I’ve been asked to write this post by strangers and friends. But I wanted to solidify my own thoughts, too.
Please note: This post has been continuously updated to 11 January 2020.
I don’t want to fling outrage and insults in an unhelpful manner. And I don’t want to merely continue to share the dramatic images and tell my followers to donate to the effort, sighing that “it’s so sad”.
I want to be fully informed and deadly effective.
As Australia burns – 28 confirmed dead, 1.25 million animals killed – many of us are raging at Prime Minster Scott Morrison, but remain unsure whether our rage is appropriate, or “allowed”. Indeed, I’m witnessing influencers share the dramatic images accompanied by split heart emotions with the message that we should not be political right now. This stuns me. Politics didn’t flick the match, sure. But clearly politics permeates the whole sorry situation. Plus, crucially, compassionate, competent political leadership is what we need to move forward….and it’s sorely absent. Indeed, ScoMo’s leadership is proving wholly unkind, incompetent and political.
We are also confused as to what rationale we can use in a considered debate. And what power we might have as individuals to change things. We feel overwhelmed hopeless, helpless and disempowered.
My take: Over several decades we have become politically disengaged, lulled into a false and constructed belief that “those in charge” will do the right thing, and that “someone else” will hold them accountable if they don’t. Like the media. Or other politicians. But those in charge haven’t been doing the right thing. They’ve ruined our water supply, our reefs, they’ve sold off chunks of our land, they’ve allowed thousands of animals to become extinct. And they’ve got away with it because we’ve not been paying attention and we’ve half-bought their non-truths and distractions (while the media’s impartiality has been eroded). I think we are now genuinely bewildered that we have landed in a place so dire. How did this happen? Why didn’t anyone do anything? Why weren’t we warned?
And we feel guilty and embarrassed for allowing it to happen.
[click_to_tweet tweet=”In part due to our guilt, we struggle to accept that when governments fail us, it’s our right to get activist, to drag the people we pay to represent us over the coals. It’s deeply uncomfortable – and seems feral and extremist! – but here we are. ” quote=”At the same time, and in part due to our guilt, we struggle to accept that when governments fail us, it’s our right – our responsibility – to get activist, to overthrow, to drag the people we pay to represent us over the coals. It’s deeply uncomfortable – and seems feral and extremist! – but here we are. “]
(In my next post I’ll show how to go about doing this in a deadly effective and non-feral way.)
I think we all know that it’s time to engage in our rage and pay attention. And to get deadly effective, and not just pay hashtagged “thoughts and prayers” lip service.
Perhaps this will be useful…
A rundown of why ScoMo must be held to account…
… with links to reputable, impartial sources, such as The Conversation, The Guardian, The ABC, as well as traditionally Liberal party-propping papers, for (admittedly, undeserved) “balance”. Don’t take my word for it…read up. Think, reflect, ask questions. Discuss calmly and kindly with truth, compassion and effectiveness as the end goal.
Please note, I refer to our Prime Minister as ScoMo as this is what he calls himself, plus it represents his very inappropriateness and lack of awareness – it feels entirely inappropriate that a nation’s leader should refer to himself by a nickname!
The ScoMo Government was warned of the fires.
Former fire and safety chiefs – 23 of them – wrote to Scott Morrison in April, requesting they meet to speak to him about the effects of climate change and the “catastrophic extreme weather events putting lives, properties and livelihoods at greater risk”. ScoMo refused the invite. Indeed the Government has ignored countless warnings over three decades – check out this rundown – including those calling for a national large air-tanker fleet in May 2016, that could have radically reduced the effect of the fires.
On top of this, a major report by Professor Ross Garnaut commissioned by the government at the time in 2007 and delivered in 2008 clearly predicted catastrophic fire “in 2020” if nothing is done.
And yet he continues to try and dupe us, repeatedly saying, “No one could have predicted this”.
Then ScoMo told us we were panicking, his government accused us of being raging “lunatics” and tried to ban protests and the democratic right to speak up.
In November he told coal industry folk of “a new breed of radical activist, apocalyptic in tone and an insidious threat” then promised new legislation to have them arrested. In addition, his government has been cracking down on unions, civic organizations and journalists. Under legislation pending in Tasmania environmental protesters now face up to 21 years in jail for demonstrating.
This is the behaviour of a dictator, no?
And denied additional funding to the firefighters.
And did so on that day in December of Sydney’s worst air pollution on record, equivalent to smoking 32 cigarettes a day.
Then he went on holiday in Hawaii
Is this so bad? Everyone needs a holiday. Yeah. Except leaders don’t do holidays in crises. They just don’t.
Which says to me, he doesn’t think we’re in crisis. Or he can’t admit to it. I’ll say it a few times here, he doesn’t get it.
The details of how he handled things in the aftermath are just horrible, including his blaming his kids and issuing the classic “I’m sorry if I offended people” style of non-apology. I’ll leave it to you to read the links.
(On top of this, his office denied he was there. Then he was seen having drinks after tweeting he was rushing home. Then he refused to rule out not taking another holiday within a week or so.)
Which leads to his coal interests
I can’t do the layers of vested interest this Government has in the fossil fuel industry justice here. I recommend you watch this 15 minute documentary by investigative journalist Michael West. It was released in May 2019, but is still relevant. It’s stunning and sickening. But you must watch it. It brings together many of the news items you’ve probably been grabbing glimpses of over the past few years.
Be sure to form your own opinion, though.
Also in November, just before he came out declaring that there is no link between coal, climate change and the fires (see below), a major UN report forecast Australia to be the sixth-largest producer of fossil fuels by 2030, contributing to a carbon emission prediction four times what’s required to keep global heating below the 1.5C we know to be the dangerous tipping point for our survival.
When ScoMo claims – with much bluster – that we are too small a country to make a difference to global CO2 emissions, he is totally ignoring this vital point. I’ll say it again: sixth-largest producer of fossil fuels!
According to the Economist: “The report lays much blame on (the Australian) governments’ generosity to fossil-fuel industries” and details at length how Australia supports its fossil fuel industries.
And his religious beliefs…
We have been left to wonder if ScoMo’s Pentecostal faith has had a part to play in his decisions.
Yes, absolutely, he has a right to his faith. (And the fundamentals of Christianity and most spiritual traditions pose little threat to our democracy, and mostly nourish it.) So long as he does not allow it to influence his politics in a detrimental, unrepresentative way. As a bare minimum.
Most Pentecostals are eschatological, awaiting the second coming of Jesus triggered by cataclysmic events. My understanding is that many believe that we are all living in the “end times” now. And so no need to act on potentially cataclysmic, apocalyptic stuff… ‘cos Jesus is coming!!
The thing is, this “rapture” sees only believers saved and lifted to heaven. The rest of us are left to literally burn in hell (on earth).
I’m asking myself, as are many, how much of Scomo’s inaction is to do with this hardcore faith. And, if he’s a true believer, where is he leading the rest of us?
I feel awkward raising this. It’s almost unfathomable and, thus, seems wrong to raise it as a consideration. But the suggestion has come from former members of ScoMo’s church and, given the extremities playing out, and the irrational response from our Prime Minister right now, it’s fair to ask the question. And we have a right to know the answers.
Within days of denying additional funding to volunteer fire fighters, he gave $111,000 to his church.
Which is not a lot of cash in the scheme, but, again, it’s just not what a leader does. Also on that day in December of Sydney’s worst air pollution on record, ScoMo pushed through his amended religious freedom legislation, holds a press conference and the whole circus. Crook. Look. Deeply insensitive. At. Best
Then he actually AXED THE ENVIRONMENT DEPARTMENT!
Yep! And dumped the portfolio into Agriculture where Barnaby Joyce and Michael McCormack (he of the “inner-city lunatics” line) are to take care of things. Since then, McCormack has * actually* blamed the fires on exploding horse manure.
The best experts in the country confirm climate change is at play. ScoMo has denied this repeatedly.
In November 2019, Scott Morrison argued there is no direct link between greenhouse gas emissions and the severity of fires ravaging the country. “The suggestion that any way shape or form that Australia, accountable for 1.3% of the world’s emissions, that the individual actions of Australia are impacting directly on specific fire events, whether it’s here or anywhere else in the world, that doesn’t bear up to credible scientific evidence either”.
Which is patently untrue (need we even remind ourselves of this?). The leading experts in the world categorically confirm the connection between coal, climate change and the fires.
He even said we could increase emissions.
Meanwhile, the world’s media and leaders are talking about our PM as laughing stock. And dangerous.
He then backflipped. And lied.
In early January 2020 he claimed, after observing his “quiet Australians” getting loud and angry,“the government has always made the connection between climate change and extreme weather conditions.”
Is it deluded, immoral or just truly inappropriate leadership to treat us as idiots in this way? You decide.
Meanwhile, the Government tried to wriggle out of our existing and thin climate commitments.
During all this, at the Madrid conference, Australia was accused of “cheating” and named as one of a handful of nations that thwarted the Paris climate agreement. Embarrassing.
And just as Australia got ranked 57th out of 57 countries on climate change policy.
Australia scored the lowest possible rating of 0.0, compared with the highest-scoring country, Portugal, which was ranked best for its climate policy at 97.8 per cent. The 2020 Climate Change Performance Index, prepared by a group of thinktanks comprising the NewClimate Institute, the Climate Action Network and Germanwatch, looks at national climate action across the categories of emissions, renewable energy, energy use and policy.
On the assessment of national and international climate policy, Australia was singled out as the worst-performing, with the report saying the re-elected Morrison government “has continued to worsen performance at both national and international levels”.
“Experts observe a lack of progress to reduce the country’s very high level of emissions,” Greenwatch policy adviser Ursurla Hagen said. “With greenhouse gas per capita emissions of 21.1 tonnes, Australia ranks last for the indicator on current levels in the greenhouse gas emissions category. Further, experts observe that the government is playing an increasingly regressive force in international negotiations.” Again, embarrassing.
All of which he refused to comment on when journalists raised it. Just, simply, refused.
When asked by journalists why he wouldn’t comment, he said dismissively,”it’s not credible”. That’s it. Then he walked off. The report’s authors rejected Morrison’s avoidant answer saying the assessment was based on scientific criteria and official data. You know, facts.
It’s all sounding very Trump-onian.
We deserve feedback, explanation, reasons. He’s not a recalcitrant uncle at the end of the table at Christmas lunch. He’s our Prime Minister.
Then this was his New Year message published in newspapers across the country:
“Australians have never been fussed about trying to impress people overseas or respond to what others tell us we should think or what we should do. We have always made our own decisions in Australia.”
Yes, but the climate is a global concern, my friend..
Then as fires got dire in January he authorised a Liberal party ad about the fires…
…with (wait for it) a “donate” button that sees funds going (OMFG) to the Liberal party. The ad shows Scott Morrison in the field, taking charge (angry locals refusing to shake his hand, see below, are nowhere to be seen).
This is vile, unconscionable, from another planet… you decide. When right-wing pundit Piers Morgan declares it “a self-promotional commercial” and “shameless & shameful”, you know it must be bad (check out his tear-down of Australian Liberal MP on British TV overnight…it’s brutal as the MP – Craig Kelly – argues climate change has nothing to do with the fires.)
But to be sure, the Australian Defence Association (ADA) — a public-interest watchdog of Australian Defence matters — said on Twitter “milking ADF support to civil agencies fighting bushfires” was a “clear breach of the (reciprocal) non-partisanship convention applying to both the ADF & Ministers/MPs”.
As kids wept and towns burned ScoMo told us it’s going to be a great summer for cricket
Merely deluded, out of touch, perhaps? But he’s the Prime Minister FFS. And he has advisors. Lots of them. Which suggests this delusion isn’t a one-off mistake, it’s the whole flavour of the party. On New Year’s Day, in the aftermath of some of the worst loss and damage, photos emerged of ScoMo hosting the Australian cricket team in Sydney.
He has drip-fed aid, too late
But it gets worse. New South Wales Rural Fire Service Commissioner Shane Fitzsimmons said he found out about the recent additional military aid via media, leaving him unprepared as to how the measures would be integrated while his crews battled a dozen fire emergencies across the state.
Again, a leader just doesn’t do that.
He’s not shutting down misinformation, he’s fuelling it.
Dismissing the scientists is criminal right now. We accept and respect science’s gold-standard methodology on everything else, why not climate change, a threat to our very existence?
Right up until a few days ago ScoMo was arguing hazard reduction was the bigger issue, playing into the factually wrong argument that the Greens blocked hazard reduction, blahblah (a line educated, smart people I know still believe). Of course, it’s a line the Murdoch press has fed the country, very effectively, with entirely vested interests.
At this point, I’m just going to pause and throw this in…if, like one of my friends who I chatted to last night, you’re thinking this seems all too farcical to be true, I just want to flag that the scientists, the impartial media and the firefighters don’t have a vested interest in sharing these facts. There is no reason to be suspicious of what they tell us. Scott Morrison’s government, ScoMo himself and Rupert Murdoch on the other hand… they have a lot to gain from refuting the facts and from spreading the line that the “science is not confirmed”.
He forced fire victims to shake his hand.
And didn’t get it when they refused. And then, Good Lord, he gave a press conference and said these distraught, exhausted people were being “emotional” and that they dissed him only because he was the first leader in town.
This was after rolling into town without telling the State leaders.
Leaders just don’t do this. Period.
And just before – reportedly – launching a campaign to put the blame for his inappropriate behaviour onto the State leaders.
ScoMo was due to fly to India in early January to meet with Adani…
To chat coal. Yep. Although he announced after all the above went down he’s cancelled the trip. Presumably he’s got the message that this would probably be a really crook look. Of course, the discussions will continue
Finally, the LNP ran a “Scott Morrison wants to know what matters to you” survey… and never came back to us.
I shared their survey around a few weeks before Christmas, in good faith. Many of us took time to fill it in and explain that “tackling the climate crisis” (I think that was the wording of the option that was placed down the bottom of the list) was what mattered to us. I rang his office, I emailed several times, to ask what was being done with the results of the survey and whether they could confirm it was not being used for voter targeting purposes. I was promised I’d get a reply. I didn’t. I chased. Nothing. It’s added to my concern that the Liberal Party and ScoMo really don’t care what matters to us. (Note, I also contacted my local MP Dave Sharma…no reply).
*
I think this display of unkind, too-often-deluded ineptness will go on and on. Because this is the bottom line: ScoMo doesn’t get it.
But it’s not that he doesn’t get the truth or the facts. He does. He knows the science, he knows the warnings, the predictions.
What he doesn’t get is that he can’t dupe us like this. That he can’t lie. That he can’t tell us we shouldn’t feel as we do.
And he doesn’t get that we would eventually catch on to his motives, which, let’s be honest, is preserving his ties to the coal industry, which fund and enable his prime ministership.
He doesn’t get that his behaviour right now is entirely inappropriate because he is so tied up in the act of defending his vested and, to be frank, corrupt position, at all costs. He must gaslight, deflect, blame and tell non-truths to survive, at least psychologically.
And so he is psychologically, spiritually, politically incapable of being compassionate and relating to us.
He is literally, in all functioning senses, incapable of being a leader.
Dare I say it, I feel for him. I think he’s genuinely shocked by our rage. I think he’s dismayed that he is getting it all so wrong in the most train-wreckish way.
I’d normally allow more room for error, perhaps wait for a mia culpa, see if he does some make-good, except this is an emergency. We know this. We all know this at some level, even if some of us are still coming to grips with the data.
When a democracy is faced with a leader incapable of representing its people at such a fundamental level, we speak up and demand change. That’s what we do. (And it’s not the same as what happened to former PMs in recent years; they were rolled by their parties). It hasn’t been done for a while. We are not used to it. It feels weird. But we must do it anyway.
Yep, we voted him in. And we get the leaders we deserve. And so on. True. But voters were duped into this line during the election campaign, and now that the misinformation is being exposed, and more facts and urgency are coming to light, we are allowed to demand the leader we need.
On balance, after considering the credible information I’ve been able to access, I believe our Prime Minster must find a way to “get it” – that is, meet us and lead us with the bold truth – or step down. I’d prefer the former option, because I truly hope for growth and awakening. It would be a powerful and beautiful thing indeed if we could get ScoMo to shift his perspective, admit he got it wrong, apologise wholeheartedly and move forward radically and progressively with a climate emergency agenda. Oh, and would it be asking too much to imagine him committing to answering questions honestly, without that horrible circumventing of the point to tediously irrelevant and distracting bluster? (To ask that he acknowledge his vested interests, might be a bridge too far.)
My next post will share the most effective ways for us to rise to the challenge of demanding change (not necessarily resignation). These are wild times, let’s pay attention.
And please pick me up on any missing information, or misinformation (provide links to evidence please!), plus I’ll update things as they emerge. If you comment in the Facebook feed, you’ll be alerted to these updates.
