Uniparty — Political Collusion or Responsible Governance?

I have a personal dislike for the slogan “uniparty, bordering on irrational intense hatred 😊. 

Political scientists & critics (I include myself, for my sins, among the latter) have challenged the uniparty narrative as misleading.

 

I regard it as a convenient political weapon, used to discredit, dismiss & manipulate opinion. One that finds a particularly receptive audience among those more interested in political outrage than understanding the complexities of governance.

 

The irony is that we live in an era of considerable political polarisation, something those of us who are politically active are extremely aware of.

 

Yet we’re expected to believe that political parties with fundamentally different philosophies, policies & priorities are somehow all working together as one. 

 

And it’s an increasingly easy narrative to sell to those who react to political headlines without bothering to examine the substance of policy, the nuances of legislation, or what ultimately passes through Parliament.

 

What populists frequently describe as “uniparty collusion” is often nothing more sinister than the normal functioning of parliamentary democracy.

 

𝐈𝐭’𝐬 𝐜𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐞𝐝 𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐩𝐨𝐧𝐬𝐢𝐛𝐥𝐞 𝐠𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐧𝐚𝐧𝐜𝐞.

 

Governments develop policies and introduce legislation.

 

Oppositions scrutinise that legislation, challenge its shortcomings, propose amendments, hold governments accountable and, where appropriate, support measures they believe are in the national interest.

 

And where governments lack the numbers to pass legislation, particularly in the Senate, negotiation and compromise become necessary.

 

That’s how our parliamentary system is designed to function. And it's how parliamentary politics should work, even if constructive compromise has become increasingly difficult in today's polarised environment.

 

Imagine an opposition that automatically rejected every piece of government legislation, irrespective of its merits, simply because the government proposed it.

 

Parliamentary business would become an exercise in obstruction rather than responsible governance. And frankly the country would grind to a halt. 

 

𝐎𝐩𝐩𝐨𝐬𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐬𝐚𝐤𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐨𝐩𝐩𝐨𝐬𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐢𝐬 𝐧𝐨𝐭 𝐠𝐨𝐨𝐝 𝐠𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐧𝐚𝐧𝐜𝐞. 𝐍𝐨𝐫 𝐢𝐬 𝐚𝐠𝐫𝐞𝐞𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐧𝐞𝐜𝐞𝐬𝐬𝐚𝐫𝐢𝐥𝐲 𝐞𝐯𝐢𝐝𝐞𝐧𝐜𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐜𝐨𝐥𝐥𝐮𝐬𝐢𝐨𝐧.

 

There are perfectly legitimate reasons to criticise political parties for abandoning principles, breaking promises, or supporting policies inconsistent with their stated positions. It goes without saying that those decisions deserve scrutiny.

 

But there is a considerable difference between holding political parties accountable for their decisions & dismissing the entire parliamentary process as a “uniparty.”

 

Perhaps before condemning the entire parliamentary process as evidence of political collusion, we should try to understand how our democracy actually works.

 

𝐁𝐞𝐜𝐚𝐮𝐬𝐞 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐟𝐮𝐬𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐩𝐨𝐧𝐬𝐢𝐛𝐥𝐞 𝐠𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐧𝐚𝐧𝐜𝐞 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐩𝐨𝐥𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐥 𝐜𝐨𝐥𝐥𝐮𝐬𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐝𝐨𝐞𝐬𝐧’𝐭 𝐦𝐚𝐤𝐞 𝐮𝐬 𝐛𝐞𝐭𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐢𝐧𝐟𝐨𝐫𝐦𝐞𝐝. 𝐈𝐭 𝐬𝐢𝐦𝐩𝐥𝐲 𝐦𝐚𝐤𝐞𝐬 𝐮𝐬 𝐞𝐚𝐬𝐢𝐞𝐫 𝐭𝐨 𝐦𝐚𝐧𝐢𝐩𝐮𝐥𝐚𝐭𝐞.

 

 

UNDERSTANDING WHAT SATIRE ACTUALLY IS

I’ve spent a considerable amount of time recently being told that I don’t understand satire, that I’ve lost my sense of humour, that I’m a retard, insane & that I should simply accept certain political cartoons as harmless entertainment.

 Well, perhaps it’s time we examined what satire actually is.

 

Satire is an artistic or literary form that uses humour, irony, exaggeration, or ridicule to expose human foolishness, hypocrisy, corruption, abuses of power or the absurdities of society.

 

At its best, satire does something rather clever. It makes us laugh while simultaneously making us think.

 

It challenges authority. It exposes contradictions. It strips away pretence. It holds a mirror up to society & invites us to recognise something about ourselves or those who govern us.

 

And it can be savage.

 

But here’s where I believe an important distinction needs to be made.

 

Not everything that is offensive is satire. Not everything that is cruel is clever. And not everything that makes someone laugh deserves to be defended as humour.

 

Consider some recent examples served up as satire in this country. The depiction of a woman being disembowelled with a stick. The deliberate ridicule of a political opponent’s medical condition.

 

What hypocrisy is being exposed? What abuse of power is being challenged? What foolish political behaviour is being revealed?

 

A medical condition is not a moral failing. It isn’t a political decision. Nor is it evidence of corruption, incompetence, or hypocrisy.

 

And depicting the disembowelling of a woman as entertainment raises an entirely different question. What exactly is supposed to be funny about that?

 

When someone’s medical condition becomes the object of ridicule, we have moved away from political criticism & into personal humiliation.

 

And when grotesque violence becomes the centrepiece of the joke, surely, we are entitled to question whether there is any meaningful political commentary beneath it.

 

Calling something satire doesn’t magically transform it into something intellectually worthwhile.

 

Then we have the use of words such as traitor to describe political opponents.

 

Political betrayal can certainly be a legitimate subject for satire. But simply labelling someone a traitor is not satire. It’s an accusation.

 

Where is the irony? Where is the clever observation? Where is the underlying criticism that invites the audience to think?

 

And then we come to the depiction of political opponents being mowed down by a vehicle, with a beloved children’s character incorporated into the imagery.

 

Yes, satire can employ violent imagery. It has done so throughout history.

 

But context matters enormously.

 

What is the message? What exactly are we being invited to laugh at? Is the violence exposing some political absurdity, or is the humiliation or destruction of political opponents itself the entertainment?

 

And why introduce a character associated with childhood innocence into imagery depicting political violence?

 

What does that add beyond shock value?

 

These are perfectly reasonable questions.

 

And dismissing those questions by declaring that anyone who objects doesn’t understand satire is not an argument. It’s an evasion.

 

I have no objection to politicians being lampooned, ridiculed, or subjected to merciless scrutiny. I’ve contributed more than my fair share of that by way of memes I’ve created, posts I’ve made & blogs I’ve written.

 

They occupy positions of public authority & should expect their decisions, contradictions & behaviour to be challenged.

 

But there is a difference between ridiculing what someone does & degrading who someone is.

 

There is a difference between exposing political hypocrisy & exploiting personal vulnerability.

 

And there is a difference between using humour to challenge power & using humour as a convenient disguise for hostility.

 

The fact that an audience finds something hilarious doesn’t settle the question either.

 

People have laughed at cruelty throughout human history. Laughter is not, by itself, evidence of intelligence, insight, or moral justification.

 

Nor does describing something as satire absolve its creator or audience of responsibility for the message being communicated.

 

We are often told that people should be free to express themselves. I agree.

 

But freedom of expression also includes my freedom to question, criticise & reject what others choose to express.

 

You cannot demand freedom to ridicule others while insisting that your own preferred form of ridicule must be immune from criticism.

 

And that brings me to the broader issue that concerns me far more than any individual cartoon.

 

We are living in a society where political disagreement is increasingly becoming personal hostility. Where contempt is mistaken for conviction. Where cruelty is excused as humour. And where questioning the appropriateness of something is met not with reasoned argument but with another barrage of insults.

 

Instead of repeatedly telling people to lighten up, we should be asking ourselves why we have become so comfortable laughing at the humiliation of others.

 

Because satire at its best exposes what is wrong with society.

 

But when cruelty itself becomes the entertainment, what is being exposed is something rather uncomfortable about us.

 

THE PROBLEM WITH BOXES

There are good conservatives & there are bad conservatives.

There are good people on the left & there are bad people on the left.

There are good men & there are bad men.

There are good women & there are bad women.

There are good leaders & there are bad leaders.

There are good governments & there are bad governments.

There are good Christians & there are bad Christians.

There are good Muslims & there are bad Muslims.

There are good people & there are bad people.

And the list goes on.

But even those distinctions are inadequate.

Because within every one of those categories there are degrees of difference. There are good leaders & exceptional leaders. Poor leaders & disastrous leaders. There are decent people who occasionally behave badly & deeply flawed people who are capable of extraordinary acts of kindness.

Human beings are not absolutes. Nor are their beliefs, capabilities, motivations, or behaviours.

And therein lies the problem with putting people into boxes.

The variability disappears. The nuance disappears. And eventually, independent judgement disappears with it.

Instead of assessing someone on their character, conduct, decisions, or achievements, we assess them according to the label we’ve assigned them.

The box becomes the evidence.

To some on the political left, being conservative is sufficient reason to condemn someone. To some on the political right, identifying with the left is equally sufficient.

The same thinking extends to religion, gender, nationality, occupation & almost every other characteristic by which we categorise human beings.

Once someone has been assigned to the wrong box, their individual qualities become irrelevant. Their arguments can be dismissed without examination. Their motives can be questioned without evidence. Their achievements can be disregarded without consideration. And attacks against them can be justified by assumptions founded on ignorance rather than fact.

And perhaps most troubling of all, their humanity can become secondary to their classification.

It’s intellectually lazy, but extraordinarily convenient.

It removes the need to think critically, to examine evidence, to consider competing perspectives or to acknowledge that someone we disagree with might occasionally be right.

It also provides a remarkably effective weapon.

If I can convince myself that everyone belonging to a particular group is inherently bad, I no longer need to justify my hostility towards any individual within it.

The label does the work for me.

And perhaps that’s where the real danger lies.

Once we’ve reduced someone to a label, we can begin to remove their humanity from the equation.

We no longer see an individual with their own experiences, beliefs, strengths, weaknesses & contradictions. We see a representative of a group we’ve already decided is deserving of our contempt.

And that provides a convenient justification for behaving towards them in ways we might otherwise consider unacceptable.

Insults become deserved. Cruelty becomes justified. Hostility becomes righteous indignation.

Not because we’ve proven that the individual deserves any of it, but because we’ve convinced ourselves that the category does.

We excuse our own hostility because we’ve convinced ourselves that the person on the receiving end deserves it.

The box doesn’t just determine how we judge someone. It can determine how we permit ourselves to treat them.

Of course, categorisation doesn’t inevitably lead to hostility or dehumanisation. But it can create the conditions in which both become easier to justify.

And social media has made this form of thinking particularly easy. A political affiliation, a religious belief or even a single opinion can become sufficient evidence for an entire judgement of someone’s character & motives.

We increasingly judge the person before we’ve considered the argument.

Of course, categories have their uses. They help us organise information, identify shared characteristics & understand differences.

But a category is a starting point for understanding, not a substitute for it.

And there is another uncomfortable dimension to all this.

We are often perfectly capable of recognising nuance within the groups to which we belong, while refusing to extend that same consideration to those outside them.

We make allowances for our own side. We explain away inconsistencies. We distinguish between individuals. We recognise exceptions.

But when it comes to the other side, suddenly everyone is the same.

And even within our own boxes, we create smaller ones. Depending on where someone sits, or is perceived to sit, on the spectrum of acceptable beliefs, they too can find themselves judged, dismissed or excluded.

A conservative can be condemned for not being conservative enough. Someone on the left can be rejected for not being sufficiently progressive. Agree with nine positions but question the tenth & suddenly your loyalty, motives or character can be called into question.

The boxes have boxes within them.

And the boundaries are often determined by whoever considers themselves entitled to decide who belongs.

There’s an irony in all this.

We demand to be judged as individuals while insisting on judging others as members of a group.

We expect our own contradictions to be understood, our mistakes to be forgiven & our motives to be considered. Yet we can deny those same considerations to people whose beliefs differ from our own.

And we can do all of this while convincing ourselves that we’re the ones occupying the moral high ground.

Perhaps the greatest problem with boxes isn’t simply that we stop thinking about people as individuals.

It’s that we can give ourselves permission to treat them badly because we’ve stopped recognising their individuality in the first place.

And that brings me back to civility.

We cannot demand standards of behaviour from others while exempting ourselves from those same standards simply because we’ve decided they’re in the wrong box.

Disagreement doesn’t require contempt. Criticism doesn’t require cruelty. And holding someone accountable doesn’t require stripping them of their humanity.

Because when we allow a label to replace our judgement, we risk allowing prejudice to replace our principles.

And surely, we should be capable of thinking better than that.