Joe Hildebrand: Australians must never forget who the Greens truly are or what they really want to do

The Greens have for years been purging people with a zeal unmatched by Stalin himself, which is a nice nod to their true allegiance, writes Joe Hildebrand.

When the Arab Spring was rising and the war in Syria was raging, and ISIS was beheading people at home and abroad, a former CIA agent was asked by the ABC why the US didn’t just give more weapons to the good guys.

The answer he gave was so simple and profound that, more than a decade later, it still rings in my head every day.

Pro-democracy rebels were fighting to overthrow the odious Assad regime but so were ISIS and other Islamist extremists who were, if anything, even worse.

And so any arms that were supplied to the good guys would inevitably end up in the hands of the bad guys because, well, the bad guys would simply take them.

This is the eternal lesson of power: It will always flow to whoever is prepared to take the most extreme measures to seize it.

Greens co-founder Drew Hutton with wife Libby Connors at their home in West End, Brisbane. Picture: Lyndon Mechielsen/The Australian

And this, of course, brings us to the Australian Greens.

The Greens were founded in the 1980s by Bob Brown and Drew Hutton, hippy environmentalist peaceniks from central casting.

Drew Hutton and then senator Bob Brown in 1998.

The movement famously took hold as a protest against the damming of Tasmania’s Franklin River – ironically to provide renewable hydro-electricity – and they officially became a national party in 1992.

But ever since then, the hippies have become the hunted. Card-carrying Communists began infiltrating the Greens after the collapse of the Soviet Union they so loyally supported and the party is now effectively a hollowed-out shell that barely even bothers to use environmentalism as a figleaf for its extremist agenda.

Despite the intensely secretive and autocratic nature of the party – members are not allowed to vote for the leader, who is instead chosen by a chilling closed-door process of “consensus” – the proof of this is now laid bare for all to see.

Last week comrade co-founder Hutton was expelled for social media posts that he didn’t even write. His crime was to declare himself in favour of both trans rights and women’s rights and failing to censor some pissant debate in the comments section.

Whether he was right or wrong was immaterial. Simply allowing the discussion was enough for him to be taken out the back and shot.

Even the support of the demigod Brown – who effectively forced Julia Gillard to sign her political suicide note – and his successor Christine Milne – who knifed Gillard after she had done so – was not enough to satisfy the hardliners.

Honestly, there’s just no pleasing some people.

Thus Hutton got non-personed and proceeded to whinge about it like the bewildered boomer activist that he is. He now calls the party he founded an “authoritarian cult”.

He is certainly not wrong but he should hardly have been surprised.

The Greens have for years been purging people with a zeal unmatched by ol’ Joe Stalin himself, which is a nice nod to their true allegiance.

Human rights lawyer Anna Kerr. Picture: Jason McCormack

Former Greens member Marian Smedley. Picture: Colin Murty

They pretend to be the party of peace, love and mung beans but, when push comes to putsch, it is always the moderates’ backs that are up against the wall.

As the Sydney Morning Herald quoted a Greens staffer saying in 2019: “A hard-left faction in the NSW Greens is determined instead to focus on a quixotic campaign to dismantle capitalism in the cause of revolutionary socialism.”

But are there really reds under the futon beds?

Turns out, yes. As revealed by The Australian this week, human rights lawyer Anna Kerr was required to “pledge” she recognised that the NSW Greens were inclusive. If she didn’t, they would expel her from the party.

Yes, if you don’t swear at gunpoint that the Greens are inclusive, they will have no choice but to exclude you. Monty Python would be proud.

But Monty Python was funny. The Greens are not.

Retired teacher Marian Smedley also felt she was forced out of the party in 2023.

“You’re not even allowed to ask a question … it’s so Stalinist,” she told The Australian.

To be fair, the Greens’ leadership contests resemble those after the death of Stalin more than anything faintly democratic, but it is true that for the hardcore apparatchiks Stalin is still very much alive.

And so is the revolutionary zeal. The secret byword for these commie cookers is “worse is better” – namely that the pain of ordinary people is a good thing because it will bring on the downfall of capitalism.

As always, these upper-middle class socialists and ideological extremists use the poor and disadvantaged as human shields, while never suffering themselves. Hello Gaza!

Thankfully the Australian people conducted their own purge at the last election and the Greens have been cleansed of their leader and their lower house seats. But we must never forget who they truly are or what they really want to do.

Originally published as Joe Hildebrand: Australians must never forget who the Greens truly are or what they really want to do