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Flat White

Happy families vs noisy activism

23 April 2022

2:00 PM

23 April 2022

2:00 PM

I have a genuine problem this election concerning which political party will get my consent to govern.

The problem posed by minority parties could be fixed immediately by abolishing their umbilical cord, preferential voting…

That said, I have what most in Australia have – a leaning towards conserving what is important in this nation. Meanwhile, the minor parties attempt to elevate the most trivial of issues to the level of ‘national catastrophe’ in order to give their policies a louder voice. 

Personally, I want to hear about policies that will achieve what the vast majority of people desire. Let’s call it ‘their happiness’ and define happiness as ‘living well with moderately sufficient resources’. If we next ask, ‘What is the context in which Australians seek their happiness?’ The obvious answer is, ‘In the company of a happy family.’

For almost every Australian, the family is the social reality in which their happiness is made possible. My Jewish friends and family take a more practical if parochial view when they say: ‘Happy wife; Happy life.’ While true, family life requires more. It requires the protection and support of government policies. 

Both major parties have sought to tie happiness to economic factors. While the current Liberal strategy is very much economic, it has been sidetracked by social policy issues that dwarf economic discussions.

Historically, the ALP relied on the trade union movement, but since its capture by the left we are told that only when the world’s climate is restored in fifty years, and only when we have abandoned petrol vehicles for electric ones, and only when we have abandoned coal-fired power stations for wind a solar – well then we can we look forward to being happy. 


Despite the obvious difficulties he will face when asked to reconcile these policies with economic forecasts, I thought Albanese’s responses to journalists’ gotcha questions were not all that important, even if the media thought otherwise. Even ex-Prime Minister John Howard had to have two goes before he got the answer correct. Albanese’s answer was embarrassing, but then so was John Howard’s initial response.

Albanese has already relied on having an economic plan, which is a tactic that every ALP leader has resorted to for the past sixty years. It reflects the impact of socialism that one can forecast so accurately that a plan is all that is needed. He claims that his policies will obtain full employment, in part by increasing the size of our manufacturing sector. As with most plans, however, there is a heck of a lot of detail that is missing, and as we all know that is where the devil – if anyone still believes in the existence of that fallen angel – resides. 

If the truth was known, Scott Morrison faced a more difficult week than Albanese, given that criticisms by members of his party, some very critical of the Prime Minister’s character, were given extreme prominence in the media. 

One of the more difficult issues to arise that initially reflected adversely on the Prime Minister’s character, involved his endorsement of Katherine Deves for the Sydney seat of Warringah. Ms Deves is the mother of three young girls and has been one of a group of Liberal women to have publicly objected to men who identify as women competing against biological women in women’s sports.

Since it all comes back to the traditional family and the importance for that unit of the biological distinction between men and women, resolution of that issue is critical to the happiness of most women in their families. The family is not bulletproof and there are many on the left who, having identified the family as the cornerstone of liberal democracy, are keen to undermine its structure with incompatible and alternative life styles for the ultimate, fifth column attack on civilised life. 

The left-wing plan was enabled when the Parliament passed the Marriage Amendment (Definitions and Religious Freedoms) Act 2017 which permitted same-sex marriages by only one vote, with an exceedingly Woke High Court having given a plain text meaning marriage without once mentioning reproduction. 

Before she was pre-selected, Ms Deves co-founded the advocacy group, Save Women’s Sport Australasia and assisted Tasmanian Liberal Senator Claire Chandler in the development of the draft Private Member’s Bill known as, ‘Save Women’s Sport’, something that Mr Morrison originally applauded when endorsing Deves’ candidature. 

Unfortunately, when short-sighted members of the Liberal Party called for Deves to be dis-endorsed as her comments were archaic, she felt obliged to apologise for the wording of her comments, something which was interpreted by the left-wing media as a sign of vulnerability. This inflamed the ignorant bullies one finds in Australia’s media to attack with greater venom.

So heated were the attacks, and despite her receiving death threats, that the next day the Prime Minister, sensing Easter was an appropriate time for a Paschal sacrifice, sought to defuse the issue by reneging on his earlier support for the draft bill. Instead, he claimed that the Private Member’s Bill would not be brought before the House for a vote as the government was in charge. This provoked the left to even greater anger, for Katherine Deves was still the candidate for Warringah.

Sensing that his support might rise again after the sacrifice and despite the lapse of a week, Mr Morrison came out to support Deves, saying: ‘I’m not going to allow her to be pushed aside as the pile on comes in to try and silence her. I will stand up with her, my team is standing up with her, and we will make sure that she won’t be silenced.’

He has risen indeed. To be clear, his support was for the candidate, not expressly for her objection to men competing in women’s sport. About this, Morrison said: ‘She is standing up for women and girls and their access to fair sport in this country.’

It is difficult to understand left-wing support for men competing in women’s sport, other than as an attack on the traditional family and the moderate sexual habits that it demands for its existence. Despite the faux moral outrage of those apologists, it is the overwhelming opinion of women who are biologically women, particularly those who compete or have daughters, that both the apologists and the men concerned are perpetrating a gross injustice in the name of equality.

Now that Scott Morrison has emerged from this melee with his honour intact, he should ask Mr Albanese whether the affirmative action policy of ALP pre-selection applies equally to trans women. This has become particularly pressing now that Albo has said: ‘That girls should be able to play sport against girls and boys should be able to play sport against boys.’ Here, he is relying on ambiguity to avoid saying that men identifying as girls would be considered to be girls.

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