ensure everyone had access to justice. Both the Left and Right are undoing this humanism in their own ways, leading us right back to the 1600s. We have the UN Bill of Human Rights to guide us and social welfare for the lower classes, not the upper classes, has been repeatedly proven to strengthen society. Giving half a billion to the churches, extracted from secular education, is insane. Give it back!
The Labo(u)r party was elected with inclusion signalling and promptly did nothing about taking back that half a billion from the religious cults, did nothing about deaths in custody, did nothing about emissions reductions except, that is, to increase them. Now these ‘leaders’ who are each worth millions cannot be bothered to simply give Indigenous peoples a voice. There is no reason to take this to referendum. All other examples prove that Indigenous voices in government improve Indigenous lives. Insane leaders.
Many people have harped on about the end of civilisation over the centuries. It’s a hobby, I guess. And what I’m seeing with this burgeoning social war makes a nuclear attack look simplistic.
I don’t subscribe to either side as neither are based on respect or inclusion. They are both reactive and, in this way, are both thoughtless. The Right over-simplifies the human condition; the Left forces minority identities on the majority without consent. The complex and subtle issues of personal and social identity require a well-considered response, something most people seem unable to manage at this point in time.
Society sans leadership.