Scott Morrison and the big problem with identity politics

SCOTT Morrison has been lampooned for being a straight, white male. How soul-destroying to believe you are defined by the skin you are born into.

OPINION

THERE is something cripplingly sad at the heart of identity politics, which perhaps explains why those who practise it always seem so morose.

How literally soul-destroying it must be to believe that you are defined by the skin you are born into, rather than the heart that beats inside it. That the experience of the body is more important than the life of the mind.

Although, to be fair, when you consider the minds at work in this area, even the most sedentary body is more interesting.

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The problem is that when you define yourself by your race or gender or sexuality and others by theirs, you immediately vacate the field of intellectual rigour, what humans once optimistically called the battle of ideas.

Instead of the most compelling and logical arguments gaining ascendancy, all points of view are reduced to the fleshy bits of whoever is espousing them. Hence, only a woman can understand sexism and no caucasian can comprehend racism.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison has been lampooned for being a straight, white, male Christian. Picture: AAP Image/Paul Braven

To grasp an issue — or what might now be called an “experience” — you don’t have to examine it or explore it, you only have to be it. Your only qualification is your body. And of course the opposite applies — anyone who doesn’t meet at least one physical criteria for oppression is seen as illegitimate.

This brings us to the lampooning of Scott Morrison for being not just straight, white and male but also — horror of horrors — a Christian! If being a straight, white man is the trifecta of cultural oppression these days, then ScoMo has just taken out the quadrella.

Far be it from me to be remotely offended by this — indeed, as a failed rock star, I applauded Tonightly’s rhyming of “Jesus” with “Refugees-us” — however, it is a perfect example of why defining someone by their racial, sexual or even religious identity is both utterly pointless and deeply hypocritical.

Hey kids check out this AWESOME cool Christian band who play at @scottmorrisonMP's church all the time to get the low down on the whole Jesus/refugee thing, yeah? Sweet #tonightly #RefuJesus pic.twitter.com/XJUGxdSn39

— Tom Ballard (@TomCBallard) August 28, 2018

Allow me to demonstrate.

ScoMo has long attracted special attention for his skin colour, chromosomes and God-bothering ways. A 2016 Fairfax opinion piece opened with, “Poor Scott Morrison. As a wealthy white male Christian, he’s got it tough”, and a Huffington Post piece opened with, “Scott Morrison, a straight white Christian male politician, claims he has experienced the same sort of ‘hatred and bigotry’ which face LGBTI people striving for marriage equality.”

And of course, since becoming PM, he has only been defined evermore by his whiteness, straightness and churchiness.

Again, I am far from outraged but here’s a little fun fact: Morrison is actually not the first straight, white, male Christian to become prime minister.

In fact, the bloke who Morrison replaced was also straight, white, male and Christian — and quite a bit wealthier — yet he was breathlessly feted by Fairfax.

Who could forget star columnist Elizabeth Farrelly’s glowing prediction in 2015 that Malcolm Turnbull “will be the longest-serving prime minister since Menzies. Possibly ever.”

And not only was the PM before Morrison but so is the man who will be PM after him. Yep, snap your garters and call yourself Ethel because Bill Shorten is — wait for it — straight, white, male and Christian.

Bill Shorten is also straight, white, male and Christian. Picture: AAP Image/Darren England

Former Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull also ticked all three boxes. Picture: AP Photo/Andrew Taylor, File

And if that wasn’t enough of a coinky-dink for you, it’s also worth remembering that all three men have something else in common: Their asylum seeker policy! Yet sadly, only one gets a tribute song on the ABC. It’s enough to make Baby Refu-Jesus cry.

Of course, the savvy identity politician would say this only proves the point: if you’re straight, white, male and Christian it means you have no empathy for all those nasty, brown-skinned Muslims coming over in boats.

Inconveniently for them, the most outspoken advocate for boat people in the country is probably an Anglican priest called Rod Bower. Should Father Rod’s position on refugees also be dismissed because he is straight, white, male and, er, Christian?

Identity politics would have us believe that possessing just one of these properties would lead us to a certain world view and yet Bower and Morrison share all four qualities and have come to completely opposite positions on the issue that most defines them both. That little experiment alone is enough to prove its utter worthlessness as a political theory.

And yet it still remains very much in practice, to the point where the contentious section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act makes it illegal to offend someone based on their racial identity.

And only last year the Grand Mufti of Australia made a submission to Parliament calling for 18C to be extended to include religion. Prominent Labor MP Anne Aly supported the discussion of such a proposal at the time.

Had such a proposal succeeded, ScoMo could be hauling the ABC through the courts right now — which again tells you how smart the purveyors of identity politics really are.

Personally, I would rather live in a world where people can say what they want and ideas are judged on their merits. But what would I know — I’m just a straight white male.