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Letter from a former One Nation candidate
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Now that Pauline Hanson and One Nation have come and gone
you may be interested in the recollections of a former One Nation member and election candidate.
Most vividly, I recall being surrounded by a large group of 15-year-old schoolgirls outside a One Nation public meeting at
Hawthorn Town Hall and told that they weren't letting me get in because I was racist. No doubt well trained and indoctrinated by their teachers, they had obviously been brainwashed and taught to have a contempt for democracy and free speech.
Many other people attempting to enter were punched , kicked and spat on while the police looked on and did nothing.
The entire establishment decided to never debate or discuss any of One
Nation's policies, which were ironically almost identical to traditional ALP policies, but to only ever ridicule and insult all One Nation leaders and members.
In football terms, the grand strategy was to always play the man and never play the ball.
We were said to be racist, whatever that exactly means, ignorant,
intolerant and bigoted rednecks.
Also all Anglo-Celtic Christian Aussies were made to endure continual guilt trips by the media, the concept of inherited racial guilt only applying to this group. This requirement for self-flagellation was very effective and I have no doubt, substantially increased the suicide rate
amongst them.
The hard left propaganda campaign against One Nation was led by the
Melbourne Age and the ABC. The Howard government never once complained about the hard left ABC attack until much later.
Again the actual One Nation policies were never mentioned or debated, merely being dismissed as simplistic
The One Nation phenomenon was essentially a peasants' revolt, in our supposedly classless
Australian society. Members were mainly the disadvantaged, small struggling business people and many out of work. Many election candidates were on the dole. There was a total lack of lawyers, and very few accountants or other
professionals, very few were on the internet or knew how to use a computer. Almost none had been involved in politics before, including me. We are now all retired hurt, with no desire to ever be involved in politics again.
We were very proud of the women who stood as candidates and stoically endured many insults and threats . Their courage inspired the men .
Kim Beazley’s contributions are well remembered. His anti-Hanson and anti-One Nation speeches were more suited to an attempt to incite a lynch mob, and
Beazley often seemed at the point of foaming from the mouth. Many of us are still very fearful of
Beazley ever becoming Prime Minister, as he obviously was so
contemptuous of us and couldn't moderate his loathing of us at all.
Beazley seems out of place in the parliament of a free speech democracy.
Many printers were too frightened to have their name appear on One Nation’s electoral leaflets and a subcontracting scheme had to be used to keep there names off otherwise very little printed matter could have been produced. Many venues refused to hire their halls to One Nation for meetings but a few, often migrant groups ironically, had the courage to do so. The hysteria was so severe that for one federal election all polling places in Victoria had police stationed inside the buildings, which has never been done before.
To find anything like the mass hysteria promoted against One Nation in
Australia we must go back to the McCarthyist anti-communist mass hysteria of the early 1950’s.
So ultimately the One Nation peasants revolt has been put down and put down decisively, the cost to our democratic traditions will need to be judged by others.
Pauline Hanson didn't handle her sudden fame well and undoubtedly received much poor advice and was taken advantage of by
unscrupulous people.
Harold Edwards
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