In March, Victorian Opposition Leader John Pesutto released a statement on the latest neo-Nazi protest at the steps of Victorian Parliament in which he condemned the “shameful individuals and the hateful ideology they push”.
The statement stood out for its strong, unequivocal language. But it is no longer guaranteed that neo-Nazis will be unequivocally condemned in terms that leave them with no place to hide, whether in our political parties, social movements or society more broadly. It seems “How will the neo-Nazis feel?” is becoming a real electoral consideration.
I am not joking and I wish I was exaggerating, but Pesutto’s stance has made his leadership weaker. On Saturday he was booed and heckled at the Liberal Party’s state council in Bendigo by supporters of Moira Deeming. This spectacle began when Pesutto initiated proceedings to expel Deeming over her involvement in an anti-transgender rally that attracted the support of neo-Nazis, a separate neo-Nazi rally from the aforementioned one.
Pesutto also condemned that rally and went further by seeking to expel Deeming. In the end, she survived the push for expulsion. Yet the drama didn’t end there.
In what would rival any episode in any reality television franchise anywhere, Deeming issued a statement threatening to sue Pesutto for defamation. With this threat at the leadership, a second expulsion push commenced. Deeming backtracked and released another statement denying she planned to sue. In return, Pesutto confirmed he did, in fact, receive a defamation concerns notice from Deeming’s lawyer. This time Deeming did not survive expulsion.
Lost the play but not the game
It seems Deeming miscalculated in a manner the young and the hip would surmise as: “You played yourself.” Yet while she may have lost the play, she hasn’t lost the game. This weekend her supporters booed and heckled Pesutto. The results are that Pesutto’s leadership is reported to be under more stress than before. And despite avoiding a potential federal takeover by Opposition Leader Peter Dutton, the party is split and still floundering in ideological disarray.
To settle this dispute, Deeming demanded that Pesutto make a public statement that exonerates her “from all allegations and imputations” that she is a Nazi or Nazi sympathiser. She appears to be aware only strong and unequivocal language can dispel allegations and imputations to clear her name.
I can only say: same. Like Deeming, but for different reasons, I appreciate the use of only strong and unequivocal language for certain things — like condemning Nazis. Silence is not enough. And statements hanging on some vague expression of “freedom of speech” or “broad church” wouldn’t cut through to leave no imputations that Nazis have no place, no place at all, in our political life or social movements.
Yet to have this expectation for clear condemnation, an expectation that Deeming claims for herself and for which she clearly understands its social value, is treated as an unfair attack through guilt by association. The opposition is that to maintain this expectation is unwarranted because it assumes an association that must be dispelled. What is expected instead is that in good faith we assume no association exists even with the presence of neo-Nazis at your events.
That view is not without merit. What weight to give to the merits of that view, however, is not informed only by the style of debate we adopt, but also the political realities of our times. The need for unequivocal condemnation might not be great if the threat is theoretical. It is not.
Principle of white supremacy
The core idea of neo-Nazis and far-right extremists is white supremacy. In the United States, white supremacists and other far-right extremists are “the most significant domestic terrorism threat” according to a bill presented to the US Congress. Here the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) warns the neo-Nazi threat is becoming a significant security challenge, especially as these hate groups are becoming more organised and “politically” sophisticated. The threat is real and growing.
A key player in the neo-Nazi scene in Australia involves the neo-Nazis who rallied twice at the steps of the Victorian Parliament this year. They are Australia’s largest neo-Nazi group and have been linked to the Australian white supremacist who killed 50 Muslims in Christchurch, New Zealand, as they worshipped. The Christchurch royal commission report revealed that the shooter was an “active member” of the online groups run by the neo-Nazis who organised the Melbourne rallies. Years before his killing he had voiced support for their leader at the time calling him the “emperor”.
The Christchurch terrorist is also linked to the current leader of the neo-Nazis, Tom Sewell, who organised and led both rallies. Sewell is mentioned in the Christchurch royal commission report. He had previously approached the shooter to join his group. The shooter turned him down so he could commit his massacre. The youngest victim was three-year-old Mucad Ibrahim who ran towards the gunman. He killed him. This brutality, this cruelty, this senseless violence is today a source of inspiration to the neo-Nazis who used the footage of the massacre as a recruiting tool and see the terrorist as a hero.
These are the political realities of our times.
Guilt by association
When you add to these realities the known facts that neo-Nazis groups are interested in infiltrating Australian politics “by having candidates elected and lobbying conservative politicians to drive them to the far right”, and they are sophisticated enough, according to the ASIO chief, to “not openly showing their true ideology and not openly showing their violent beliefs or their use of violence”, the issues of guilt by association become far more complex.
The expectation that politicians, or leaders of social movements, denounce neo-Nazis in explicit terms, in my view, is the bare minimum of leadership needed for our times. It does not matter whether they gatecrashed your movement or your political party. The fact that they think you have something in common should be concerning enough to distance yourself from a group that celebrates genocide as a source of inspiration for humankind.
If leaders of political parties or movements remain silent, or refuse to condemn neo-Nazis who hijack their programs, and cannot unequivocally condemn, we cannot unequivocally claim you have no associations. All we can assume and say is that we do not know where you stand. That is a cautious approach for serious times. This, however, is not a complete answer to the issues.
The problem, for people like Deeming and the Liberal Party is that association isn’t one-way. Even if you claim you are not associated with neo-Nazis, neo-Nazis can believe they are associated with you. It is not by coincidence that it is the conservative political parties that are the targets of neo-Nazis’ desire to infiltrate Australian politics and turn them into instruments for their “hateful ideology”. It is not accidental that they gatecrashed the anti-trans protest in support of the anti-trans movement. Nor is it by chance that 48 hours after Dutton’s budget reply linked migration to concerns about housing and infrastructure, neo-Nazis staged an anti-immigration rally calling to stop immigration and for “living space for whites”.
Finally, it was not destiny that Dutton led the racially charged “African gangs” campaign and neo-Nazis responded by holding rallies against African gangs. As Andrew Gillum said to Ron DeSantis after his too many coincidences with white supremacists and neo-Nazis: “I’m not calling Mr DeSantis a racist. I’m simply saying the racists believe he’s a racist.”
The same can be said here. It is not that Deeming and the Liberals are neo-Nazis sympathisers, it is that neo-Nazis believe they are neo-Nazi sympathisers. This is why leadership matters. This is why language matters.
Language matters
The leadership needed is one willing to use the languages required by our times and political realities. Unequivocally condemning groups such as neo-Nazis isolates them and provides them with no rhetorical covers while stripping them of any legitimacy to participate in public debate. Such leadership sets the tone and gives others confidence in the leader’s stance. Of all things, it is the lack of leadership, or what goes for leadership, that is most concerning — especially on the political right.
We no longer seem to have political leaders; we seem to have entertainers, and worse, people whose public conduct is closer to a YouTube star or a social media influencer. In part this is because the Australian political right has been captured by Australia right-wing media. That relationship has transformed the nature of conservative parties as normal political parties and the character of their leaders as political leaders.
Instead of governance we have entertainment. In place of considered policy debates, we are subjected to slogans, rage-baits, race-baits, or just plain governance by “shit-posting”. In this environment, it does not seem out of place that a potential future prime minister would describe a large part of “his” population as “dirty lefties”. It is as if he could never owe them anything.
But dirty lefties or not, these are Australians for whom any Australian prime minister owes a duty by virtue of public office. Of course this style of leadership is not contained to the political right; it can be found in many sectors. On the right, however, it seems far more consequential.
The consequences are there in the effects of climate-change denialism, despite climate change being a threat to our ecology, economy and national security. It is there in the opposition to the Voice which conservative politicians first supported and then abandoned. What is next is whether this leadership will fail us in its response to far-right extremist and neo-Nazi threats.
The response so far has not been encouraging. It is hard to believe a person who can’t condemn a thing in strong words will oppose the thing with strong deeds.
Well said, Nyudol, from beginning to end. Thank you.
Agree excellent piece. Particularly the corruption of politics as entertainment, the ultimate logic of a reliance on commercial media for news and information. One could say thank goodness for the ABC, but they are increasingly under the hegemony of commercial media models and imperatives. Something the commercial media and Coalition politicians push for continuously. This problem of commercial imperatives ‘trumping’ everything sits within or alongside what I call the rise and rise of Strat comms, where decisions in all organisations are increasingly decisively made by spin doctors. A surreal Utopia world where appearance is everything. The rise of people who lack any expert knowledge except a tactical one related to manipulation.
To the core of Nyadol’s argument, one thing a tolerant society cannot tolerate is intolerance. Neatly outlined for current times by Levitsky and Ziblatt’s How Democracies Die. For the classic lesson in this, the actual history of the rise of Nazism, the conservative parties, eager to protect wealth, fellow-travelled with what seemed (to them) an increasingly reasonable Nazi party, until wasn’t.
All very performative, and part of that ‘manipulation’ is focused upon not just language of PR, but political communication changing meaning, to preclude context or comparison and analysis.
This is achieved by focus on the now & oneself, Orwellian doublespeak, faux ‘freedom of speech’, closed ‘gotcha’ questions for yes/no responses (authoritarian), glibness & shallowness, encouraging gut instinct or beliefs over rational thinking, and shortened attention spans.
Makes for maybe a noisy society or ‘quiet Australians’ on sociocultural issues (inc. misdirection), but still passive on more substantive issues that are then able to pass without scrutiny….
Agreed. This is an excellent article. It is a pity that readers of the Herald-Sun and its equivalents elsewhere will never read anything like it.
I heard Pasutto interviewed this morning on ABC RN and was so relieved to hear a Liberal (other than Bridget Archer) stand for the values that once characterised many leading members of that party.
If Dutton et al think that supporting racism and other forms of bigotry will lead to electoral success, then its fair to assume that Labor will be in government for the foreseeable future – or at least until the Teals, other independents + the Greens can collaborate in a new coalition.
The starting point is that odious little toad J W Howard. Fraser, Hawke or Keating would have crucified Hanson, but Howard gave aid and comfort. this set the scene for the acceptance of neo fascism from Abbott and Morrison and by their failure to speak up they endorse it. Dutton seems to be a sympathiser. If we can outlaw motorcycle gangs or jihadist groups, why can we not outlaw these scum?
Dutton cannot bring himself to condemn Neo-Nazis………………….
………..their beliefs have much in common.
Dawp…….
An article about neo-n**** blocks the use of the word neo-n***?
Grow up, guys.
Yes and I mentioned the party with you know, 1930s German supremacy, now awaiting approval. Can’t work out if this supports the argument for zero tolerance or not, a postmodern conundrum.
Try Na2is.
Little Johnny was the worst kind of political opportunist who saw value only in what could keep him in the Prime Ministership. Even his own party couldn’t get rid of him. It took his own electorate to kick him out, but the LNP ever since has lauded him as a political hero and economic genius, despite his very obvious failings and the damage he did to the country through his moral apathy.
We have now lived through a period of one of the most ethically compromised governments in history, where a free-for-all in the use of public money for private enrichment has been coupled with a targeting of both individuals and specific demographic groups for the purposes of creating handy political scapegoats.
The milquetoast management of purveyors of hate both on social media and in public protests is a shameful reminder that fish rot from the head. The stink is now so pervasive that only someone with a peg on their moral proboscis can be unaware of how far this country has fallen into moral turpitude.
When will we see the same trenchant policing of rightwing demonstrations, just for one example, as has been applied to climate protesters? When I see a few black-clad balaclava-wearing men with tatts being carted off to prison I will consider we have taken this right wing threat seriously.
Waiting, waiting, waiting…….
That just demonstrates how bereft it is of talent or integrity.
I suspect that Little Johnny Eyebrows in fact died some years ago, but was zombified by the LNP’s resident Bokor in order to be wheeled out (in some cases, quite literally) in order to guarantee failure of their chosen candidate………………………
Between elections, I understand he spends his time in a sumptuously-appointed coffin to avoid dry-rot or rising damp.
The police and security services are blind in the right eye.
I did like the head of the Oathkeepers being jailed for 18 years for his part in the insurrection.
What worries me is that moderates don’t seem to have the courage to indict Trump and all the others including Murdoch for this threat to democracy.
Don’t forget pollsters, influencers, NGOs etc. and resurrecting proxy white Australia with potential border &/or population control via immigration restrictions to rev up the nativist right, and left…. by presenting as an environmental issue; greenwashing bigotry and blocking environmental regulation has been central to politics for a generation.
When Hanson looked like holding the balance of power in the Queensland government, I seriously considered going OS for the foreseeable.
That was 199??????????
And she and her ilk are still around and living on the sunshine coast near a fellow traveler Clive Palmer.
To be fair though where would LNP membership be nationwide without RWNJs? I’m sure a “very fine people” remark isn’t far off from old mate Spud.
For one we wouldn’t have that suppository of wisdom Teena McQueen as vice president of the NSW LNP. She is really something to behold. Given her unwavering support for all things Trump I wouldn’t be surprised to hear her say there are very fine people on both sides when discussed white supremacists in Australia
Dutton is from the extreme right and does not hide his racism, his notion of white supremacy and desire to see Australia at war with China. It’s unfathomable that the Australian [?] Broadcasting Corporationgive him a platform……..
The ABC give a platform to a lot of people that haven’t earned their right to voice an opinion, or a particular opinion. Another reason people are turning off.
He is an ex-Queensland cop after all. Why expect anything different?
More to the point he is an ex QLD copper who the Queensland coppers were happy to see leave the force