The world as we know it will end on July 1, this year. That is the day the Greens take power in the Senate. James Arvanitakis explains.
Not that long ago, I toyed with the idea of setting up my own doomsday cult. The problem is that I failed to find any of the basic ingredients that attract followers: charismatic leadership, the ability to ask for money from complete strangers, a doomsday message and a specific date to rally support. I have always been fascinated by doomsday cults. Every time I hear that a charismatic leader has picked a specific date for the end of the world – be it the arrival of extra terrestrials or the predicted Rapture – I get out my diary, mark the date and begin to make plans around it.
As readers of The Punch would know, the most recent episode was the claim by the Harold Camping and the crew over at Family Radio predicted the world would end on 21 May 2011. Using the date to rally friends and family, a group of buddies went out for a farewell bonding session a few days beforehand. I also organised a weekend to enjoy time with loved ones just in case. To tie things up I also left a farewell message on my Facebook page and completed all my marking.
The world did not end, but all had a good time.
I had essentially given up on my ‘founder of a doomsday quest’ until just last week. Sitting in a café drinking my long black (no latte here for this ivory tower academic), it dawned on me that I had found a cause that would meet all the above criteria.
Not only are the criteria being met, but also the cause already has a large number of supporters waiting to be saved: from members of the federal government and federal opposition, to certain journalists and radio hosts, as well as business leaders.
The date of course is 1 July 2011. This is the date that the Australian Greens will hold the balance of power in the Senate and the world will undoubtedly end.
In preparation for the Greens Driven Rapture (or GDR) I thought I better undertake research and prepare some advertising material to broaden support for my cult.
Looking at the media over the last months, there seems to be any number of reasons why the world will end on 1 July because of the GDR. For the sake of brevity, I will concentrate on three.
The first is that The Greens want to end all mining in Australia that will see the collapse of the Australian economy. Checking out their website, I disappointingly found no evidence that this was their position. Rather, the policy is to no longer support the opening of new coalmines nor expand existing ones. Their argument is that to tackle climate change means removing dependency on coal as an export earner and plan for this change.
Not much there, so I thought I would be move on.
The second claim is that The Greens are being taken over by radicals who are anti-Semitic. This has been the focus since Marrickville Council Mayor and NSW lower house candidate Fiona Byrne and federal senator elect, Lee Rhiannon, have been driving a boycott of Israel until a just peace settlement is reached with the Palestinian people and the occupied territories.
What – a boycott? I trolled through the website looking for anti-Semitic language and support for any group that is disputing Israel’s right to exist – and nothing! The radical label thrown at the Greens revolves around a decision to ‘not buy’ some stuff because they argue that the Israeli occupation of Palestinian lands should cease.
Like me, you may not agree that this is the best policy to be pursued, but when did such a proposal become radical?
Students of mine boycotted university outlets until the on campus cafes purchased ethical coffee. This is not a radical step, but one that allows people to express their political views through their consumption decisions. This is the power of the market: if enough people support such decisions, then things change.
Strike two! Nothing there so I thought I would look at other claims and came across one that is certain to bring about the end of the world: the Greens are not only anti-capitalist, but hard core socialists. They are watermelons: green on outside, but red on the inside.
Again I started looking for the broader anti-capitalist positions of the Greens.
I thought I would start with the Chairman, comrade Bob Brown. In speaking about the budget, I found Bob Brown talking about returning the budget to surplus as soon as practical without threatening Australia’s tenuous economic growth. What, chairman Brown talking about budget surpluses? This cannot be!
Then there is comrade Lee Rhiannon, leading the ‘democracy 4 sale’ campaign demanding transparency for lobbyists and donations. According to former World Bank economist, Joseph Stiglitz, transparency is the foundation of both a well functioning democracy and the free market system. Comrade Rhiannon supporting the infrastructure that supports the free market – I was devastated.
Interestingly, over the last few decades, we have seen the balance of power held by the Australian Democrats, Tasmanian Senator Brian Harradine and Family First. Rightly so, the policy positions of the individuals and parties have come under scrutiny by both the media and the two main parties.
The personal attacks aimed at the Australian Greens in general, and Lee Rhiannon specifically, have been unprecedented. Not even One Nation, whose mantra was anti-Asian immigration and the need to print more money received such a barrage of criticism.
It appears the GDR is destined to fail because I doubt the world will end on 1 July 2011. What will not end, however, is the need for a transition to a low-carbon economy, a more humane approach to dealing with refugees, greater transparency to protect our democracy and marriage rights of same sex couples.
You may not like these policies, but claims that they are radical really do miss the mark.
Disclaimer: the author would like it to be known he has volunteered his time for both the Greens and ALP. In the past, he has also supported various Liberal Party and Australian Democrat candidates. Once he shared a urinal with a high profile (male) member of One Nation where they talked rugby league and dated someone who was convinced she was a Jedi Knight.
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