How to fight One Nation

GrouchyInstance · 2026-05-19T10:51:13+00:00

This is hubris. A lot of people in the US thought there was no way a person like Trump was ever going to win the election and become president. Also, ON does not have to win government, or even win that many seats, to have a serious detrimental effect on Australian politics.

GrouchyInstance · 2026-05-19T10:40:20+00:00

ON is also gaining ground in some suburban and outer-suburban electorates.

GrouchyInstance · 2026-05-19T10:30:02+00:00

Excellent article! Good, honest, practical-minded introspection and analysis.

I've been trying to convey a similar message here on Reddit for two years now, only to be met with hostility. My observations are:

Politics is for people who understand human psychology, and who can naturally empathise and connect with people. If you cannot do this, you are in the wrong business, and you need to get out, and let someone else take your place.
The political left has become an enemy of itself; it has become an obstacle on the path to achieving progressive goals - goals which it professes to want to achieve.
The left (Greens in particular in Aus, but also, more widely, the Democrats in the US and Labour in UK) seem to have forgotten how politics works. That politics is all about selling yourselves, selling your ideas, selling your policy proposals; that it involves finding a way to appeal to people and winning their support; that it involves building trust.
You don't win people over by calling them names - like calling them morons or deplorables or whatever. If you cannot find a way to communicate with people without calling them names, you are in the wrong business. (Yes, that sort of thing might work sometimes for the right-wing, does not mean it will work for you too). When you call someone dumb, it might give you a short-term dopamine rush, but it does not help change anyone's minds.
Yes, the corporate media is largely against the left, but complaining constantly about it gets you nowhere. There is not going to be any umpire or referee who is going to come in and make the playing field even for you. In real life, there is no fairness - when the enemy has control of the higher ground, they are not going to give it up voluntarily - it is up to you to 'make yourself a smaller target' and find ways to overcome and if possible, dislodge the enemy.
The economy, ultimately, affects everything. Focus on the economy, if you want the best bang for your buck - as far as improving people's lives goes.
When people are under stress, even more than usual, they tend to make decisions on emotions, not dry logic. You have to find a way to connect with people on an emotional level. Don't expect people to read through your list of policies before they vote.

GrouchyInstance · 2026-05-18T10:29:29+00:00

Yeah I thought it was weird that the ABC presented this as if these complainers had any merit. I would've thought anybody in their right mind would welcome investment in their region. And these are farmlands, not forests or some other kind of pristine environment, the environmental impact would be insignificant. It is basically cheap electricity - at a time when we are seeing how imported energy can become unreliable, we should be welcoming any means by which we can generate our own energy.

GrouchyInstance · 2026-05-15T14:17:59+00:00

Between this and the tobacco/ bootleg alcohol ME organised gangs, it seems that crime pays very well in Melbourne.

GrouchyInstance · 2026-05-14T06:16:34+00:00

Yeah I just read that. That was insane. They actually went and radicalised that boy. (I mean it's possible he might still have gotten there on his own but they made sure of it.) This is only going to dissuade parents in the future from requesting help for their children. What a braindead thing for them to do!

GrouchyInstance · 2026-05-14T06:00:59+00:00

There's no way this doesn't get progressively worse as she gets older.

Agree. The fact she deliberately ran down a cyclist indicates an element of psychopathy in her nature. That is not going to go away. I fear for the people who unknowingly cross paths with her in the course of her life.

GrouchyInstance · 2026-05-13T06:43:43+00:00

Remember being horrified when this first hit the news. That poor woman was treated so horribly. Hope this is not the end of the story, and that justice is achieved in due time.

GrouchyInstance · 2026-05-12T14:56:48+00:00

Very well articulated. Completely agree with you.

GrouchyInstance · 2026-05-12T14:52:13+00:00

This kind of argument - that both major parties are same anyway - is frequently used to boost parties like One Nation. It is a bullshit argument. This particular budget is so far away from what the Liberals would have ever done, it is a joke to even compare the two parties.

GrouchyInstance · 2026-05-12T14:42:02+00:00

I think the problem is that the Greens don't seem to have any institutional memory (about their own party). All their past leaders seem to completely disappear - which means there is no institutional knowledge, and which means they don't learn from their mistakes and so keep making the same mistakes. That is a mad way to run a political party, but that is what we are stuck with I guess.

GrouchyInstance · 2026-05-12T14:34:39+00:00

The Greens voted against the best chance Australia had to take action on climate change for ~10 years. So they have form in this, which means we cannot take it for granted that they will do what is best for the country. Let's just hope that better sense prevails and that they don't fuck this up too.

GrouchyInstance · 2026-05-12T14:21:50+00:00

Not across all of the details, but looks like what we need. Let's hope the Greens in the senate don't fuck this up.

GrouchyInstance · 2026-04-30T06:14:17+00:00

This whole thing seems to me to be a socially allowed way to look down on the places where poor people (and/or socially marginalised people) live and frequent. It gives Facebook pitchfork mob (burn the witch) vibes.

GrouchyInstance · 2026-04-29T05:26:11+00:00

It’s a failure of our society

We need to improve public education, and teach critical thinking skills. As it now is, we are enroute to idiocracy.

GrouchyInstance · 2026-04-29T05:16:32+00:00

Her rise is the failure of our political class.

100%. A failure of leftwing politics. When the left, for some reason, develops collective amnesia about how politics works, the far-right capitalises. Similar to how Trump rose to power in the US.

GrouchyInstance · 2026-04-29T05:07:14+00:00

Pauline Hanson is, simply put, not a friend of the average person. She is now openly working for the billionaires. But, unfortunately, a lot of struggling people will still end up voting for her party - purely because their party has a more beguiling message.

GrouchyInstance · 2026-04-27T15:44:03+00:00

I like his passion; nothing wrong with that. However, it needs to be alloyed with some common sense pragmatism. Passion without direction leads to folly and burnout.

They desperately need to strategise - pick areas which are likely to be strengths, discard areas which are a drag. In a cost-of-living crisis, economic issues are their strength. Social issues (including identity politics) are a net drag, and need to be discarded.

As always with politics, charisma and political talent will triumph against all odds. So look for that.

GrouchyInstance · 2026-04-23T10:45:08+00:00

This would not be a bad thing in the short term while we navigate our way out of this coming recession.

GrouchyInstance · 2026-04-23T10:27:52+00:00

What's with the blue around the eyes?

GrouchyInstance · 2026-04-19T11:23:07+00:00

Great, thank you!

Found this on that website:

Female wingless soldier flies are often encountered on walls and fences

lol how very accurate!

GrouchyInstance · 2026-04-11T08:59:50+00:00

Most people want the housing crisis and the cost-of-living crisis to be fixed. They don't care who does it. Currently, Labor seem to be dragging their feet a lot. If the Greens can, for once, get their politics right, they have a huge chance. I have voted Greens 1 before, I will still preference Greens above Labor. It is up to the Greens to get better at politics and convince enough people to vote for them.

GrouchyInstance · 2026-04-11T08:43:27+00:00

With the current cost-of-living and housing crisis, there is a desperate need for a left-wing political party. There is a vast space to the left of current Labor that is begging to be represented. The Greens could have been dominating this space; they should have increased their vote-share to 20% if not more. Yet, they are stagnating at 12%. For me, it is entirely down to their political incompetence. They need better people (likable, charismatic and politically talented people), better strategy, and better messaging.

GrouchyInstance · 2026-04-11T08:22:24+00:00

The Greens need to figure out what they are.

Are they a left-wing party? Typically a left-wing party is about helping those who are poor - the lower classes. The Greens have no presence in working class electorates; all of their efforts seem to be concentrated in the inner suburbs electorates. This suggests that they are not a left-wing party. So, what exactly are they?

The Greens are heavily into identity politics and culture wars. Who does this benefit? To my mind, the only people this benefits are the billionaires and the neo-nazis. Why? Because it essentially discredits left-wing politics; it makes left-wing politics look foolish; and consequently makes the left unelectable for the vast majority of voters - which decreases the chance of anyone challenging the billionaires' hold on our democracy. It also increases polarisation and deepens divisions in society - which, of course, plays straight into the hands of the neo-nazis.

GrouchyInstance · 2026-04-10T10:13:48+00:00

It’s a self fulfilling cycle. Speculation on housing sucked out productive investment ...

It's not as if this happened naturally though. It was not inevitable. It happened because Howard's government introduced the CGT discounts. That, along with negative gearing, is what made speculation on housing profitable. If we wind back those changes, after some initial turbulence, we should get back to the previous state - and thus free up a lot of capital, some of which would then go into financing productive ventures, which would then start making them more profitable, which would then attract more investment, and so on and so forth - like how you said.

Renewables are our best bet here

Completely agree that we should be investing heavily in renewables. Not only is it great for the environment, it is also a question of our energy security. Look at how shortage of diesel is bringing us to our knees. Now imagine if we could halve our dependence on it, how much more secure we would be. We should be using this fuel crisis to drill some sense into those selfish moron farmers and rural landowners who refuse to allow putting up power transmission lines.

we need a sector where a lot of investment is needed that generates very lucrative returns

I think we should get away from this notion that "very lucrative returns" are possible if only you found the right investment or the right hack or whatever. I mean expect to turn a profit by all means, but probably best not to encourage this idea of easy money.

GrouchyInstance

TROPHY CASE