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Kim Jong-Un’s Viagra Diplomacy

Posted in Nothing in Particular, Political Whinging on April 23, 2013 | 3 Comments »

People keep asking me what Kim Jong-Un is up to at the moment. What is he hoping to achieve? Does he actually want to start a war? Is he really intending to launch nukes? I’m flattered that my friends and acquaintances think I might have an answer for them, but I don’t exactly have a hotline to Pyongyang and am thus privileged to the same information as everyone else outside of the intelligence services. Having said that, I do have an answer of sorts, which is hardly all that original – it’s all just a lot of posturing.

The recent escalation of rhetoric has certainly been dramatic. The bellicose reminder of the state of war between North and South Korea, tough talking about ballistic and nuclear capability, overzealous reactions to even the smallest slight from the south and, more recently, the statement that foreign embassy officials could no longer consider themselves safe in North Korea – all amounts to an alarming increase of tension, but likely little else. As an official at South Korea’s defence ministry quipped – “barking dogs don’t bite.”

Pyongyang’s recent attacks on the south – the torpedoing of the Cheonan, which left 46 dead, or the shelling of Yeonpyeong Island, both in 2010 – have been by stealth, or come without warning. That doesn’t mean his threats have no substance, but it does suggests that talking and walking are by no means linked, so to speak.

Some years ago a wit described the India / Pakistan nuclear arms race as “Viagra Diplomacy,” a term which applies itself well to the current situation with North Korea. There is something ludicrously phallic about rocket launches, a situation not helped by North Korea’s tendency to suffix its rocket names with the word “Dong.” Take the Taepodong for example, a name which lends itself spectacularly to punning, or the even sillier and counter-intuitive Nodong, which was effectively an adapted Soviet SS1 or “Scud” and, dare I say it, a bit of a flop. Joking aside, there’s no doubt that North Korea has made progress with its ballistic capability and just may have the capacity to mount a nuclear warhead, but the threat to rain down missiles on the United States seems farfetched considering their as yet limited range of roughly 6000 kilometres.

Having said that, North Korea certainly has the capacity to target its immediate neighbours; the southern capital Seoul, at just 25 kilometres south of the border, is within artillery range. There is no doubt that North Korea could inflict terrible carnage if they wished to attack the south. Nuclear, chemical and biological weapons aside, the scale of their conventional forces is staggering. A quick glance at the Wikipedia list of countries by number of military and paramilitary personnel puts North Korea on top, with an active military of roughly 1.1 million, bolstered by an incredible 8 million reservists. The Korean war of 1950-53 cost the lives of two million people, and whilst any modern war would prove a very different beast, there is little doubt that it could also cost millions of lives.

Yet what, one must ask, would be the point? Surely, despite the capacity to inflict untold damage on the south, the North would ultimately be defeated. North Korea would have no allies – China would wash their hands of them and Pyongyang would find itself facing off against a broad alliance led by the United States and supported by the U.N. The north might achieve initial successes, but would surely lose the war, and, apart from the disastrous human, social, environmental and economic consequences of a conflict, losing the war would potentially mark the end of the regime, the end of military domination, and the end of North Korea as a state: the end of Kim Jong-Un. One suspects that nothing other than unconditional surrender would be demanded, especially considering how long the situation has festered and how great the desire to avoid any furtherance of this geopolitical cancer. What might follow is anyone’s guess: re-unification, a long and awkward occupation of the smoking ruins… It would all depend on the nature of the war, which, after an initial bout of shock and awe by both sides, could even be over in a couple of days with an internal coup.

Which brings us back to this important question of what the hell Kim Jong-Un is up to? If war is unlikely, what is the point of all this belligerent rhetoric and rocket-rattling? Surely the most likely explanation is that he wishes to shore up support at home.

Just as George Bush, John Howard and Tony Blair all rhetorically escalated the level of external threat to their respective countries after 9/11 in order to shore up domestic support for their imperial ambitions by creating a clear and present external danger, so it would seem King Jong-Un, perhaps struggling to define himself internally and to assert the legitimacy of his rule, wishes to create an almost hysterical climate of fear. If anything this whole business seems to highlight his insecurity rather than his capability or intent. Ironically the very survival of the regime depends on avoiding conflict, but the state largely defines itself through struggle and conflict.

The real fear is that with tensions so high war might begin by accident rather than design. Miscalculation, misinterpretation… it seems unlikely, but it is by no means impossible. The levels of readiness are such that hell could be unleashed at very short notice – perhaps before clarity prevails. Should a war begin, even by accident, it will be extremely difficult to stop.

There is also the genuine possibility that Kim Jong-Un is something of a nutcase. He is certainly less predictable than his familial predecessors and less well understood, but he must know as surely as anyone else that war would be the end of his regime with all its privileges.

It’s very easy to parody and caricature Kim Jong-Un as a greedy little brat of a despot, and I have to confess I’ve been guilty of such parody myself, yet whilst it might be childish fun to joke about him, it’s somewhat counterproductive. The belief that he is genuinely mad, propagated by the parodies and caricatures, only fuels the paranoia about his intentions.

Yet, as always with humour, there is a great deal of truth in much of it. He likely is a spoilt brat with delusions of grandeur instilled through constant inflation of his talents and charms, drunk on power. He really does come across as the tubby, nerdy gamer kid with a chip on his shoulder. His recent actions remind me of people on Facebook, including myself, who, when lonely or feeling starved of attention, start posting in a more exclamatory and regular manner. His international threats are like bad-tempered tweets – mouthing off at a world he can neither influence nor change because of his own relative impotence, despite having a vast army at his back.

We must not forget how recent his accession to the throne was. Despite great popular efforts to create a new cult of personality around him, there must be pressure to put his own personal stamp on the regime and cement his rule. Perhaps there is internal pressure from within the military himself. Perhaps he fears the ambitions of those who surround him. Perhaps there is fear of popular unrest. Whatever the case, all this rhetoric seems to be more inwardly focussed, despite its outward broadcast.

The real question now is what happens next, and, to be honest, I haven’t got the faintest idea. I suspect things will die down, flare up, die down, flare up, die down, flare up… for the next decade, possibly even longer. Then again, Kim Jong-Un might be dead next week, assassinated by an ambitious general, or dead by deep vein thrombosis for that matter. Whether North Korea will ever come in from the cold is anyone’s guess, but as unsustainable as the current situation appears to be, we should remember just how long it has been sustained – sixty years this very year. It is hardly possible for this feudal Stalinist regime to become more isolated internationally, and anyway, it is isolation and insularity that allows the regime to survive. Rarely have two nations existed in such contrasting states of connectivity as North and South Korea, the latter the most wired state in the world, the former disconnected from everything, including, it seems reality.

Perhaps somehow the internet will work its magic; perhaps starvation will start a revolution; perhaps there really will be coup, or an unexpected Myanmar-style change of heart. In all honesty I think there won’t be a war and nothing will change. Ten years from today, Kim Jong-Un will still be there, fatter than ever, rubbing his wealth in the face of his own people and waving his latest Dongs at the world.

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See you later, Pontificator

Posted in Nothing in Particular, Political Whinging on March 1, 2013 | Leave a Comment »

So, it’s goodbye to Eggs, aka, Pope Benedict XVI. I can’t say I’ll miss him a whole lot, but that’s not surprising considering I’m an atheist with a strong dislike for religion and unscientific “belief” in all its forms. In the aftermath of his rather unexpected decision to resign, we’ve been subjected to the usual preliminary obituaries of his papacy, with all manner of people voicing their opinions about whether he was successful or otherwise. Today was his last day in office and now we have the rare and beautiful breathing space of an interregnum or interpontificatus (?) as it were, during which time the papacy can choose the next man to annoy and frustrate the hell out of us secular non-believers.

I have a strange relationship to the papacy, it must be said. Having done a PhD in early medieval Italian history and had a long obsession with the late Roman Empire and the cultural and religious transformation that took place during that period, I have long been fascinated by this ancient institution. It is worth remembering that Julius Caesar himself once held the title of Pontifex Maximus, the chief priest of Rome, a position that came exclusively to be held by Christians in the fourth century once the Empire had made Christianity its official religion. The transition was not quite as smooth as this, but I’m not about to go into that sort of detail. Even in Caesar’s time, the position of Pontifex Maximus was already centuries old, which does lend the Papacy a certain cred for sustaining such an ancient institution.

As an unabashed fan of Roman civilization, culture and law, with apologies for the slavery and warmongering, I found a certain sympathy with the popes of Late Antiquity. With the slow decline and ultimate collapse of the Western Empire (a process by which they practically delegated themselves out of existence) the popes came to the forefront of Roman affairs, playing an increasingly important role in protecting Roman interests. People Leo I “The Great” even went so far as to confront Attila the Hun when he invaded Italy in AD 452 and persuaded him to turn back.

During the sixth century, after the devastating reconquest of Italy by the Eastern Roman Emperor Justinian (527-565), the papacy became the major player in the organisation and defence of the much reduced city of Rome. Presiding over the depopulated, overgrown wreck of the once-great city, with only one of ten aqueducts still functional, the popes did their best to mitigate the chaos that ensued shortly after the reconquest when the Lombards invaded to find inadequate resistance and easy plunder in the derelict metropolises of the Italian peninsula.

Perhaps the most outstanding figure of this age was Pope Gregory I, also “The Great” (c. 540 – 12 March 604) who held the position from AD 590 until his death in 604. Gregory, a Roman aristocrat with an at times almost desperate nostalgia for the long-passed glories of Roman dominion over western Europe, lamented the moribund state of present affairs and did his best to make a difference. Gregory attempted to re-energise the Church’s missionary work and to re-establish closer contact with Catholic bishops in Visigothic Spain and Frankish Gaul. He is most famous for sending Augustine of Canterbury to spread the word amongst the pagan Anglo-Saxons, who had invaded formerly Roman and Christian Britain in the 5th century. The mission was successful, and it was from England that missionaries later set out for the Netherlands and Germany. The culture of education and learning promoted by the church during this period, helped significantly to spread literacy and preserve much of the dwindling knowledge accumulated during the heights of Roman power and civilization. On that score, props.

During the seventh and eighth centuries, the Papacy worked hard to shore up the pockets of territory it held in Italy, along with those still directly governed by representatives of the Eastern Roman Empire – based at Ravenna – against the further incursions of the Lombards who had established themselves throughout Italy. It also found itself increasingly at odds with and slowly divorced itself from the policies and administrative demands of the Eastern Empire. Indeed, there was a most curious instance in 663, during the time of Pope Vitalian (657-72) when Emperor Constans II (641-68) actually visited Rome from Constantinople, allegedly considering moving his court there in the wake of a string of Islamic conquests of Roman territory in the Middle East and North Africa. In the end he stayed a mere twelve days, during which time he stripped the city’s churches of their valuables, including the gold gilding from the roof of the Pantheon. It’s hardly necessary to say that this did not leave a good impression.

When, in 726, the Emperor Leo III (717-741) decreed a new policy of Iconoclasm, banning the veneration of images, he faced revolts not only in Greece, but in the Italian territories as well. The defiant attitudes of Popes Gregory II and III soured relations with the Eastern Empire even further. Gregory II’s decision to excommunicate iconoclasts in Italy resulted in Leo’s retaliation by which he, on paper, transferred the provinces of southern Italy and Illyricum to the Patriarch of Constantinople. He further attempted to put down an armed outbreak in the Exarchate of Ravenna by sending a large fleet, but its destruction in a storm marked not only the failure of his attempts to bring Italy to heel, but also marked the final separation of the Italian territories from the Eastern Empire. From this period onwards, the destiny of all Italian territories was tied to that of the Papacy.

Likely the most significant figure of this period, however, was Pope Steven II (752-757) who first engineered an alliance with the Franks to protect against the constant Lombard threat. With the fall of Ravenna in 751, the Lombards began to look to Rome to complete their conquest of Italy. Not only did Stephen II prove himself extremely agile in negotiating with the Lombards and preventing further incursions, but he went so far as to travel to Paris to persuade the Franks, under Pepin the Short (752-768), to cross the alps in 756 and chastise the pesky Lombards in a manner they weren’t likely to forget in a hurry. The Franks forced the Lombards to surrender their recent conquests and guaranteed the lands between Rome and Ravenna should remain under the rule of the Duchy of Rome, now very much an independent entity.

It wasn’t, however, until 774, during the papacy of Adrian I, that the Lombard problem was solved once and for all. Distrustful of the intentions of the Lombards, Adrian appealed first to the eastern emperor, who was unable or unwilling to assist, and then to the Frankish King Charlemagne (768-814). Charlemagne saw it as a great opportunity both to obtain the support and legitimacy offered by the papacy, expand his territories into Italy, and get rid of the nuisance that was the Lombards once and for all. He did all of this and more of course, which is why his name is so well known into the present.

From here on in the fortunes of the Papacy are far too complex and lengthy to narrate, suffice to say that towards the end of the ninth century, a period of decline set in which resulted in the period between 904 and 964 being referred to as a saeculum obscurum, or dark age. One scholar went so far as to refer to the Papacy of the 10th century as the “pornocracy,” so corrupt and seedy were its affairs.

So, in a nutshell, the early medieval period in Italy saw some rather extraordinary characters fill the role of pope, some of whom had very interesting names. Consider the following monickers:

Hilarius I, 461-468

Simplicius, 468-483

Gelasius, 492-496

Symmachus, 498-514

Hormisdas, 514-523

Agapetus I, 535-536

Pelagius I, 556-561

Sabinian, 604-606

Adeodatus, 615-618

Severinus, 638-640

Donus, 676-678

Agatho, 678-681

Conon, 686-687

Sisinnius, 15 January, 708- 4 February, 708

And the list goes on. All we get these days is boring old John Paul and Benedict. Indeed, I’m desperately hoping the new Pope will have a peculiar fascination with one of these early figures and take on a name not spoken for centuries. How great would it be to have Hormisdas II giving the Christmas homilies instead of the likely inevitable John Paul III or some equally dull name?

Not all of the Popes during this period were Italian either. Some came from Syria, Palestine, Constantinople. Perhaps, should another non-Italian Pope don the mantle and pick up the sceptre or whatever they get up to, we might see a more creative choice of name.

Speaking of the future, one cannot help but keep one eye on the past. It seems ironic, considering how many popes have proven so divisive throughout history, that the title “Pontifex” has a curious metaphorical meaning. It literally means bridge-builder, on account of the fact that the position originally also included these duties. It is fair to say that in more recent years the papacy has attempted to build bridges between itself and other religions, or those who have felt themselves victimised, hurt or excluded by its policies. Of course, it moves with the pace of continental drift, although the shake up of Vatican II was, historically speaking, the earthquake that broke the Richter Scale.

Either way, I don’t hold much hope of any significant change taking place and, on this front, without wishing to sound illiberal or reactionary, I’m not entirely sure I want the Catholic Church to change at all. Not because I support their backward policies on abortion, contraception and er, believing in God etc, but precisely because I want them NOT to be relevant to the modern world. These sorry bastards have persecuted people throughout history, burning them at the stake, sending them to prison, exile, condemning the cultures and religions of whole peoples as worthless pagan shite and brutally enforcing their own dogma, how dare they turn around and say, oh, perhaps we were wrong about that? They should stand by all their sorry and misguided beliefs, especially where people have died opposing them, and be shown up for the uselessly effete bunch of medieval paedophile-protecting snobs they actually are. My fascination with the survival of an ancient Roman institution does not necessarily mean I wish to accommodate its continuation into the future.

One thing I will say about the Pope, which I do consider to be a sort of positive, is that despite the relative hypocrisy of the institution’s history, at least he regularly goes around preaching peace in the world these days. That at least, is a nice thing, and I’ve often wondered if present tensions between “the West” and Islam wouldn’t be tempered by the presence of a similar central figure preaching peace to Muslims the world over. Not to suggest that Islam is intrinsically warlike or even an aggressor, but if such a message were broadcast by a figure of equal authority who garnered an equal degree of respect and deference, then perhaps there would be a few less instances of people resorting to violence. Of course, it is important to note that considering the degree of hostility to Islam offered by Israel, the USA and various other nations including my own, Australia, the anger is justified. But still, non-violence is always preferable and allows one to retain the moral high ground. Controversial as it might sound, and in lieu of people just quitting religion altogether, an Islamic Pope might not be such a bad thing.

So, in brief conclusion, bring on Pope Hormisdas II, I say, and may you oversee a rapid decline in membership and faith in your antiquated institution.

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Why you shouldn’t eat Tuna

Posted in Environment & Science, Political Whinging on November 3, 2011 | Leave a Comment »

It never ceases to amaze me which species get picked for special attention. The reasons are easy enough to understand; either they are magnificent, attractive, cuddly, intelligent, or perhaps have some form of cultural significance as a national symbol. The giant Panda and Polar Bear are classic examples of this phenomenon of bias towards saving species that seem ready-made for conservation campaigns on account of their being so photogenic.

In these two cases, however, it is hardly surprising that they have become endangered; both are bears and bears are essentially omnivorous opportunists, yet these particular bears have taken a dangerously narrow evolutionary path into high-risk specialisation. Their sacrifice of flexibility has made them vulnerable. Perhaps, in the end, it’s really just too bad. Enjoy it while you can, adapt or die, has always been the Earth’s motto.

Of course, with the exception of occasional freak events causing rapid transformation of climactic conditions and immediate destruction of habitat – an asteroid impact, snowball Earth, or large-scale volcanic upheaval – most species have had plenty of time to adapt to changing conditions, and those who could not adapt lie frozen in stone; the dead ends of evolution; the leafless twigs that fell from the tree.

The wild populations of giant Panda might be at serious risk from habitat loss, and indeed, a great deal of bamboo forest remains threatened by development, but the campaign to save them has become almost embarrassingly successful, so far as captive breeding programs are concerned. They are not hunted and harvested for food, at least not on an industrial scale, and as a potent national symbol of China and, indeed, as an accepted symbol of international efforts to save species and habitat, they are at relatively little risk of going extinct either in the wild or in captivity.

Sadly, the same cannot be said of Polar Bears, whose habitat is shrinking rapidly and whose lifestyle is not readily adaptable to different conditions. Given more time, they would likely adapt or evolve, though there is no guarantee of that. With the retreat of the last ice-age, the woolly mammoth was driven further and further north, until the last populations were restricted to arctic islands in northern Russia where their isolation led to that common evolutionary phenomenon of dwarfism – they shed most of their bulk and shrank to the size of hippos. Polar bears, one suspects, will not have time on their side, yet in all likelihood, if given sufficient territory and left unmolested, small populations will cling on in far northern Canada or Alaska. They may shrink and be forced to significantly adjust their hunting range and habits, but they seem sufficiently clever and resourceful to pull through.

Other species will not be so fortunate, even when their plight garners public attention and attracts conservation dollars. Pity the northern white rhino, a magnificent odd-toed ungulate. There are now five males and two females left on the planet. That number again: five males and two females ON EARTH, all in captivity. It’s enough to make you cry. Pity the primates. More than half of the Earth’s primate species are threatened with extinction. However much we love them, however good they look on posters, television advertisements and campaign leaflets, their vulnerability to the consequences of war, poverty, hunger and greed is all too real. If peace and prosperity came to the jungles of Congo, things might pan out a lot better for the Gorilla and chimpanzee, but as things stand, their situation is extremely tenuous.

As one reader joked in a letter to the New Scientist, the best way for creatures to ensure survival is to evolve as rapidly as possible into a more lovable, cuddly form; big eyes and soft fur can do wonders for a species on the conservation wheel of fortune. Yet, if we can’t even manage to save the cuddly ones, then what hope is there for all the frog, flower, amphibian, bush, beetle, tree, fish and reptile species, many of which have gone extinct in recent times due to habitat destruction and climate change?

There are many and varied estimates of the background extinction rates, and indeed, similarly varied estimates as to how many species there actually are on the planet. Judging from the fossil record, the background extinction rate is estimated to be roughly one species per million every year. Very rough estimates suggest a current total of around ten million different species on the planet, and a current extinction rate of somewhere between 27000 and 30000 plant and animal species per year. Just as geologists have recently agreed that human warming of the planet justifies acknowledging the end of the geologically short and wonderfully mild Holocene epoch, and the commencement, beginning with the industrial revolution, of the Anthropocene, so biologists, among others, agree that we are now in the midst of a mass extinction, the likes of which have occurred several times already in Earth’s history, though not, so far as we are aware, through the agency of one dominant species. Though, having said that, we cannot ignore the climatic impact of, for example, oxygen-producing cyanobacteria, who for millions of years, beginning somewhere between 3.4 and 2.7 billion years ago, exhaled this waste-product on such a scale that the planet could no longer absorb it, until, roughly 2.4 billion years ago, the Great Oxygenation Event occurred, wiping out much of the planet’s anaerobic inhabitants and ultimately triggering the first and longest snowball Earth event.

Still, just because we are in good company does not make being responsible for the sixth great extinction in the planet’s history something to be proud of. As things stand, an estimated fifth of the world’s mammals, a third of its amphibians, more than 25% of its reptiles and up to 70% of its plants face the threat of extinction. That is, to say the least, seriously fucked up, and the only way to arrest the situation is to, quite literally, stop doing everything, switch off the nuclear power stations, disarm the warheads, sit down wherever you are, and quietly die.

More realistic, of course, is the promotion of peace, sustainable development, recycling and efficiency and the end of overconsumption. Yet, sadly, despite the world having become considerably more peaceful on the grand timescale, prosperity is growing at such a pace, irrespective of hiccups, financial crises and what have you, that consumption and atmospheric pollution are increasing very rapidly indeed. With the exception of the species we farm and harvest, and those who are well adapted to our artificial environments, such as rats, cats, dogs, pigeons, squirrels, possums etc, almost everything is under threat, and in recent years, I have become seriously alarmed by the plight of the Tuna.

The tuna is a truly magnificent creature, of which there are over fifty different varieties. The Atlantic Bluefin tuna can grow to a size of four and a half metres long, can weigh as much as 650kg, and can swim at speeds of up to 70kph. Tuna do not have white flesh like most fish, but their muscle tissue ranges from pink to dark red. This coloration derives from myoglobin, an oxygen-binding molecule, which tuna produce in significantly higher quantities than most other fish. Some of the larger tuna species, such as bluefin tuna, have warm-blooded adaptations, and can raise their body temperature above water temperature, thus enabling them to survive in cooler waters and to exploit and inhabit a far wider range of ocean environments.

Tuna not only look magnificent, but they are magnificent. The sad reality, however, is that tuna, the world over, are on the brink of a terrible catastrophe. As Greenpeace’s 2008 report entitled Tinned Tuna’s Hidden Catch states:

“Of the 23 commercially exploited tuna stocks identified: At least nine are classified as fully fished, a further four are classified as overexploited or depleted, three are classified as critically endangered, three are endangered and three are classified as vulnerable to extinction.”

Worldwide, Greenpeace estimates that 90% of large predatory fish have already been wiped out. Catches are down dramatically in all fisheries. In the Mediterranean, the World Wildlife Fund has estimated that tuna stocks will reach complete collapse as early as 2012. In 2007 the breeding population of tuna was only a quarter that of fifty years ago and the size and weight of mature tuna has more than halved since the early 1990s. Attempts by scientists, marine biologists and fisheries experts to dramatically reduce quotas have brought only tokenistic, inadequate responses and led to an explosion of illegal fishing that goes largely unpoliced.

It’s not merely the scale of the industry causing problems, but also the fishing techniques used. The common use of Fish Aggregation Devices (FADs), wherein fish are lured to a particular zone and then scooped up en masse, not only results in the catching of juvenile tuna, but also lures many other species, juvenile or otherwise, which make up an estimate ten percent of the catch. Not only do FADs act as death-traps for young tuna, but they draw tuna away from migratory routes, resulting in loss of optimal feeding opportunities, seriously effecting the life-cycle of tuna which are not caught, and thus having broader impacts on the entire marine ecosystem. Similarly, long-line fishing, where lines of up to 100km are used, are also responsible for significant bycatch.

Big Tuna likes to make a special point of their tuna being “dolphin friendly.” Yet, as Greenpeace states:

“Many fishing practices that are labelled dolphin friendly still result in the catch of a host of non-target species, known as bycatch, including turtles, sharks, rays, juvenile tuna and a huge range of other marine life.”

Some companies have gone a step further and changed their practices. Around the corner from my house is a huge billboard advertising the environmental credentials of Greenseas tinned Tuna. There are, in fact, two advertisements side by side, each with the large happy face of a marine species, pleased to have avoided being caught unnecessarily. Greenseas can claim some credibility on this front, as they have made the important commitment to stop buying tuna caught using FADs. Yet, when we consider the rate at which the tuna themselves are being exterminated, this feels like a diversion; more of the green-washing bullshit we’ve come to expect from big business in the last decades.

The simple fact is that Big Tuna may claim to be dolphin friendly. They may claim to be dugong friendly. They may claim to be turtle friendly, but they are definitely not Tuna friendly. The Tuna, in all its glorious varieties, is, quite literally, being fished to death. In the vastness of the oceans, it would be difficult to hunt down and kill every single tuna available, it would be a hell of a job to drive them to extinction, yet humans are currently giving it their absolute best shot.

The rising popularity of sushi, along with tuna’s longstanding popularity in salads, pasta dishes and all manner of culinary creations, has dramatically increased the scale of the market in recent years. This commercial success guarantees that the industry will pursue tuna for as long as possible, and there seems relatively little effort within the industry itself to harvest tuna in a sustainable fashion. Governments must co-operate internationally to put a stop to current quotas and practices, and actively police illegal fishing.

Greenpeace advises that in order to save tuna populations the world over, the fishing industry must stop using FADs and switch to line and pole fishing, which are highly targeted towards adult tuna; governments must impose and enforce marine reserves to safeguard ecosystems from destructive fishing practices; supermarkets should stop buying tuna products caught using FADs, only support sustainably caught tuna, and help to promote the creation of and awareness about marine reserves.

The issue of bycatch is bad enough, but the scale of tuna fishing must be severely restricted in order to avoid a potential environmental disaster. We cannot even begin to imagine the devastating impact on an ecosystem of removing 90% of its predatory species, but the resulting imbalances are bound to be hugely disruptive.

Sure, it sucks not being able to eat tuna, because I admit, like so many people, I have always enjoyed the taste of it. Yet, for the last three or four years, I have not been able to buy it out of a colossal sense of guilt. I recently swore off eating cephalopods (squids, octopi) after reading a New Scientist feature on their extraordinary intelligence. When, two weeks ago, I broke my pact and ate squid, then, the following day, found myself with food poisoning, I felt a rare case of instant karma. At least I learned my lesson, and I won’t be eating those guys again.

Of course, as someone who eats dairy, I leave myself open to accusations of hypocrisy, for the dairy industry is not an industry known for its sustainability. Of course, it’s not the cows that are threatened – though they are often mistreated – but the environment, on account of industrial scale farming practices.

It would be nice to think that humans will wise up to their destructive habits and avert a major catastrophe, both on land and at sea, but I’m not especially confident. Either way, don’t be surprised if the price of tuna skyrockets in coming years. Some time soon, this already critical situation is going to hit the wall.

ps. apologies for lazy referencing. After doing a PhD, I never want to footnote again…

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Black Future

Posted in Environment & Science, Political Whinging on July 6, 2011 | Leave a Comment »

This is really a fragment of a rant against the damage being caused by rampant economic growth around the planet. I began writing it whilst in India last year and have fleshed it out ever so slightly. It has no real beginning or ending, but I cannot quite see where it could begin and end, as it treats a subject too vast for detail. I figured that rather than agonising over what to do with it, I ought to just get it out there… So, here it is!

I see a future black with carbon smoke. Everywhere I look, I see carbon rising into the atmosphere. From factories, kitchens, chimneys, cars, bonfires and barbecues; there is a lot of burning taking place. I too am making my contribution; every time I fly or charge my phone; every time I eat, every time I turn on a light to read, even now as I type on my computer I’m emitting carbon into the atmosphere. The world is rapidly being overwhelmed by the stuff; and it’s certainly not just carbon dioxide. Methane, a gas twenty times more effective at warming the planet, is bubbling out of the melting permafrost and sea floor of far eastern Russia, and from the warming seabed of the Arctic. Already our warming has kick-started other environmental mechanisms and feedbacks; already we have reached a tipping point where a certain amount of warming is now inevitable. There has been much talk at an international level, but the biggest dent put in emissions in the last decades did not come from policy or effort, but simply from the Global Financial Crisis reducing demand. As we return slowly but surely to business as usual, the Earth continues to be threatened not by a mild warming effect, but instead by its worst-case scenario.

Such is the strength of our influence on the atmosphere already, that scientists have signalled the end of the Holocene epoch and are pushing for the present to mark the beginning of a new geological epoch dubbed the Anthropocene. It may be some time before such a designation is recognised, for one question still to be answered is just how long will the Anthropocene last? Will it last long enough to warrant being labelled as a new geological epoch? In truth, humans have already been altering the planet significantly since they first migrated out of Africa, wiped out the remaining megafauna and took up agriculture and animal husbandry. It is estimated that even as little as 8000 years ago, with a population of just 10 million, humans had altered one fifth of the Earth’s ice-free land, mostly through burning and clearing of forest. The widespread nature of the alteration derives from early practices of clearing, exhausting, then moving on to another location. Much of the land was thus in a state of recovery after being transformed by humans. In the present, the scale of transformation is staggering, and even if some catastrophic event caused a large scale reduction in the use of land, our efforts would still leave an indelible record on the environment, particularly when we consider the ongoing mass extinction of species and the unnaturally high levels of carbon in the atmosphere.

So it is that we are burning, clearing, cutting and tearing up the earth on a scale and with an impact that equates to the natural geological climate shifts the earth has undergone in its four-billion year history. All around me, here in India, the burning is just getting underway. It is happening everywhere. In 2009, I saw the countless fires burning in Bali. Even there, where much forest still remained, above everything a haze of smoke hung. From the hills near Munduk, one could see all the carbon; not black, but white, diaphanous coils of carbon dissolving into a wide flat smog across the land. Hundreds of fires, in every home, in every village. Burning off, cooking fires, fires for the amusement of children. It seemed that soon enough all the fires would join and there would no longer be forest in between. No more would the hills be clothed with trees but tamed and terraced, or stripped to rock and dirt.

Yet, Bali was still a paradise of sorts. Java, however, the most populated island on Earth was, environmentally, sinking like an overloaded ferry. What if anything, would be left in fifty years? Leonard Cohen’s lyric came to mind:

Take the only tree that’s left and stuff it up the hole in your culture.

And what was that hole? It was a general, almost endemic absence of environmental awareness, the great hole in the culture of the entire planet. Because, the simple truth is, we’re all as guilty as sin. In America, it’s mass overconsumption, rampant emissions, car dependence, land-stripping and thousands upon thousands of domestic flights. Europe likes to think they’re moving forward, yet half of what they buy is made elsewhere in unsound conditions. The developing world might pollute at will, but it’s not just domestic demand building those coal-fired power stations and dirty factories nor are they all domestic companies.

Australia, perhaps the most guilty country of all, likes to think any guilt is offset by the economics of scale. Being the fattest, greediest, laziest and most self-indulgent population on the planet, living in the largest houses is nothing to be proud of. It doesn’t matter that there are only twenty-one million of us. It is not a valid excuse.

The Australian economy grew at nearly five percent for fifteen years, with barely a hiccup. But what is the goal of this growth? What’s the point of it all? We’ve long since passed the target of general wealth. Sure, not everyone owns a house and has three cars, but there are very few genuinely poor people, and many many massively fat, greedy people living in houses with far more toilets than necessary. Is it this that we have all been striving for? Cocooning ourselves in layers of flab, lounging in unnecessarily large houses and only shaking a fist when interest rates rise and the mortgage becomes more of a burden? There is no real politics in the Australian mainstream anymore. Or rather, it is all politics and no ethics, morality, philosophy or responsibility. Of course, this is an exaggeration; there are many very committed people who are careful about how they use power, careful about where they shop and what they buy, who are sympathetic to the plight of the unfortunate, yet the bulk of the population seem to be rather selfishly indifferent. I myself could do a good deal more.

The relative indifference to the environment, as epitomised by an unwillingness to act or support government initiatives on this front, is mirrored by the selfish attitudes to refugees. In Australia, attitudes to asylum seekers have been hardening rather than softening. Do we not have enough here to share with other people? I’d consider an enviro-ecological argument against increasing the population in the country, though that rarely gets a look in in the “debate” about refugees, asylum seekers and boat people. And anyway, compassion for those who are vulnerable and in need of help will always trump it in my case. Instead, it’s always the old paradigm; refugees have it too good, they’re taking our jobs and costing us precious tax dollars. Well, the truth is that everyone in Australia could afford to give a little more, not just from their wallets but from their hearts. Two cars, three bathrooms and no fucking heart. We do very little suffering here, but around the world there are millions in a tragic limbo. Not to feel compassion for these people strikes me as a very odd thing indeed.

The Australian public has a terribly disproportionate set of values. It has been said that we are no longer living in a society, but rather, an economy. At election time, the one truly humanitarian issue on the agenda was boat people, which is odd considering that, the total number who have come to Australia in the last thirty-odd years is less than 30000, equivalent to roughly 0.14% of the population. There was no public debate about how to help these people, but only how we could stop them coming in the first place. At the election, voting intention will be dictated by financial concerns, fear and paranoia, not a moral or ethical concern about what is right or wrong. It seems that anything tantamount to making a sacrifice is off the agenda in Australia. The debate about the carbon tax is further evidence of this. Whilst there are legitimate questions about its implementation and effectiveness, the public and media response has been hugely negative, simply on account of its being a tax, irrespective of its goals or intended outcomes.

Meanwhile, here, in India, the fires are burning everywhere. The middle class, now swollen to above three-hundred million, will soon own two cars each and live in India-ready air-conditioned houses. The future is a fat and pampered world of skin-whitening products, dandruff-free hair, big fridges, filtered drinking water, cheap domestic flights, and cricket, cricket, cricket! – the bhang of the masses.

Everywhere the fires are burning. The roadsides are rubbish-heaps. There are few if any garbage bins, and most people don’t use them anyway. The West preaches incessantly, and with immense hypocrisy, yet there is no question, what is happening in India does not look like sustainable development. India will swallow itself whole; the people will cut and burn all they can, they will eat up everything, except the cows who graze the rubbish-heaps, chewing their way through plastic and cardboard. What is dumped is picked over by the poor. Thus, to some degree, recycling is an active, ongoing process. But most of what is dumped is heaped into piles, which are then set alight. One cannot even begin to calculate the sheer amount of carbon that is going into the atmosphere from this source alone. Nor is it any surprise that so many Indians have respiratory problems. The burning rubbish, mixed with human excrement, is, more often than not, plastic waste. How much longer can people go on breathing in burning plastic in the cities?

The roads are already choking with motor vehicles, and whilst many of these, by virtue of their small motors, are, relatively speaking, low emission, they will soon be joined by millions more cars with larger engines and power-hungry air-con. In both India and China the land is drying up. Not only have there been problems with failing rainfall, but the water tables and aquifers have been tapped to such a point that soon there will be no ground water to rely upon as backup. China this year has faced the worst ever drought in its long history, and if the rains fail again and the aquifers are gone, how will they eat but by importing even more food from abroad, thus raising the already skyrocketing price of food.

How anyone could pull a rabbit out of this hat, is a mystery to me. I want to be hopeful, but my inclination is to despair. A respected science fiction author, whose name escapes me, when asked what the Earth might be like at the end of this century, stated, in so many words, “I can’t see over the vast pile of corpses.” I hope to goodness that we can avoid the worst of the harm that is already being done, but the reality seems to be one of putting things off until tomorrow. The only problem is that tomorrow is already yesterday.

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Realpolitik

Posted in Political Whinging on January 25, 2011 | Leave a Comment »

This article was published on Al Jazeera’s website on 31 Jan, 2009. I must confess I was rather pleased to see it on the front page ; ) Unfortunately, however, I accidentally sent the wrong draft, which lacked a few minor changes and additions. The correct draft appears below.

Hope for Realpolitik?

The seductive powers of Barack Obama’s rhetoric are well noted. Throughout the primary contest and presidential campaign his stirring speeches captivated millions, both inside and outside of America. Yet, what made his core message of hope and change so entrancing, was not merely the skill of his rhetoric, but the growing perception that behind this message lay a great pragmatism, common sense, and an inspiring work ethic. For all his uplifting talk, Barack Obama comes across as a practitioner of realpolitik.

The Oxford English dictionary defines realpolitik as “politics based on realities and material needs, rather than morals or ideas.” President Obama’s cabinet choices reflect this. Whereas George W. Bush largely surrounded himself with Neo-con ideologues, (or rather, it might be said, they put forward Bush as their spokesman) Obama has selected a capable team of qualified people. The message is clear – the problems faced by the United States and the world are huge and Obama is serious about finding solutions.

It is unfortunate that the same cannot be said of the situation in Israel and Palestine. Rarely, in recent years, has realpolitik had a look-in. To the outside observer, there seems only one viable option – the two-state solution born of a land-for-peace deal, including East Jerusalem as Palestinian capital. The occupation which began in 1967 is a ceaseless source of resentment amongst Palestinians, and a powerful spur to violent resistance. The ending of this occupation and the creation of a Palestinian state will not solve all the region’s problems, but it is a clear pre-requisite for peace. This is the practical solution; it is realpolitik.

With an election on February 10, Israel seems poised to place its trust once again in the right, in the form of Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud and Avigdor Lieberman’s Yisrael Beiteinu party. Both are in favour of a land for peace settlement, but reject Palestinian demands for East Jerusalem as capital of a Palestinian state. Sadly, it is unlikely that any process will move forward without this issue on the agenda.

In an interview in Yedioth Ahronoth last September, outgoing Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert admitted that Israel must accept a land for peace deal. “We have to reach an agreement with the Palestinians, the meaning of which is that in practice we will withdraw from almost all the territories, if not all the territories.” Olmert also acknowledged that Israel must consider relinquishing parts of East Jerusalem. Whilst Kadima party head, Tzipi Livni and Labor Party chairman, Ehud Barak have suggested they are amenable to a two-state solution with Jerusalem as Palestinian capital, both are unlikely to wield much influence in the aftermath of the election.

Whatever the case, such sentiments have not translated into action in recent years. Far from it. The West Bank holds no less than 149 Israeli settlements, with an estimated population of 460,000. New construction is underway in 88 settlements, in which population growth is thrice that of Israel proper. More than 38 per cent of the West Bank is now occupied by settlements, roadblocks, outposts, military compounds, nature reserves and settler roads closed to Palestinian traffic. This is an ever-present source of humiliation; an open sore for the Palestinians.

Strategically, Israel’s policy can only have one purpose: to make a more compelling case for the retention of as much land as possible in any final settlement. Indeed, this strategy has a name – “facts on the ground”, and the policy is facilitated by cheap and easy loans from the Israeli government for those wishing to settle. Were Israel at all serious about relinquishing this territory in a peace deal, then one might expect a reversal of settler expansion – if only to avert the internal upheaval the dismantling of even a minority of these settlements would entail. Instead, however, colonisation of the West Bank continues apace. Even were the Obama administration to cut US $1 Billion in loan guarantees to Israel, in accordance with pre-conditions that the money not be invested in settlements, as has been recently speculated, it seems unlikely that Israel will reverse its current policy. This is not a viable road to peace.

It goes without saying that the Palestinians, too, must make concessions; they too must practice realpolitik. Firstly, Hamas must recognise Israel – an Israel bounded by its pre-1967 perimeter. Not to do so is pure intransigence, and utterly impractical. Israel is there to stay – the only remaining questions regard its size and shape. There is no questioning the folly, and, in many ways, the counterproductive, almost counter-intuitive provocation of Israel by Hamas militants. Like a punch-drunk boxer desperate to salvage some pride and a last paycheck, Hamas has not acted in its best interests. Hamas must rein in its militants and dismantle its infrastructure of violence; it must walk the path of the IRA; strengthening its political arm, whilst discouraging violent resistance.

UN Special Rapporteur John Dugard concluded in his January 2008 report, that Palestinian terrorism is the “inevitable consequence” of Israeli occupation. While Palestinian terrorist acts are deplorable, “they must be understood as being a painful but inevitable consequence of colonialism, apartheid or occupation.” Power brings responsibility. The more powerful a state, the greater the consequences when it acts. To consider that there is any equivalence between the actions of Hamas militants and the IDF is ludicrous. Israel must act first by accepting its illegal appropriation of Palestinian land is the principal obstacle. “In other situations, for example Namibia, peace has been achieved by the ending of occupation, without setting the end of resistance as a precondition.”

Israel is an occupying power and to act contrary to this truth is not to play realpolitik. The Northern Island peace process was a victory for and because of realpolitik. It was successful because all major players made the compromises that had to be made. It survived through the admirable restraint shown by all sides in the face of intransigence. In the Occupied Territories, land is the principal grievance. At the price of short to medium-term political upheaval, Israel can guarantee a long-term peace and viable local economy for both Israelis and Palestinians.

It doesn’t matter that this is no easy solution. The status quo is far harder, far less agreeable. One shudders to think of the scale of disadvantage faced by children growing up in Gaza now; of the young men and women whose education and social development has been retarded by ceaseless deprivation, fear and anxiety. No child, Palestinian or Israeli, should be subject to gunfire, sonic booms, rocket attacks, nor should they have their doors kicked in and their few possessions destroyed. Yet, it is mostly Palestinians who do the suffering; the hapless victims of colonialism, apartheid, disproportionate military aggression, and, one must add, poor leadership and administration. These people need jobs, food, housing and most of all, hope.

How Obama will choose to engage with Israel, and whether or not he will be willing to engage with Hamas, with, or without conditions, remains to be seen. In the meantime we can only hope the ceasefire holds and wait for new initiatives, for a new Israeli government. Pragmatism must overcome ideology. Now is the time for realpolitik.

http://aljazeera.com/news/articles/39/A_hope_for_realpolitik.html

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Inside Enemy Territory

Posted in Political Whinging on August 10, 2010 | Leave a Comment »

Elections can be rather polarising affairs across all spectra – at a social and personal level. I tend to become rather short-tempered during campaigns, responding with at times intense emotion to the events as they unfold, generally through fear of a conservative victory. Without any true party of the left in Australia, however, every election seems to be a conservative victory, irrespective of whether or not the Liberal or Labor Party wins. That said, there is little point in disguising my hatred and contempt for everything the Liberal Party stands for, and it is the prospect of their being elected that frightens me the most.

All this makes it difficult to remain level-headed, especially when living in the Paddington / Woollahra area, which is overdosed with conservative prats. Their smug, carefree and occasionally disgusting affluence flies in the face of any hopes one might harbour for a sustainable future where personal greed and indulgence are marginalised in favour of the greater good. But what really upset me most of all last Saturday night, was the awful blandness and barbarism of many present in this electorate.

I needed to get out, somewhere, anywhere, “where there’s music and people and they’re young and alive.” With a loose arrangement to meet a friend on Queen Street, I thought it best to stay within the vicinity, so I wandered into the Light Brigade Hotel on Oxford Street. I should have known better, having been there many times in the past on account of its proximity. It was early evening but the place was entirely packed. Australia was playing New Zealand in the rugby, about which I would have been happy to remain ignorant. Rugby is a tiresome, messy game, which people continually tell me is tactically more sophisticated than Rugby League. Empirical observation however, has shown it to be merely a bunch of violent boofheads jumping on each other, then kicking the ball first chance they get. Where exactly the skill or tactics reside in this dreadfully boring mess is a mystery to me.

The crowd was not unlike the usual collection of dullards, however, on this occasion, multiplied by a significant factor. A most moribund collection of collared shirts, tucked-in! and that most awful type of person – the man who wears a suit on a Saturday WHEN HE DOESN’T HAVE TO. I have never really understood this phenomenon, with the exception of say, a fine-quality three-piece retro number or something in blue velvet. But this was like a real-estate agents’ convention. Pretty well everyone else was attired in striped-shirts, with the effect that, were an alien observer to take this random sample, they might conclude that the human species generated offspring through a process of cloning.

I pushed my way through to the bar thinking, hell, I’m here now – one beer then out. I figured I could lean against a wall, sipping away, and at least not feel as lonely as I had done prior to entering. Indeed, my initial response was more positive than the above paragraph would suggest. Yes, here were people and plenty of them. What harm could it do to warm up for the evening in a warm atmosphere?

It was surprisingly easy to get served, after which I found a great spot to lean against the wall. This vacancy was ensured by the fact that, from this vantage point, it was not possible to see any of the two-hundred odd screens with the rugby on. I surveyed the crowd, noting here and there the rare individual who had made some effort, albeit a conservative one, to appear to be an individual. It struck me immediately that from this bunch, the Liberal Party was getting a big fat number 1 on the ballot paper come August 21. The true awfulness of the people, however, was yet to reveal itself!

This was the eye of the storm. I had entered during the half-time break, and once that whistle blew time on, all hell broke loose. The loud chorus of banter now began to show more uniform emotional responses. Approval or disapproval erupted in bursts of emotion, in accordance with the fortunes of the shaved apes on the screen. Yet, there was something very disturbing about it all – both the positive and negative shouts seemed fuelled by anger and invective. One rather frightening-looking fellow, standing a mere four feet from me, was swearing his head off. “Fuck you” this and “Fuck you” that, apparently oblivious to the presence of a civilised human-being within his earshot. Indeed, it occurred to me after a time that he thought this sort of behaviour might earn approval from those around him – something even more frightening to consider.

The game was not going well for Australia, or so I gathered, and my delight at this grew with every angry shout from these hideous barbarians around me. And why not let the New Zealanders have it? It seems to mean a whole lot more to them anyway. Clearly some of the fools in the pub needed a good dose of humility. Anyone who finds it necessary to shout “Die, you cunts!” at a rugby game, has their priorities wrong. I could understand if John Howard had appeared on the screen, though of course, amidst this crowd they would be far more likely to applaud.

It wasn’t long before I’d had enough. I had come here to feel less lonely, but now I felt more lonely than ever. These people really sucked balls, to put it mildly, and they were, with each passing moment of Labor’s fumbled election campaign, moving ever closer to an insufferable joy at the victory of that Catholic misogynist Tony Abbott. The idea was so dreadful that I simply had to get out, and so I did.

I freely admit that it had been a gross error of judgement to go into the pub in the first place, yet to then follow it up by walking down to the Woollahra hotel, borders on the criminally insane. I have long known that this is a haunt of the worst kind of toffs imaginable, and yet, still awaiting contact from my old friend, who was somewhere in the locale, it seemed to make tactical sense to remain hereabouts.

I walked down Queen Street, enjoying the cool air. I was free for now, and some levity returned to my mood. Indeed, I felt as though my loneliness were beginning to vanish on the back of a wave of self-appreciation. There wasn’t a great deal to appreciate, with the exception of the fact that I was not one of those people I had left behind. Negativity is rarely a good starting point for positivity, yet for now it was working.

The Woollahra Hotel was at least blissfully quiet. The rugby was on too, sure, but it wasn’t overwhelmingly loud and the crowd was comparatively thin. It was, however, equally unpromising. Not only were the same clones present as had been in attendance up the road, but the suit count here was even higher, and despite the apparently higher socio-economic status of the clientele, the taste on display was, to put it mildly, extremely disappointing. Suits and ties on a Saturday, with no discernible motive are bad enough, but sloppy, ill-fitting suits on sloppy, under-exercised men are positively revolting. Bad suits, bad ties, bad vibes. And, ye gods, the few ladies present were, to quote René Artois from ‘Allo ‘allo, “dressed-up like the dinner of a dog.” Perhaps it is unfair to judge people by their appearance, but when they have spent a lot of money on rubbish, thus displaying extremely questionable taste, and are likely to vote Liberal, it’s very very hard to like them.

What on earth was I doing here? I was in the heartland of the enemy; the very people who want to turn this country into a gauche playground for the mega-rich, while all artistic sensibility was crushed beneath the weight of their four-wheel drives. They glanced at me occasionally as though I were some odd curiosity; clearly out of place for not wearing the regulation uniform of the rich and dull. I sank into a chair, again, lonely and persecuted, only now, angry and a little exhausted. I knew there was only one thing to do, and I should have done it long before. Finish up and get the hell out of the eastern suburbs. Surry Hills was calling, and, a few minutes later, off I went!

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One more sleep!

Posted in Political Whinging on November 23, 2007 | Leave a Comment »

So here it is at last, the election that has obsessed me for so many months. Tomorrow morning, just one sleep away!, I shall arise at seven to begin watching the election results coming in from Australia. I have waited eleven and a half years for this moment, the first federal election since 1993 where it looks as though Labor will actually win. The polls have been indicating a Labor landslide all year, though in the last two days the results seem to have narrowed considerably. Still, a Labor victory seems the most likely result at this stage, and that is certainly where the money is going with the betting agencies.

The recent Galaxy and Newspoll figures indicated a breakdown of 52/48 to Labor in the two-party preferred vote – this ought still to be enough to get Labor over the line, but it has produced a great deal of angst amongst those who have dared to believe that the end of Howard’s government could really be about to happen. I’m particularly enthusiastic to see this happen. Not out of any great sense of belief in the rather pissweak and watered down version of the Labor party on offer at this election, but because my dislike of the conservative Liberal/National coalition is so intense. Some years ago I would have been satisfied with any victory, just to get them out of power, but as the dangerous legacy of the years of misrule becomes ever more apparent, I’ve come to feel that only a complete massacre will be satisfying. The Liberal party has moved further right than at any point in its history since the war, and only a complete change of personnel or its collapse altogether as an organisation can be good for the Australian political landscape.

That said, considering the immensity of the task that was before Kevin Rudd when he assumed the leadership, even a narrow victory to Labor would be an incredible feat. It has been said that this would be the first time that a government had been thrown out in the middle of an economic boom, though, it could be said that really the economic boom commenced in the years immediately after the last recession and was well underway when Keating was defeated. Either way, considering his success at the last election, his general popularity (which I have always found utterly mystifying) and the well-known fact that Howard is as cunning as a shithouse rat, defeating the man Keating once dubbed “Lazarus with a triple bypass” would be a Herculean task.

Three years ago, when Howard defeated Latham with an increased majority, I had already given up hope of a change of government at this election. So convinced was I that we might have entered another Menzies era, I wrote a novel titled “Advance Australia Farewell,” set thirty years from now, in a future in which everything, inevitably, had gone to the dogs. It was designed to be a worst-case scenario forecast, to the point of being slightly farcical, sarcastic, sardonic and mordant; a story about a seventeen year-old boy who joins a group of professional beggars and eventually escapes as a refugee to New Zealand. By the time I finished the novel in June of last year, I realised that I had lost all hope of a positive future of Australia; that it was destined to become increasingly conservative, Christian, vapid, greedy, materialistic, anti-intellectual, intolerant and assertively nationalistic; that it was heading for environmental collapse. It was an extrapolation of the effects of a continuity of current policy and attitude; an extrapolation from a belief that conservative rule would not only continue, but would become more extreme.

With this forecast in mind, it seems remarkable that I am sitting here, the night before an Australia federal election, looking forward to a shift back towards the centre. It seems even more remarkable, after the devastating loss of the last election, that I am sitting here feeling a deep sense of disappointment, not that Labor might not win, but rather, that they might not win by a landslide.

There are good reasons, however, for desiring a significant majority, the most obvious of this is that a government with a secure mandate can afford to take more risks. What has been most disappointing about this Labor opposition is how risk-averse its entire strategy has been from the moment Kevin Rudd became opposition leader. Who would ever have imagined a Labor leader stating calmly and clearly that he was an economic conservative? It is certainly understandable considering the generally benevolent economic climate and the low level of unemployment that an opposition leader would need to reassure the public that this one positive to which the government laid claim could be sustained. Yet this cannot excuse the Tasmanian pulp mill, or the matching of government tax cuts, or, indeed, the entire Labor tax package. Howard made hay with Peter Garrett’s slip up, in which it was suggested that once Labor got into power they would “change it all”, but many Labor supporters, myself included, hope that Garrett was telling the truth. As Ross Gittins pointed out in the Sydney Morning Herald several weeks ago, the sad truth with Kevin Rudd is that what you see is what you get.[1]

At least, however, this would suggest we might have a new prime minister who was honest and genuine and who was outspoken about the fact that the key to the future was education and acting sooner rather than later on climate change. In a recent article urging Australians to drive a stake “through the dark heart of Howard’s reactionary government,” the man Howard replaced, former Prime Minister Paul Keating, argued that this election was “a chance to rebuild after a decade of moral erosion.”

Keating writes:

“He (Howard) has turned out to be the most divisive prime minister in our history. Not simply a conservative maintaining the status quo, but a militant reactionary bent upon turning the clock back. Turning it back against social inclusion, cooperation at the workplace, the alignment of our foreign policies towards Asia, providing a truthful and honourable basis for our reconciliation, accepting the notion that all prime ministers since Menzies had: Holt, Gorton, McMahon, Whitlam, Fraser, Hawke and me: that our ethnic diversity had made us better and stronger and the nation’s leitmotif was tolerance. Howard has trodden those values into the ground.”

Keating is correct when he states that “Cynicism and deceitfulness have been the defining characteristics of John Howard and his Government.”[2] Personally I think the worst aspect of this government has its aggressive, insular, nationalism and parochialism. The Cronulla riots were a direct and very obvious consequence of this, but I could list countless other, smaller, everyday examples of aggressive nationalism. By way of an example, an old friend, an Australian of German Jewish descent, when visiting Bondi Beach was asked “How did you find the water mate?” When he replied, “It was okay,” the response that was thrown back at him was “well I bet it’s bloody better than wherever you’re from,” which was odd, considering he was from Bondi Junction.

I left Australia because I no longer felt comfortable amongst Australians. The rampant parochialism made it feel further away from the rest of the world than ever before. In a time when growing connectivity ought to have been increasing tolerance, it seemed as though xenophobia, which had so easily re-asserted itself under Howard’s first government thanks to his lukewarm condemnations of Pauline Hanson and which was later augmented by the Howard government’s fear-mongering hypocrisy on terrorism, was becoming more firmly rooted in Australian society. I can only hope, should Rudd win tomorrow, that a change of government will lead to a significant change of tone; less bombastic rhetoric, and a renewed drive for tolerance and social inclusion.

Last weekend, in a desperate need for some popcorn entertainment, I went to see the film “Beowulf ”. When Beowulf first arrives on the shores of Denmark, he makes the bold statement that “I’m here to kill your monster.” I sincerely hope that Kevin Rudd, like Beowulf, can kill the monster tomorrow, before much more harm is done. One more sleep!

It only remains for me to make a prediction. Taking into account all the polls and the analysis of various psephologists, and putting aside my fear of BoBos (Bohemian Bourgeoisie who make a noise in the polls, then turn up and vote conservative) I’m plumping for a Labor win, somewhat narrower than hoped: c. 81 seats to 67. I’m also hoping for a significant increase in the Green vote and, ideally, the addition of as many as six Greens to the Senate. I’ll happily take five, or even four, so long as they hold the balance of power. This can only exert a positive influence, in my mind. Mark Latham might have called this a “Seinfeld election” about nothing, but the truth is that a very great deal is really at stake. The very fact that we are still talking about Kyoto, without having moved beyond it, is indicative of how far behind Australia has fallen. A change of government might provide the momentum needed to catch up fast.

Bring it on!

[1] Sydney Morning Herald, October 24, 2007 “A Smarter Vision for the Future: Not Ruddy Likely.”

[2] Sydney Morning Herald, November 22, 2007. “A Chance to Rebuild after a Decade of Moral Erosion.”

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Return from Exile?

Posted in Political Whinging on November 20, 2007 | Leave a Comment »

On the 18th of May, 2006, I left Australia to head for Europe with the intention of staying away indefinitely. There were a number of reasons for my departure. I had studied at the University of Cambridge and, later, Rome, between September 1999 and September 2003, during which time I became very accustomed to and very fond of living in Europe. I missed the somewhat greater intensity of life as a foreigner and longed for the cities, galleries, museums, landscapes and languages of Europe. I missed the whole European project. Australia was an insignificant sideshow in Asia, but in Europe great forces were at work; the expansion of the Union, the last throes of the unravelling of communism, the denouement of the post-war period. I also desperately missed ruins.
Yet, perhaps the greatest thing about living in Europe was that for four whole years I did not have to live under the stomach-turning regime of John Howard and his cronies. I was devastated when they came to power in 1996. Prior to that, since I’d been politically aware, I’d lived under a government whose ethics and principles I broadly agreed with. In 1995, Paul Keating had said in parliament, “what possible use could Australia have… for a man who described himself as the most conservative leader the Liberal’s have ever had?” I couldn’t believe that anyone in their right mind could vote for Howard, but sure enough, it happened. They did so in droves, and I can still feel the stab in my back. It was the first time I truly began to doubt my admittedly rather naïve belief that Australia was on an inexorable path towards becoming a multicultural republic and reconciling itself to the indigenous population.
When I left in 1999, things were not exactly going the way I wanted them to, yet Labor’s loss was relatively recent – the ink from the stamp of conservatism was still wet and might perhaps be washed away. I retained my belief that Australia could get back on the course it had been on under Keating, and this feeling, coupled with homesickness, cast my memories of and attitude towards Australia in a positive light. I thought of it as an open-minded, forward-looking nation of people who, through the benefits of good education and commonsense secular egalitarianism, were on the whole, decent, aware and concerned, not merely about themselves, but also sympathetic to global issues and the plight of others less fortunate than themselves. In the eighties Australia had been a radical leader on environmental policy and gay rights; it had shifted its traditional focus from Europe to Asia; it seemed that a future of tolerance, conservation, pragmatism and innovation was still an intrinsic goal of society.
I did not remain oblivious to what was taking place in Australia, yet I certainly lost touch with many developments in the political spectrum. None of the news was good; the heartless treatment of refugees, the recalcitrance of the government in its attitude to reconciliation, the gutting of the universities, the sale of public assets, the post 9/11 anti-terrorist rhetoric and commitment to the illegal war in Iraq, the complete disregard for the environment and the failure to ratify Kyoto. The final insult came when Philip “Davros” Ruddock, the champion of the so-called “detention centres” (very little different to prison camps, in which legitimate refugees and asylum seekers were kept for such long periods of time and in such bleak conditions that many of them developed significant psychological problems, were driven to hunger strikes, sewing their lips together and attempting suicide in despair and protest, to the condemnation of the United Nations) was made attorney general.
Upon returning to Australia, I grew very rapidly alarmed at just how awful things in the country had become and even more alarmed at how utterly indifferent most people seemed to be about the state of affairs. It was immediately evident that the country had gone a very long way down the path of conservatism, materialism, anti-intellectualism, and, most obviously, rampant, and aggressively asserted nationalism. This, coupled with an almost complete disregard for environmental issues at all levels – clear in governmental policy and rhetoric (including denial of global warming, a crime which ought to be met with the same reprisals as Holocaust denial in Germany) and public practice, ie. boundless consumption, the utter neglect of the Australian indigenous community, and a record that singled out Australia as the only country in the OECD to have reduced university funding in the last ten years, made it quite clear that Australia had veered off in the entirely wrong direction, far further than I had imagined.
Parochialism and casual racism were rife; selfishness in the form of disregard and aggressive individualism, competition and one-upmanship, without concern for those effected or displaced by the shameless pursuit of personal wealth, had reached an unbelievable level. The only thing that seemed to concern those living in Sydney was the ownership of property and, having a good time. At a basic level, there is little wrong with either of these pursuits, yet when they are pursued without any concern about the environmental or economic consequences, and done so in a vacuum of philosophical and ethical questioning of the appropriateness of these pursuits as goals, the consequences are dire. Australia had become a vapid nation, with a few noble exceptions. The arts were either derided or underfunded, any display of humanistic feeling was rapidly quashed by knee-jerk nationalism; religious righteousness was creeping increasingly into government rhetoric. It was a nation of people both quick to arms and quick to armchairs; a nation of people who drove unnecessarily large and inefficient vehicles, who aspired to live in oversized houses, and who ate considerably more than was necessary both for their own health and the health of the environment.
Australia had become, to twist, with intentional irony, the Marxist term, “a dictatorship of the plebs.” The great irony of Australian political history is that the micro and macro economic streamlining of the centre-left Hawke and Keating governments had created such a benevolent social environment that the working classes in Australia had become bourgeois. It was now the selfish concerns of these most parochial, intrinsically anti-intellectual “plebs”, which dictated government policy, and, so wealthy had they become that they switched to voting conservative: “Howard’s battlers”, as they became known in 1996.
The process by which the working class was lured away from their traditional voting habits was particularly insidious and laid, to a great degree, the foundations upon which Howard was to govern. The process was predicated upon the idea that the Labor government had concerned itself too greatly with minorities and the promotion of multi-culturalism to the neglect of “traditional Australia”. “Australian culture”, it was claimed, was under threat from, most prominently, immigration and the Aboriginal land rights movement. The assertion that the conservative Liberal/National coalition was somehow more intrinsically “Australian” than the Labor party has remained at the heart of government rhetoric since they first came to power on that dark day in 1996. It was this device that Pauline Hanson used, wrapping herself in the flag and warning that the nation was about to be “swamped by Asians.” She pushed the political debate sufficiently far right to allow the government, in the wake of its weak condemnation of her, to shift itself into the space she had opened up and led increasingly to the aggressive public championing of the lowest common denominator. The argument was arrogantly put from the right that the promotion of other communities within Australia and the attempts to redress the unjust conditions of the Aboriginal community were in some way eroding “Australian values”. It seemed that really the government was looking for a licence to enshrine casual racism, discrimination and xenophobia as “Australian values.”
Things have hardly improved since then either, and in 2004 Howard won control of the Senate. The inevitable next step was WorkChoices, and with that it was farewell to many years of hard-won protections in the workplace, removal of unfair dismissal laws, the right to bargain collectively… Since then women’s wages have been reduced from 90 per cent to 81 per cent those of male employees. If the country had been on the slide when I returned, things really accelerated after 2004.
So, before I risk going off into an emotionally charged and opinionated history of Australian politics over the last ten years, I shall get to the point. The point is, in a nutshell, that I was extremely pissed off with the state of affairs back in Australia. It was awful to feel such antipathetic distrust of my fellow citizens, and to suffer such an intense and seemingly irremediable loss of faith in Australia as a whole. The left was shot to bits and bickering amongst themselves. The Labor party was seeking electoral salvation by swinging right with the rest of the nation, and had already jettisoned half their principles. With Latham’s defeat and the return of Beazley, they were more pathetic and toothless than ever. The only political movement worth voting for were the Greens, derided by most of the population as a bunch of quasi-communist loonies. With the typical absence of foresight that has characterised all coalition policy, the people of Australia had been encouraged to mortgage themselves up to their eyeballs; political debate was held hostage by interest rates. The country and its nationals were now a major terrorist target and an international embarrassment. There was nowhere to turn, no one to support with any realistic hope of bringing about change, and this was largely because, it seemed, short of a significant economic downturn, no one saw any need for change, let alone finding the time to give a shit about anything serious at all. They were simply too wealthy to care.
It was in this light that I decided to clear out and head back to Europe. Whilst hardly a bed of roses, at least in Europe the intelligentsia were not written off as wankers and some degree of common sense had prevailed on environmental issues, cross media ownership, same-sex marriages…

Shortly before my departure the Australian band, The Whitlams, named after former Labor prime minister Gough Whitlam (12/12/72 to 11/11/75) released their fifth studio album, “Little Cloud”. The song “White Horses” contained a lyric which summed up exactly my experience since returning to Australia.

“I don’t feel good in a big crowd since the rodent got back in.
They used to move amongst us and now we move amongst them.”

Having decided to leave, I packed up my flat, moved home and saved every available penny. It was then that I sent out the following, rather bombastic and sour e-mails by way of farewell to colleagues and friends. They were conceived as much in a spirit of fun as anything else, but reading over them again, the bile and bitterness is what strikes me as paramount. I have included the first one in full for the sake of colour…

This to my friends:

Dear friends,

How are you? Good, I hope. I’m writing to notify you all of a change of address and my impending departure. To begin with, I have relocated from Glebe back to the Workers’ Socialist Democratic Republic Paradise of 6 Furber Road, Centennial Park, also known as Fortress Furber (or Festung Furber) for the die-hards.
Many of you I have not seen for some time; having been rather head down, tail up of late. This comes as a consequence of committing myself to a crazy campaign, the objective of which is to leave Australia indefinitely sometime in the middle of May.
The reasons for departure are manifold – as many positives as negatives, but essentially I’ve had enough of John Howard’s Australia and the deeply distressing complacency accompanying Australia’s slide into ethical barbarism, and the surprisingly rapid and unprotesting death of its soul. When I found myself visiting http://www.extremistorganisationsaustralia.com.au, trying to discover who advocated political assassinations, I realised it was time to go.
Tant pis, c’est la vie! so I’m ducking out like a true coward and applying for cultural asylum in Britain (primarily for the newspapers). Essentially I’m moving back to Cambridge in May where I shall be looking for work sweeping the dust out of museums and serving drinks to the privileged to keep body and soul together whilst shopping my novels and poems to agents in London. When my rent-free accommodation in Cambridge runs out (end of June) I plan either to move to London or stay in Cambridge, taking frequent jaunts via Stansted Airport to the continent and, eventually, making my way to the Aegean for a long stay. There I hope to spend at least two months on the island of Lesbos (go on, snigger, I still do…) at the house of a friend of my father’s where I will do a lot of hiking (nice, rugged landscape) and bunker down to devote my attentions full time to a gradually accumulating second volume of poetry. I also intend to take a plethora of photographs, potentially whilst wearing a plethora of cardigans™, considering it will likely be winter by the time I get there.
After this I shall crawl back across the Mediterranean to London where I shall subsist in a garret on crusts dipped in stale red wine and do what George Costanza thought epitomised the ideal of rustic bachelordom – bite into a big hunk of cheese. If I can’t find anyone willing to marry me and bless me with a British passport (fortunately Australian passports are in demand in the UK), then upon the expiry of my ancestry visa on the 30th of April, 2007, I shall escape to New York and live as an illegal immigrant washing up, peeling potatoes, shelling peas and smoking butts in a deprived neighbourhood in Queens – you can see I’m really banking on that passport option coming good.
Basically I’m not planning to return until Julia Gillard is prime minister and until Australia is mature enough to behave responsibly, which could be a bit of a wait I fear. I’m a tad sick and tired of feeling like vomiting every time I read the newspaper or see -smug liberal-voting scumbags in their four wheel drives. When other countries screw up completely and turn out to be largely inhabited by a bunch of useless mongrels, it’s much less personal!
So, I hope to catch up with most of you before I go, though that may prove difficult. There will be a farewell event of some magnitude (provided anyone shows up) to which you will all be invited; more on that later.

And this excerpt, from an e-mail to my colleagues at ACP:

“So, I’m off to Europe indefinitely…
The reason? – to seek cultural asylum. Basically I’m putting myself into voluntary exile from the destructive, racist, quasi-religious, and utterly heartless philistinism of the Howard regime which has abused this once fair land for the last ten years and completely destroyed its soul, along with wrecking the future of all workers and students. Why doesn’t it surprise me that that this guy – who must have the worst case of tennis elbow in history from waving the flag so much – is also the vilest traitor in Australian history? Betraying the entire workforce – almost eight and a half million people, must surely rank as the greatest act of betrayal on the record. Personally I’d prefer to live in a society, not an economy, but hey, that’s just me.”

And so, in five days’ time, dare I say it, Howard’s dreadful, ideologically regressive, irresponsible, divisive, lying, cheating, morally and ethically bankrupt, brain-dead, war-mongering, nationalist government looks likely to come to an end. I can barely contain my excitement at the prospect of his government’s demise. I cannot say that I am particularly optimistic about Kevin Rudd and the Labor party, though perhaps the left will step forward once it is safe to do so. With any luck the strong polling for the Greens will be mirrored on election day and they shall claim sufficient seats in the Senate to hold the balance of power. This would certainly place increased pressure on the government to implement much needed environmental initiatives.
So, perhaps it is not too late for Australia after all. Perhaps the now firmly imprinted stamp of conservatism can be erased through time and effort. Perhaps a change of rhetoric at the top level will bring the nation back from the brink of its nationalistic chauvinism; perhaps we might see a less materialistic message from the government; a message that there is something beyond the housing market, sport, and the generation of wealth. I won’t hold my breath, but at least I can return from exile if I so desire. Julia Gillard may not be leader of the opposition and, hence, not potentially the incoming prime minister, yet she is shadow Deputy Prime Minister, and if she gets up there with Kevin on Saturday, that will do just fine.
So, bring on Saturday, November 24, and may the darkest and most shameful period in Australian history come to a close!

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