A second candidate calling for the murder of Victorian Premier Dan Andrews; a Victorian Liberal candidate making misogynist, racist comments; another revealed to be the speartip of a concerted (and seemingly successful) campaign by religious extremists to infiltrate the Victorian Liberal Party — the Victorian election is increasingly resembling the removal of a bandage from a festering sore.
Crikey readers will fall over themselves with surprise, but Andrews is right in his response to Legislative Councillor Catherine Cumming’s reference to turning Andrews into “red mist”, that this represents the Americanisation of Australian politics — or more accurately another stage in that process.
A Liberal candidate has already called for Andrews to face justice for murder — and retained his Liberal endorsement. The Liberals are preferencing a candidate who called for the murder of Andrews ahead of Labor. As Crikey’s Cam Wilson reported, a Liberal candidate is spreading “Big Lie”-style claims designed to undermine perceptions of the integrity of the election. And the Liberal Party has already tried to spread conspiracy theories about Andrews.
Each of these — violent rhetoric, religious extremism, misogyny, racism, claims political opponents are criminals, attempts to undermine the legitimacy of elections, conspiracy theories — can be checked off against a list of Republican tactics in the US in the age of Trump.
It’s unsurprising in the sense that right-wing extremism in Australia is very heavily derivative of US extremism, and readily borrows its tactics, ideas and slogans.
While the Victorian Liberal Party is the centre of this shift towards a far more extreme and dangerous political environment, it is only going where other branches of the Coalition have gone before it.
Those with long memories will recall that a key issue that caused problems for the Howard government was preferencing One Nation, with John Howard happy to allow Pauline Hanson and her candidates to be preferenced ahead of Labor and other senior Liberals, who regarded her racism as beyond the pale, wanting her to be put last in all circumstances. Eventually Howard had to succumb to more moderate opinion.
In recent years, the Nationals simply abandoned that policy and began preferencing One Nation ahead of Labor — even after Hanson and her apparatchiks were revealed to have sought US help to undermine Australia’s gun laws. It took that scandal to force Scott Morrison in 2019 to announce One Nation would be preferenced below Labor by the Liberals. But in this year’s election, the LNP in Queensland put One Nation ahead of Labor in most electorates.
That all occurred with minimal outrage from the media — Howard must have wondered why he copped so much heat for something the press gallery mostly now ignores.
The Nationals and the LNP’s treatment of Hanson was another step in the normalisation of right-wing extremism in Australian politics — by which blatant racism was no longer seen as a disqualifying feature for participation in political life. It’s little wonder that a young Victorian Liberal candidate should attack Indigenous peoples and call for nuclear waste to be dumped in Alice Springs — such views are little different to those espoused by parties preferenced by the Nationals and the LNP.
And despite the efforts of candidates guilty of urging the murder of Andrews to crabwalk away from their comments, such rhetoric has real consequences. The more that violent rhetoric is given a platform, the more people it reaches. And the more people it reaches, the more statistically likely an individual is to be motivated to engage in violence.
Urge the killing of a politician often enough, loud enough and with enough amplification, and eventually the message will reach someone at risk of acting on it. And if it comes from a mainstream, legitimate source — a Liberal Party candidate, for example, or a serving politician — that increases the odds still further.
That’s exactly what’s happened in the US as political violence and violent assaults on synagogues, mosques, LGBTIQA+ people and women have ramped up as Republicans regularly use violent rhetoric and right-wing media like Fox News try to shift blame and play down violence.
This is not something turned around easily or quickly. Especially not if one of the principal vectors of it, the Victorian Liberals, do nothing.
Watching from another State and seeing the headlines of particular newspapers, mainly those belonging to Newscorp , including SkyNews, there has been unrelenting attacks on Dan Andrews, even replicated at times on the ABC and other news sources, and supported by the Liberal Party.. These attacks are not rational, well researched analysis but rather irrational propaganda. No wonder permission has been given in that State for adherents of extremist groups to run amok. This is very sad for Victorians but also demonstrates the ongoing demise of the Liberal Party and of media. It’s time for something to be done about truth in media and media ownership, and for the Liberal Party to do an in-depth review and renewal of itself
Nothing irrational about it. Post-Trump the Right has adopted a take no prisoners ideology. One can only hope this will blow up in the faces of the Victorian Liberals the way it did in the US mid-terms.
It would not be so bad if the Victorian Liberals were only doing nothing. Instead they are hell-bent on making things worse and the article lists many of the things they are doing. It is also too narrow to see this as a threat only to the more obvious targets such as the article cites: synagogues, mosques, LGBTIQA+ people and women. That’s just the beginning. Look at any country where the political system falls under the control of the far right. The assault quickly spreads to: removing independent judges so that the judicial system works for the ruling party; carrying out similar purges of all ostensibly independent agencies and replacing them with party stooges; and barring political opponents and their parties so that voting is just a ritual that cannot threaten the ruling party. The signs are already obvious. The Victorian Liberal candidates’ various attacks on their opponents including Dan Andrews go far beyond legitimate political debate. It is an absolute denial of the legitimacy of all opponents. The Victorian Liberals are also trying to destroy the legitimacy of bodies such as the Victorian Electoral Commission and the state’s integrity commission.
Maybe Australia will not collapse so quickly and easily under such assaults because it has advantages that countries like the USA do not, in particular, compulsory voting. But there are senior Liberals and others working to end that too.
Precisely. The obsession. With appealing to the base makes sense in a voluntary voting system, but is counterproductive in a compulsory one.
I have an idea that I read somewhere that when Howard briefly controlled the Senate, they looked into voluntary voting and decided that compulsory voting saves political parties a motza in having to get the voters out.
You really don’t expect much different from the Conservatives as their political power ebbs away, but what is really disturbing is just how many voters are now sufficiently brain dead to believe this nonsense.
Years of Hollywood propaganda and relentless advertising lies have had their effect – I hope our education system is able to reverse this americanisation of our thinking and understanding.
“You really don’t expect much different from the Conservatives as their political power ebbs away” – cornered rats* will fight to the death
*no offence SSR
What really irks the crap out of me, is that these all-too common bozos suddenly have vast reserves of scepticism when it comes to any attempt to inform them about the true nature of their chosen team, regardless of how obvious the stupid evil becomes.
These turkeys dribble on about conspiracies, but the LNP, the BCA, the IPA, News Ltd, squeaky clean.
Yes, I see disturbing parallels with the governments of Hungary and Poland.
Chile?
Agree with lots of this Sinking Ship Rat. As an equal opportunity sceptic of political parties though, the far left is just as bad – didn’t Dan do some of the same? I reckon the answer is a VAST load of independents, who are not beholden to the gambling industry and reshape parliament with them.
What is this “far left” of who you speak?
Dan Andrews?
What is this “far left” of which you speak ?
Like others have commented already, who or what is this “far left” of which you speak? It cannot, so far as I can see, be anybody already elected to either house of the Victorian Parliament, or any candidate for any party present there. So far as they are not on the right they all appear to be playing by the rules, such as they are, and none of them show any signs of trying to break or undermine what passes for democracy here. They are not engaged in sedition and they are not trying to incite public violence including assassination of their opponents. I’ll freely admit they have plenty of faults, including taking donations they would be better off refusing, but there are lines already crossed by the Liberals they show no signs of crossing.
If there really is some “far left” which is “just as bad” it is also wholly irrelevant compared to size, wealth, connections and influence of the Liberals.
It’s a bit much to call Dan Andrews far left but the rest of your point is well made in my view.
If you think Dan Andrews is the far-Left, then you have no idea where the centre is.
Can you provide an example of this type of behaviour from the “far left” in the context and time frame of this debate? Thanks.
As in so many other areas, the rot started with John Howard and has continued since. I think it was Andrew Markus who referred to Howard’s “re-naturalizing” of bigotry. This was a core project for Howard – making Australians more tolerant of racism and seeking to reduce the political costs of “dog-whistling” to racist voters. To this end, Howard used Hanson as a proxy, dismissing criticism of her anti-Aboriginal and anti-Asian comments as the “political correctness” of “cultural dieticians”. while he didn’t hesitate to attack her views on free trade. Howard’s dismissal of historians critical of Australia’s racist past as “black armband” historians, and his attempts to undermine any legal or political gains won by First Nations people, his demonizing of refugees, it all hangs together. Howard: the Great White Ant.
Don’t forget his normalizing of the lunatic “Plymouth Brethren”……………
……….that was the start of the infiltration of the Liberal party by the religious loonies.
Very much so and the US fulcrum of that movement is deceased white nationalist John ‘passive eugenics’ Tanton who was at the fossil fueled ZPG late ’70s, which morphed into an Anglosphere network of faux environmental NGOs positing that fertility, refugees, immigrants and population growth are the environmental ‘hygiene’ issue of our time (while omitting fossil fuels & climate science).
Tanton was keen on the white Australia policy, had visited and was hosted by a local ‘population’ NGO linked to him (with two former Labor Ministers), while he is the muse of or with influence on Bannon, Farage, alt right, ‘great replacement’, GOP, Fidesz (Hungary), LNP & Tory immigration policies; the present dog whistling over Channel refugees in UK is centred on Tanton linked Migration Watch.
The Libs keep asking why they are unelectable. Hello! Look at the quality (mediocrity) of candidates they put forward.
I sincerely hope that revolting Liberal candidate for Narre Warren North fails in his bid. Appalling prat.
Just what is the Liberal Party/Coalition good for anymore? .. And, for that matter, those large swathes of our partisan, politically active, media?:
Yes imagine how the Libs would do without Murdoch – probably fewer votes than the Greens and Independents – whoops – isn’t that where they are heading now?
Thermal coal companies. That’s about it.