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- It's giving Red Scare
The federal government has been advised to defund universities, censor media organisations, and deport or ban migrants that are critical of Israel. The Special Envoy’s Plan to Combat Antisemitism, published and delivered to the federal government on Thursday is – to put it bluntly – a shocking attempt to influence key pillars of Australian society on behalf of a violent foreign government. If that sounds scary, that’s because it is.
The Special Envoy is Jillian Segal, a business executive and former corporate lawyer who was appointed by Anthony Albanese to the newly created envoy role in July 2024. Her husband is property developer John Roth, whose company Henroth Group donated $50,000 to right-wing lobby group Advance and $45,000 to the Liberals in the 23/24 financial year.
You can read Segal’s report in full here. The Albanese government will now consider the report and whether to adopt any of the recommendations. The report is not binding, the government can ultimately do what it wants. At the time of writing it’s not clear which way Albanese is leaning on this report – he’s played it pretty straight.
These are the recommendations I am most concerned about:
Definition of antisemitism: The Envoy will require all levels of government and public institutes adopt the IHRA definition of antisemitism, which includes criticism of Israel’s actions as an act of antisemitism. This is really at the core of the problem, as this definition of antisemitism would be used as the benchmark for the Envoy to…
Review and strengthen federal, state and territory legislation relating to hate speech, including protest activity;
“Embed” its preferred lesson plans about the Holocaust and antisemitism into public and private schools;
Evaluate Australian universities against its own “report card”, and require the government to withhold funding and grants from universities and academics that if the Envoy believes the uni/academic is antisemitic;
Require the government to terminate funding for cultural institutions or festivals to that The Envoy believes “does not deal effectively with hate or antisemitism”;
Change the Migration Act so that migrants can be deported for “antisemitism” and require the government to screen visa applications for evidence of “antisemitism”.
In particular, the power and prominence given to the role of the Envoy to dictate what is allowed to be said about Israel is extremely concerning. For example, in Segal’s view it would be antisemitic to draw any comparison between “contemporary Israeli policy” and Nazi policy. The report recommends the Envoy plays a direct role in adjusting legislation to its own liking, and cutting funding for anyone that doesn’t comply.
This is consistent with the pattern of some in the pro-Israel and Zionist community of trying to end the career of anyone high-profile person who supports Palestinian liberation.
It should go without saying, but antisemitism is a hate-filled ideology. It is dangerous and unacceptable in Australian society. And it is already covered by existing hate speech and racial discrimination laws.
This all has very strong parallels to McCarthyism and the “Red Ccare” in 1940s and ‘50s America; a coordinated campaign of political persecution, using the fear of the Soviet Union to target anyone American thought to be a communist. The ‘reason’ was to uncover anyone who might be working as a spy for the Soviet Union. Being a spy would be a crime, of course, but believing in communist ideology was not. The distinction didn’t matter to the authorities. Targets were imprisoned, ostracised, stripped of jobs and opportunities; some were involved with the US Communist Party, some were not, and the vast majority were not spies at all. In reality it was a scheme led by the FBI to suppress left-wing politics, critics of the US government and conservative politics, anti-nuclear campaigners, and even gay men were targeted.
This is a really interesting PBS article on McCarthyism. Will leave you with this paragraph, which is in my mind a lot these days:
“To help the government’s investigators uncover Communist party members and sympathizers, the Attorney General released a list of supposedly subversive organizations. Besides the Ku Klux Klan and a few Nazi and fascist outfits, most of the organizations on the list were the front groups associated with the Communist Party. As a result, government employees could lose their jobs if, for example, they had joined a defunct hiking group that was on the Attorney General’s list, or signed a petition calling for nuclear disarmament, or socialized with people of other races. Within a few years, similar loyalty-security programs had spread from the nation’s capital to local governments, school systems, movie studios, defense plants and beyond. One authority claimed that by the late 1950s such anti-Communist tests for employment reached one-fifth of the nation’s work force.”
Smart stuff on the Internet 💭
All the stuff I found on the web that made me think, smile, or have an ‘aha!’ moment. Spend your Sunday reading them – you'll be better off for it:
What do you mean Jeff Bezos wants to buy Condé Nast? on NSS Magazine
WHAT!!!!!!!!!! “According to some rumors reported by the Daily Mail, Jeff Bezos is allegedly planning to acquire Condé Nast as a wedding gift for Lauren Sanchez.”
Lone Actor: Secrets We Keep podcast
Journalist Joey Watson has done an in-depth investigation into the radicalisation pathway of the Australia’s worst terrorist, the man who carried out the 2019 Christchurch mosque mass shooting. While the shooter committed this act alone, he was not simply born an extremist. People radicalise people, and it’s this angle that Watson is exploring across the podcast series. I think Australia has kept its head in the sand about all this, but the reality is: he was one of ours. Understanding how he got there is crucial to prevent it happening again. This series will probably be a polarising one (only the first two eps are out so far) but I’m interested to see where it goes.
Too Much, But Not Enough on Vulture
I am a GIRLS stan – that show is really, truly perfection. But two episodes in, I feel really mixed about Lena Dunham’s new show Too Much. Have you watched it? If so please email and tell me what you think! This review on Vulture sums up how I feel so far but I am very open to other interpretations – especially if you liked it. “But later in the series, when Jessica experiences heartbreak or flashes back to difficult memories of her previous life in New York, Dunham reverts to a style of direction that’s all her: a long held shot to punctuate a scene with an ellipsis, moments accompanied by softer lighting and harsher truths. After which, Too Much will revert back to cheerier Netflix mode. Is this a Lena Dunham show smuggled inside a Netflix show, or a Netflix show consuming a Dunham one from the outside in?
The special envoy’s plan is the latest push to weaponise antisemitism, as a relentless campaign pays off on Guardian Australia
This response to the Envoy’s report was written by prominent Jewish Australian Louise Adler. “The plan is certainly guilty of overreach. The envoy wants to strengthen legislation apparently. Isn’t that the role of the government of the day? Who is to be the arbiter? Who is to be the judge, for example, of universities and their report cards? Who will adjudicate “accountability” in the media? Who will recommend defunding which artist? Should this government endorse this proposal, it will clearly be the envoy.”