The Denial of Australia’s Moral Disintegration
History will judge us harshly.
Author’s note: This was written in 2014. Haven’t gotten around to publishingit, but want to follow up about further developments in another piece. So here it is, however finished or unfinished.
The Australian Psyche — as much as amorphous general phrases such as that are useful — is often lauded for it’s love of the underdog, for it’s love of the battler, and for any person or group that punches above it’s weight. It’s actually, a lot of the time, how Australians see the country. Whether it’s on the sporting field, or at Anzac Cove, we think of ourselves as the little country that could.
There is more than a little hint of insecurity wrapped up in that ethos though. We, on the one hand, decry the Americanization of our language (see what I did there?) while on the other hand associate just about anywhere else but here as the best, or the worst, at any field or endeavour you care to mention.
The one area where we are most starkly in denial about our country must be our human rights record. We refuse to believe it, we refuse to engage with it, but we are absolutely world class when it comes to human rights abuse.
If you’re Australian, and wondering how human tragedies happen, the answer is, you’re living in it. It’s too obvious and probably hyperbole to use the traditional comparison of Nazi Germany, but I don’t think it’s too much of a stretch to do some comparisons with some other historic moral brain farts by populations. Apartheid South Africa comes to mind. It certainly does for John Pilger:
Having reported from South Africa, I was struck by the similarity of white supremacy and the compliance and defensiveness of liberals [DM: small l liberals].
And the metrics for Aboriginal health, education and incarceration, amongst other things, back him up.
Perhaps we can also have a glance at Turkey. The state's official denial of the existence of the Armenian Genocide continues. Australia's official stance on that hasn’t changed, and we’re somehow still one of the countries that hasn’t acknowledged the genocide, at least at a federal level. Perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised, there seems to be a lot of money wrapped up in Anzac memorials, particularly coming up to the centenary.
For all Turkey’s threats that officially recognising the genocide would destroy the Australian–Turkish friendship, elaborate plans to mark the Anzac centenary continue, with Turkey set to reap rich financial rewards from battlefield tourism.
At this stage, the Australian federal government does not officially recognise the genocide, but may well do so after Gallipoli 2015.
I love the smell of official fiscal pragmatism messing with the facts of history and the memorial of tragedy.
Until depressingly recently, official recognition of the Stolen Generations, and an apology, weren’t really on the radar. Prime Minister John Howard was, and still is, against it. One of Kevin Rudd’s moments of moral excellence was his decision to go ahead and say sorry. Unfortunately, it’s at best questionable whether the other important parts that go along with true reconciliation are actually taking place. PR is easy, but governments do seem to struggle with actually making reparations when the rubber hits the road. So it’s probably fair to say that while Australia’s relationship to it’s history isn't quite in the same league as Turkey’s, it's certainly playing the same sport.
Speaking of sport, Adam Goodes was just announced as Australian of the Year. It's highlighted how much work is to be done. The growing unease around Australia Day feels like a battle that is only just beginning, but part of a larger war.
Which is all a long way of saying that the white population's relationship with the history of the first Australians is one of uneasy denial. An unwillingness to admit we might be able to compete with the USA, or Colonial Britain, when it comes to treatment of indigenous peoples? Now it's just a matter of contextualising the current state of affairs. The consensus seems to be that what happened is done, history - if not ancient, then certainly far enough back to remain comfortable.
What about a situation that is agreed by all to be contemporary.
Boats. With Asylum Seekers on them.
Insulated as I am - physically within the inner city of Melbourne, where the Greens can actually win a lower house seat, virtually on social media following my friends, and the ASRC and Julian Burnside, or Amnesty, or Human Rights Watch - I can sometimes miss the tenor of the rest of the country. And then I come across things like this:
A poll last month had 60 per cent of us urging the Abbott government to ‘’increase the severity’’ of our policies towards asylum seekers. That’s not a pragmatic policy judgement. We find something cathartic about this official form of violence.
That’s a clear majority of Australians not just sanctioning harsh treatment of Asylum Seekers, they’re actively encouraging worse treatment than what is currently being doled out. Whatever we want to label it - inhumanity, a lack of empathy, a lack of informed opinion, all of the above — we are undoubtedly world class at it. The only question that remains is, are we happy with that?
I began writing this piece prior to the events on Manus Island on the 18th of February. I began writing it wondering what sort of tragedy it would take to sway that 60% of Australians who seemed to have shut off their ability to walk in another’s shoes. Since then, as well as Manus Island, an Eritrian man(Rezene Mebrahtu Engeda) has drowned himself rather than be sent back to his country of birth. In a river 10 minutes walk from my home.
The reality is here, people are dying on our watch. But nothing seems to change the tenor of the conversation being had in this country. The information is there, the camps are the stuff of dystopian science fiction/horror, World War II movies, or Russian Gulags, or Abu Griab.
Yet no matter the blown whistles(see here, and here, and here) the majority of the country seems determined to ignore what is happening. Relegate it to the “in news from around the world” pile.
And successive governments are happy with this, and can tailor their policy with impunity to be completely pragmatic. What’s happened recently is fine by the current government. There is clear logic to what they are doing, it’s just that what they’ve seen as the pressure point to solve the problem of boat arrivals involves a pathological obsession with the most vulnerable stakeholders in what is a worldwide issue.
The ALP sometimes seems to be torn between principle and pragmatism. However, Labor can’t outgun the Coalition on pragmatism — its whole policy approach is totally opportunistic.
But compassion, like honour or truth, can’t just be a matter of calculation — “if it’s popular, we’ll do it, if not, not!”
Tony Abbott:
“We will not succumb to pressure, to moral blackmail,” he said. “We will ensure these camps are run fairly, if necessary, firmly.”
There are a number of questions here, and unfortunately for Tony, and those that agree with his policies, they are all moral. Does he think it’s a moral good not to succumb to “moral blackmail”? Is that just another way of saying “moral argument”? And if it is, and he won’t succumb to this particular moral argument, then what are his counter arguments, do they only involve talk of queues or supposedly saving lives at sea?
When dealing with the plight of other human beings, is there ever a point where moral questions can’t be asked? If there is, I cannot believe that that point is anywhere near the discussion of potential refugees.
These questions can be asked of the 60% too. What are their moral arguments for the current situation? I am genuinely curious. As we’re the only country that distinguishes between different methods of arrival, and given the nature of seeking asylum and the desperate measures people naturally take when trying to flee for their lives, and given the numbers in need versus what near by receiving countries can accommodate, talk of queues seems to me completely detached from reality. “The case of Latifa, a 31-year-old woman of the persecuted Rohingya people of Myanmar” seems a nice piece of “moral blackmail” for Tony and co. She had “ spent nearly 10 years in a refugee camp in Malaysia.” Only to end up with her baby taken from her:
[Latifa]is being locked up for 18 hours a day in a detention centre in Brisbane while her week-old baby remains in hospital with respiratory problems.
She was separated from her baby on Sunday, four days after a caesarean delivery, and has since been allowed to visit him only between 10am and 4pm in Brisbane’s Mater Hospital. The boy, named Farus, has respiratory problems and needs round-the-clock medical care.
The queue appears to be at least 10 years long, and the start of it is elusive (read non-existent).
All of which is particularly galling when put in context with the financial situation for Australians compared to the rest of the world.
Net Assets of $10,000 puts a person in the top third of the world’s population, Australia’s average wealth per adult is $US40,000, and “half our adult population is worth more than $US219,500, the highest median wealth in the world.”
Yet:
The Abbott government is cutting $4.5 billion from the aid budget over four years because politically it is safe to do so. In a world in which Australians are the most advantaged of all people, that’s a depressing measure of national selfishness.
So let’s put this in some sort of order and context. We are very much a lucky country, by any sort of measure you’d like to use. We are financially well off, we have low population density, we have natural resources, and we have an excellent standard of living. This, and a poisonus political landscape for the last decade, has left us drinking the Aussie Battling-I have Anzac blood-oi-oi-oi Cool-aid, which has a side effect of leaving us ignoring our fellow human beings.
We are, apparently, world class at ignoring tragedy, and we are, ever more, isolating ourselves from the world around us. In places like Hungary they close detention centres and adjust policy due to triggers that would barely raise an eyebrow here, probably because they have actual borders, with actual countries right next to them.
It’s still too early to really see what effect the murder of Reza Berati and the recent onslaught of footage from within some of the camps will have. It’s hard to not be cynical. From Children Overboard to children in detention, to Go Back to Where You Came From it seems living in comfort makes people blind to the obvious imorality of what our country is doing.
I want to believe things are changing. I hope this momentum sticks. I know the tireless work of the Asylum Seeker Resource Centre is on going. But it’s an uphill battle.
Let’s hope we find our moral compass.
History will judge us harshly.
