Writer
Lucy Hamilton
Lucy Hamilton is a Melbourne writer with degrees from the University of Melbourne and Monash University. She is a doctoral student at the University of Technology Sydney.
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Channel 7 fostering fascist politics
The Right is obsessed with gender. This deep paranoia comes out of America and international far right movements. It harms straight people and LGBTQIA+ people differently, and we need to fight it before our copycat Right entrenches it here too. Continue reading »
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The Insurgency
It is hard to gauge the importance of the Trumpist Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) event that took place in Sydney this weekend. There were more high-profile figures speaking than previously, and several currently serving politicians alongside white supremacists and antisemites. Continue reading »
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Federal Liberals continue to back Victorian ultra-conservative Deeming despite expulsion
The Liberal Party is in deep trouble. As our main “conservative” party, the fact that it is besieged by far right figures is reason for vigilance by the rest of us. No party holds government forever, and a “conservative” or anti-incumbent vote must not be an accidental vote for theocratic politics. Figures like Moira Deeming Continue reading »
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Greg Sheridan, Australian conservatives flirt with Orban’s fascistic politics
Senior Australian “conservative” figures continue to attend conferences backed by illiberal Hungarian leader Viktor Orban. The Mathias Corvinus Collegium (MCC) hosted its 2023 London Summit in late June, featuring Alexander Downer and Greg Sheridan as two of the five speakers. Australians must focus on connections between our Right and Hungarian fascistic politics. Continue reading »
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Prison hulks and river blades: fortress building in the climate-castrophe era
Britain has commissioned a prison hulk to house immigrants, in a cruel re-enactment of history. Meanwhile, Texas Governor Greg Abbott has implemented two strategies to stop immigrants crossing the Rio Grande into America: one is a floating barrier with razor wire and rolling motion that pulls people under the water; the other is an apparent Continue reading »
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Racism, the ‘No’ campaign and the Americanisation of Australian politics
There may be some Coalition politicians and Murdoch employers who are motivated by genuine racism to oppose the Voice to Parliament. Some might believe First Nations Australians are unworthy. Some probably believe in “reverse racism.” That, of course, is the belief that there is a correct direction for racism to travel. Continue reading »
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An American system of “state sanctioned forced births”?
Labels have power. They shape the way we know the world. They allow people to see actions with greater clarity or distort our understanding to make things unrecognisable. Continue reading »
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Centrist parties crush dissent, foreclose on race to avoid extinction
“We are thankful you are here. We are happy to a be recipient of [the Australian Petroleum Production & Exploration Association] APPEA’s largesse in the form of coming here more often…The South Australian government is at your disposal…” (South Australian Labor minister for energy and mining, Tony Koutsantonis, May 15, 2023). Continue reading »
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Dan Andrews and Murdoch crying wolf
Rupert Murdoch has done incalculable harm to the democratic experiment throughout the AUKUS nations and beyond. In Victoria, his propaganda campaigns have made him the magnate who cried wolf. The state’s integrity infrastructure is in perilous condition but Newscorp’s constant invective against Labor governments, and Premier Dan Andrew’s government in particular, has made it more Continue reading »
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Weaponised unreality
Having spent decades inculcating their base in poisonous nonsense, there is now no external authority to which right wing media can send their audience when the lies become troublesome. Continue reading »
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Grotesque Dutton drums up another pedophilia crisis
Dutton is the right politician for the post-QAnon age: in fact the radical right zeitgeist caught up with him. His decision to drum up (another) pedophilia crisis to stain the referendum on the Voice to parliament is both grotesque and on trend. Continue reading »
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The AAT: abolishing a system of indefinite torment
The abolition of the Administrative Appeals Tribunal (AAT) is a crucial part of Attorney General Mark Dreyfus KC’s integrity platform. In the last decade of Coalition governments it had become overwhelmed by partisan appointments, creating a bedlam of incompetence and politically-motivated decisions. Continue reading »
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Secrecy is our enemy: whistleblowers must be defended
One of the most hated aspects of the Morrison government was the secrecy. Over and again, we continue to shock to revelations of hidden wrongdoing long after their defeat last May. Continue reading »
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Infiltrated by extremists, what will the real Liberals do now?
The Labor victory in NSW this weekend has put the Liberal Party on notice. While many local issues were in play, the increasing radicalisation of the party at federal and state levels is making it unelectable. The usual drongos’ voices cry, “Liberals must go further right to win,” but Australia’s superior electoral system will make Continue reading »
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Why do police high five Neo-Nazis?
On some level it is straightforward for a Neo Nazi protest to be easy for police to handle. As we saw on the streets of Melbourne last weekend, and repeatedly over recent years, a high five for white supremacist protesters is an easy gesture for some police officers. Continue reading »
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The Voice: Newscorp’s dangerous zero sum games
As the wording of the Voice referendum question is released, the Murdoch media’s “news” drives resentment with propaganda as constant as drums of war. The pounding message for its audience is that every development is a zero sum game, one that only defrauds this “conservative” base. Continue reading »
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We are not America
Australia is transitioning from our old colonial master to a self-selected new colonial master. We have those with power nostalgic for the glories of imperial Britain. Continue reading »
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How much blood are we prepared to let extremists spill?
JK Rowling recently tweeted a defence of her bigotry, conflating trans people with, in her words, “violent, duplicitous rapists”. Continue reading »
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The Ultra High Net Worth Individual’s strongest weapon: News Corp
We are at a crossroads. The Ultra High Net Worth Individual (UHNWI) class is creating a new international feudal order, assisted by the professional enabler class including politicians in pursuit of their money. One of those enabling mechanisms is the media. In Australia, News Corp serves as the strongest weapon in the creation of their Continue reading »
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Blaming Morrison for Liberal’s disastrous collapse is a facile critique
We see a tendency to blame individuals for the crisis in our politics across the AUKUS nations. This is facile. Donald Trump did not create the farce of a Republican party seen in the vote for the Speaker in early January. Boris Johnson did not create the catastrophe that is the British Conservative party displayed Continue reading »
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Defending ourselves from infiltration
The Age last year revealed that special forces veteran Ben Roberts-Smith wore the provocative symbol of a crusader cross on his breast over his uniform while on duty in Afghanistan. Apparently “quite a few” others wore it. Continue reading »
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Fighting paranoid nostalgia, EU puts financial screws on Orbán
Around the west, authoritarian right wing parties are fighting the changes to the world that scare them. Protecting western liberalism is a challenge proponents of the democratic project are only just beginning to address. Continue reading »
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The right is now lies and bigotry: what next for conservatives?
Those of us who hope for a future for our children cannot vote for the current right, infected by international strains of bigotry and deceptive authoritarianism as it stands. The centre right must evaluate what it has to offer, rather than cowering under the threatening might of its extreme partners. Continue reading »
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Victorian Elections: Liberals under siege from extremist religious groups
The Victorian election is a mess. This is the product of the destruction of our conservative forces by international right wing radicalism; for people in that sphere discrediting democracy is the desirable first step in dismantling the status quo. For the rest of us, it is a threat. Continue reading »
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Greed and a spoiled society: workers are not the problem
Of course The Australian republished Andy Kessler’s ridiculous Wall Street Journal column, “The decline of work in a spoiled society.” Those News Corp bedfellows continue to miss that they are at the core of the problem. Continue reading »
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Our media is failing us
At a moment, when one side of politics has abandoned the bases of democracy as an impediment to their grasp on power, we need journalists holding them to account rather than gaslighting the public, normalising the rot. Continue reading »
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Covid Hindsight: Victoria acted on nightmare potential for system collapse
The press has been spattered in recent weeks with hindsight wisdom about Australia’s – and particularly Victoria’s – handling of the pre-vaccine pandemic. The relatively easy time we are having with COVID now and the low numbers of people being hospitalised with COVID are being used to argue that earlier restrictions were unnecessary but it Continue reading »
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The Storm is Here: can Australia prevent the conspiracy sphere metastasising into fatal disease?
Sometimes it takes a war correspondent to cast light on what is happening at home. Continue reading »
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The IPA launches campaign to harass teachers. Why???
The IPA has become a culture war factory with barely any research to justify the label “think tank” and the tax perks it claims. Their campaign to harass teachers, however, is utterly self-defeating. Continue reading »
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News Corp is normalising fascistic politics
The radical right, and in particular, Murdoch’s News Corp, are laundering the dirty ideas of the people deploying fascistic politics to make them seem normal “conservative” thought. Continue reading »
