Not Politics Freedom and More Freedom!

by Ian G Graham

In the modern world our beliefs are no longer easily identified within traditional religious systems or political ideologies… and rather – blurred. Opinions are everything in the free-world where there are so many opinions and so many forms of self-interest. Truth becomes diluted and smudged across one’s clear view of meaning… and in ways it may be interpreted.

A throng of voices ricochet from every corner demanding to be heard – people and groups with individual opinions are getting louder and stronger and finding powerful allies that represent their views in the political arena and the media.

And so truth is blurry, and the community is more than just divided, it’s splintered. Never has polling been more overcooked than it is now because it’s assumed that no one knows what to think, or what to believe anymore. Maybe, we really don’t understand what we value anymore?

 Moral values (if they exist) are determined by individualism, particularism and tribalism, instead of community consensus. All polls do for all their usefulness, is sift out specks of truth in the soupiness of postmodern culture – diminishing their reliability – they are not infallible. But far and above anything else that depletes their accuracy is the way in which they can be manipulated to bring about falsities that satisfy interest groups who use the results as a form of proof to turn community opinion their way through the media.

I know I’m easily accused of cynicism, but we do live in a world where social engineering (some go so far as to call it social totalitarianism) through media manipulation is rife. Where traditional religion and the big political parties were once the centre-point for the community in providing moral support and the provision of living standards, they no longer hold the sway they did, at least not in a large part of the Western world.

So what’s out there now? A plethora of quasi-religions I would suggest. Interest groups or Non-Government Organisations (NGO’s) as they are sometimes called all produce their own moral code, their own this is right, this is wrong ideas and their own interpretation of meaning. And what better place to push you case than parliament – the engine room of the country where truth is milled from the husks of reality.

The upper house in Australia, the senate, has become a gathering of self-interest politics – in recent times a place of confusion that reflects the blurriness of truth. It has reached a point where it is no longer workable. How can it possibly be, when everyone is right and everyone wrong in the splintering of political agendas? There’s the Greens who want one world government, total support for action on climate change, LGBT rights, same sex marriage, euthanasia and open border policies to protect asylum seekers to name a few issues that raise the hackles of those who can’t stand them and that’s just about everyone else in the senate.

But then the dishevelment goes the other way too because they can’t stand conservative politics, so anyone who moves slightly to the right of their fixed left ideas is never given much respect either. Of course they sometimes pal-up with the labour party to block legislation from the conservatives but that does not mean the two are united in any substantial way, it means they just want to block legislation because it came via the conservatives. But look it works the other way too, because the conservatives have no problems with making their own deals with senators who don’t necessarily reflect their ideas.

 The 2016 election just gone sees Pauline Hanson back in the senate, who many argue is this country’s answer to far right conservatism – Hanson being a vigorous campaigner against everything the Greens’ believe in and fight for  to make people happy, they say. She could be around for the next six years and has three other senators in her One Nation team. Oh and we have some independent senators too, who add to the combination soup of opinions in the house. Some go with the left, some with the right, some can be bought and sold depending who holds their mouth the right way on the right day.

That’s it, a confusing mess in my opinion, where truth is an oasis in a dessert of nonsense. Never mind good policy, never mind what may serve the country well overall. We get what we deserve, at least that’s what we’re told… and what’s that? No-one gets anything?

It does sound ridiculous but you have to ask why we’ve had such a close call in the recent election 2016, where it took weeks to see who won government and why we’ve had so many prime-ministerial changes in this country in recent years. Too many polls? Too much media influence? Well, yes to those, to some extent, but I come back to the way in which we have become a splintered society with valueless values, with self-interest as the new-god where we no longer understand what we value anymore. No-one agrees and everyone fights to put their spin about so it jumps aboard the 24-hour news cycle.

A final word on the senate and the recent election where it was hard not to be amused by the senate voting slip. Who did you vote for? The Fishing and Hunting Party, Family First, One Nation, The Australian Sex Party, Animal Justice Party, Secular Party, For Australia  Party, Rise Up Australia Party, Sustainable Australia, The Greens, The Christian Democratic Party, Mature Australia, Health Australia, Seniors United Party of Australia, Liberal Democrats, The Liberal Party, The Nationals, Science Party, Australian Cyclists Party, Shooters Fishers and Farmers, Voluntary Euthanasia Party, The Socialist Alliance, Pirate Party… and more.

I could make some rude remarks about the whole thing and at those who believe they hold the interests of the country close to their hearts but, I will resist for now. In closing, I will say that secularism has brought with it many options with its emphasis on individualism and freedom. It’s as if it has created its own version of The Sermon on the Mount and called it Free Choice…. Blessed be the FREE for through granting them FREEDOM they may suffocate in FREEDOM.