The Politics of Fear (Reprised)

Image courtesy Delaware Online

I have clear memories of the sixties and seventies and the culture of fear that was evident at the time.

The cold war was at its height, McCarthyism had been and gone, and we were assailed in the media daily and from the pulpit weekly with horror stories about the evils of Communism, the domino theory, and how we would have to "fight them there" (SE Asia) so we didn't have to "fight them here" (Australia).

The prophets of doom never really defined who "they" were, or what their ways and means of invasion and domination were, but that didn't really count. 

It was enough just to be afraid. Thank the good Lord that we didn't have social media back then.

None of this would have mattered that much to me, a bush kid growing up in Queensland, except that in 1965, Bob Menzies introduced a significant amendment to the National Service Act, and it wasn't very long before I was patrolling the jungles of Phuoc Tuy province with an SLR and in the company of good men caught up in the same boondoggle.

This was an outcome of that climate of fear that had kept a Coalition government (with the help of DLP preferences) in power since 1949.

I can't help but look at the climate of fear and loathing that has developed in the USA since the advent of the Tea Party movement, and draw the parallels between that phenomenon and events across the Pacific (and to a lesser extent in this country) since.

There are a number of core components of this climate that were evident in the fifties and sixties, and are once again obvious now. They include denouncements, outrage, branding, and conspiracy theories. These days, they can be harnessed by media that thrives on that same outrage, hate, fear and anger, and harnesses these base aspects of human nature to make money and build corporate empires.

Infowars and Breitbart are great examples.

Politicians interested in making a dollar out of the phenomenon include John Bannon, Newt Gingrich, and of course, Donald Trump. Bannon and Gingrich may, to some extent believe in the philosophies driving these movement, but Trump is a different animal entirely.

If you follow his trajectory, it becomes completely obvious that he has no love of country or political philosophy that can be identified, but possesses a bloated ego, and a belief that there are only winners and losers, rather than "people". People are to be used and discarded when they are no longer useful. 

An examination of his married life is best evidence of that, as well as the unbelievable rate of turnover in his 2016-2020 administration.

The fact that he has, in sequence, lost the popular presidential vote (2016), the 2018 midterms, the 2020 presidential election, and most recently, contributed to an historically poor showing in the 2022 midterms doesn't seem to have sunk in. 

Or perhaps, the experience he most fears (losing) is haunting him to such an extent that he continues to attempt to lay the ghost.

All of this has some significance for Australians (as I learned in 1969/70), but the most frightening element is the seepage across the Pacific of some of the trends we're seeing now.

I find the social media conspiracies about our very efficient and independent AEC the most disturbing.  I take solace in the fact that it doesn't seem to have penetrated beyond the lunatic fringe.

As we used to say (about the Yanks) when I was in Vietnam - 

"You can tell them anything - sell them anything". 

Now that is a vast over generalisation, but Australians tend to be far more pragmatic and less naive as a bunch than our transpacific friends.

Let's hope it stays that way.