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ARTWORK: Rose Dixon-Campbell
Post-election Pessimism Kaeden Kabo
Amidst the monumental downfall of the Liberal Party this election and the seeming sudden push towards more progressive governance, it has been easy to lose sight of many concerning trends sighted during this election. Having finally broken from the drunken euphoria of a Labor Government, I’ve realised that the future looks a bit grim. The cynical part of me is increasingly concerned with an increasingly sensationalised election with inadequate media coverage, as well as a scarily discrete shift of the Overton window—the sector of the political spectrum that is considered acceptable or regular—to the right. It seems ubiquitous these days that politicians are never to be trusted. Your mileage may vary but as was well-outlined in the past election, an increasing number of Australians are dissatisfied with the major parties (see: a lot of independents/Greens). But it is not until now that attacks on the characters of our political figureheads have become predominant in Australia. Labor didn’t just run this election on lowering the cost of living and establishing a federal anti-corruption commission, they also ran it on the premise that Scott Morrison could not be trusted. Liberals similarly campaigned on the notion that Albanese was inexperienced and an unstable element that Australians should not trust. Indeed, those personal attacks were, at least in my experience, the large majority of the advertising aired by the parties. The problem with this is that policy had been thrown out the window. Australians are not being asked to
engage in what is the party that will best serve their interests and the interests of the country, but which bobblehead has a nicer look to it. Party heads are ultimately nothing more than that— Bobbleheads—and if we focus only on them, we lose sight of the bigger picture: the future of Australia. To never be exposed to what party policies are is a serious issue for a functioning democracy. A lack of civility is something that dominated our leadership debates. Individuals from both sides of the political spectrum noted and complained about the juvenile yelling and shouting between the leaders of our nation. However, it was a lack of coverage that dominated our ministerial debates. The only news piece reported from the defence debate between Peter Dutton, our beloved potato slash dark overlord, and Brendan O’Connor was a catchy soundbite of Dutton calling the Guardian a “trashy publication.” If it wasn’t bad enough that parties have moved away from running on policy, our journalists aren’t even reporting half of it, let alone how to analyse that policy and decide if it’s decent or abjectly terrible. As noted by Denis Muller, a journalist and senior researcher at the University of Melbourne, our election coverage has been “unimaginative, slavish PR-stunt footage of the leaders, combined with young go-getters in the travelling media packs trying to make a name for themselves with gotcha questions.” None of this truly tells us how good our leaders are at
