It is time to be pessimistic. Joy has fled. Hope is dead. The sun is setting on the election and we are entering a long, dark, conservative night.
Already the chilling intent of the new government has sucked the warmth from the evening. Like a low fog a miasma of economic rationalism is spreading out to blanket the land and utterly obscure the economic lowlands. Soon, once again, the only things visible to our politicians will be the spires of the churches, the towers of the corporations, and the mansions of the rich.
The revolution has failed. Equality has gone missing in action, Liberty is on the run, and Society is lying bleeding in a gutter. So now is the time to gather the remaining troops together and discuss survival strategies.
These ten tips may help you to survive during the coming months – but nothing is certain.
Tip #1: Ideological panic is warranted!
If you are Marxist, Socialist, Progressive, Libertarian, or Anarchistic, or do not own three investment properties, then ideological panic is entirely warranted. Our new government does not harbour any hidden intentions to do you harm: their plans are right out in the open! You are the enemy.
Full blown panic may be your only option. In 1984 Winston Smith had some options available whereas your every action and thought is already recorded for all to see on every social media site in the country. So the forces of niceness and right-thinking already have your number. Your ticket has already been clipped. You have been identified.
The best you can possibly hope for is to stay under the radar for as long as possible before you hear the inevitable late night knock at your door.
Tip#2: Gay people should embrace only their second class status.
Same sex attracted people are advised to avoid the use of the words ‘Gay’ or ‘marriage’ and stand at least three feet apart whenever in public. If you memorise the names of all the members of a local football team it may fool some of the lower level operatives for some minutes. It may give you some time to gather a few possessions before you have to flee.
Tip#3: We are all Godly and upstanding Believers now.
If you understand the difference between being an Atheist and an Agnostic then you are advised to dig a deep bunker and store all of your religious knowledge deep underground, and then only visit it once a month with one or two trusted friends.
If confronted just repeat over and over again; ‘Jesus is my saviour’. Remember that if you get excommunicated you will no longer be able to receive many of the government benefits that are now being distributed only by the church.
Wearing several cloves of garlic on a sanctified string around your neck may help. Also remember that ‘Islam is not a religion’. Nor is Buddhism (or any belief system where you might have to revisit your share portfolio). Avoid sandals (unless you really do think you are Jesus).
Tip#4: Your landlord is always right.
Whilst it might seem a bit of an imposition – if your landlord needs a greater proportion of your paypacket then it is simply best to just hand it over and then apologise for forcing them to have to ask. After all they have been working hard at pumping up property values for years and deserve to be well compensated for all their hard work.
Remember that our landlords are only acting in the best economic interests of our country. When they retire with just a bare 1.4 million dollars in superannuation and several investment properties set aside they will be saving the public purse from having to pay them a pension! Their retirement will also help the economies of many of our trading partners like the Riviera, sunny spots on the Mediterranean, and ski resorts around the globe.
Tip#5: Earning less money is good for the working class soul.
Our modern consumer society provides the morally weak working class citizen with far too many options for unbridled consumption. The employers and small businessmen in our country understand this and so are only doing us a favour when they cut our wages. Beer, cigarettes, fast cars, and electricity are simply fripperies that suck the moral fibre from the working class in our society.
So the next time you are denied a reasonable wage rise – realise that this is simply to make it easier for you to live a wholesome life free of bad habits. In fact: many in the LNP are intent on ensuring that no working class individual will ever suffer from obesity again. Or take up smoking. Or suffer from alcoholism. Or die from a fire caused by a heater.
Certainly it would be churlish (and kinda dangerous) to complain?
Tip#6: The environment is an important container for our economy.
Everyone knows that the LNP believes that our environment is important! The environment contains our economy – and without a healthy, happy, economy what would we do?
And do we really need a great barrier reef? Only heartless communist unionist greeny thugs would dare put the needs of a nebulous idea like a ‘reef’ over the economic wellbeing of our wide brown (and ever browner) land!
How many people are paid by a piece of coral? And just think about all the jobs that have been created in academia in studying the dying reef. The environmentalists should be proud of the growth in ‘dying reef’ academic studies.
You are also advised to immediately chop down all the trees in your vicinity and then pour petroleum products into any water source nearby. You can safely ignore the animals, birds, and fish: you can be sure that the government will.
Tip#7: Coal is good for humanity.
By winning the election the LNP have been proved to be entirely right about coal. So you now have to simply admit that the mining industry only exists to benefit the working class and the environment. These are obviously its principal functions. Making squillions of dollars for overseas companies and a few very rich Aussies is simply a by-product of all their good works.
This is because the carbon dioxide that is emitted by burning Aussie coal is distinctly different to the carbon dioxide that is emitted by burning nasty dirty overseas coal. Australian coal is good healthy clean patriotic coal that actually benefits the planet. So building coal mines is good for the environment.
In fact the LNP is so dedicated to the environment that they want to see the whole of our country simply covered with environmentally positive coal mines. It’s about time the so-called ‘environmentalists’ understood that all of this mining is simply being done to make the world a better place.
Tip#8: Being unemployed for Australia is your patriotic duty.
Ever since Adam Smith was knee-high to a stockbroker the moneymen in our midst have understood that a substantial number of unemployed people benefits those who run our economy. Wages are suppressed, production costs go down, and profits soar. So if you find yourself unemployed then you simply have to realise that this is for the good of our country. You are patriotically assisting in making all the more fortunate in our society economically secure. Moreover this will ensure that the economic good times will eventually trickle down to the working poor. After all – if there is lots and lots of surplus economic benefit going to the top end of town then there will be even more wealth up there to eventually trickle down!
So if you are unemployed you need to take solace in the fact that you are actually suffering to make sure your children (or perhaps your grandchildren) are so much better off than they would otherwise be.
Tip#9: Health care is overrated anyway.
The LNP realise that too much health care is simply wasted on the poor and unemployed. You are advised to just accept their logic as being irrefutably correct. It is (economically) obvious that too much health care will only extend the suffering of the undeserving poor. Whereas the obvious need for our economic and political masters to be in the best of health is obvious. They have to make a lot of important decisions on our behalf and also have to be able to survive a lot of long rigorous journeys to visit with their workers every now and again – then return to one of the nicer parts of the globe. It can be a long journey!
Tip#10: Too much education leads to unrealistic expectations.
Existential and/or political angst is something that is rarely encountered by those who understand very little and expect nothing. So it is obvious that too much education is the cause of a great deal of unwarranted suffering. Tip number 10 is therefore the most significant of all these suggestions. Since at the root of all the problems suffered by the working class is the canker of ‘knowledge’ – then it is obvious that the slow banishing of knowledge can only be of benefit to the average worker.
Soon the schools used by the poor and unemployed will be suitably equipped to provide almost no knowledge at all. And surely by now you understand that this will only benefit the poor by making them so much more ignorant, and therefore content.
So now you are a ‘new Australian’. By internalising these tips you will have embraced the great modern conservative ideology which now so benevolently rules us. You will now understand your small place in our much bigger economy. You will feel content to be a poor and insignificant part of something that is so much bigger and important than you.
And by following these ten tips for good health during an LNP reign you may even survive for some frugal months. Like Winston Smith you have now learnt how to forget. You have learnt how to embrace ignorance as a comfort and you have banished from your mind any idea that ‘society’ might exist at all. You now understand that there is only an ‘economy’ – and you have been given the privilege of helping to keep it healthy.
We truly are a lucky country. Everyone has an equal right to serve the government and the needs of our economy. Everyone has the right to agree. We really are blessed.
He gazed up at the enormous face. Forty years it had taken him to learn what kind of smile was hidden beneath the dark moustache. O cruel, needless misunderstanding! O stubborn, self-willed exile from the loving breast! Two gin-scented tears trickled down the sides of his nose. But it was all right, everything was all right, the struggle was finished. He had won the victory over himself. He loved Big Brother (George Orwell, 1984).
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