Referendum Coming Up

The Voice, The Voice

The referendum for The Voice is coming up on Saturday. No surprises, I'm voting 'Yes', so let's just get that out of the way. The choice is pretty stark. There's really no confusion except those points-of-confusion spread about by 'No' vote campaigners. If you want to side with people who think outcomes for indigenous Australians are going swimmingly well, you vote 'no'. If you want to side with the people who don't think things are working that great when it comes to outcomes for Indigenous people, then you vote 'yes'. The fact that you might be lining up with the woke, the sanctimonious, the inner-city-latte-sipping urban elites, and the LGBTQ+ alphabet soup people is actually by-the-by. In turn, if you want to be on the side of conservatives, red necks, racists, conspiracy nut jobs, and other assorted bloody-minded personality-disordered types, you vote 'no' and wear the opprobrium. Society is binary (gender, is less so) in 2023.  

There was that scintillating observation made by an indigenous MP that things were working out great for indigenous people because European colonisation brought running water, got ridiculed a lot. She's only right if you ignore all the suffering otherwise - and we are trying to address the suffering. The "what have the Romans ever done for us?" gag from 'The Life of Brian' is now coming up to almost 50 years old. You would think that our political classes would have digested it a bit better by now, but clearly they have not. Nobody siding with a parochial 'cultural' mindset (as per David Graeber) is not going to accept the merits of civilisation. It's interesting that the best argument in favour of continuing the status quo is history as seen through the prism of civilisation and technology. 

Conversely, it is equally notable that the there are a number of indigenous groups saying they want to vote 'no'  because they didn't get a say, or it doesn't get enough of a bite out of what mainstream Australia possesses. Some even argue if it's not the treaty, they don't want to know about it. Others have said they weren't consulted, while yet others more have said they don't get how it's going to make their lives better immediately - so 'no' thank you. The defiant poses struck by these indigenous leaders arguing for a 'no' vote is also reminiscent of the argument made by David Graeber that the heart of culture is defiance. That in the face of encroaching civilisation, some would defiantly say no to it, is deeply cultural. 

All this has me thinking that this referendum is largely symbolic for a reason. The Prime Minister Anthony Albanese wants us to waste our energy on something trivial, patronising, and somewhat idiotic for the sole reason of distraction. He would like us to expend tremendous amounts of energy arguing the pros and cons of something that is largely without economic or climactic impact. The nation has spent a good deal of time talking about this, while exercising very little scrutiny of just what this government is doing about housing, energy policy, climate change (read "GLOBAL WARMING") and healthcare after the pandemic. He has basically given us this idiotic shibboleth with which to beat over our own heads. It is government by the patronising, for the patronising of the patronised. 

In other words, we are the idiot marks for putting up with this so-called debate.