<
https://theconversation.com/can-a-trumpist-approach-to-politics-work-in-australia-241780>
"In one of their typically literary sketches, 1990s comedy duo Stephen Fry and
Hugh Laurie asked if Adolf Hitler’s fanatical racist oratory would have been as
charismatic if delivered in English.
It’s a joke that has no answer, of course, but there is little doubt that
national characteristics including history, public debate and electoral
institutions have framed the way politics is discussed in notionally open
societies.
Political actors venturing beyond these informal boundaries have courted
controversy and opprobrium. Transgressions could be career-ending.
But such limits have never been entirely static and may now be tumbling
entirely as the failures of neoliberalism and globalism feed a widening
distrust in old orthodoxies.
Increasingly, high-profile nationalist and populist movements in many countries
are making a virtue of eschewing the usual etiquette of politics in favour of
divisive hyperbole.
In the digitised global media age, these nativist forces can also
cross-pollinate.
Within New Zealand’s Luxon coalition government, for example, far-right support
for rolling back Maori rights under the
Treaty of Waitangi takes
encouragement from Australia’s refusal to recognise First Nations Peoples in
the Constitution.
In two Australian states in the past few weeks, (South Australia and
Queensland), ultra-conservative Liberal MPs have been associated with attempts
to re‑criminalise abortion.
The revival of an incendiary debate that had largely been settled in Australia
felt like it came from nowhere. In fact, it probably came from post-
Roe v
Wade America."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
