Time's Up!

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As a male I am always very self-aware that I shouldn’t be talking about issues pertaining to female’s rights and how they should feel. This is not simply because of gender portrayal but an alignment with my view of if you do not belong to an ethnic minority group and had become a target for racial abuse or vilification, you cannot tell people racism does not exist.

The Harvey Weinstein situation and the subsequently unfolded events in Hollywood put a new spin to what is culturally and socially acceptable in our society. I personally believe sexual harassment is never acceptable but when we live in a society that the powerful retains rights to almost everything, and being the weak and lowly will only be portrayed as opportunists and liars, there aren’t a lot of outlet or options for the victims.

There were lots of debates on what is socially acceptable. Some men even argued that certain actions showed their appreciation of the opposite (or same in some cases) gender. Also there were also “degree of acceptability” for similar array of actions. Personally, I am a firm believer of if this is not something the other party wants to willingly participate, it is harassment, period. There is no grey areas or degree of severity for these kinds of actions. Sexual harassment does not have a PH scale for they are all acidic to the people, social groups, professions and the societies that they have impacts on. If we believe in the true values of freedom, anything that infringes on other people’s freedom, including the freedom of non-participation, is harassment.

Some people might argue my views as wussy or lefty, but it is not. In my opinion, this sits right in the middle of our moral and social compass. No one is more equal than others that’s how I see it.

I had several debates with different people on this issue and some, even females, argued that victims of these cases, by not calling out these predators when they happened, are themselves perpetrators of such behaviours. In all occasions I asked them, “Have you experienced it yourself within the same context?” The entertainment industry is a very relationship based industry. People in power in this industry knows it very well and so do new comers. I had been a new comer and I had been placed into such situation myself and I knew how those things impact you for life. You will never stop thinking about it whatever the outcome of the situation was. You might think you came out lucky and unscathed but the fact is the repercussion is real when you suddenly noticed work stopped or some people suddenly stopped answering your emails or calls after that incident, despite the same group of people were being extremely supportive and friendly before that. You felt alone and if you are not strong enough inside, you fall. I think that is the kind of understanding people need to have before they, both males and females, starting making comments such as, “Isn’t it too late to speak up now?” “Why now?” “Why do they allow this to happen to them?”

I personally think that it is great that people are united and trying to make changes. Changes for the better of the society is always good. Banding together provides the power it needs to make positive changes. But we must remember that changes must be applied to all equally instead of being stratified. The current movement is in full steam but if the actions are not applying to everyone equally, it will fail to implement the change it set out to do.

However at the same time, we should continue to maintain an open and fair attitude to whatever claims that were put forward, so we will not allow opportunists to ride the wave and take down the innocent. The beauty of democratic societies is “innocent till proved guilty” and I strongly believe that if the media wants to help change our society for the better, a strict neutrality should be adopted in their reporting, and that includes the application of fair and square headlines. Journalism should be about proactivity and neutrality, so they can inform the society in an unbiased manner.

Many people say actors or participants wearing black means nothing because it is just a bunch of lefties and attention seekers, well, seeking attention. But that doesn’t change the fact that something is being done, whether people saw them as relevant or not. It is a position, a gesture and a demonstration of determination for positive changes. At the end of the day if you know what you are doing and stick to the goal, whatever other people said does not matter.

There are lots of people who don’t want changes for the better but wanting to stick to their good old days. But the fact is that days might be old, they don’t necessarily all be good. I am forever a fan of a better society that moves closer to equality every day.

Dealing with "No" voters in Marriage Equality

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As the society is further divided by the Marriage Equality debate. Anger is further boiling up in both camps in the news and on the social media. The fact is that whole of the Australian society have become pawns to our Right Wing Elitist Conservative politicians in the Parliament. These people they thrive on division and popularism that give them further platforms to throw out baseless rhetoric views to fuel the dividing walls of fire in our society.

I have already expressed my view and support on Marriage Equality, so there is no point further elaborating on the matter. However, I started to feel strongly that we need to be able to deal with this division triggered by the likes of Tony Abbott, who wanted to bring themselves back into relevance when the rest of the society intended to move on and continue to evolve.

So how to deal with people who are saying no?

1. Are their views relevant to you?

It is very easy to get personal about this because it is personal. However, if you look at the bigger picture, people who championing the “No” vote have their reasons and baggage too. Their baggage whether they are social, political or religious will not go away because you told them they are wrong and baseless. So there is no point trying to convince or argue with them while spoiling your good day with a nice coffee and croissant. They voting “No” and urging other people to do the same will inevitably impact on the count, but if the “Yes” camp runs a positive and active campaign, they will be able to counter the impact or minimise the impact. Yelling and condemning “No” voters will only discount your own credibility in the debate and give them ammo to attack you further.

2. Are their views evidence based?

By this stage of the debate, we all already know that most of the time the arguments are not evidence base. The “No” camp’s argument are all personal – be them social, political or religious. When being crossed examined most of the arguments will not stand. Simply taking the Bible as an example, it is a book that I studied hard and believe in but if someone wanted to put out an argument against Marriage Equality simply because a few passages in the Bible said so, I could quote many more to argue against them on a lot of basic human right issues in the Bible, including slavery, racial equality and women’s right, which we have all seen our societies evolved beyond them.

A lot of time people just want to believe what they want to believe in, evidence based or not. These views or beliefs are their anchor points and they will not let them to be rocked. While they will attempt to rock other people’s boat just like what they are doing in the Marriage Equality debate; that is because of the restless insecurity deep inside them. This insecurity stems from their full knowledge of what they believe in may not have come from as strong a foundation as they thought they were. As they were not necessarily evidence based, but rhetoric based.

3. Is there a need to corner them in the debate?

It is easy to lose ourselves in heated debate. That’s why it is always important to stay level headed. I personally have a number of “friends” on Facebook putting up their “No” vote banner on Marriage Equality. I respect them as a person but not for their views. But by understanding where they came from and knowing that they will not in their life change their views, there is no point bringing out my rocket launcher against them. They are entitled to their views and they are entitled to put out their arguments, no matter how erroneous they are from my point of view. But if we just jump on them and corner them in the debate, we are giving those in power ammo and evidence to condemn the same rights that we are fighting for, which is social equality.

Knowing someone who won’t vote for social equality is disappointing but if humanity wants to evolve we need to able to deal with differences. Otherwise we are just driving people to their corners and inevitably we will get bitten ourselves. If that happens, nobody but only the likes of the Far Right camps will win because this is what they thrive on – extreme actions to divide the society.

4. The sticky situation of unfriending

This decision is personal. If you don’t think you want to hang around or be acquainted with people whom you do not have the same social or world view, it is your right to unfriend them and cut these people out of your life. I think this is particularly personal to the LGBQTI community as they have suffered the most before and during the debate. I can totally understand why members of these communities will want to have nothing to do with the “No” voters in their lives.

For those “No” voters who noticed they got unfriended, do not take offence as this is an inevitable outcome when we feed the bait of the Far Right sector of our society in the disguise of social, political and religious responsibilities. Just need to understand that you are indeed impacting other people’s life not based on a basic human right but your personal world view. It will be completely naïve to think that there will be no repercussions to your life, whether Marriage Equality is legislated or not.

At the end of the day...

At the end of the day, Marriage Equality is both personal and social. I do not believe it should be political or religious issue, but this is the world we are living in. We gravitate toward things we know to support our world views. We just all need to know how to deal with differences and the cost our world views would bring to our lives.

I have voted “Yes” to the matter, and will not change my view. Nor would I attempt to bring down other people’s view with overzealous attacks as I want to minimise my role in this social political fiasco that was brought to us by the small sector of Far Right politicians controlling this Australian Government.

Debate or Debase? Marriage Equality

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I am the last person who is qualified to talk about relationship. I never had a successful one. Even mine with my cat is dysfunctional. But that is a different story. As such I could never understand why other people’s relationships are some other peoples’ business. And furthermore, I don’t understand why some people think they have the right to judge and make decision whether other people can have a civic relationship in the form of a marriage. A marriage is after all a union between two persons.

The whole marriage equality debate is really getting ugly these days. Unfortunately, some of those hurtful comments were made by my fellow ethnic group and that made the whole thing so much closer to home. Some of the arguments were not even evidence or fact based but fear mongering rhetoric and even outright lies.

If these are common people I understand. They might be uneducated, ill-informed or just plainly prejudiced. But some of our so-called scholar politicians were doing the same thing too. For me this not only set bad examples for the rest of the society but also shamed our country internationally. How could these so-called leaders of the country be so outlandish about what they said?

A lot of people brought out the whole Holy Matrimony thing about marriage as a base of arguments about why Australia should not allow people of the same sex to get married. This for me is ridiculous because:

a.      Australia constitutionally is not a Christian country. What faith those politicians or people have had nothing to do with what should be considered a social right among all people. A basic re-balancing of rights for the people who should be made from a social standpoint and not from a religious standpoint. This is because, again, Australia is not a Christian country

b.      Marriage exists outside of the Christian establishment. Take China for example, it is not a Christian country but people still get married. So, marriage is something beyond the governance of religion but the solidification of two persons’ relationship. Arguing against marriage equality based on religion basically is, well, baseless

Some people argued marriage equality promotes homosexual life style, which is not healthy for the society. For one thing, homosexuality exists long in human history before human society is willing to admit its existence. There were lots of historical documents that rulers in the olds worlds have homosexual relationships, that includes some kings in the Chinese dynasties. So, there is no promotion required. Further from what I understood from my friends, it is not a lifestyle you adopt. If you are into it you are, if you are not, you just are not. Also, there was no scientific evidence showing that marriage equality drastically increased the homosexual populations in those countries where marriage equality stands.

The whole thing about that woman in the Coalition for Marriage TV ad saying she is worried that her son can wear dresses to school, something that already refuted by the principle of the same school was just completely fear mongering, preying on people’s insecurity on the issue. Also, I wonder whether that mother had ever wear pants in her life. Pants were once considered as man’s attire, so if she could wear pants why can’t her son wear dresses? There are men who wear similar things in history, such as kilts, does that make them less men? That kind of imaginative arguments simply do not stand but only aimed to create fear for people, hoping to ill inform other people.

At the end of the day, what you don’t like does not matter. What I felt in this whole debate is all about, especially for the “No” side, were what they want, what they think. Those arguments had nothing to do with what the society needs to progress. Pauline Hanson said her society was brought up with father and mother as a family. Well, guess what, a long time ago someone like her calibre would not be able to get into the Parliament either. So, she accepted that part of the change to her favour but not the part that not to her liking. This kind of standard shifting and favouritism is what is killing the Australian society in this and other social issues.

I do not expect to live in a Utopia but I would hope everyone respects everyone, and everyone makes an effort to make this a better society. The debasing exhibited in this whole debate is just heart-breaking. Maybe I am too rational as a person whole only operates on facts and evidence, and in this post-truth world people like to take advantage of the uniformed, but I believe if everyone who has the sense tries to correct this, one day our society will be back on the right track again.

Political correctness and marriage equality

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There are a lot of things in our society that are bugging me at the moment. One of them being the dragged on debate of the marriage-equality.

First of all I still cannot gather the need for our mostly “straight” white male / female politicians to refute simple rights that were wrongly not given to a particular sector of the society in the first place. For me, discrimination based on your so called religious / Christian value is social terrorism on our society. You are no better than other people when you conduct such activities. You are even worse when you are conducting such activities in God’s name. While God’s wrath is unmatched and cannot be measured, be remembered that “not everyone calling his name will enter the Pearly Gates”. It is like Judi Dench’s response in Shakespeare in Love – people throwing out her name to suppress other so much that she felt her name is being worn out. I am sure the Christian God, who happened to be mine too, is sick and tired of people using His name to oppress others, while throughout the Biblical history He had time and time again saving the oppressed from the oppressing. The Bible is full of story about freedom and making things right. However, these so called modern “Christian politicians” seemed to have forgot what their Christian faith is about but gladly taking up the roles of Pharisees and Sadducees of the modern times. We all know well those went down in the Biblical history.

Another frequent argument these groups of politicians time and time again threw out to support their views is “political correctness”. Political correctness had been labelled by the Liberal National Coalition as social madness so many times that people started to lose track of what this is about. Political correctness itself is not a bad thing because it foster an understanding of respect to each other. It is when this was over applied to facilitate specific social political agenda that this became an issue. But guess what? Using political correctness as a defence is also the tactics this group of “cry political correctness foul politicians” do best. They don’t want to be labelled as bigots when they made bigotry comments and went even further to say that it is their right to bigotry. They also hated being called social fossils when it was proved that they were not moving on with time. Those are their rights to be politically correctly acknowledged.

Political correctness is not about avoiding but about respecting. Not calling people or labelling people because of their ethnicity, religious beliefs and sexual orientation is what we would expect for a modern civilised society. We are not living in a time where white supremacy rules the world and colonising the rest of the world under the disguise of preaching the Christian value to the savages. In the past century or so most of the world has moved on in a lightning speed, hanging tight to your old school White Colonising-Christian views and being criticised for doing so is not political correctness but social political correction. If you don’t like it don’t do it in the first place. If you do it own it up and prepare for the backlash. What these politicians are doing are like a bunch of spoiled brats crying foul when their bullying acts did not go their way and got caught by the rest of the society. So all of a sudden political correctness is the beast that needs to be tamed, but not the bullies in the social school yard.

What really surprised me is that time and time again these people still got elected into powerful positions. It is quite obvious that in Australia the political arena it is just a few bullying clique groups battling out against each other trying to take control of the country. They are not different to mafias or triads killing each other to keep their pockets full. When being called out about their behaviours and illogical hate speeches, it is not political correctness gone mad but political correction in works from the society. When 70% of the society think it is time to make marriage equality a basic right for everyone in the country, it is your duty, whom we are paying you through our tax money to deliver the results we want, not to spend $122 million on something you don’t intend to honour as an opinion poll so to avoid doing a job you personally don’t like. Whether you like it or not does not matter as you were paid to do the job. Otherwise what is the point of us financing your lifestyle if you are not delivering? Being called out for your inability to do your job is not political correctness but politically correcting your attitude to do your job properly.

At the time of writing the plebiscite was voted down again but these bunch of school yard bully white “straight” male politicians who loves attacking political correctness while using that as their defence will not rest to avoid their responsibilities. It is up to the Australian people to deliver the report card to them at the next election and I do hope everyone does that responsibly. At the moment we are stuck with a bunch of spoiled brats eating up the society’s resources and a Prime Minister who has no guts and spine at all to stand up to what once believed in (unless those were just political con job for votes). However I believe with a political correcting voter base we might eventually got what this country deserves – a responsible and levelled headed government that exactly delivers what this country needs and one of them without a doubt being marriage equality that rebalances the basic rights of our society.

The Parliamentarians' Logic of Free Loading

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It was not a good start to 2017 for the current Australian government. Amidst the Centrelink automated debt collection saga that incorrectly targeting people using flawed algorithms, the Sussan Ley’s Gold Coast property scandal that unravelled other MP’s luxury lifestyles paid by tax payers did not sit well with the Australian public. Bronwyn Bishop, now notorious for using tax payer money for chartered helicopter flights to functions while they can easily be reached by car blamed this as Socialist attacks. This further reflects how these groups of self-entitled self-centred politicians just did not get it, and they are the reasons for the rise of the alt-sectors of politics including the One Nation in this country.

Without being too socialist, let me break this down in a more common sense term. The argument itself is about what constituted official business. A number of MPs claimed that if they are invited to private events because of who they are, they can claim. The grey area is “who they are”, but then if we look into this further, it is not about who they are but “what kind of business was conducted”. Of course you can said you talked about “ministerial businesses” but then the question are what are they? Who knows? And were they recorded? The fact that these MPs claimed their rights to tax payer money simply because of “Who they are” reflects the megalomaniac culture and ego of these groups of people. If you strictly look at this from a business governance point of view, it is not about a pub test but a series of well-defined criteria that should govern these activities. Simply put, if they are on official businesses, they should at least meet the following straightforward criteria:

• In what aspect of their current portfolio are these businesses related to?

• Why would the MPs meet with these groups of people to discuss about these businesses in relation to their portfolio?

• What were discussed at these functions and events?

• Were these discussions recorded and reported back to the Parliament in any record management compliant manner?

• Where these discussions available for the public aka the tax payers to review?

These are just basic processes that any reasonable governing body should have regarding official businesses and it is just borderline ridiculous that these MPs or even our so called Government, the highest governing body in this country, could not comprehend and follow. Many a time we heard these MPs said they checked with so and so about it and he said, or she said or the office said it is ok. But the fact is what did they tell them and what were they checking against?

Some MPs argued that they cannot disclose certain discussions because they are not mature enough and / or command business confidentiality. The fact is if you are charging tax payers for your “business” it is your responsibility to disclose these “businesses”. People who paid for you have the rights to know. It is not within your personal judgement to not disclose. The only thing you can argue about non-disclosure is when it involves national security or intelligence agencies, which I doubt there would be a lot of portfolios in the Parliament that need to deal with.

Of course the Government made itself even look worse when it claims they are trying to crackdown free loaders in the society with the Centrelink debacle while at the same time they displayed free loading behaviours themselves and trying to justify their luxurious public funded lifestyles.

The bottom line is how can one justify trying to “save the budget” with cuts in health care, education and infrastructure while at the same time the same group of people are spending so much public money that they claimed they are entitled to? Would the public really believe that the generation of entitlement are out in the wild and not within the walls of the Parliament? This is not about individual MPs behaviour but that whole group of people collectively. It is more than just about setting up an anti-corruption agency but have strictly implemented and followed guidelines for these spending that you don’t need to justify but simply report on. If not these so called MPs are no different to those free loaders they are trying to crack down in the society during this Centrelink debacle. But would they ever learn? God knows.

What about me?

In the recent years, my general feeling is that the world has become a place where it is all about me and nothing else. This is a worrying trend in my humble opinion.

The current debate in the national census irrevocably reflects that. The paranoid and defiance was generated by the collection of personal information and the information retention policy. People are unhappy that they have to disclose their details in the form and staging protests against it. The argument was of course privacy.

The thing is, census is an extremely important exercise for the country as it provides important information of its population in one single source, making evidence based decision a lot more streamlined, saving time collecting data from multiple sources and collate them. The fact is if you need to collect data from multiple sources to provide evidence, the margin of error is significantly higher as different sources would have collected the data with different focus thus might not be completely compatible with each other. So carrying out full census at regular intervals can provide controlled data that can be compared and thus provide more precise information for policy making, and in some cases for rebuking against certain policies being made.

This centralisation of information is also the reason some people arguing against it saying it is an invasion of privacy. Also the fact that completing the census form is compulsory became an excuse to cry foul of democracy. Arguments on “I have the right not to do certain things if this is true democracy”. “I have the right to keep my information mine” flourished across the cyber space. The fact is, these arguments have only one common denominator – me.

I personally find this quite disappointing. We live in a democracy – we have the freedom that a lot of other people in this world do not enjoy or even cannot enjoy. However, we have become so egoistic about our freedom that some of us start to fail to see their civic duty is to up keep this democracy through sensible participation. The scenario is, a government was elected via a democratic process, whether you like the results or not, there is the result. It is your obligation to respect and accept the results while rebuking senseless policies – through facts. The better we understand how these facts are being collected the better we can debate on social and political issues in a constructive manner. However, refusing to do so by claiming the rights to freedom means you at the same time surrender your freedom because as uninformed as you are, you will lack the knowledge to support your arguments, which seems to be the prominent way of debating things these days, even for our politicians.

The countless threads about “I don’t like this”, “I am worrying about this” without actually studying and understanding the census process is disturbing. People keep saying they don’t want their information centralised in one place because of privacy and information security, but then at the same time they surrendered all their information to their Facebook and Google accounts for data mining, which directly contradicts to their arguments. One might say, they did it on a voluntary basis not being forced, but if the argument is about information privacy, it is about information privacy and not the way information being collected. In this day and age, everyone is an open book, whether you like it or not. As soon as you get your tax file number, everything about your financials are already recorded, that is together with your bank account, mortgage, Medicare account, passport, etc. etc. So does one really think that if the government want that information there is no way the extract it? It might take longer than using the census data but it is out there whether you like it or not. So this privacy concern is redundant. And about security, nothing is secure – all you need is a hacker to hack one of your online accounts, there is no more security to talk about. And yet all these people seemed to have completely forgotten about that.

The fact is the idea of the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) will not in their best efforts protect participants’ information is absurd. Yes it is Australia, people may be a bit more laid back (enters stereotypes) but to think that the ABS doesn’t care about this issue is just weird. Yes they might have security scared or incidents in the past, but if hackers can hack into the CIA and can bring Microsoft and Sony down, what makes one think that the ABS will always be safe? Most people are always online nowadays, even one’s phone or computer could be a breeding bed for information leeches. So singling out ABS alone is not a particularly strong argument.

At the end of the day, it is up to the individuals to decide what they want to do with the census. The only words I have are “If you make your bed, you lie in it”. Don’t start pointing fingers when it is time to pay the price or take the consequence. As for me, I have done my duty and can sleep well.

Brexit

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Brexit – it is happening. This mean there will be some serious earthquakes in the political and national scene in Britain. The nationalistic UKIP will without a doubt continue to expand its xenophobic agenda and capitalising its success in the Leave campaign. For those who voted to leave, time will tell whether they did the right thing or just presented the fate and treasury of Britain to some opportunistic politicians to be put into their own coffers.

Nonetheless political blood has been spilled. David Cameron has resigned and EU demanded Britain to leave as soon as possible to remove uncertainty. The situation in Europe will continue to be uncertain as Putin would continue to push for a separatist Europe so he can expand his ambition to annex smaller Eastern European countries. The fact that there are reports about Russia funding the Leave campaign in Britain indirectly is quite an alarming bell.

But the greater impact of this event is how it rocks the very foundation of modern politics – and this is no longer an isolated case. From the Philippines election, to Donald Trump, to Brexit and to the latest poll in Australia that there is an increasing number of people decided to go for independent and smaller parties (from 4% a few months ago to over 20% this week) all speak volume about how modern politics had failed. They might all look different but at the very basic level there is a common denominator – people are not happy and have lost confidence in modern politics.

Modern politicians have been focusing on politics instead of governing. A trend that has cast a doom spell for established political platforms. However, these politicians were so confident about their power that they did not realise the power they currently have were given to them by the people. Political parties are no longer about sustainable governing but a continuous opposition of opinions for the sake of opposing. Modern politicians forgot that politics is a means to an end but not an end itself. Putting politics in the fore front without thinking about what is efficient and responsible governing is what is bringing the downfall of these politicians.

From what is happening around the world there is a very one clear signal – people are not happy and there are clear divides across different sectors of the society. This social segregation resulted by opposing politics played by those in power eventually lead to a rebellion from those most disenchanted. The Trump phenomenon and the Brexit vote are very clear indications of that. However it seems that a number of politicians still failed to understand that.

Take Australia as an example, the two biggest parties immediately tried to take this opportunity to grab voters’ vote by saying how much they would be better than the other party to sail through this change. This completely missed the opportunity to show voters that the major parties are united to keep Australia’s boat safe. Instead it became, “if you vote for me you get a ticket to the lifesaving boat”. Further the Prime Minister’s comment about how unbinding the $160 million plebiscite on same sex marriage has nothing but reflected how out of touch modern politicians are, when it comes to responsible governing. Spending that much money on something that you will not honour on something that in the latest polls 70% of Australians already indicated they are positive about is not the most responsible way of governing. This kind of “doing things for the small elite groups” practice is exactly why voters are revolting against established political entities. However, the continual refusal to learn and accept the world has change will continue to bring discontent to the society giving rise to unchecked blind nationalistic tendencies – and we all know what that could bring in 1914 and 1939.

Maybe as will all lifecycles, it is time for an end and a change but the question is “Does the world need to pay a hefty price for the change?” We study history to learn from the past but then at the moment learning is less important than staying in power for most political establishments. This kind of vicious old school and small circle sentiment is what is leading our society and voters making sometimes illogical decisions at polling stations.

Brexit is now a reality there is nothing to stop it. Pounds and stock market are crashing. Scotland is going to go for another round of independent vote to leave UK and stay in EU. Northern Ireland is looking for a way to secure its existence. Political unrest and economic costs are already kicking in and I do hope the voters in Britain now understood what they have done when this thin veil of nationalism finally got blown apart. It is up to the Brits to salvage what is left in their society but Australian politicians are the next up to face the music, and probably it won’t be a song they would like to hear. All I could say is the earlier they learn about what their jobs mean the higher the chance they can turn the Titanic around.

The Evita Style of Campaign

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As this snooze fest election campaign soldiers on, general Australians really wonder: what is in for us?

A lot of things have been touched on but as Evita once sang “there is no hope or solution”. In fact what it felt like in the past two weeks was that our so called political leaders were just doing one musical number after another. They sang tunes to voters’ ears hoping one of them would be catchy enough and thus take them pass the finishing line first.

One thing I found quite interesting was that at this weeks’ Q and A both representatives of Liberal and Labor parties were attacking the Greens leader saying “You were not invited to the leadership debate because you are not considered as a viable Prime Minister candidate”. Personal attack on a public discussion forum is pathetic in my opinion. But personal attack without considering their declining position and still clinging to the past about the glorious two party rules is even more pathetic. And if this is what our so called leaders in the country are, Australia is doomed.

What one needs to remember is that in the past 6 or so years the Government is controlled not by Liberal nor Labor but by independents. In fact their influences were so great that the Government was unable to pass socially unwelcoming and unpopular policies because of them. This is why the current Coalition government and the Greens were trying to get rid of them through voting legislation changes.

For me this is sad and aggravating. This without a doubt reflects what our politicians are – power mongers who have no regards to what the society wants. And this is the exactly why the Australian society is punishing them by granting independents more power through voting them in. Liberals and Labors nowadays are basically the same set of people with a different skin. When they are in opposition they will say whatever that sounds like pleasing general voters but once they are in power they just do whatever that pleases themselves and their cores. This might work in the past but then one thing our politicians nowadays do not understand is that – the world has become smaller and new generation of voters are more exposed to knowledge than they thought they are. Manipulated data to facilitate sales of policies no longer works as it used to, for anyone can check facts and distribute that knowledge to everyone via social media.

The inability to understand how technology and ease in transfer of knowledge have affected voters understanding of our society, the world and ultimately politics is what is bringing the downfall of our so called “veteran politicians”. They thought by using social media they can get their messages through to the younger generations but they do not understand that by doing so any mis-steps in or attempts to manipulate messages will inevitably backfire – and the current generation of voters will not hesitate to raise their cyber cannons against these politicians.

What our society wants is a government that truly represents the view of the society – be it on issues such as education, healthcare, infrastructure, refugees, global warming etc. When the society questioned about “why are we using our tax money to support private schools running as private businesses instead of providing funds to government schools that have the responsible for providing equal education to all?” The society expects the Government to answer the question and respond to the society’s wish. When the society questioned the Government’s understanding about healthcare for underprivileged people in our society, the society expects the Government to rectify the error instead of protecting the insurance businesses. When the society rallied against coal mines and for protecting our natural environment through clean renewable energy, the society does not expect the Government to use legislative measures to justify doing something against the society’s wishes.

If our Australian politicians continue to neglect these strong voices from the majority of the society and continues to protect the interests of a small sector of the society, it is just dictatorship in under a democratic disguise – and our current society can easily see through that. Traditional Australian politicians are failing because they failed to evolve with the society. Australia has not experienced its Trump moment yet but if they continue to fail to align themselves with an Australian society that has evolved beyond them, they will be eventually be abandoned. Jingoes and slogans might work in the past but our current generation of society, like it or not, is a lot smarter than that.

The Evita style of politics is truly a time of the past but if our Australian politicians continue to neglect this I am sure Australia will not cry for them when the society finally decide to completely abandon them.

Has Turnbull Turned His Own Table?

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So the election has been called. Unlike the US President Campaign, Australian elections are usually short and sweet. It comes like a flash flood and it is over before you know. You just hope you won’t get yourself drowned in the process.

Malcolm Turnbull as Prime Minister in my opinion was quite underwhelming. This perhaps was because I had such high hopes for him when he took over from a ridiculously narcissistic right wing government, I expected things to change into the correct directions. A lot of issues were unresolved including education, health and same-sex marriage. He did change a bit of stuff like dropping the magnitude of arts funding cut and replacing some questionable personnel in the government. However as a person who put himself as the Prime Minister of the modern age and understands what the Australian people want and need, he really hasn’t done much to prove that.

So it is not surprising that his approval rating (something he used to challenge his predecessor) had been tumbling in the last few months. Bill Shorten, the opposition leader came back up as a resurgent and became a contender again. That makes a lot of people think: “isn’t this a risky business to call for an election now?” It really does seem under the current political weather and in the current Australian social environment. However, judging from the point of view that Malcolm Turnbull is a businessman I have a strong feeling that this is a calculated risk that he is willing to take to secure a better controlled government.

First of all, Bill Shorten’s resurgence and Malcolm Turnbull’s downturn has just begun. The longer Malcolm Turnbull waits, the more disadvantageous position he puts himself into. There are lots of things that despite being the Prime Minister, Malcolm Turnbull’s hands are tied. On the other hand, Bill Shorten, unproven as a Prime Minister but working the same magic as Tony Abbott did when he was the opposition leader was serving plates after plates of counter proposals to a lot of policies. Whether they would work God knows but they are certainly ideologically enticing proposals. The difference between Bill Shorten and Tony Abbott was that he is not just a no person but he said no then put something else forward, whether tested or not. This makes him looks like he is the man of change, which Australia is craving for after almost two years of disastrous Abbott leadership. Malcolm certainly knows that the longer he allows Bill Shorten to act as the “social conscience” the harder he could counter his rise with his hands still being tied. Under such circumstance it is essential to put the election forward before Bill Shorten can secure enough Australian votes to take the precious Prime Ministership from him.

The other risk Malcolm Turnbull is willing to take is losing some seats in this election to flush out the old conservatives. In the past two and a half years it is not a secret that the Australian public learnt its mistake by voting in someone who is not popular in but just because they did not want the existing government at that time to stay in office. Australia as a country has evolved beyond the conservative right wing white supremist society Australia once was. The actions of the Abbott government had completely alienated majority of the voters and Malcolm Turnbull certainly knows that. However, if he wants to stay in power he also has to answer to the cabinet, whom holds his fate at this point by some extremely conservative members. An early election can be used as a tool to flush out these cabinet members and members of the Parliament who have become nothing but stumbling blocks for Malcolm Turnbull. The fact that Cory Bernardi lost his primary ticket position in his electorate to make way for another minister is a sign that Malcolm Turnbull is attempting to use the public’s power to get rid of people who are still putting a shackle around his Prime Ministership. Of course losing a few seats could mean looking bad for the Coalition government but Malcolm Turnbull at the same time knows with the current majority in the Parliament he can afford to lose a few seats to freshen up his cabinet for his own visions and reforms. This is the risk that he is willing to take to gain more power both in the Parliament and in the cabinet.

People might think Malcolm Turnbull is risking his government for an election that he might or might not win. But Malcom Turnbull as an experienced business man is a man who is willing to take calculated risks to achieve what he wants to achieve. This is something that a lot of current generation politicians do not have in their guts or their wits. Would he succeed? At this point I do think he would. The good thing about this tactic is that it took the spotlight off him a bit so he could show he is a person who endeavours to get things done. The noise generated by critics and the media around him, if we look closely, is not entirely about him but about other groups of people who are scrambling to stay in the spotlight for power.

The current circumstance seemed to be Malcolm Turnbull turning the table against him but for me it looks like it is going to be a 360 degree turn that is going to consolidate his own power by shaking off unnecessary items that used to be on the table.

When Politics is Failing

The world seemed to be currently in crisis. By this I don’t mean the natural disasters and global warming (which a lot of right wingers and sceptics are still denying) but the world political orders. Recent events in Hong Kong, America and Australia really led me to ask – is this the end of old school politics?

Politics is never meant to be about people generally. It will always serve the interest of a specific group that by any means rise to power and move its interests and agenda forward. It will be naïve to even think that democracy is fair politics but the main difference is it offers a blue print for change and people would have the “power” to change government when they want.

This leads to what is happening in the United States at the moment. Donald Trump has risen from a butt end joke in the Republican President race to a front runner that seems to be no stopping at all. The other alternative is Ted Cruz, a similar clone to Donald Trump but a lot more, well, political. The fact that Donald Trump defied all odds to get to this stage was beyond a lot of people’s expectations. However when we look at what was happening in United States in the past 8 years we can see why. Since Barrack Obama became the first African-American President the Republicans made it clear that they would give him a hard time in the House. This went to the point of not just trying to vote down policies that are good for general Americans, e.g. Obama Care, but to a point of shutting down the Government, leaving thousands of civil servants almost financially stranded. With this kind of behaviour, no wonder people are sick of politicians and starting to look for an alternative. Donald Trump did not hide the fact that he is ignorant in policy making or international diplomacy. Donald Trump acted like a school yard bully and a spoiled brat. But the different he offers is that he doesn’t do political talks and he gears his media campaign in this nature to “talk to the general Americans”. It is no rocket science to understand why Donald Trump is actually trumping his more seasoned political opponents.

In Australia, similar things are happening. Australia had 5 Prime Ministers in 5 years and it had become a joke to the international arena. The Rudd-Gillard-Rudd-Abbott-Turnbull wombo combo is proving too much for the Australian people. During this period not really a lot of useful policies showed any traction or continuity. Scandals came one after another and it became quite obvious to the general public that these people who claimed to represent them are after, all about themselves. This gave rise to a group of independents who eventually held the balance in the Parliament. Traditional politicians on all sides hate them because as major parties their majority no longer counts and have to leave their fates to these independent members’ hands. This came the recent voting system change to try to eliminate these independent Members of the Parliament at the next election. The Greens whom once seemed to be a viable option outside of the Labor and the Coalition camps had become devil advocates themselves by siding with the major parties on this matter and turned themselves into nothing but just another bunch of politicians who are all about themselves. The democracy that was supposed to support people’s power change in Australia is changing its nature. It has become more and more about a democracy that supports people who are already powerful and the Australian public is sick of it. This is reflected by the current High Court challenge to the voting change.

In Hong Kong, since the Yellow Umbrella Movement, China had tightened its grip further to control the freedom of speech in this Special Administrative Region. The disappearance of the five publishers who publish scandalous books about the Chinese government outside of the Chinese territory but then showed up in Chinese custody in the mainland drew huge alarm to the freedom this ex-British Colony once enjoyed. Further the took down of the film “Ten Years” that painted a pessimistic view of the territory in ten years’ time while it was still selling to full houses every show reflected that Chinese initiated and self-inflicted censorships are starting to get a strong foothold in this once free and autonomous place.  The people of Hong Kong are not prepared to lie down and take the punch though. The award of “Ten Years” with the Best Picture gong in the latest Hong Kong Film Awards shows that artists in Hong Kong are fighting for their freedom and the tug of war between this seemingly small place and the Chinese juggernaut is far from over. The fact that the Chief Executive is losing support both locally and in the mainland also showed that the shine of old school politics is wearing off.

So where do we go from here? There are two possibilities, a) the old political systems fall into disarray and the political entities descend into an orderless state; or b) new social political orders will rise and replace the old worn out system and set up new political orders. At the moment I would optimistically believe in the second option as our society had gone too far to forgo everything it has established. The cost is too great and both the governing and the governed know. None of them will be willing to give it all up so they will need to find a new way to get out of this corner. Donald Trump might not be a great or even viable option but he inevitably had triggered this alarm for this process to happen. In Australia the upcoming election will be the clearest indicator that the Australian public is sick of the current political establishments so it will be interesting to study its outcome. As for Hong Kong there will be more and more creative and innovative ways exhibited by the people there to express their will to the world.

We share wait and see, and then hope for the best.