CLANCY OVERELL | Editor | CONTACT
In case you haven’t heard the most exciting news since Barnaby Joyce’s Canberra naptime, Opposition leader and former home affairs minister, Peter Dutton, has declared that the Labor government has “lost control” of the country’s borders.
This follows the news that at least 40 men have been lucky enough to not drown in their efforts illegally immigrate to Australia by boat.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has responded to the arrivals by declaring that Australia’s asylum policies were unchanged: “People who attempt to arrive here by boat will not settle here.”
However, the mere fact that brown people were able to touch Australian soil without being multimillionaire foreign students has given the Australian media and Federal Opposition enough to suggest that an apocalypse is around the corner, and that our daughters and transgender sons will be soon forced to wear face scarves.
However, while Peter Dutton and his cheerleaders in the Australian media begin to tool up for a hysterically xenophobic fear campaign, it seems this brand of Howard-era politics is struggling to hit as hard as it used to.
Namely, because voters still remember the time that they were lied to about asylum seekers throwing their own children overboard to secure passage to Australia.
On top of this, Dutton must contend with the fact that islamophobia isn’t really a sure bet anymore.
In an increasingly multicultural country, even the rednecks are spending their weekends watching Saudi-backed LIV Golf tournaments and UFC matches live from the UAE, where the blood-soaked winners are almost always Dagestani Muslims.
The Qatar world cup, the rise of Arab superstars within both the rugby league and AFL, as well as the fact that Dubai is now considered a luxurious holiday destination for the Australian middle class. All these factors make it a lot harder for right-wing political populists to paint every single brown person as potential Osama Bin Ladens.
Even more so, within the grass roots cricketing community.
The news that 40 men believed to be from Bangladesh, India and Pakistan, have arrived by boat on the northern Kimberley coast, has caused some ears to prick up across the cricket ovals of Western Australian today.
“Wait up” says Perth grade cricket icon, Clubby Messenger (59).
“Let’s just see if we’ve got any pace bowlers in here”
“Could really use a Shoaib out here”
