Right out there: how the pandemic has given rise to extreme views and fractured conservative politics

Wes Mountain/The Conversation, CC BY-ND

Frank Bongiorno, Australian National UniversityGreat crises are a stimulus to right-wing political mobilisation. Famously, the Great Depression of the 1930s gave the Nazis their chance. It was a good time for fascists or near-fascists in other countries as well, including Australia. Here, the ground was thick with the Old Guard, New Guard, White Army, Country Movement, New Staters, Western Australian secessionists, patriotic bodies and citizens’ leagues, all claiming to be sick of politics and above it all.

The present pandemic has been no exception. The uncertainty of the times has been a great generator of conspiracy theories and, dangerously, of do-it-yourself medical science. The Depression gave a great boost to funny money theories such as Social Credit, which identified an evil and conspiratorial “money power” as the root of all social and economic evil, a theory that sometimes had anti-Semitic content.

Such conspiracy theories are still with us, expressed most obviously by the obsession of a section of the right with the supposedly malign influence of billionaire George Soros. Others worry Bill Gates is listening in, 5G technology is enslaving us, and vaccination is a plot to destroy our liberty. For many years now, the far right has been preoccupied with Islam. Without abandoning old enemies, it’s now finding new ones to worry about.

But not entirely new. It is a feature of right-wing political mobilisation that it tends to stitch together bits and pieces of fabric that have often been around for a long while, tailoring them into new garments for the present. Anti-vaccination arguments have been around for years. They are now being repurposed for the times.

Where are they coming from? Not entirely from the right, of course: there are wellness and natural lifestyle advocates, and social media influencers, who object to vaccination. Lockdown protesters might be predominantly of the right, but not exclusively so. There is a palpable frustration with restrictions on personal freedom. This extends well beyond those who might consider themselves on the right.

Anti-lockdown protestors seem to be predominantly of the right, but not exclusively so.
Mick Tsikas/AAP

Still, is it striking that much that is recognisable as right-wing protest about “freedom” at present has its origins in the mainstream politics of the right. Craig Kelly, an enthusiastic purveyor of COVID misinformation, was until recently a Liberal member for a Sydney seat, his preselection under the protection of the current prime minister. John Ruddick, a prominent member of the libertarian Liberal Democrats conspicuous in recent anti-lockdown protests in Sydney, is a former candidate for president of the Liberal Party. Campbell Newman was Liberal National Party premier of Queensland for a term: he’s now also hitched a ride with the Liberal Democrats and announced his Senate candidature in the noble cause of “freedom”. Others complaining of lockdowns and restrictions, such as George Christensen and Matt Canavan, both Queensland federal politicians, remain in the Coalition government.

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All of this conforms to a historical pattern. Pauline Hanson would likely never have been heard of if not for Liberal Party preselection for Oxley in 1996. Sky News is fronted by former Liberal advisers such as Alan Jones and Peta Credlin – even if Andrew Bolt once worked on the Labor side of politics and Mark Latham puts in the odd appearance.

The right benefits from our media ecology. The role of the Murdoch media in turning last night’s exotic and extreme into this evening’s political meat and three veg is well enough understood. So is the role of social media in enabling the spread of conspiracy theories, loopy ideas and even violent extremism of the kind witnessed in Washington DC on January 6.

But there is an understandable reluctance on the part of the mainstream media, given their complicity, in exploring their own role in facilitating right-wing political mobilisation. Just over a fortnight ago, Senator Matt Canavan was talking on a program fronted by Breitbart founder and Trump adviser Steven Bannon. Last week, he was on the ABC’s Q&A, where he was handed a national audience.

Mainstream media thrive on the melodrama provided by the staging of stark disagreement. The advocate of locking down the population for its own safety while infections run at over 300 per day in the country’s largest city needs to be confronted with a “let the virus run free” type. For the sake of “representation” and “balance”, the right-wing Institute of Public Affairs gets media opportunities quite out of proportion to any real public interest in its libertarian ideas.

The revival of Hanson’s political career in the mid-2010s was fundamentally dependent on the opportunities provided by commercial television, where her extreme views and opinions could be guaranteed to draw attention, viewers and advertising coin. Similarly, she and her advisers have always understood the media value of the political gimmick – such as appearing in parliament in a burqa.

Mainstream media have long been complicit in providing a platform – and thereby validation – for extreme views.
Peter Mathew/AAP

To read the Australian section of The Spectator these days – I realise I am among a small minority who do – is to encounter a fragment of the right-wing commentariat that seems out of sorts with the Coalition government under Scott Morrison.

Indeed, it seems almost as upset with him as it was with its previous dangerous radical enemy, Malcolm Turnbull. In the July 17 issue, it asserted:

The Liberal Party is adrift, a large, ugly and ungainly tanker that has slipped its moorings and is taking on water as it flounders in a turbulent and unpredictable sea. On the bridge, an ineffectual captain navigates by opinion polls and focus groups, with sinister factional bosses whispering in his ear.

Commentators of this kind – and the editorial goes on to praise Ruddick as “one of the great thinkers of the modern Liberal Party over three decades” – seem almost as worried these days by Morrison as by “Dictator Dan” Andrews in Melbourne. Perhaps more so. They are worried by the authoritarianism, the big spending and the flirtation with zero-carbon ideas. Above all, they are worried by what they call the lies and deceit about COVID.

The basic idea in these circles is that most politicians and their health advisers have persistently exaggerated the risks of the disease. They have done so because they fundamentally hate individual freedom, care nothing for ordinary people and are cosseted from having to earn their bread in the real economy. And, once again, here are ideas you will find among certain commentators in the mainstream media, not only in strange corners of the internet or in low-circulation, right-wing magazines.

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In one sense, they are the Australian backwash of Brexit and Trump, mouthing the slogans of British Europhobes, Hungarian despots, Dixieland governors and Republican Party senators – and Steve Bannon.

But like these right-wing populist counterparts elsewhere, they are also political adventurers and entrepreneurs, seeking to build new constituencies in unknown territory. Short on solutions, big on rhetoric and in the fortunate position of not having to run anything, the libertarian right is frustrated that most of the population seems content to do what it’s told.

At times, it sounds as shrill as the sectarians on the far left whom it sometimes resembles. But those on the right are more consequential because they have significant media sponsors, they exploit real fears and frustrations, and they can sound reasonable when they criticise government excess and authoritarianism.

That is because our governments have sometimes, during this crisis, practised excess and authoritarianism.

Frank Bongiorno, Professor of History, ANU College of Arts and Social Sciences, Australian National University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Right-wing shock jock stoush reveals the awful truth about COVID, politics and media ratings

Denis Muller, The University of MelbourneA COVID-induced rancour that has broken out between Sydney’s commercial radio shock jocks and the Sky News night-time ravers over Sydney’s lockdown would be funny if it were not so serious.

It is mildly entertaining to see 2GB’s Ray Hadley excoriating his former colleague Alan Jones, now at Sky, for his “ridiculous stance” against the lockdown, with Jones calling New South Wales Premier Gladys Berejiklian “gutless” for extending it.

Hadley went on to brand Sky’s Andrew Bolt a “lapdog” for agreeing with Jones, and Bolt retaliated by calling Hadley a “weak and ignorant man who panders to an ugly pack”.

It takes one to know one, of course, but behind all this spittle-flecked slanging there is a serious issue: the disproportionate political power of a small group of radio and television broadcasters in Sydney.

It is one factor that helps explain the procrastination and prevarication that have marked the premier’s response.

Long before COVID-19 afflicted the world, the shock jocks of Sydney commercial radio stations, particularly 2GB and 2UE, had created a successful business model built on outrage.

It is based on a political ideology that appeals to an older audience living in what Jones is pleased to call “Struggle Street”. It is not conservatism, as they like to claim, but rank reactionaryism.

In marginal electorates, largely in western Sydney, there are enough people who find this ideology attractive to make politicians nervous.

That is what has given these jocks political power incommensurate with their position in Australia’s democratic institutional arrangements.

They have become a kind of shadow government in New South Wales.

For example, in 2001, when Bob Carr, a Labor Premier, was about to appoint Michael Costa police minister, he sent Costa to Jones’s home to discuss law-and-order policy.

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In 2017, a former Director of Public Prosecutions in New South Wales, Nicholas Cowdery, QC, singled out Jones and Hadley, as well as the recently resurrected John Laws, as wielding disproportionate power over politicians and other policy-makers.

They hate, to differing degrees, independent statutory officers such as Directors of Public Prosecutions who speak out objectively on issues in criminal justice.

In more recent times, Prime Minister Scott Morrison has relied on Hadley to provide him with a friendly platform on which to propagandise.

The relationship between the two has been described as a “bromance”, although it had a temporary rupture in 2015 when Hadley tried to have Morrison swear on the Bible concerning any role he might have had in the demise of Tony Abbott as prime minister.

Scott Morrison often relies on sympathetic interviews on Hadley’s show to get his message across.
AAP/Mick Tsikas

Berejiklian, as a Liberal premier, has also prospered in her commercial radio relationships, most notably from the benignity of Jones’s successor in the 2GB breakfast slot, Ben Fordham.

He was supportive of her even during the embarrassing disclosures about her relationship with the Wagga Wagga MP Daryl Maguire, who is the subject of an ICAC investigation.

So she had a stake in not rattling the shock jocks’ cages. That meant trying to hold the line against lockdowns.

However, that calculation changed abruptly last week after the latest Sydney radio ratings showed that for the first time in 18 years, 2GB lost the breakfast time-slot.

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The winners were the KIIS FM pair of Kyle Sandilands and Jackie O, whose shtick involves penis pageants and a determination not to be “woke”.

Horrified fellow-travellers in the right-wing commentariat pounced on Fordham. Jones was especially vitriolic. His successors, he said, didn’t have the “balls” to stand up to “cancel culture warriors”. Government, media and big pharma seemed to be all in bed together, and the media were too ready to accommodate the left.

Management at 2GB were also aghast. The Australian reported they told Fordham to take a harder line with Berejiklian, and Fordham duly delivered. Three days after the ratings results had come out, he unleashed this on-air tirade against the Premier’s lockdown decision:

The virus hasn’t killed anyone this year, but the lockdowns, the extensions, the excuses, the mistakes, the missed opportunities, they are killing this city fast. And stop telling us it’s about the health advice!

By now Berejikilian was in a bind.

There was her own hubris, proclaiming her state doesn’t do lockdowns.

There was Scott Morrison’s hostility to lockdowns, exemplified by his repeated attacks on the Victorian Labor Government. Was she to be a source of further embarrassment to him over how the pandemic is playing out?

There was Morrison’s cosy relationship with the likes of Hadley, in which their reciprocal position on lockdowns was self-reinforcing.

And there was the demonstrated willingness by 2GB station management to go after Berejiklian in pursuit of better ratings for Fordham’s breakfast show.

In the circumstances, it is hardly a surprise that she has procrastinated and prevaricated.

If, as many epidemiologists are saying, the so-called “light” approach is condemning Sydney to a long lockdown and exposing the rest of the country to avoidable risk, the role of the jocks in creating the political climate in which Berejiklian is operating since the Delta strain took hold should not be underestimated.

Denis Muller, Senior Research Fellow, Centre for Advancing Journalism, The University of Melbourne

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Finding dignity and grace in the aftermath of the Christchurch attack

Victims are responding to the Christchurch mosque shooting with bravery and compassion, not anger and hate.
Mick Tsikas/AAP

Mohamad Abdalla, University of South Australia

Following the tragic attack in Christchurch that killed 50 people as they prayed, I felt compelled to visit the injured in hospital, and meet their family and friends.

I also visited others in their homes, alongside an elder and pioneer of the New Zealand Islamic community, the man who helped establish Al Noor Mosque where most of the victims were killed.

Their stories of survival are moving, sometimes remarkable and often deeply sad.

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But the common thread in their response to the horrific events of March 15 is profound bravery, deep consideration and thoughtfulness, and a complete lack of desire for vengeance.

At the hospital, I met Ahmad, a middle-aged man from an Afghani background. He said he survived because he was buried under the dead bodies that piled up in the mosque. Although he was shot twice in the back and was lucky to survive, he was not angry or resentful.

When asked about his abiding thoughts now he said:

terrorism must not scare us. Racism must not divide us.

I then visited Fuad, another middle-aged man originally from Afghanistan who also escaped death. He had been struck by a bullet in the back and another just missing the back of his head.

His wounds were visible. He told me, with four children, he was just grateful to be alive. Not resentful or vengeful, he was full of praise for Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and her deep expression of humanity.

Mustafa, a young university student of Turkish heritage, was shot in the legs. One of the bullets exploded in his leg and it is difficult to know the long-term impacts – but he smiles and is cheerful, kind and respectful to the nurses who care for him.

Like the other two, he was not hateful. He said:

We trust in God. Don’t be scared to go to Mosques and schools.

He was quick to point out terrorism would serve its purpose if it made people afraid – our fear is their victory.

Still in shock from seeing the events at Al Noor mosque unfold, Burhan, a Sudanese man in his 60s, stood in the hospital corridor. That Friday at the mosque, he heard the shooting but was not sure if it was real.

He then saw two men shot dead, one on his right and the other behind him.

He ran outside and hid behind a car but could see the shoes of the terrorist as he continued to fire. He watched as a father ran out with his three-year-old daughter in his arms calling out “my daughter!”.

Both had been shot multiple times and both remain in critical care.

A young man in his 20s whom I had met when we completed the hajj pilgrimage last year, witnessed the gunman as he shot that young father and child.

Not unscathed, he too was shot in the hip and shoulder and his father only survived by pretending to be dead.

Without anger and strong in his faith he said:

the Prophets of God were tested more severely.

Down every corridor the message was the same – the survivors urged unity and the strength to resist hatred, racism and vengeance.

At the community centre later that day I met Adnan Ibrahim the father of the youngest of the 50 victims killed at the two mosques. His son, Mucad Ibrahim, was only three years old.

Before he was killed, he had run toward the gunman thinking it was a game.

As Adnan retold the events, everyone became very silent. In deep pain and sorrow, he showed grace and dignity.

Verily we belong to God and to Him we shall return.

His most present thoughts were about the sad condition of humanity, that such things could happen.

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On my way to the carpark, I met Matiullah, a young man under 20 years old. I greeted him and asked if he lost anyone. He told me his father was killed while standing in prayer at the mosque. I embraced him and was struck by his gentleness and calmness.

The community elder Dr Hanif Quazi took me to see Ambreen Nadeem, who lost both her husband and her 21-year-old son, Talha.

Talha was completing an engineering degree. The entire family were planning to visit Pakistan in June and the tickets were booked.

As I met her with her two remaining sons, 17 and seven years old, I was filled with sadness.

Grief lined her dignified face.

And she said:

I pity the killer because his heart was filled with hate, not love.

“Pray for us,” she added quietly. I did.

At a time when we could expect that anger, vengeance and resentment could take hold in a community so demolished by violence, I found the exact opposite.

They were compassionate. They were forgiving. They were humane. And this is what we need right now.

Mohamad Abdalla, Founding Director of the Centre for Islamic Thought and Education, University of South Australia

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Right-wing extremism has a long history in Australia

Kristy Campion, Charles Sturt University

The first step in coming to terms with the attack in Christchurch is to understand that it has been produced by right wing extremism, both in Australia and internationally.

The problem does not lie with immigration policies. The problem does not lie with the so-called outsiders, such as Muslim communities, who are so often the targets of right wing rage.

In this country, the problem lies with the broader Australian community that ignores or accepts the presence of right wing extremists in its midst, and tolerates the increasingly Islamophobic and anti-immigrant discourse in Australia.

Right wing extremism generally starts with perception (or construction) of a threat that imperils the extremist’s way of life. Groups promoting this idea, like the Antipodean Resistance and the Lads Society, have dominated headlines in Australia in recent years. But they are far from the sum of the extreme right in Australia.

Instead, they are a recent manifestation of a recurring problem that can be traced back decades. Here’s a primer on the history of right wing extremism in Australia.

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What right wing extremism is and what drives it

Right wing extremism is an umbrella term used to describe a complex array of ideologies. The core components are authoritarianism, anti-democracy and exclusionary nationalism.

Fascist, national socialist, white supremacist ideologies – especially those that advocate ethno-states and monocultures – sit firmly within the remit of right wing extremism.

Racism, xenophobia, homophobia, and intolerance are fellow travellers: they are characteristics of the ideologies, without actually defining them.

In Australia, right wing extremists tend to position themselves in response to an imagined or constructed threat. Sympathisers believe that society is degenerating, or is at risk of degenerating. Then they externalise this to attribute blame to a target group, such as an ethnic or ideological community.

Right wing extremists foster feelings of peril, and exploit crises to drive narratives that society’s problems are entirely the fault of a target group of outsiders.

They believe the only way to safeguard their society is to remove the threat – often through violence.

The roots of Australian right wing extremism

Historians of the radical right have documented reactionary and radical groups, collectively referred to as the Old Guard, operating in Australia in the 1920s. These groups were concerned about the communist threat, and were driven by the Bolshevik-led Russian revolution in 1917. Although they stockpiled arms, they did not appear to proactively engage in violence.

In the 1930s, members of the Old Guard splintered into a New Guard, and decided to take violent action against communism. They engaged in street fights with Australian communists and trade unionists, disrupted their meetings, and established an alternative employment bureau to try and deter workers from accessing unions.

There was also support for a formal fascist movement. Fascist circles arose in Melbourne in support of Benito Mussolini, and national socialist strongholds formed as early as 1932. Although established independently, they were soon directly administered by the Nazi Party through the Auslands Organisation. Members were considered to be anti-Semitic, fascist and concerned with German/Aryan identity.

Another prominent voice of the extreme right was Alexander Rud Mills. He believed that modern Christianity had degenerated into so-called “Jew-worship”, and the only way to restore it was through a racial interpretation of Odinism (a form of Norse paganism), which he orientated towards Aryan ideals. It is worth noting that the Christchurch perpetrator’s manifesto referenced Valhalla, the hall of fallen heroes in Norse mythology.

Mills was a loud supporter of the Australia First Movement, which promoted the idea that Australia was – and should remain – a white country. In 1941, members in Western Australia were found in possession of plans to assassinate prominent Australians, sabotage vulnerable areas, and drafts of speeches welcoming the Japanese in the event of an invasion.

After the war, these sentiments did not entirely disappear, but were relegated to the political fringe. The Australian League of Rights and its leader, Eric Butler, rose to prominence. In 1946, Butler published The International Jew: The Protocols of the Elders of Zion. Butler argued that a Zionist Occupation Government existed, and used its wealth to control the governments of the world, including Nazi Germany, in order to enslave various races.

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Attempts to infiltrate mainstream politics

Members of the Australian League of Rights adopted various strategies to subvert democracy. The most significant was “elite penetration”, where members would join mainstream political parties, attempt to subvert their core values and ideas and attain leadership positions.

We saw echoes of this strategy by the Lads Society in 2018, when they infiltrated the Young Nationals conference. It was also supported by the Christchurch perpetrator in his manifesto, when he encouraged fellow travellers to “Lightning Blitz” dominant positions.

Right wing extremism reduced in the sixties, but it nonetheless remained in subcultural networks. In 1964, Nazi materials were still being imported to Australia – including Stormtrooper magazines, and stickers proclaiming “Hitler was right”. There was also the (albeit unsuccessful) formation of the Australia Nationalist Socialist Party – a neo-Nazi party which struggled to attract or retain recruits. Its leaders were found in possession of explosives, detonators, and other weapons, and jailed for unlawful possession in 1964.

In 1968, serious attempts were made to revitalise the radical right, but this time using the democratic process. The National Socialist Party of Australia was reformed, and attempted to foster an Australian-centric style, orientating it away from typical Nazism.

The group, which adopted the Eureka flag and exploited Henry Lawson’s writings, gained some support given their deliberate exploitation of white Australian symbols and anti-communist attitudes. It was rumoured they had a “kill list” of 100 Australians.

Shootings and firebombings

Towards 1976, there were other extreme right groups who did not engage with the democratic process, instead seeking to use violence to effect change. Among them, ASIO monitored Safari 8, the Legion of the Frontiersmen of the Commonwealth, and the Australian Youth Coalition.

Ultimately, they executed no attacks and swiftly disbanded.

The next prominent surge in activity came in the late eighties from the National Action and the Australian Nationalist Movement. Both of these groups persecuted immigrants, homosexuals, and communists – all of whom they believed put white culture in peril. National Action was involved in a number of attacks in Sydney, including a drive-by shooting; while Australian Nationalist Movement launched a prolonged firebombing campaign against Asian businesses in Perth.

While activity appeared to slump after law enforcement clamped down, it persisted in subcultural networks and “skinhead” counterculture. The ideological foundations, especially around racialised identity, was kept alive by groups such as the Southern Cross Hammerskins, Combat 18/Blood and Honour, and the Women of the Southern Legion (a chapter of Women for Aryan Unity).

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The international rise of right wing extremism

In 2009, right wing extremism began to rise around the world, in response to a supposedly existential threat: jihadism, and the broader Muslim community in the West. This was more a response to the threat supposedly posed by immigration to white culture, heritage, and values, than to an actual fear of jihadism.

Groups with international connections, such as the Australian Defence League and Right Wing Resistance, were formed. The rise of Reclaim Australia also saw extremist members of these groups splinter off to form new groups, such as the True Blue Crew and the United Patriots Front.

Phillip Galea, associated with both of these groups, was apprehended on terrorism charges in 2016. The United Patriots Front has given way to the Lads Society. They are joined in this by Antipodean Resistance – an outwardly nationalist socialist group which defines outsiders as left wing groups, Jews, and homosexuals, and condemns interracial couples and supposed sexual promiscuity.

But these groups barely touch the surface of this surge. Australia has hosted a mix of groups on the extreme right in the last decade. This includes the Nationalist Australian Alternative, Proud Boys, Soldiers of Odin, Identity Australia, Australian Traditional, Australian Liberty Alliance, New National Action, the Patriotic Youth League, and more.

The fact that Christchurch attack has been shared and exploited by extreme right wing elements in Australia shows we have a long way to go in confronting this threat.

Kristy Campion, Lecturer in Terrorism Studies, Charles Sturt University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Christchurch attack strains Australian-Turkish relations ahead of ANZAC day

Michelle Grattan, University of Canberra

Weeks ahead of the ANZAC commemoration at Gallipoli, serious tensions erupted between Australia and Turkey, after threatening comments by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in the wake of the Christchurch massacre.

Scott Morrison on Wednesday called in the Turkish ambassador to give him a tongue lashing. He demanded a withdrawal of the remarks and the taking down of a nationalist video featuring footage of the Australian gunman’s live stream.

The strength of the Prime Minister’s response has an eye to the emotional place of Gallipoli in the Australian narrative. But he also has to be careful not to cause the Turkish government to respond by hampering next month’s ANZAC commemoration.

President Erdoğan, electioneering at Çanakkale, just across from the Gallipoli peninsula, referred to the massacre, saying: “They test us with the messages they give in New Zealand […] We understood that your hatred is alive […] We understood that you begrudge our lives.”

He said: “Your ancestors came. […] Later on, some of them returned back on their feet, some of them in coffins.

“If you will come here with the same intentions, we will be waiting for you. You should have no doubt that we will farewell you just like your grandfathers”.

New Zealand Foreign Minister Winston Peters, visiting Indonesia, on Wednesday highlighted that the gunman was “a non-New Zealander, an outsider”.

Peters also said he thought Erdoğan had not known the full facts but “since he’s been apprised, or informed of the facts, he’s made a very conciliatory statement today […] which would stand in stark contrast to what he said the other day.”

In an opinion piece published in The Washington Post Erdoğan has written “all Western leaders must learn from the courage, leadership and sincerity of New Zealand’s prime minister, Jacinda Ardern, to embrace Muslims living in their respective countries”.

Peters, who is going to Turkey this week, said when there he would “set any record straight that needs to be set straight as to what went on”.

Attacking Erdoğan’s original comments, Morrison told a news conference they were “highly offensive to Australians and highly reckless in this very sensitive environment”.

Morrison said he had asked for the remarks to be clarified and withdrawn. “I’ve asked for these comments, particularly their reporting of the misrepresented position of Australia on Turkish television, the state-sponsored broadcaster, to be taken down,” he said.

He would wait for the Turkish government’s response – beyond that “all options are on the table”. Asked what these options were, the Prime Minister would not elaborate.

Morrison said he did not accept as an excuse that “things are said in an electoral context”.

The travel advisory for Turkey is under review. People planning to go to Gallipoli should exercise common sense and await further advice, Morrison said. The present advice is for people to exercise a “high degree of caution”.

Morrison said Erdoğan’s remarks were “offensive, because they insult the memory of our ANZACs and they violate the pledge that is etched in the stone at Gallipoli, of the promise of Atatürk to the mothers of our ANZACs. So I understand the deep offence Australians would be feeling about this.

“The comments completely misrepresented the Australian and New Zealand governments’ very strong response to the extremist attack, he said. All Australians had condemned it.

“We have reached out to embrace our Muslim brothers and sisters in New Zealand and in Australia, quite to the contrary of the vile assertion that has been made about our response,” Morrison said.

He said he had spoken with Turkish Australian leaders on Wednesday morning. “They have expressed to me their deep disappointment about these comments. They don’t represent the views of Turkish Australians.

“I am not going to single out the comments of one person and ascribe it to a people, whether in Turkey or across Australia. I don’t think it does reflect the views of the Turkish people, or certainly of Turkish Australians,” Morrison said.

He said Foreign Minister Marise Payne would be speaking to her Turkish counterpart.

The Australian ambassador to Turkey was due to speak with Erdoğan’s advisers.

Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Christchurch attacks are a stark warning of toxic political environment that allows hate to flourish

Greg Barton, Deakin University

When lives are tragically cut short, it is generally easier to explain the “how” than the “why”. This dark reality is all the more felt when tragedy comes at the hands of murderous intent. Explaining how 50 people came to be killed, and almost as many badly injured, in Christchurch’s double massacre of Muslims at prayer is heartbreaking but relatively straightforward.

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As with so many mass murders in recent years, the use of an assault rifle, the ubiquitous AR15, oxymoronically referred to as “the civilian M-16”, explains how one cowardly killer could be so lethal.

It was much the same in the Pulse nightclub in Orlando three years ago, when one gunman shot dead 49 people in a crowded space and, though the motive appears very different, the same sort of military instrument of death lies behind the 58 deaths in Las Vegas a year later. An AR15 was used to shoot dead 11 worshippers in Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life Synagogue last October and a similar weapon was used to kill six people in a Quebec City mosque in January 2017.

It is a credit to the peaceful nature of New Zealand society that, despite the open availability of weapons like the AR15, the last time there was a mass shooting was in 1997. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern rightly identified reform of gun laws as one of the immediate outcomes required in response to this tragedy.

But lax gun laws are arguably the only area in which blame can be laid in New Zealand. Ardern, together with Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison, was also right to refer to this barbaric act of cold-blooded murder of people in prayer as right wing extremist terrorism driven by Islamophobic hatred.

State and federal police in Australia have long warned that, next to the immediate threat posed by Salafi jihadi terrorism, they are most concerned about the steady rise of right-wing extremism. There has been some comfort in the recognition that the most active right wing extremist groups, and there are many, are disorganised, poorly led, and attract but small crowds.

On the face of it, then, right wing extremism in Australia is nowhere near as serious as the neo-Nazi movements of Europe or the various permutations of white supremacy and toxic nationalism that bedevil American politics. In America, it is conservatively estimated that there were 50 deaths due to terrorist attacks in 2018, almost all linked to right-wing extremism.

In 2017, it is calculated that there were 950 attacks on Muslims and mosques in Germany alone. Many of last year’s attacks in America involved a common right wing extremist hatred of Islam, and a targeting of Muslims, joining a long-standing enmity towards Jews.

Almost all recent terrorist attacks have been lone-actor attacks. They are notoriously difficult to predict. Whether inspired by Salafi jihadi Islamist extremism or right wing extremism, lone-actor attacks commonly feature individuals fixated on the deluded dream of going from “zero to hero”.

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One of the main reasons authorities struggle with identifying right wing extremist “nobodies” who post online, before they turn to violence, is that it’s difficult to pick up a clear signal in the noise of a national discourse increasingly dominated by exactly the same narrative elements of mistrust, anxiety, and a blaming of the other.

In Australia, as in Europe and America, mainstream politicians and mainstream media commentators have increasingly toyed with extremist ideas in the pursuit of popularity. Many have openly brandished outrageous ideas that in previous years would have been unsayable in mainstream political discourse or commentary.

Donald Trump can be deservedly singled out for making the unspeakable the new normal in mainstream right wing politics, but he is hardly alone in this. And sadly, for all of the relative civility and stability of Australian politics, we too have now come to normalise the toxic politics of fear.

No-one put it better than The Project host Waleed Aly in saying that Friday’s terrorist attacks, although profoundly disturbing, did not come as a shocking surprise. Anyone who has been paying attention and who really cares about the well-being and security of Australian society has observed the steady growth of right wing extremist and right supremacist ideas in general, and Islamophobia particular.

They have seen the numerous attacks on Muslims and Jews at prayer and worried about the day when the murderous violence that has plagued the northern hemisphere will visit the southern hemisphere. But more than that, they have worried about the singling-out of migrants, and in particular asylum seekers, African youth and Muslims as pawns to be played with in the cynical politics of fear.

Scott Morrison is right to say these problems have been with us for many years. But he would do better to point out that our downward trajectory sharply accelerated after John Howard’s “dark victory” of 2001. The unwinnable election was won on the back of the arrival of asylum seekers on the MV Tampa in August followed by the September 11 attacks, and at the price of John Howard and the Liberal party embracing the white supremacist extremist politics of Pauline Hanson.

Both major parties, it must be said, succumbed to the lure of giving focus groups and pollsters the tough language and inhumane policies the public appeared to demand and reward. We are now beginning to see the true price that we have paid with the demonising of those arriving by boat seeking asylum, or looking too dark-skinned, or appearing too religious.

The result has been such a cacophony of hateful rhetoric that it has been hard for those tasked with spotting the emergence of violent extremism to separate it from all the background noise of extremism.

There are, of course lessons to be learned. Authorities need to do better. We can begin with a national database of hate crimes, with standard definitions and robust data collection. Clearly, we need to pay attention to hateful extremism if we are to prevent violent extremism.

But ultimately, we need to address the permissive political environment that allows such hateful extremism to be promulgated so openly. The onus is on commentators and political leaders alike. They cannot change the past, but they will determine the future.

Greg Barton, Chair in Global Islamic Politics, Alfred Deakin Institute for Citizenship and Globalisation, Deakin University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

The psychology of fear and hate, and what each of us can do to stop it

New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has travelled to Christchurch after yesterday’s terror attacks.
NZ Prime Minister’s office, CC BY-SA

Stephen Croucher, Massey University

As an immigrant to New Zealand, I am saddened and outraged by the events in Christchurch. The apparent innocence of New Zealand has been stripped away by acts of cowardice and evil.

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Christchurch mosque shootings must end New Zealand’s innocence about right-wing terrorism

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Police remain on high alert and authorities are still responding to events following the shootings at two mosques in Christchurch that took the lives of 50 people and seriously injured many more. Three people have been arrested, and one, an Australian living in New Zealand sporadically, has appeared in court on murder charges.

My research focuses on how members of a majority perceive a growing immigrant population, and what we can all do to keep fear and hatred in check.

Migrants target of hate

The alleged gunman (whom the Conversation has chosen not to name) is a self-identified white supremacist. Before the attacks he posted an 87-page manifesto online. In his manifesto and social media accounts, he refers to the rise of Islam, and to towns and cities being shamed and ruined by migrants.

He posts photos of ammunition, retweets alt-right references and praises other white supremacists. The manifesto includes references to “white genocide,” which is likely a reference to a conspiracy theory embraced by the alt-right and white supremacists that “non-white” migration dilutes white nations.

The gunman’s motivations seem to echo those of other white supremacists who have committed similar atrocities: the Pittsburgh synagogue shooter, the Charlottesville attacker, the Charleston church shooter, and attackers in Sweden, Quebec and Norway.

In each of these cases, the attackers voiced hatred toward minorities or immigrants and expressed a belief that their way of life, the “white” way, was being destroyed by these groups who were infiltrating their societies.

Over the past decade, my team has conducted research in India, France, Finland, Germany, the United Kingdom and the United States, analysing how members of the dominant group perceive minorities and immigrant groups. The research has shown that many dominant group members, often white Christians in the countries studied, express fear of immigrants in their nations. In particular, respondents have voiced fear of immigrants changing their cultural, political, and economic way of life.

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Hearing hate speech primes your brain for hateful actions

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Combating fears to reduce hate

Normally such fears are benign and lead only to misunderstanding or lack of interaction. But as we have seen too often, they can lead to prejudice, hatred and much worse.

Recently, such fears have become more visceral with the proliferation of social media platforms. With the use of social media, individuals can easily find others who share their feelings, and therefore not feel alone. The ability to find a community that shares one’s feelings provides a sense of security and validates ones fears and feelings of hate.

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In our increasingly connected world, it’s essential we take steps to combat these fears to reduce the chances of such atrocities happening in the future. First, how families talk about minorities and immigrants is critical. In work that we conducted in Finland, we found prejudicial opinions of Finns toward Russian immigrants are largely shaped during adolescence. It’s incumbent upon parents to be role models for their children and adolescents and to promote tolerance and mutual respect early.

Second, in an increasingly computer-mediated world, it is our shared responsibility to challenge racist and hateful cyber messages. If you see a YouTube clip that you deem abusive or offensive, report it.

Third, the more contact we have with each other and learn about one another, the less likely we are to fear one another. This may sound trite, but the more we know about other groups, the more likely we are to pass that information onto one another and improve overall social cohesion. In turn, we are better able to identify and challenge those bent on dividing society. It is our collective responsibility as diverse societies to recognise our diversity and to face the psychology of hate that would attack our home and us.

Stephen Croucher, Professor and Head of School of Communication, Journalism, and Marketing, Massey University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Can a senator be expelled from the federal parliament for offensive statements?

Anne Twomey, University of Sydney

In the wake of comments about the Christchurch massacre, members of the public have raised the question of whether a senator can be expelled from the Senate for making offensive statements.

It is now well known that members of parliament can have their seat vacated in the parliament due to their disqualification under section 44 of the Constitution for reasons including dual citizenship, bankruptcy, holding certain government offices or being convicted of offences punishable by imprisonment for one year or longer.

But there is no ground of disqualification for behaviour that brings a House of Parliament into disrepute. This was something left to the house to deal with by way of expulsion.

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What powers do the houses have to expel?

Section 49 of the Commonwealth Constitution provides that until the Commonwealth parliament declares the powers, privileges and immunities of its houses, they shall be those the British House of Commons had at the time of federation (1901).

The House of Commons then had, and continues to have, the power to expel its members. The power was rarely exercised, but was most commonly used when a member was found to have committed a criminal offence or contempt of parliament. Because of the application of section 49 of the Constitution, such a power was also initially conferred upon both houses of the Australian parliament.

The House of Representatives exercised that power in 1920 when it expelled a member of the Labor opposition, Hugh Mahon. He had given a speech at a public meeting that criticised the actions of the British in Ireland and expressed support for an Australian republic.

Prime Minister Billy Hughes (whom Mahon had previously voted to expel from the Labor Party over conscription in 1916), moved to expel Mahon from the House of Representatives on November 11 – a dangerous date for dismissals. He accused Mahon of having made “seditious and disloyal utterances” that were “inconsistent with his oath of allegiance”. The opposition objected, arguing that no action should be taken unless Mahon was tried and convicted by the courts. Mahon was expelled by a vote taken on party lines.

In 2016, a private member’s motion was moved to recognise that his expulsion was unjust and a misuse of the power then invested in the house.

The power of the houses to expel members, as granted by section 49, was subject to the Commonwealth parliament declaring what the powers, privileges and immunities of the houses shall be. This occurred with the enactment of the Parliamentary Privileges Act 1987.

It was enacted as a result of an inquiry by a parliamentary committee, which pointed out the potential for this power to be abused and that as a matter of democratic principle, it was up to voters to decide the composition of the parliament. This is reinforced by sections seven and 24 of the Constitution, which say that the houses of parliament are to be “directly chosen by the people”.

As a consequence, the power to expel was removed from the houses. Section 8 of the Parliamentary Privileges Act 1987 says:

A House does not have power to expel a member from membership of a House.

This means that currently neither house of the Commonwealth parliament has the power to expel one of its members.

Could the position be changed?

Just as the parliament had the legislative power to limit the powers and privileges of its houses, it could legislate to amend or repeal section eight so that a house could, in future, expel one of its members, either on any ground or for limited reasons.

Whether or not this is wise remains doubtful. The reasons given by the parliamentary committee for the removal of this power remain strong. The power to expel is vulnerable to misuse when one political party holds a majority in the house. Equally, there is a good democratic argument that such matters should be left to the voters at election time.

However, expulsion is still an option in other Australian parliaments, such as the NSW parliament. It’s used in circumstances where the member is judged guilty of conduct unworthy of a member of parliament and where the continuing service of the member is likely to bring the house into disrepute.

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It is commonly the case, though, that a finding of illegality, dishonesty or corruption is first made by a court, a royal commission or the Independent Commission Against Corruption before action to expel is taken. The prospect of expulsion is almost always enough to cause the member to resign without expulsion formally occurring. So, actual cases of expulsion remain extremely rare.

Are there any other remedies to deal with objectionable behaviour?

The houses retain powers to suspend members for offences against the house, such as disorderly conduct. But it is doubtful that a house retains powers of suspension in relation to conduct that does not amount to a breach of standing orders or an “offence against the house”. Suspension may therefore not be available in relation to statements made outside the house that do not affect its proceedings.

Instead, the house may choose to censure such comments by way of a formal motion. Such motions are more commonly moved against ministers in relation to government failings. A censure motion is regarded as a serious form of rebuke, but it does not give rise to any further kind of punishment such as a fine or suspension.

The primary remedy for dealing with unacceptable behaviour remains at the ballot box. This is a pertinent reminder to all voters of the importance of being vigilant in the casting of their vote to ensure the people they elect to high office are worthy of fulfilling it.

Anne Twomey, Professor of Constitutional Law, University of Sydney

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Why overhauling NZ’s gun and terrorism laws alone can’t stop terrorist attacks

Grieving members of the public following a shooting at the Masjid Al Noor in Christchurch.
EPA/Martin Hunter, CC BY-SA

John Battersby, Massey University

My research focuses on terrorism in or affecting New Zealand. Until yesterday, my phone didn’t ring that often because few were interested in anything I had to say. Since yesterday, it has not stopped.

There is no understating the horrific nature of the Christchurch tragedy. Forty nine people have been killed, and more than 40 are being treated for injuries at Christchurch hospital.

Three people have been arrested in relation to the mosque shootings. One Australian citizen has appeared in court today charged with murder.

New Zealanders will need to come to terms with this tragedy, vent emotions and frustrations, and they will want to know why this could not be stopped. These are valid questions.

New Zealand is a small country, geographically distant from the rest of the world. It has been happy in the assumption that the violent extremism that has showed itself on multiple occasions on five continents over the last 20 years had never happened here. Many New Zealanders believed that because it hadn’t, it couldn’t.

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Christchurch mosque shootings must end New Zealand’s innocence about right-wing terrorism

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Geographic isolation no protection

There was a definite realisation by those in the security sector that this assumption was not safe. The spread of extremism through social media simply obliterates geographical distance and there is really nothing to prevent overseas events being replicated here.

The emphasis was on monitoring and detecting extremism – in whatever form it took. The few arrests for possession and distribution of ISIS related propaganda exhibit that fact. It was not confined – as some commentators have suggested – to just those engaging with violent jihadism.

Another key problem is hindsight. Now that the culmination of a sequence of activities has become so painfully clear, it will be inevitable that several points will be picked out that security sector operators perhaps did see, or could have seen. A retrospective case will be made that therefore they should have seen this coming.

But any sign there was, would have occurred in the context of the day before yesterday. Trying to convince the average New Zealander that anything like this could ever happen here would have been no easy endeavour.

Review of gun and terrorism laws

There will be questions over the resourcing and powers of law enforcement and intelligence agencies, and rightfully so. But we must be mature and evidence-based in the conclusions we take from all this.

New Zealand’s Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has announced a review of gun laws. New Zealand doesn’t have a gun register, but there are an estimated 1.3 million legally owned firearms, with illegal firearms a significant problem.

It is not just the law that needs a review. Gun control, monitoring and enforcement will need to be tightened, but changes need to be considered calmly and focus on the individuals that are not likely to abide by any new law. The vast majority of licensed gun owners are not a problem, but they will need to accept that military-style automatic weapons will likely be banned and a national register will become a reality.

New Zealand’s Terrorism Suppression Act was found wanting in 2007, following the “Urewera raids”. Police relied on the act to spy on and arrest activists who allegedly trained to use semi-automatic weapons in military-style camps in the Urewera forest. Then Solicitor-General David Collins QC described the act as “incoherent and unworkable”. Nothing meaningful has been done with it since.

Social media to blame

New Zealand is a democratic country in which freedom of expression, conscience, religious freedom and free speech are valued. Any legislative change will need to impinge on these as little as possible, but people need to be safe here.

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Why news outlets should think twice about republishing the New Zealand mosque shooter’s livestream

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Regardless of how big and well-resourced security agencies are, overseas experience has shown that individual actors, or small tightly integrated groups can slip through any security filter. It is simply impossible to monitor people’s thoughts, intentions, sayings and social media accounts so closely that every signal that someone might be planning to carry out an attack is seen.

Australian media suggestions of an “intelligence failure” are useful to a point. But the fact that at least one of the Christchurch offenders left Australia a short time ago and was not on any watch-list of concern in Australia, where police and intelligence powers are much more comprehensive, demonstrates this is a very difficult failure to guard against.

This attack was enabled by, and certainly comprised a strong element of, social media. Social media has been wilfully and readily adopted across modern societies. This has happened without much thought being given to its usefulness to organised criminals or extremists to spread their toxic views, or its ready use as a means of sourcing an audience for terror attacks.

As a society perhaps we should take pause to consider the broader implications before rushing to adopt every new piece of communications technology. It’s all very well to ask the security sector what could they have done to stop this attack, when we could ask ourselves the same – what could we have done?

John Battersby, Police Teaching Fellow, Massey University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Why news outlets should think twice about republishing the New Zealand mosque shooter’s livestream

Colleen Murrell, Swinburne University of Technology

Like so many times before with acts of mass violence in different parts of the world, news of shootings at two Christchurch mosques on Friday instantly ricocheted around the world via social media.

When these incidents occur, online activity follows a predictable pattern as journalists and others try to learn the name of the perpetrator and any reason behind the killings.

This time they did not have to wait long. In an appalling example of the latest technology, the gunman reportedly livestreamed his killings on Facebook. According to reports, the footage apparently showed a man moving through the interior of a mosque and shooting at his victims indiscriminately.

Amplifying the spread of this kind of material can be harmful.

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Mainstream media outlets posted raw footage from gunman

The video was later taken down but not before many had called out the social media company. The ABC’s online technology reporter, Ariel Bogle, blamed the platforms for allowing the video to be shared.

ABC investigative reporter Sophie McNeil asked people on Twitter not to share the video, since the perpetrator clearly wanted it to be widely disseminated. New Zealand police similarly urged people not to share the link and said they were working to have the footage removed.

Following a spate of killings in France in 2016, French mainstream media proprietors decided to adopt a policy of not recycling pictures of atrocities.

The editor of Le Monde, Jérôme Fenoglio, said:

Following the attack in Nice, we will no longer publish photographs of the perpetrators of killings, to avoid possible effects of posthumous glorification.

Today, information about the name of the Christchurch gunman, his photograph and his Twitter account, were easy to find. Later, it was possible to see that his Twitter account had been suspended. On Facebook, it was easy to source pictures, and even a selfie, that the alleged perpetrator had shared on social media before entering the mosque.

But it was not just social media that shared the pictures. Six minutes of raw video was posted by news.com.au, which, after a warning at the front of the clip, showed video from the gunman’s helmet camera as he drove through the streets on his way to the mosque.

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Mainstream media outlets are dropping the ball with terrorism coverage

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The risks of sharing information about terrorism

Sharing this material can be highly problematic. In some past incidences of terrorism and hate crime, pictures of the wrong people have been published around the world on social and in mainstream media.

After the Boston Marathon bombing in 2013, the wrong man was fingered as a culprit by a crowd-sourced detective hunt on various social media sites.

There is also the real fear that publishing such material could lead to copycat crimes. Along with the photographs and 17 minutes of film, the alleged perpetrator has penned a 73-page manifesto, in which he describes himself as “just a regular white man”.

Norwegian extremist Anders Behring Breivik, who killed 69 people on the island of Utøya in 2011, took a similar approach to justifying his acts. Before his killing spree, Breivik wrote a 1,518 page manifesto called “2083: A European Declaration of Independence”.

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The public’s right to know

Those who believe in media freedom and the public’s right to know are likely to complain if information and pictures are not available in full view on the internet. Conspiracies fester when people believe they are not being told the truth.

Instant global access to news can also pose problems to subsequent trials of perpetrators, as was shown in the recent case involving Cardinal George Pell.

While some large media platforms, like Facebook and Twitter, are under increasing pressure to clean up their acts in terms of publishing hate crime material, it is nigh on impossible to stop the material popping up in multiple places elsewhere.

Members of the public, and some media organisations, will not stop speculating, playing detective or “rubber necking” at horror, despite what well-meaning social media citizens may desire. For the media, it’s all about clicks, and unfortunately horror drives clicks.

Colleen Murrell, Associate Professor, Journalism, Swinburne University of Technology

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.