Triumph of identity politics over open debate in Australia, by Greg Sheridan.
The single most depressing aspect of the debate about the proposed same-sex marriage plebiscite is the determination that there not be a debate — more than that, the authoritarian, censorious, profoundly illiberal strain that the very business of debating the issue is somehow insulting if not illegal.
As Malcolm Turnbull observed, some in the opposition seemed to imply that if you didn’t live in a family with two gay parents, you had no right to have a view on the Marriage Act at all. It’s akin to the view that we must change the Constitution purely because Aboriginal leaders want it changed, that the only change must be a change that they want and that the views of non-Aboriginal citizens are less important — though, unfortunately for the advocates of such change, in our democracy all citizens get to vote.
This sudden and utterly toxic triumph of a doctrine of the supremacy of identity politics — your views are legitimate only if you belong to the relevant or approved identity group, and then only if you repeat the orthodox positions — is one of the most dangerous, undemocratic and ill favoured excursions our democracy has ever taken.
Yep, that about sums it up. So what happens then? If the media and the our politicians won’t discuss issues except from a teachy, lecturing, PC perspective? Why, we need new politicians and a new media.
If the public feels that mainstream political leaders are not allowed to discuss issues they care about, they finally resort to populists who refuse to take direction from the political class.
Typically, the political class then decides even more censorship is necessary and completely needless bitter conflict ensues, wholly because of the anti-democratic impulses of the bureaucratic authoritarians who police the official ideology. …
We are at an evil fork in the road. Thought control, needless, ideological speech control — these are not a decent path ahead.
Ok, I didn’t have enough cash on hand to buy a newspaper of TV channel, so I started the Wentworth Report. New media will arrive eventually.
