Simon Copland

Jonathan Moylan, civil disobedience and our moral priorities

On Monday, a little known activist, Jonathan Moylan, armed with his lap top and a phone, wiped $314 million off Nathan Tinkler’s Whitehaven Coal. Sitting in a forest, Moylan sent out a media release on an ANZ template announcing that that the bank was withdrawing funding from the new Maules Creek coal mine. The release sent Whitehaven’s share prices plummeting and by the time it was found out to be a hoax, over $300 million had been wiped off the company (the share price has now recovered to its original state).

Whilst many have lauded Moylan’s courage to raise the issue of coal mining in Australia, his actions have also been followed by moral outrage. Many have complained that his actions were ideological, morally corrupt, and that he ripped off ‘ordinary people’ for a political stunt.

In starting this debate what Moylan has done therefore is directly pointed out the very strange moral priorities we have in our society; priorities that say that causing a temporary drop in a company’s share price is a more reprehensible act than fuelling global climate change.

Civil disobedience has a long and rich history in challenging the immoral in our society. Whether it is Rosa Parks sitting on the front of a bus, Nelson Mandela standing up to Apartheid, or Gandhi fighting against British colonialism we often revere those who engage in civil disobedience for a true moral cause.

In celebrating these figures what we have done is made an active moral decision; one which said that we think that the immorality of segregation, Apartheid and British Colonialism was bad enough that it was worth breaking the law to oppose them. That breaking the law, even though at times it hurt other people, was the right moral choice.

And it is in understanding civil disobedience in this manner that the response to Moylan’s actions becomes very interesting.

In the criticisms I’ve seen of Moylan the basic argument I can gather against his actions (beyond those of concerns around fraud) is that it was immoral for Moylan to cause such a big drop in company profits and take money off ‘regular shareholders’ (an argument I think is rather weak given that the drop in share prices was so temporary). Building on to this many have used a ‘right to private property’ argument, stating that it is immoral for someone to take away someone else’s private property, and right to have that property, for their own political means. The immorality of Moylan’s actions was his ‘property theft’.

I have to say, I’m no fan of taking money off working people, but the moral outrage to Moylan’s actions point to a very strange moral decision. Whitehaven is investing heavily in a product that is causing serious global destruction. This is a product that fuelling climate change, increasing global temperatures, creating more extreme weather events, and likely causing serious impacts that we are yet to comprehend.

In doing so this is a company that is aiding the destructions of people’s lives all around the world. If the new science is right for example, and we can already see links between climate change and extreme weather, then the actions of companies who are investing in coal, have now started to take the lives of many – the people who have died in floods, fires and cyclones globally. Building into a private property argument these companies have also actively (in a sense that they know coal is causing climate change) taken away people’s property. It’s the property of farmers, whose crops that are now dying, the property of individuals, whose houses are being destroyed in floods, fires and storms, and the property of communities whose infrastructure is being destroyed. If Moylan hurt “ordinary people” whose lives ‘depend on the stock market’, he was doing so to defend the “ordinary people” whose lives depend on the climate.

In the end the outrage points to a pretty odd moral decision to me. We have decided on a moral reasoning that says that causing a drop in share prices is worse than investing in a product that is causing probably one of the worst crises human kind has ever face. We’ve got a moral reasoning that says that the property we have now in the form of shares is more important than people’s houses, the community’s infrastructure, and ultimately people’s lives.

Now, there is a chance that Moylan will end up in gaol over his stunt on Monday. That’s not something I am against (although I will actively question the laws and Government that allows coal mining to continue). That is the price that those who engage in civil disobedience pay. It is part of the act.

But whilst we sit here and get morally indignant about what he has done, I think it is important that we start to question our moral priorities. We need to question the priorities of a Government that places short term profits ahead of our future. We need to question the morals of our community that places short term profit and shareholder gain ahead of long-term planet security.

Because if given a choice between someone causing a temporary blip in a coal companies share price and others who invest in fuelling global climate change, I know which actions I consider more morally reprehensible.

 

Summer is a great time to finish books, and over this last break I managed to complete an epic: the first volume of Michel Foucault’s The History of Sexuality. Whilst volume one isn’t long (only 159 pages in the version I have), it is to say the least, tough going. Foucault’s language is not only tough to get through, but his ideas are complex, meaning you cannot glide through this book with a switched off mind.

However, in that sense, the History of Sexuality is also a stunning read. If you’re willing to open yourself up, put some time into it, and think hard, then you will come out of this piece with not only some great ideas, but also potentially with a VERY different perspective on sexuality.

Because of the complex nature of this, I’ve decided I won’t be able to squeeze everything into one post – so this is just part one of what will be a multi-post review (hopefully this will mean you will get more out of the reviews too). Today, I’m going to have a bit of a look at the basis under which Foucault builds his thesis; what he calls the ‘Repressive Hypothesis’.

I think to understand The History Sexuality, and why it is so challenging, we have to think about our assumptions when it comes to understand the relationship between power and sexuality. It’s the sort of assumption that I came to when reading this pieceand the sort of assumption I assumed Foucault would be describing. This is the assumption that we live in a world of sexual censorship; one in which capitalist and bourgeoisie has suppressed discourse around sex, and where power structures are aimed solely at suppressing sexual activity. This is what Foucault calls the ‘repressive hypothesis.’ He describes it as thus:

“At the beginning of the seventeenth century a certain frankness was still common, it would seem. Sexual practices had little need of secrecy; words were said without undue reticence, and things were done without too much concealment…

“But twilight soon fell upon this bright day, followed by the monotonous nights of the Victorian bourgeoisie. Sexuality was carefully confined; it moved into the home. The conjugal family took custody of it and absorbed it into the serious function of reproduction. On the subject of sex, silence became the rule.” (p. 1)*

When explained in that way it sounds logical, it is the sort of idea that one could easily ascribe to. We live in a world of sexual repression, one in which our society refuses to talk about sex, and in which the law is used to suppress sex. We can see a lot of that in our history. But this is not the sort of idea that Foucault wants to promote; in fact Foucault builds the basis of his piece by challenging this thesis; by arguing that there has in fact been a discursive ‘explosion’ over the last centuries.

“At the level of discourses and their domains, however, practically the opposite phenomenon occurred. There was a steady proliferation of discourses concerned with sex – specific discourses, different from one another both by their form and by their object: a discursive ferment that gathered momentum from the eighteenth century onward.” (p.18)

How have these discourses exploded? Foucault argues that the discoursive explosion stemmed from the Counter-Reformation, where the Roman Catholic Church encouraged its followers to confess their sinful desires and act. This act of confession has now however moved beyond the catholic form of confession in the confessional booth. What we have seen a proliferation of confessional speak – the need to confess one’s sexual deeds. As part of this need to confess, we have seen a proliferation of new forms of sexual discourse, ones that move well beyond the discourse of heterosexual monogamy:

“The discursive explosion of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries caused this system centred on legitimate alliance to undergo two modifications. First, a centrifugal movement with respect to heterosexual monogamy. Of course, the array of practices and pleasures continued to be referred to it as their internal standard; but it was spoken of less and less, or in any case with a growing moderation…

“On the other hand, what came under scrutiny was the sexuality of children, mad men and women, and criminals; the sensuality of those who did not like the opposite sex; reveries, obsessions, petty manias, or great transports of rage. It was time for all these figures, scarcely noticed in the past, to step forward and speak, to make the difficult confession of what they were.” (p. 38)

These new ‘forms’, now spoken about, now confessed, created a new field of sexuality; unnatural sexuality.

“Whence the setting apart of the “unnatural” as a specific dimension in the field of sexuality. This kind of activity assumed an autonomy with regard to the other condemned forms such as adultry or rape…” (p. 39)

These unnatural forms were what started to be classified within a system of ‘perversion’. A legal and moral system arose that created what Foucault called a new ‘sub-race’ of humans.

“An entire sub-race was born, different – despite certain kinship ties – from the libertines of the past. From the end of the eighteenth century to our own, they circulated through the pores of society; they were always hounded, but not always by the laws; were often locked up, but not always in prisons; were sick perhaps, but scandalous, dangerous victims, prey to a strange evil that also bore the name of vice and sometimes crime.” (p. 40)

And whilst these ‘unnaturals’ may have been hounded, locked up and decried as sick, there was very little done to suppress them to the point of elimination. Instead, society created an analytical, and scientific order for these people (more on this in later posts):

“The machinery of power that focused on this whole alien strain did not aim to suppress it, but rather to give it an analytical, visible, and permanent reality: it was implanted in bodies, slipped in beneath modes of conduct, made into a principle of classification and intelligibility, established as a raison d’être and a natural order of disorder.” (p. 43 – 44)

This is probably one of the most challenging elements of the basis under which Foucault develops his thesis. The general assumption for many who discuss the power relations behind sexuality is that we live in a world of sexual suppression – that those who hold power are out to stop sexual discussion and completely repress any form of ‘abnormal’ sexuality through legislative mechanisms. Foucault however takes a much more nuanced approach than this. Yes, I think he would argue, there are those who want to repress any forms of sexual discussion and expression, but the power realities are much more complex than that. Whilst there are those who want to repress, there has also been an explosion in sexual discourse. He explains it best:

“We must therefore abandon the hypothesis that modern industrial societies ushered in an age of increased sexual repression. We have not only witnessed a visible explosion of unorthodox sexualities; but – and this is the important point – a deployment quite different from the law, even if it is locally dependent on procedures of prohibition, has ensured, through a network of interconnecting mechanisms, the proliferation of specific pleasures and multiplication of disparate sexualities.” (p. 49)

It is here where Foucault’s thesis is built, and it is quite a challenging one at that. I will leave this post at that and return with where Foucault goes next, how this explosion of sexual discourse has lead to what he calls Scientia Sexualis, the ‘scientification’ of sexuality.

* The page numbers for this review refer to the Penguin classic version of the book (the very worn-out version in the cover-photo)

Whenever compulsory voting comes up in the public debate (see stories about the QLD Government considering scrapping compulsory voting), it inevitably leads to a longer discussion about the nature of our democracy. How can ensure that people are enfranchised in our electoral system? How can we get people involved in politics? Does our system do this?

Whenever this debate arises, it always astounds me when proponents of compulsory voting come out against proportional representation. More problematic is when ‘left-wing’ people come out against prop-rep because it leads to too many ‘radicals’ entering Parliament. Left-wingers look towards the rise of the British National Party (BNP) in the UK, Geert Wilders in the Netherlands and the Swedish Democrats in Sweden and say ‘we don’t want that here’.

I’m absolutely no fan of extreme right-wing parties. But I’m also no fan of excluding people from our political processes because we determine them to be ‘too radical’. So here goes my defence of allowing more radical parties into our Parliament, and why the left should be happy to risk some extreme right-wingers as well.

My arguments fall across three general categories; enfranchisement, political debate, and political power.

Firstly, in a general sense, I think proportional representation is probably one of the most important elements to ensure, that at least within our current system, that people can stay enfranchised. It is much more important than compulsory voting.

In many ways we’ve grown up in a world where we’re expected to fit within two political boxes – left or right – and then vote for one of two major parties along those lines. The reality is however, that the world doesn’t work like that, and even along the left-right spectrum there are lots of different colours. It is without a doubt that, under our current democratic systems, proportional representation is one of the best ways to ensure that this spectrum is represented.

The reality of this of course is that we can end up enfranchising people we don’t like – radical, racist, sexist, homophobic right-wingers. But if we want to talk about an engaged and enfranchised community, this is a reality we have to deal with, and one we should confront, rather than try and hide from using the political system.

This leads onto my second argument, the argument of political debate. Hiding radical right-wing parties simply hides the debate we need to have. Whilst we may achieve a result in that radical people are pushed into centre parties, and therefore have their views stifled, it doesn’t mean that the views and issues go away. They are just left to fester, without any real political debate. I don’t think this is a healthy way to defeat the ideologies we oppose.

If we look at countries that have some form of prop-rep, we can see that allowing the extreme out into the open can allow genuine debate to occur. Take a look at the issue of racism and immigration for example. In the United Kingdom, the BNP took the mantle of racism on over the past couple of decades, and had members elected to the European Parliament. Yet, the rise of the BNP also lead to some serious discussion around racism in the UK, and in particular, some strong left-wing campaigns around the issue. The result of this is the recent decimation of the BNP, as left-wing communities mobilised against the open racism they promoted. That doesn’t mean racism has been solved in the UK, but it certainly is being addressed.

But, I think the refusal to have that political debate probably hides the biggest reason many in the left are anti-proportional representation: power.

Despite what I may think about many far-right parties, I think in some ways they are very similar to those on the far-left. Whilst we end up with very different conclusions, both those on the far-left and (most elements of) the far-right are fighting against the current system as it stands. The reason we are seen as radical is that we are challenging the fundamentals of the way the world works in order to completely overhaul it for something that we see as being better.

The refusal to engage in this debate therefore is one of power. The reality of ‘centre-right’ and ‘centre-left’ parties in modern democracies is that they are no longer real ideological creatures engaging in great debates about the nature of our world. They have agreed fundamentally on the system we have and simply want to tinker around it in different ways to achieve slight different goals.

Keeping other parties out therefore is simply a way to hold onto that power – to ensure we don’t even start a debate that questions our current system. Whilst, as a left-winger, you may not want to change our system, forcing out discussion as a way to ensure you keep your own power is certainly the highest form of disenfranchisement.

If we ever achieve proportional representation in Australia, I will be one of the first on the front lines fighting against any new right-wing parties that may emerge. But in using the current political system to stop new parties from being able to enter Parliament, the left is doing itself no favours.

Originally published in ABC The Drum, 3 January 2012

The Labor Government set itself up for failure when it promised a surplus this financial year. Instead of bowing to Opposition pressure, the ALP must lead in the economic debate, writes Simon Copland.

The Government’s announcement that it was dumping its promise for a surplus this financial year signifies one of the most frustrating elements of this latest term of ALP Government.

While the decision was lauded by economists and reflects the general views of the public, it is likely to end up hurting the Government heavily, in what can only be described as a self-inflicted wound.

The way I see it, good governments really have two main jobs. The first is to develop and manage policy and programs to tackle the major issues of the day. Second however, and this is often ignored, the government needs to be an ideological leader.

To be successful in government, political parties need to be able to take the population on a policy journey with them. It is only in doing so that a government can get support for the work it is doing, in turn creating long-term change.

Here is the crux of what went wrong when it came to the surplus, and what is going wrong with much of the ALP’s term in government.

It’s been pretty clear for a while that very few in the ALP, and particularly few in the broader left, saw the need for a surplus in this financial year. The decision to go to the last election with a deadline for a surplus was entirely political. It was based almost solely on pressure from the Coalition about the Government’s ability to manage a budget, and fear of attacks on its economic credibility.

In making such a decision therefore the Government failed to provide leadership in the economic debate. In going to the last election, they had two choices: they could stand up and argue why we didn’t need a surplus or why we needed to be flexible on a surplus, or it could succumb to Coalition pressure to set a deadline for its implementation. In succumbing to pressure, the ALP bought solely into the Coalition’s framing of the debate – a conservative ideological framing that was never going to work for the ALP.

The Government therefore set itself up for failure. It either delivered a surplus that its members didn’t want, and that would (and has) require cuts to programs that it held dear. Or alternatively, and this is the situation we are now facing, it could drop the surplus, follow good policy, but be derided as a party who break promises for political gain.

And you can see this narrative already playing out. Despite the cheers from economists, and the polling that showed the vast majority of people don’t care that much about the surplus, the decision is already hurting the ALP. The day following the surplus being dropped, the Daily Telegraph ran a front page story ‘Gillard breaks third promise as $1 billion surplus axed’. Shadow treasurer Joe Hockey took a similar tact, tweeting at one point:

“I see PM has broken her holidays to go to a folk festival. Shame the PM didn’t front up to apologise for breaking 400 promises for a surplus.”

And if you think that this is a one-off mistake by a government worried about economic management, then you only need to look at the other two ‘broken promises’ the Daily Telegraph pointed out to see how this weakness is really within the blood of the ALP.

First, there was the ‘there will be no carbon tax under a Government I lead’. Amongst all the discussion about that line, one question has never really been answered, ‘why did the Prime Minister ever say that?’

Given the force in which the Government has defended the carbon price it is clearly something they (now) believe in. It was always the sort of policy you could see an ALP government being willing to support. The pain they are feeling therefore is one that is largely around an early refusal to fight for what was potentially a strong policy. The line was a political statement based on fear of attacks from the right.

The same can be said about asylum seekers. Whilst this may have changed somewhat in the last year, it is clear most in the ALP find mandatory offshore detention repulsive. Ever since Tampa however, the ALP has been trapped in a debate that has been framed on Coalition terms. Faced with fear of community backlash, and an attack campaign from the Coalition, the ALP has refused to take the debate on, leaving us with a policy that is far to the right of anything Howard ever gave us and is doing the ALP no good.

While we can have a go at how politicians and the media are unable or unwilling to adapt to changes in circumstances (a needed criticism), the surplus debacle is the epitome of what has been frustrating about this latest term of government. Good government isn’t just a technocratic dream to ‘develop policy to solve problems’. Governments also need take leadership on the major issues facing the day, providing an ideological basis for decisions they make.

With a constant threat of being attacked however, this is something the ALP has constantly refused to do, leaving them looking like liars, who constantly backfill on policies for political gain.

Dear anyone who made a sexist, homophobic, racist, transphobic, or any other discriminatory comment last year.

2012 was a big year for you all wasn’t it? We had some biggies last year; a horse being named sportswoman of the year, homosexuality being called worse for people’s health than smoking, being told that women were ‘destroying the joint’. It was a big year for bigoted statements.

I have to say I understand. It’s an easy thing to do. I can even imagine how it happened. Maybe you were chatting with some mates about your next piece and with a few beers in you naming a horse the ‘sportswoman of the year’ seemed like a great joke. Maybe you were making some comments about a political enemy behind closed doors that you thought no one would ever hear. Hey, you may just identify as a bigot and believe this stuff (if that’s the case, then this article probably isn’t for you). Now, I’m not saying that this is an excuse. You probably should have got how awful your comments were before you put words to paper. All I’m saying though is that I understand how it happened.

And of course therefore, I see how you could never have predicted the sort of reaction you received. You know, and everyone else should know, that you’re not a sexist, or homophobic, or a racist. You’re not a bigot. And, despite the way I may react to what you say, I probably believe you (although I definitely know some of you – looking at you Jim Wallace – probably do identify as a bigot in some way. Again this article is not for you). For you, it was a just a joke, or maybe some just some charged up language. Can’t we all just bloody well lighten up?

Yet, in looking back on 2012, and a pretty big year of discrimination, I think it’s maybe about time you, and I, started to think about what we’re saying. Because in many ways I don’t think it was your comments that caused the real stir, but in reality your reaction had the greater impact.

As writers, people who make public comment, and even just as members of our community, I think it’s our responsibility to be constantly thinking about the impact our words have on others. As a writer myself, I try to be constantly aware of the potential impact my writing could have. In fact I obsess over it, and am constantly amazed at the reactions it does have. I’m pretty sure all public commentators work like this to some level.

Yet, there is a difference between you and me. Maybe it’s because I’m gay. I’m one of those minorities that we all love to laugh at and have therefore expressed annoyance, even outrage at someone else’s joke, and then been told to lighten up.

But maybe through that experience I’ve learnt something important about being a writer, a commentator, and just a human being. Because, in being surprised at how people react to our comments, I think it’s important we start to actively think about what we are saying. Part of the responsibility of being someone in the public space, is to be constantly, and actively, thinking about the impact of our work. We have to be thinking about it all the time – both how our jokes will give some people a laugh, but also how it may hurt some others.

And if we don’t think of ourselves as bigots, what that means is actively standing in people’s shoes and thinking about their life experiences with every word you write or every word you say. Yeah, I understand how you don’t get how people have reacted to you – that sort of reaction is just probably not within your world view. But as a person, it is your responsibility to think about that – to think about your readers – and most importantly to question whether what you are doing is hurting others.

And unfortunately, that’s not what I’ve seen from many of you. For example Phil Rothfield (who names a horse the sportswoman of the year), as the reaction to your piece spread, I saw you tell a pretty prominent comedian and feminist, Wendy Harper, to ‘pull her head in’. Alan Jones, your press conference after the ‘dying of shame’ comments may have been one of the worst I’ve ever seen. The amount of times I’ve seen politicians, commentators and comedians arch their back up about some comments just makes me ill. And I can understand why – you probably feel defensive about it – it’s about your reputation.

In doing so however, you’ve failed a basic test as a human being and a commentator. When you get a reaction like this, you have to listen, think, and reflect. You have to put yourself in other people’s shoes, and then even if you still don’t agree with them you may start to get a sense of where they’re coming from.

Everybody makes mistakes – we all at times make jokes or comments that are insensitive to others. Everybody insults somebody at some point of time or another. But the true test of a decent person, and importantly, a decent commentator, is your ability to reflect on why you may have insulted someone, and even think about how you could stop yourself from doing it again. If you can’t even do this, then you probably shouldn’t be saying anything at all.

Yesterday, Christy Wampole wrote a piece in the New York Times titled How to Live Without Irony. In a long piece, Wampole takes a look at the tale of the hipster, providing a cultural critique of our new cultural phenomenon.

Wampole’s argument is hard to describe in one go, but here goes. Her argument is that the cultural phenomenon of hipsterism is based around irony, or living an ironic life. In doing so hipsterism represents a cultural void in Generation X – an attempt to relive the success of the baby boomers in order to fix the cultural weakness of the current generation. Furthermore, Wampole argues that hipsterism also represents an emptyness in young generations, a cultural phenomenon that represents our lack of passion for the real things in life and our need to replace this passion with irony about everything that we surround ourselves with. This leads to a disengagement within young people – a disengagement with the good things in life, and a disengagement with the political processes in life.

Let me start by saying that I don’t identify myself as a hipster. With that in mind, I think Wampole has some really interesting points about the cultural realities of today and the potential long-term impacts they will have on our society. However, I get tired every time I read articles about my ‘youth’ and more importantly, criticising our complete ‘lack of culture’. Even more annoyingly, I get constantly frustrated with those who are ready to criticise youth culture without taking a proper look at the reasons behind the growth of these cultural phenomena.

Let’s have a look at each issue one-by-one. First, Wampole seems to take the position that hipsterism represents something of an attempt to fill a cultural void that exists within young people. As she says:

How did this happen? It stems in part from the belief that this generation has little to offer in terms of culture, that everything has already been done, or that serious commitment to any belief will eventually be subsumed by an opposing belief, rendering the first laughable at best and contemptible at worst.

In other words, hipsterism is just a response to the lack of culture that exists in the modern day. She expands on this in the way she describes hipster culture:

Manifesting a nostalgia for times he never lived himself, this contemporary urban harlequin appropriates outmoded fashions (the mustache, the tiny shorts), mechanisms (fixed-gear bicycles, portable record players) and hobbies (home brewing, playing trombone). He harvests awkwardness and self-consciousness. Before he makes any choice, he has proceeded through several stages of self-scrutiny.

Irony is the most self-defensive mode, as it allows a person to dodge responsibility for his or her choices, aesthetic and otherwise. To live ironically is to hide in public. It is flagrantly indirect, a form of subterfuge, which means etymologically to “secretly flee” (subter + fuge). Somehow, directness has become unbearable to us.

Whilst I think there is some value to Wampole’s arguments about hipster culture, I think to deny that it has any value at all is nonsense. The reality is that whilst hipsterism may have been born from an idea of irony, it has expanded well beyond that in the modern age. Hipsters have created their own cultural form; one that mixes values of the old world and new world. This cultural form is a reaction to the world we have grown up in; one in which many have seen a selfish form of passion (often focused around individual gain) in many of the older generations – the sort of passion that Wampole so reveres. And whether you like hipsterism or not, it is undeniable that it has it’s own cultural value, one that tries to bring in what many consider to be the good parts of previous generations into a new world order.

And it is ironic (funnily enough) that Wampole wants to use this mixture of old and new to criticise hipster lifestyles. As someone who is so keen to return to the non-ironic values of the past, she is stuck in a past where hipsters lived solely on irony and refusing to see the value the culture provides today – one that has gone well beyond irony. She wants to revere in the past, but then criticise the way this culture builds into the past at the same time.

But let’s build on Wampole’s argument and look at some of the criticisms she has of hipsterism. Wampole’s largest argument against the ironic lifestyle is that it is a lifestyle that lacks meaning, one in which we have disconnected ourselves from reality and importantly from community. As she states:

While we have gained some skill sets (multitasking, technological savvy), other skills have suffered: the art of conversation, the art of looking at people, the art of being seen, the art of being present. Our conduct is no longer governed by subtlety, finesse, grace and attention, all qualities more esteemed in earlier decades. Inwardness and narcissism now hold sway.

In other words, the hipster can frivolously invest in sham social capital without ever paying back one sincere dime. He doesn’t own anything he possesses.

In many ways I have to say I agree with Wampole in her criticism. There is, in many ways, a lack of meaning, and importantly a lack of community than runs through much of our modern culture. But where Wampole falls down is finding reasons behind this malaise. Reading this in the context of so many other articles on youth culture you can easily read into it a sense than young people are simply just lacking culture, they don’t have the same temperament that the baby boomers in particular (noting that Wampole isn’t a baby boomer) had to develop their fine culture and political engagement.

Yet what this refuses to realise is that this is the very culture that the older generations created that lead to the world in which we live, and the cultures in which young people pursue. In particular, it was the older generations who developed the individualistic society focused largely on consumerism that lead to the development of the ironic society that Wampole so chastises. It is the older generations who took away meaning from our society and replaced it with consumerable goods and then expected younger people to find passion and excitement within it. When you look at it this way, you cannot help but think of course people may become disconnected.

And that is where arguments like Wampole’s become so potentially dangerous. As part of her piece, and as an extension on the argument, Wampole also stated that young people have become completely disengaged with the world – a passionless group who can only live an ironic life. Whilst she didn’t specifically target political engagement, the subtext there was clear – we have created a generation of people who just don’t care about the future of our world.

Of course, as an initial reaction these sorts of sentiments are an insult to every young person who is engaged politically and otherwise within our society. But at a higher level, it completely ignores the role that older generations have played in disengaging younger generations. It’s not just about the systematic talking down to young people, pushing young people aside or creating structures that make political engagement difficult. It’s much more than that. The last decades have seen generations create such an individualist world that it actively and systematically pushes many people out of the political process. A world which focuses so heavily on the individual that civic and community engagement is seen as secondary.

The result of this is that yes, many young people are disengaged. But that has nothing to do with an inherent nature of our age – it is all to do with being brought up in a society in which individual consumerism is rated more highly than our communities – the very society that baby boomers developed.

It may be nice and easy to blame young people for all our ills and complain about their lack of engagement. But to systematically ignore the role that older generations have had in creating such a malaise is not only lazy, but it completely lacks any analysis on how we can make the world a better place.

Today I am going to post the first of what I hope will be a major part of my blog; reviews (this will be a great way to force me to read/watch more). And what a better way to start than with some quick philosophy; Jean Baudrillard’s ‘Why hasn’t everything already disappeared?’

In one of his final texts before his death in 2007, in this piece, Baudrillard tackles the question of disappearance. For those who don’t know him, Baudrillard was a French post-modernist/post-structuralist philosopher. I hadn’t read much of his work before this text, but having read it now, I am definitely going to go and look for more.

First, to start off with the basics of reading this Baudrillard text. Unlike many philosophers (who I tend to try and read as much as possible), there is some ease in reading this text. In many ways, this piece feels like a short novel in the way it’s written, which makes it an ease to read. The text is only 70 pages long, and is mixed with images (which I am still trying to decipher) and is quick and easy to read. In fact, it is so enjoyable, that I read it twice. But you also have to be careful in reading this – it sometimes is a little too easy, meaning you can skip over the actual ideas. I gained so much more from this from the second reading than the first.

As I said, in this piece, Baudrillard deals with the issue of disappearance, or more importantly, why haven’t we all already disappeared?

What on Earth does that mean? He explains:

It’s a question of disappearance, not exhaustion, extinction or extermination. The exhaustion of resources, the extinction of species – these are physical processes or natural phenomena. And that’s the whole difference. The human species is doubtless the only one to have invented a specific mode of disappearance that has nothing to do with Nature’s law. Perhaps even an art of disappearance.

To understand disappearance, Baudrillard first poses that we need to look at reality. Through understanding how we define what is real, we can understand how things disappear. However, it is also in the way that we understand reality that we create disappearance.

If we look closely, we see that the real world begins, in the modern age, with the decision to transform the world, and to do so by means of science, analytical knowledge and the implementation of technology–that is to say that it begins, in Hannah Arendt’s words, with the invention of an Archimedian point outside the world…by which the natural world is definitively alienated.

Baudrillard argues that in understanding reality in this form, understanding it from the point in which we transform the world, we have begun its process of disappearance. Through creating a reality that is connected to the virtual and the scientific, we have created a world in which we, as ‘natural beings’ have created our own disappearance.

It is here we see that the mode of disappearance of the human…is precisely the product of an internal logic, of a built in obsolescence, of the human race’s fulfillment of its most grandiose project, the Promethean project of mastering the universe, of acquiring exhaustive knowledge. We see, too, that it is this which precipitates it towards its disappearance much more quickly than animal species, by the acceleration it imparts to an evolution that no longer has anything natural about it.

In other words, humans have created their own disappearance by creating our own technological world – one that is beyond humans. We have seen our own demise, as it may be described, in creating a species that is technical, scientific, virtual…

And even once we’ve moved towards this scientific world, we continue to create more disappearance. Just look at one of the major foci of the Baudrillard’s piece – the image. Baudrillard argues that the digitalisation of the image has created the disappearance of the photograph, and in turn the disappearance of the object. With us now able to digitally construct images, we have ended the ‘singular presence’ of the object. Think about it this way: digitisation has meant we can create any object we want in the virtual world, meaning that the presence of the real object has disappeared.

Put together that sounds like a terrible fate – a species that has disappeared. But in reality, Baudrillard points out, disappearance is something we fantasise about – it is something within our bones.

Have we not always had the deep-seated phantasy of a world that would go on without us? The poetic temptation to see the world in our absence, free of any human, all-too-human will? The intense pleasure of poetic language lies in seeing language operating on its own, in its materiality and literality, without transiting through meaning – this is what fascinates us.

Baudrillard explains something similar when talking about the image.

Behind every image something has disappeared. And that is the source of its fascination…

And that is where the potential tragedy, but the deep meaning for thought, comes of Baudrillard’s work. If we have already disappeared, has the very fascination in disappearance – the thing that keeps us going – disappeared with us? If there is no longer mystery behind the image – if it is just a digital reconstruction – has the fascination behind photography disappeared, hence eliminating the art itself? Alternatively, if we have mastered our universe, and obtained all knowledge and truth, have we gotten rid of the reason for being – that fascination about what we do now know, and that which has disappeared?

In a piece on Wednesday, the online editor of The Monthly, Nick Feik, declared that the Green movement has been an abject failure. Drawing comparisons with the civil rights movement, Feik argued that recent reports of growing greenhouse gas emissions showed that the environment movement has fundamentally failed to achieve its goal of solving climate change. As he says:

“IF THE civil rights movement were as unsuccessful as the environmental movement has been, Rosa Parks’ granddaughter would still be sitting in the back of a segregated bus.

She might be secure in the knowledge that a global consensus had formed against racial discrimination, but she would still be sitting there.”

It’s interesting the Feik decides to use the parallels of the civil rights movement to frame his argument. In doing so he has shown very little understanding of the history of the civil rights movement, nor the reality of the successes of the 30 years of the Green movement.

To understand modern social movements, there is one key thing to know; change takes time. Whenever you are facing an opposition who has the status quo on their side, making change is always going to be difficult.

Let’s have a look at the civil rights movement for example. If you were to read Feik’s piece you would probably come under the impression that the movement simply began when Rosa Parks sat at the front of the bus one day. What this ignores though is the long history of struggle; one that lasted hundreds, if not thousands of years. It was this history of struggle that lead to the moment where Rosa Parks sat on that bus, and the many other similar moments that formed the modern civil rights movement.

With that context in mind, when you look at the environment movement, you can actually see a pretty impressive history of achievement.

Let’s have a look at climate change in Australia for example. In this country alone, environmentalists have achieved a legislatively mandated renewable energy target, a carbon tax on the country’s largest polluters, and billions of dollars in investment into renewable energy. We have seen a population that now takes the environment seriously, and climate change is firmly on the national agenda. The Green movement has also seen the rise of the Green Party, who have now become, and for the time being look cemented to be, the third largest force in Australian politics. Environmental action is now also a major consideration for both major parties. And to think that all of this has happened only within the last 30 years really points to an amazing turn around.

Look around the world and you will see example after example just like this. Put it all together, and one thing becomes clear; the world would be in a much more perilous situation if it wasn’t for the global environment movement.

This record is particularly impressive because of the complex situation climate change presents, and the opposition the movement has faced. Addressing climate change involves dramatically rethinking our economic and energy system. And in doing so it has meant coming up against some of the biggest economic powers in our world – fossil fuel companies that have had no desire to change their practices.

And this is where Feik’s criticism really falls down. In reading his post you could easily come away thinking that if only the environment movement had changed their tactics everything would be fine by now. The reality is however that action on climate change was always going to challenge the power of the fossil fuel companies. Because of this, no matter what tactics the movement employed, change was always going to face stiff opposition. This is the inherent nature of a movement that is challenging power structures.

Now, could we have done a better job taking up the fight up to these companies? Could we be in a better position? Yes, of course we could. There is a lot that environment movement can do better and I don’t think I know of one environmentalist who is happy with our current situation.

But to blame the environment movement for where we stand not only ignores the achievements that have occurred, but also deflects the blame from those who deserve it; the fossil fuel companies who are the real enemies of climate action.