ACTIVISM IN AUSTRALIA

Interview by Claudette Vaughan

CV: What does DropBear mean?

Anon: It’s an urban myth. It’s a cross between a koala and a possum. They climb up trees and they drop on peoples’ heads. I see them as a nice little symbol of people fighting back and people saying ‘fuck you’ I will drop on your head. I will agitate. So call me Drop, why don’t you?

CV: Well Drop, what do you have to say about activism in Australia?

Drop: I think after living under the Howard government for 10 years people have lost their drive. They feel helpless. They know that protests-as-usual doesn’t fix anything. If petitions and rallies worked then by the end of the 80’s there would have been no nuclear weapons left in the world.

A lot of the early direct action back then, especially in the UK, was the precursor to the Anti-Roads movement, to the whole struggle against the Criminal Justice Bill, and that’s what they are scared of. They are scared of people actually travelling and standing up and pushing fences over (ref to the protests against refugees being locked up without legal recourse in Australia). What they are not scared of is petitions and letters because they know that they can ignore that.

Like Chomsky says - I’m sick of people quoting Chomsky by the way (laughter) - but he said, “If you go to one protest then go home, that’s OK. The powers - that - be can deal with that. But when people keep at it, when people keep standing up, keep making a noise and they don’t give up and they don’t accept business-as-usual that’s what the people in power can’t deal with”.

What the powers-that-be, the police state, the corporations, the media – what they can’t deal with is sustained actions and actions that refuses to compromise for the sake of an economic reality.

What really matters is people having an inherent faith in what they do and what they want and that makes all the difference.

What’s happening in this country is people feel so helpless – people know that John Howard is not going to listen to them because he has his own agenda. He’s been planning this for 30 years. He’s not in touch with reality. He didn’t leave home until he had a wife and a seat in Parliament. He lived at home until he was 35 years old.

When people marched against the Iraqi war he didn’t see it as a legitimate expression of the communities passion, concerns or desires. He called it “The noise of the mob”. When 2 or 3 lobbyists from BHP or Rio Tinto went and saw him that to him was a legitimate representation of the concerns of the general public – yet it was a clear representation of the concerns of big business.

Basically Howard has shaped political and social landscapes and that’s why he’s able to push through the new terrorism laws, the new policing laws, the new industrial relations laws. People have been so worn down and at the same time, increasingly pressured by a changing economic landscape as far as workers rights and things like that are concerned, they have been beaten down by it all. They are tired.

CV: Is this an expression of the New World Order working itself out of the USA with Australia as it’s ally?

Drop: Absolutely. The WTO and the International Monetary Fund – all of these organisations haven’t happened by accident. Take the Free Trade Agreement that’s been pushed through between Australia and the States is part of a global plan for them and it’s hard for people to pick up all the pieces of the jig-saw puzzle that’s been scattered on the floor and find the time to put all the pieces together.

This is all part of a larger picture of working out a way to farm human beings. To make them cruise along day-by-day, go home, drink your beer, watch ‘Big Brother’, not question anything but be concerned about the trivial bullshit that goes on in the mass media and not be worried about what the Free Trade deal means to Australian culture and to the Australian people. Don’t be concerned with GE food being accepted and allowed into the country. They have worn us down by making us work harder for less money with less rights and at the same time they feed us a diet of bullshit culture that we are supposed to care about. Be a celebrity but say nothing and they feed us this mis-information through the corporate media whether it’s the Telegraph, the Herald, Channel 9, Channel 7 even the ABC feels an incredible amount of pressure not to expose things. There’s so much shit going under the radar that the message being sent out is about things that we cannot question. Take Pine Gap for example. When was the last time you saw a cohesive documentary about Pine Gap’s spy base – 20km from Alice Springs? It helps co-ordinate ballistic missile strikes. It helped in the bombing of Yugoslavia. Basically they tried to bomb that country back to the Stone Age.

Our own parliamentarians have been refused many times a visit when they have called for an inspection of Pine Gap. We are subservient to the economic and cultural power of the United States of America so much so that we have traded away sovereignty, independence, critical thinking, and our economy because of it.

We have turned into the 52ed State of America. The 51st of course being Israel.

CV: How do you see the refugee crisis in this country?

Drop: I see it with great sorrow being a testament of Howard’s playing to peoples’ xenophobia and inherent racism in this country. He did the same thing about refusing to apologise to the aborigine people of this country about the Stolen Generation, Aboriginal Land Rights issues and the fact that children for years on end are being locked up in a place like Woombara Detention Centre and Baxter Detention Centre-both of which I’ve been to.

It’s OK with Australia the fact that these people came over in a boat or on a plane but, you know, people are trying to move for economic opportunities or personal freedom issues to save their own lives. Right now at Baxter there’s all these different compounds where you can’t see the sky. There’s no sense of landscape around. In the so-called interest of “protecting detainees privacy”. How many people can put a face to ‘the refugee issue’in this country. It’s an abstract idea yet there are thousands of people locked up right now in detention centres.

It’s only when “one-of-our-own” like Corenea Rawe was locked up accidentally for months on end that people actually thought; hey this is not OK. “How can one of our Aussies, with mental problems, get locked up for months and months at Baxter. Now, that’s not how you treat Australians”.

Yet it’s OK for kids from Iran, Afghanistan, Iraq – it’s OK for them somehow.

Take the dissents in China. The Chinese consulate officials go in and interview them. They take photos, sorts out their history, and make threats to them.
People don’t want to know about it. They want to go about their lives valuing the life and the weekend they get after working meaningless soul-destroying jobs 9 to 5. They don’t want to feel any sense of responsibility for what’s going on.

After the last Federal election a group of my friends found out where the Liberals were celebrating and gate-crashed with jars of fake blood. There was no security at the door so they made it into the reception area. That’s a sign of how arrogant and blaze that this government has gotten.

So my friends got onto the dance floor and poured the fake blood on the floor. Some of these Liberals started crying and asking us, “Why are you doing this?”
They just can’t seem to make the link that this government is ruining peoples’ lives. They can’t seem to make the link between giving 5 grand to the Liberal party and the SIEV X (Suspected Illegal Entry Vessel)
tragedy – where over 400 people drowned.

The story going around was the Australian Federal police collaborated with the Indonesian police to sabotage the boat engines so they would not get to Australia because John Howard’s border protection policy had to be seen as a success.
They trade away peoples lives for their own economic and political gain. It’s as simple as that. These people that are trying to make it to Australia to save themselves in many cases are expendable.

CV: What about security in Australia?

Drop: We are now at a point in history where people regulate their own behaviour. It’s called the panopticon effect.

A panopticon was a circular prison that operated by having only one guard inside with a mirror system. Basically that one guard is the middle of a multi-level prison system who can see into any cell in any prison at any time.

People ended up regulating their behaviour because they thought at any point in time they were being watched. That’s what is happening right now. Close circuit TV cameras in the takeaway shops, in the bank, in the streets, clubs, pubs, everywhere. People now act in accordance with them being under surveillance. We have become a self-regulating society.

CV: Do you think we’ve become a timid society or the usual blaze, uninterested society?

Drop: A bit of both. I know that a section of the population doesn’t give a shit as long as the beer keeps flowing or we’re not turned away from our own beaches for example.

I tell you what really stunk out to me was when army vehicles driven down King Street. Half the crowd goes ‘whatever’. Another quarter of people look at it with disgust and fear and another slice of people give it the finger but a small proportion of people give it the finger and recognise them as part of a ruthless machine that will crush anything or anyone in it’s path.

CV: What about corporate Australia? How will they impact on the rest of us?

Drop: What you have to remember about faceless corporate hierarchies is that they are not actually faceless. They do have names and addresses. They might be robots but they are human beings. Both the Liberal and Labor parties in this country are run by corporations. It doesn’t make any economical sense whatsoever if corporations are giving $10, 000 or $20, 000 to the ALP or Liberals unless they are expecting a return. It’s bad for business otherwise.

Look at Bob Carr. He got out of politics to escape the political fall-out over the Cross City Tunnel. What’s he doing now? He’s sitting on the Board that owns the Cross City Tunnel. When you look at it like that its an abuse of power this buying and selling of influence and decisions that effect thousands and thousands of people.

CV: What’s your favourite type of activism?

Drop: I’m a big fan of anti- propaganda – independent newspapers, poll posters. I see the internet as being absolutely vital for activists. It’s not something I can touch. It’s not something inherently interfaces with life on the ground. Culture-jamming is great. My absolute favourite activism is unannounced loud creating disturbances to the business-as-usual crowd.

CV: What about animal activism?

Drop: This whole country has a recent history and it was founded on conquering the natural landscape as reflected in a 4-wheel drive driving through the city. It’s a real application of power, dominance and influence.

I see animal activism as breaking through the spell that Australia has where there’s no relationship to the land and the non-human animals we share it with.

It breaks that barrier down and says “No, It all matters”. We all share the air, the land and the water together and they animal activists refuse to be brought off by animals used in entertainment, or as meat or as a natural resource or a so-called domesticated resource. But it’s quiet hard to get through that wall. That is humans and animals that we share the planet with those same animals are not resources for human. Take Laurie Levy for example going out all these years on the wetlands fighting the shooters. I see that as much more vital than letters written – he actually does it.

Direct action in Australia comes and goes. It’s like someone’s sex drive. It comes and goes in a natural flux. It’s hard to gear it up to get people excited about it. At the same time it’s a massive reserve of people and energy who are just waiting for the right time and the right place to get out there and act up. It’s been seen in the past with the WTO out at Homebush in 2002, it’s been out at Baxter in 2005 and it’s been seen at the World Economic Forum in 2000. It’s a real critical mass of energy that builds up and when that happens Australians are a real feisty bunch.

We are playing for keeps. This is not a game because we know the alternative to lose or at least to go down without a fight is putting the handcuffs on ourselves.