The Bad Cop On The Political Beat Downunder
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Queensland is a different state. Peter Dutton, the leader of the Opposition, comes from and represents Queenslanders. The bad cop on the political beat downunder. Many of its sons and daughters are proudly proponents of a white Australia. Especially in regional Queensland, where there is blatant racism expressed by townsfolk toward those not cut from the same cloth. The banana bending state:
“Queenslanders voted against the Voice to Parliament — more than any other state or territory in Australia”
The rich history of Queensland includes the Frontier Wars:
“The Native Police was a body of Aboriginal troopers that operated under the command of white officers on the Queensland frontier from 1849 to the 1920s. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander men were often forcefully recruited from communities—already diminished due to colonisation—that were normally a great distance from the region in which they were to work. “
Lech Blane has written a Quarterly essay on the bad cop and hardman of Australian politics.
“Who is Peter Dutton, and what happened to the Liberal Party? In Bad Cop, Lech Blaine traces the making of a hardman – from Queensland detective to leader of the Opposition, from property investor to minister for Home Affairs. This is a story of ambition, race and power, and a politician with a plan.”
The Bad Cop Essay By Lech Blane
The essay draws parallels with a previous hardman of conservative politics in Australia, Tony Abbott. However, it, also, differentiates clear differences between the two macho Anglo leaders. Abbott was famed as a Rhodes scholar university pugilist, whereas Dutton dropped out of university to become a Queensland cop. There are class and defining motivation distinctions between the two. Abbott being more ideologically inspired whereas Dutton draws more upon his practical experiences as cop and property developer. Both men have sought political support from suburban Australia. There they see themselves as champions of ordinary folk, particularly blokes.
Dutton & The Gender Divide In Oz Politics
A gender divide has widened in the political landscape of Australia. More women are voting Labor and Green in contrast to more men voting conservatively for the LNP Coalition and for the other smaller right wing parties. Thus, the emergence of the archetypal hardman to lead the neocon charge. PM Anthony Albanese is not a guy with a strongman veneer. Consensus and, hopefully, taking people along with him for the ride is more his way of doing things. The contrast with Peter Dutton could not be more acute. Leadership does involve subjects seeing the things that they aspire to within the projected identity of candidates vying for the top job. In the eyes of many men, especially younger guys, Anthony Albanese lacks some innate masculinity. Probably for some women this matters too, particularly if they fit into the trad wife category.
“Dutton doesn’t need to become prime minister to redraw the battle lines of Australian politics. His fight with Albanese over parochial voters was always going to drag the political conversation rightwards: on race, immigration, gender and the pace of a transition away from fossil fuels … Dutton’s raison d’être? Make Australia Afraid Again. Then he will offer himself as the lesser of two evils. A serious strongman for the age of anxiety.”—Lech Blaine, Bad Cop.
Dutton, like all neocon politicians going around at the moment, looks to Trump and the United States for insight and inspiration. Ramping up polarisation, with the help of Murdoch’s News Corp platforms, has been the flavour of his Opposition leadership years. It was very successful during the Voice referendum and, perhaps, not so much over the High Court release of stateless illegal refugees. Drumming up fear and outrage is the name of the game for those right wing strongmen wanting to assume the mantle of power. Australia is, however, not the United States, as Australians are not so extreme and not so willing to go there.
Bad Cop Dutton Drumming Up Fear
The bad cop on the political beat downunder. Peter Dutton wants Australians to fear the Chinese, as the LNP federal government took us into blaming them for the pandemic and we were rewarded with multiple trade sanctions costing us billions. The Chinese military buildup offends proponents of a white Australia. The US desperately wants to protects its hegemony because without its military superiority its economic supremacy wont last. Thus, we are committing $366 billion to a nuclear submarine program, which is full of holes and serious tributes of our sovereignty to the Americans in return for no guarantees of any submarines. This was a LNP Coalition defence initiative, which has been carried on by Albanese. This has, then, led Dutton to putting forward a Nuclear Power energy policy proposal. This is another $331 billion costed proposal to build 7 nuclear power reactors around Australia. Australia is in the midst of an energy transformation from fossil fuels to renewables. Dutton and the LNP are ideologically opposed to renewables for political reasons. They are firm friends of the coal and gas industries. Prolonging this business is the main reason for the madcap nuclear power proposal. This is because, like the AUKUS submarine deal, building nuclear reactors will take between 20 and 30 years. Therefore, in the meantime, fossil fuelled power stations will be maintained, probably beyond their planned use by dates. In addition, having uncertainty about Australia’s energy policy direction will damage investment in renewables going forward.
Creating uncertainty serves the neocon political strategy.
Male Thinking Downunder
Stereotypical male thinking, the old way of doing things, goes like this.
‘This is the way the real world is and always has been!’ Energy is made by fossil fuels and everything else is a pipe dream. Brute force will get you what you want in the end. Look at Putin. Telling it like it is, is the way to go. Look at Trump. A lot of guys want to be wealthy and they want to be affirmed by those around them. They don’t want to be criticised about putting down women and other minorities. They don’t want to hear politicians telling the world what they are going to do for these minorities. They want to hear what these political leaders are going to be doing for them.
Dutton bags Indigenous Australia. Dutton says alarmist things about dark skinned foreigners running around threatening the safety of ordinary folk. Dutton is the bad cop, the former Queensland cop who had to clean up for his white community by locking up Aborigines. The problems in Alice Springs are, in Dutton’s view, a law and order issue. Bring in the army if the local cops cannot deal with it. There are never any deeper solutions put forward. How about understanding why these young people are doing what they are doing and breaking the law. How about putting forward proposals to provide economic opportunities for these people. There is nothing to do and no hope up there. Many of the parents of these kids are already in gaol. Neocons are only interested in appealing to the voters with short term thinking like locking up kids.
Every conservative political party in the world runs a get tough on crime campaign. It is not about solving societal problems but getting elected. Adult crime, adult time – the LNP in Queensland just got elected on it. The bad cop on the political beat downunder.
Robert Sudha Hamilton is the author of America Matters: Pre-apocalyptic Posts & Essays in the Shadow of Trump.
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