By Christopher Kennedy
Who’s listening now? Hanson and her followers.
It was very interesting to read an article in Pearls and Irritations where the author, Kos Samaras in “The half-empty hall: why Gen X broke Australian politics.” points out that the main push behind Hanson comes from the under-educated Generation X from the outer suburbs and rural areas.
It makes sense. They have been the ones paying for the Baby Boomers excess; the entering of a workforce with female and male roles drastically changing and basic economic hardship due to location, and all the time being ignored by the major parties.
So they have no money (except for the Baby Boomer money that they will, hopefully, inherit after the lawyers and the family fights are over), no futures and no friends in politics.
The Samaras article might be the most important article for the main parties to read. Neither main party is irreplaceable, as the Liberals are learning the hard way. (Don’t you love the way that Michelle Cash is crawling into the Hanson Fold?)
So what do you do about it? Labor will be out of power according to the polls if it doesn’t pull something out the hat. The first thing that came to mind is taxing mineral royalties at a fair rate and spreading it around to Gen X. Especially iron ore and gas.
Politics is a pendulum, and the swing at the moment looks like a long one with a big drop at the end.
The King James Bible was translated to English by men who wanted a book that the average farming yeoman could read; or learn to read. This personification of the yeoman as being the finest representation of the English spirit in those days.
Where does this fit into the Australian mono-culture Hanson so proudly espouses? I would say that many men; especially men, believe that the yeoman has been screwed over, specifically themselves.
And what is dripping this into their ear? A social media that is totally out of whack with reality and ready to feed any fear and misconception as truth so long as people want to believe it.
Television is par-say, the internet is new and as it happens to give people what they want, an American form of capitalism. Give me what I want and I will give you my loyalty and call it freedom. Which is not democracy. It’s not life – you don’t tend to get what you want but live in a spectrum of inconvenience and making do.
But back to the yeoman. I have a number of acquaintances of mine who are hooked on Pauline.
One of them once said to me that “No women has ever bought him a drink.” Which is pretty sad that a yeoman is so constrained he can’t just ask. Women have bought me plenty of drinks. His real beef against women is that a women conceived a child with him, went to live with another man and told everyone they the child was the other man’s. Worked until the kid was fifteen, then it screamingly obviously his kid.
Another follower of Pauline was a miner who built and landscaped three houses for different women that threw him out in the end and took the houses.
The third is a very successful tiler, making a fortune, so obviously hes not suffering, but he was bought up in the outer suburbs, follows Trump and believes the American democrats are the devil.
Why? I’m not sure because you can’t talk to him about it .
In fact you can’t talk to any of them as they go off on screaming tangents that make no sense. But that’s the point isn’t it? No one has ever listened to them so why should they listen to other people?
Also by Christopher Kennedy
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I agree with little, very little of what “Hanson and her followers” have to say. However, I hope One Nation does well, very well in the coming elections, Reason, the Big Two’s political duopoly needs to be broken, they have for too long dragged our country down.
jonangel, please don’t encourage them . Greens and a number of fine independents are a far , far better protest choice. Can you imagine the damage a Coalition / ON single term could do to our environment , our economy , our reputation in Asia ? We’d be as much a disaster as the Disunited States .
win jeavons I agree with you.The options are much better, especially with Asian relationships we have worked so hard to establish.
One Nation today banned the ABC, the Guardian and The Age from their Victorian launch.
That seems to leave Newscorp and News24 (formerly SKY).
Be care ful what you wish for Jonangel as these people are manipulating our democracy and using the Trump playbook – Hanson is just the puppet with other conservative nut-jobs who see the opportunity of overturning our democracy to their own ends.