Post No. 3,554 - From a recent activism email to an MP

This is from a recent activism email to an MP. 

*** 

 

The inspiration for this email was an "Ette Media" podcast which focused on the PM's use of the term "turn down the heat" - which I consider clearer than the journo making the podcast seems to think, but 

• it is worth being aware of this critique; 
• there are some (critical) points in the podcast which merit consideration; and 
• the podcast raised some past issues which I have been concerned about. 

Firstly, the podcast details: 

• “ONLY FRAN: It’s not the public who must turn the temperature down” on Ette Media’s “We Used to be Journos” podcast   https://podcasts.apple.com/au/podcast/we-used-to-be-journos/id1823491652?i=1000797824978   or   https://youtu.be/nFHZCB7qYok  “In the wake of the violent and deplorable attack on Independent MP Helen Haines, the Prime Minister has been asking everyone to “turn the temperature down”, but Jan Fran is not entirely clear on what that means or who it’s directed at. In this episode of Only Fran, Jan Fran combs through previous examples of the PM using that phrase and finds that some people are turning the temperature up more than others.”  
  

The concerns raised in that podcast about the actions of   

• the [ ... ] head of the current US regime,   

          and   

• [ ... ] party,   

are, IMO, important, and need to be addressed - for the sake of social cohesion, which includes ensuring that Australia is genuinely livable for targetted minorities, including women, LGBTQIASB+ people, the disabled, and First Peoples and other people of colour, which requires addressing structural discrimination and unmanaged unconscious bias, as well as interpersonal conduct (and bigots, in my experience, never hide their hate as well as they think - their facial expressions and body language are particularly telling to people on the receiving end of hate, who need to be able to "read the room" for the sake of survival). 

As you know, I am a member of the first four of those five groups I listed. The hate that has come our way over the last fifteen years or so (from political and media [ ... ] on the far right) has been particularly extraordinary, although a lot of the hate has also been around for much longer. 

The worsening of that hate is, IMO, connected to the rise of the extreme/far right - a group that I consider does meet the definition of fascism, and, in making that comment, I note Madeline Albright wrote a book warning about this, and journalists such as Rachel Maddow and other experts such as Professor Timothy Snyder, Anne Applebaum, and Tad Stoermer have also been making the same sort of warning (including in books and online) for years. 

In such matters, defending democracy and "social cohesion" does not require an enforced superficiality of niceness: it requires those who are agents of hate being vigorously, nonviolently, and effectively addressed. 

As I write that, an incident from (neoliberal, conservative, right wing) Reagan's presidency comes to mind, which was when his advisors pointed out that USA's refusal to ratify an international convention meant the USSR could use that to avoid human rights obligations, very effectively trashing the USA's reputation in the process. Once the treaty was ratified, the USA's standing was restored, and their comments promoting a better world - i.e., one where human rights were better respected and realised - were more effective. 

In our case, things like failing to charge the homophobic child abusers who were using lies to campaign against things like drag reading and LGBTQIASB+ events in libraries a few years ago provided: 

1. active encouragement for the haters; 
   and 
2. evidence that [ ... ] 

To be clear:  

• I consider events such as the violent assault on Camp Sovereignty was very likely encouraged by the failure to act against anti-LGBTQIASB+ (especially anti-trans) hate. 

Under such circumstances, calls for calm are seen by those haters as a sign of weakness. 

It should also be noted that there is quite a bit of commentary, from sources that seem competent to me, about disturbing aspects such as the desire to cause pain of long term, rusted on haters - such as the long term members of M_oG_ in the USA and their equivalents here. No amount of nice words will affect them, but then, as Dr Martin Luther King Jr put it: 

• "It may be true that the law cannot change the heart, but it can restrain the heartless." 

That is why we need laws, and why those laws need to be used. 

This is particularly important in this world, which, since 6^th January, 2021 (although less so here), has been increasingly divorced from anything bearing resemblance to "normal" politics - as outlined, in part, in a video from Tad Stoermer today at https://youtu.be/gNJYzgCmKvY. 

In summary, we do need words urging civilised, civil, decent responses and actions, but we also need actions that recognise, as with the build up to World War Two, the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and the ongoing climate crisis, that our situation is not "normal", and extraordinary actions are required. 

 

PS - one of the reasons addressing these threats to our democracy is so difficult is that they cannot be approached solely from the point of view of rationality/intellect: emotion is a key part of it. 

To illustrate that with an example, this week SBS had a human interest story about a woman who has chosen not to have children as a result of what may happen in the future. That was portrayed as fear, which is an aspect of it, but there is also incredible ethical strength and responsibility (when the predicted death toll from the climate crisis varies from one to four billion), manifested as giving up what is undoubtedly a major life goal for most people. 

Our - meaning all of humanity - response to the climate crisis has been marked by emotional overwhelm - which is something that cannot be rationalised away or intellectualised into submission: the emotions, particularly around grief at the loss of planned or expected life, must be dealt with as emotions ... which is why I want critical thinking and emotional competence (not emotional intelligence, which has been perverted into a tool for manipulation) taught from as early as possible in schools (I have seen recommendations for critical thinking for kindergarten). 

That is a reason for compassion for those who are struggling to adapt to the world's current circumstances, but not for inaction or letting haters off the hook: the price of inadequate or ineffective action is too high 

 

*** 

Possible flaws 

Where I can, I will try to highlightopossible flaws / issues youoshouldoconsider: 

• there mayobe flawedologicaloarguments in the above: to find out more about such flaws and thinking generally, I recommend Brendan  Myers’ freeoonline course “Clear and Present Thinking”;  
• I could be wrong - so keep your thinkingocaps on, and make up your own minds for yourself.
  

  

Gnwmythr 

teaching the "good" (balancedopositive and spirituallyomature [BPM]) 
safer and more effective ways to counter the "bad" (outoofobalance, spirituallyoimmature [nonBPM/antiBPM]) 

IMO, OTAAT (“one term at a time”) is the next action to save representative  democracy, along with establishment of an organisation of human-rights observing  democracies as a functional alternative to the UN (especially the veto-sabotaged UN SC), along with all organisations being run using the seven "business" principles listed here, but also note this and this “Vision for Humanity” 

If you’re new here, consider looking at the Landing Page for Newbies   

If you appreciated this post, pleaseoshare it. I am now on SubStack, Patreon, 
and you can support me at PayPal (or PayPal Repeating Support Options) or Ko-Fi 
Any and all support will be greatlyoappreciated, and willoaid me in continuing this work 

 

Remember: we generallyoneed to be more human being rather than human doing, to mind our Mӕgan, and to acknowledge that all misgenderingois an act of activeotransphobia/transmisiaothat puts trans+ lives at risk & accept that all insistence on the use of “trans” as a descriptor comes with commensurate use of “cis” as a descriptoroto prevent “othering” (just as binary gendered [men’s and women’s] sporting teams are either both given the gender descriptor, or neither).

#PsychicABetterWorld   and  

 

Note that I am cutting back on aspects of my posts - see here, and Gnwmythr is pronounced new-MYTH-ear  

Copyright © Kayleen White 2007-2026     NO AI   I do not consent to any machine learning aka Artificial Intelligence (AI), generative AI, large language model, machine learning, chatbot, or other automated analysis, generative process, or replication program to reproduce, mimic, remix, summarise, or otherwise  replicate any part of this post or other posts on this blog via any means. AI was NOT used to write this article. Typo’s may be inserrted deliberately to demonstrate this is not an AI product.     Otherwise, fair and reasonable use is accepted under Creative Commons 4.0 on an Attribution-ShareAlike basis https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/  

 

Post No. 3,239 - From a conversation with a friend

Photo by Greg Johnson on Unsplash  
(A farm field ready for sowing in the foreground leads to a home, farm structures, and trees in the midground, and a large, threatening tornado shows in the background, leaning over the farm buildings, against a dark grey sky)

 

I recently had a chat (by phone) with a friend I haven’t seen for a while, and that, and a few other matters, led to a few thoughts. 

 

The first is that it seems, or is too easy to assume (because of other examples of bad behaviour in corporations - particularly at the top), that too many - not all - of those who make enough money to retire without having to worry about money did by being the (rewarded) willing (or duped) of the neoliberal elites - the foot soldiers doing the bidding of their masters by pushing the limits of ethics and edging beyond decency. 

I also know others who didn’t behave that way and retired without money worries, but they had fairly ordinary, as-expected-by-conservatism lives - they haven’t taken on several sets of step- and foster-kids at critical (and expensive) stages of those kids’ lives, didn’t have partners who experienced major (including prolonged) health problems, didn’t relocate multiple times, didn’t see how flimsy and unsuitable Australian housing is and thus avoid buying any, and didn’t stir things up in the workplace by saying “no” to anything questionable (in other words, they were no Veronika from G Plus Animation). 

The problem is, generations of conservative politicians have assumed everyone is from that conservative pattern (there have been progressive politicians who didn't - especially in my home state, but not enough at the national level), and that has left many people struggling to survive - making those conservative politicians a bit like the tornado in the above photo.  

 

Speaking of assumptions and conservatism in lifestyles, my friend and I also discussed transphobia - he (cisgender) has observed transmen don’t experience the levels of transphobia that transwomen do. 

Our chat covered that one of the major motivations for the hate thrown at transwomen is that some men are so insecure and patriarchal that they fear anything that they consider is not heterosexual is a risk to their macho identity (it is not what would be considered normal male identity), and thus they fear what a well known trans advocate refers to as “accidental homosexuality”. 

With regard to the hate shown by some cishet women, some of them consider the existence of transwomen a threat to their princess-in-pink-with-a-pony view of femininity (which, to be fair, transwomen and lesbians and biwomen are - thank the Goddess, but the concept is also a belittling insult to the billions of women in poverty or rural situations where such affected delicacy is not an option), and they are unwilling to keep their fantasies to themselves and their life and so they demand that everyone else goes along with their fantasies, including providing social status points and worship and an adequate number of opening-doors-for-them and reinforcing their fantasy femininity as the sole acceptable model of femininity (which it is to patriarchs, fascists, and the like). 

To do that might also require them to grow  up enough to properly grieve the loss, or partial loss or modification of their life fantasy - which is something that EVERY person who is significantly different (whether through non-standard [according to patriarchy/fascism] sexuality or gender identity, or because of disability, non-standard life cycle, etc, etc, etc) has had to do. 

 

The next point, in reaction to an online YouTube video, is that I have chosen two of my eleven Deities of Tutelage or Service (Matron/nonbinary/Patreon Deity) - the others chose me, which is a process that Druid  John Beckett has written about quite eloquently at Under the Ancient Oaks. As a result of them choosing me (and was reluctant to accept service with two for some time), my Deities of Tutelage or Service come from a few different pantheons. So, based on my experience, my opinion is that to be too reductive and argue that people must choose only from one pantheon is arbitrary and often unnecessary (and sometime necessary for some people). Furthermore, people with advanced or complex spiritual obligations often need the additional help of other Deities to accomplish their life tasks (which is something I first came across in my days trying out Spiritualism, with my teacher at that time often saying people who had taken on more tasks were likely to have more guides and helpers to help accomplish that task).  

However, it could also be that people have a large task that is located within only one area, and thus may have one or a few Deities of Tutelage or Service/Guides/helpers/etc because their large/advance task is focused on a few skills, not many.  

Don’t make ANY assumptions either way based on arbitrary matters such as numbers of anything. 

Finally, as I have written elsewhere (including here), I retired from my day job a few years ago (and my professional registration will expire in a few months yay!). Others have also perhaps officially retired, but are still going - and Robert Reich is a key example, for the reasons he wrote about here (largely the poor state of the world as a result of USA’s current Autocrat-in-Chief).  

I am also having to resume work for a number of reasons, and one significant part of that is associated with my work here and on SubStack: basically, I have more spiritual work to do - more obligations to fulfill (although I won’t get through all this list, nor will I try with many of those). 

So, time for another cuppa and bit more work ...  

Possible flaws 

Where I can, I will try to highlight possible flaws / issues you should consider: 

• there may be flawed logical arguments in the above: to find out more about such flaws and thinking generally, I recommend Brendan  Myers’ free online course “Clear and Present Thinking”;  
• I could be wrong - so keep your thinking caps on, and make up your own minds for yourself.
  

 

If you appreciated this post, please share it. I am now on SubStack, 
and you can support me at PayPal (or PayPal Repeating Support Options) or Ko-Fi 

 

Remember: we generally need to be more human being rather than human doing, to mind our Mӕgan, and to acknowledge that all misgendering is an act of active transphobia/transmisia that puts trans+ lives at risk & accept that all insistence on the use of “trans” as a descriptor comes with commensurate use of “cis” as a descriptor to prevent “othering” (just as binary gendered [men’s and women’s] sporting teams are either both given the gender descriptor, or neither).

#PsychicABetterWorld   and  

Note that I am cutting back on aspects of my posts - see here, and Gnwmythr is pronounced new-MYTH-ear  

Copyright © Kayleen White 2007-2025     NO AI   I do not consent to any machine learning aka Artificial Intelligence (AI), generative AI, large language model, machine learning, chatbot, or other automated analysis, generative process, or replication program to reproduce, mimic, remix, summarise, or otherwise  replicate any part of this post or other posts on this blog via any means. Typo’s may be inserrted deliberately to demonstrate this is not an AI product.     Otherwise, fair and reasonable use is accepted under Creative Commons 4.0 on an Attribution-ShareAlike basis https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/