See something, say something

In comparatively less crazy
hours of the day, as I whisked past a suburban railway station in Sydney, a prominent panel affixed to the side of the railings attracted my attention. Akin to my body I found that my feet had frozen! A sudden halt gave an ache to my shin but was soon replaced by one in the heart. Apparently, there was nothing magical, bewildering or fascinating about it. A maiden with an anxious look on her face was gazing at two police officers who, with intimidating expressions on their faces, were staring back at her. The writing, as it invariably is the case, was on the wall. The statement, by now a cliché, stated — more than it meant, by expressing today’s ‘reality’ or tragedy – “If you see something, say something.” It was presumably alluding to the potential discovery of explosive material, probably in any form, inanimate or human. Any relation to the Muslim community would add to the piquancy, or else an over-pigmented man, a socialist or perhaps an ‘environmental terrorist’ could do. And if none is available perhaps an asylum seeker whose country has been devastated by the developed world can fill in the space. Was I reading too much into it?
In recent times things are happening at an apocalyptical velocity. In his second short stint, Kevin Rudd, using his political gimmickry of discouraging human traffickers, inhumanly closed all doors upon the refugees arriving through boats, as if in the history of Australia it was something unique, novel or unprecedented and the whole ‘10-pound’ generation probably landed here through a rocket or a laser beam. In this despicable act, Abbott went a yard ahead. To turn the boats around, his government allegedly paid a bounty to the ‘people smugglers’. What a paradigm shift! After all, ‘people are the business’ and business has ethics of its own. This grave injustice invited the attention of the judiciary. Smelling a ‘rat’ – a threat to its (class) interests — the ruling class, both the party in power and waiting in the wings (i.e. opposition), joined hands. Through an amendment, the most heinous and inhuman act of ‘offshore’ processing was turned into an irrevocable law, as divine as, or probably more than, the royal.
The act of draining first blood was probably not enough. Firing another shot was considered consistent with the necessity to make success certain; hence in the lower house of parliament another extremely controversial proposition has unfolded. This means that anyone remotely suspected of terrorism can be deported to the country he once migrated from regardless of having any relation to it now. The irony of this law is imbued in its retrospective implication and application. If it sneaks past common sense, all ‘migrants’ will immediately become susceptible to the racial holocaust commenced by the ruling elite of modern-day Australia. Any ‘terror suspect’ – in today’s scenario it will most likely be a young Muslim — is bound to be deported. Commensurate with these designs, the definition of ‘terrorist’ appears to have been deliberately kept vague to include anyone who refuses to conform to the ‘established reality’. What does this mean? The requirements or whims of the state will define the names and the nature of criminals, which, to suit its objectives, will keep changing. Julian Assange, an Australian, having no other nationality, has already become a vivid example for the rest of his kind. From the days of McCarthyism to Islamophobia, history has travelled a long distance to highlight and reassert the incompatibility of capitalism with favourable human existence. In recent years, its brutality and shenanigans have made this reality more evident than ever.
For quite some time the creepy, droll sound of stench-ridden slogans relating to ‘blood’ and ‘soil’ are being heard in the otherwise delicately balanced society of Australia. Did anyone notice the historical insidiousness hidden in these slogans once raised by the Nazis in Germany? The element of racism is imminent in them but the question remains: whose blood and which soil are they yearning for? Australian blood is aboriginal and the soil belongs to the ‘first nation’, the last in the preference of the current ruling elite. No other people can lay claim to this, least of all the state. Why imitate Svoboda or Golden Dawn, and why now? An authoritarian state born out of liberalism as its own consummation demonstrates in this way. Such a state brings forth an organisation of its own along with a theory of society that corresponds to monopoly capitalism. An antithesis of logos that, according to Aristotle, “discerns between human from animal and sets forth the just and the unjust”. Since reality in its essence is irrational, the unjust prevail and the just is masked/interred.
An authoritarian state needs a new fictionalised reality based on race, fear and bloody forces that bases its class concept on ethnic/racial/religious grounds and not on economic perspective. In this case, the two manufactured classes are the whites and the Muslims — the ‘others’. It is a premeditated, systematically planned distraction from the real class struggle that this increasingly repressive state, despite its massive social cuts, has successfully achieved. Governing through fear is always convenient but one may ask: “If the concept of ‘enemy’ and ‘fear’ constitute the ‘energetic principles’ of politics”, does democracy remain viable? Franz Neumann replies: “A democratic political system becomes impossible, whether the fear is produced from within or from without.” Montesquieu adds: “Correctly observed that fear is what makes and sustains dictatorships. If freedom is absence of restraints, the restraints to be removed today are many; the psychological restraint of fear ranks first.”
Contrary to this, today all the available market-based wisdom is consumed in confidence that fear obviates the necessity for inquiry. It certainly does; why else did Tsipras, who in the name of salvation fought for the servitude of Greece, warn his countrymen by stating: “In these critical hours, as we face history together, we must remember that the only thing to fear is fear itself.” The resounding response of the working class exposed the real pygmy hidden behind a paper tiger. “Not a few who wanted to drive out their devil have themselves entered into swine”; how succinct Nietzsche could be!
Under the conditions of fear, self-preservation remains the only objective. The people have no choice but to quietly conform or at best behave as vocal chords of a society that thrives on their imposed, alienated and yet consented labour. Herbert Marcuse succinctly states: “As long as a social system reproduces, by indoctrination and integration, a self-perpetuating conservative majority, the majority reproduces the system itself — open to changes within, but not beyond, its institutional framework. Men following their reason follow those who put their reason to profitable use.” This majority, instead of becoming a locomotive to revolution transforms what Walter Benjamin says into “passengers” (who) “activate its brakes”. What else can foster such a conservative, irrational conforming majority if not fear? To belittle its own dread, this horror stricken majority tends to seek revenge from ‘others’, the vulnerable ones. The jeers, sneers, racial slurs and slights are gestures every coloured ‘immigrant’ has long been accustomed to but ever since the official patronage has been endowed upon them, the unhappy consciousness of the majority has transcended these oddities.
Bringing physical harm to the relatively dark pigmented people is not very uncommon. But this absolute encroachment of their right of doing away with their citizenship is certainly going to prove a death knell. Outright fascism will open a Pandora’s Box. Today’s citizen will be tomorrow’s pariah, a mate will become a stranger, a companion a cast away alien, perhaps an enemy not by birth but by design. A totalitarian state marketing neo-liberal fascism is something my bleary eyes have seen and this fact I have decided to state. Is anybody listening?
Marx once stated, “History repeats itself, first time as farce and then as tragedy.” Whether it moves in a circle or in a spiral, as long as this rapacious system based on exploitation keeps dragging its feet, it will continue to repeat in one form or another.

The writer is based in Australia and has authored books on socialism and history. He can be reached at saulatnagi@hotmail.com