There’s been a growing malaise, a festering discontent in humanity in the last year or two. I’ve seen it manifest in many different ways, in so many corners of the world, but more so than any other time in recent memory, we’ve all borne witness in some way to a spectacular immolation of social cohesion on a global scale. It’s now arrived on home soil in the most horrific and unthinkable way: a terrorist massacre carried out against innocent Jews on picturesque, perfect, iconic Bondi Beach. Andrew Bolt harmony comments
I’m not going to draw conclusions on what has actually caused humanity’s rapid, self-destructive decline, particularly in recent years; that’s an incredibly complex and multi-faceted question that is well beyond the scope of this piece.
What I know doesn’t help is pieces like Andrew Bolt’s in today’s Daily Telegraph, arguing that harmony is “bullshit”. It’s a meaningless and irresponsible statement, designed to draw out his readership’s most base instincts at a particularly sensitive time, when the entire country is on heightened alert for subsequent or retaliatory attacks.
It is axiomatic that true harmony has eluded humanity for its entire existence. There may have been moments of relative peace but as a global civilisation, we have never truly existed peacefully. So why does Bolt feel the need to say the bleeding obvious?
It’s because his actual, very thinly veiled argument is that harmony is “bullshit” because of the Muslim faith. Andrew Bolt harmony comments
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It’s incredibly harmful rhetoric, in the same vein as any which celebrates Hamas’ October 7 massacre, or which supports Israel’s subsequent assault on Palestinian civilians. It may not be obvious to Bolt or his ilk, but seeking to blame a single religious or ethnic group for the state of humanity today has the same ultimate effect: it values one religion, one faith, and ultimately one human life, over another.
Bolt’s thesis is that everything we have been told is a “lie” and that we should just trust him. According to Bolt, it’s a “lie” that Muslim terrorists are a tiny unrepresentative minority of the Muslim community. It’s a “lie” that neo-Nazis are as dangerous as Islamist extremists. It’s a “lie” that Bondi was peacefully multicultural. He goes on to say that no Muslim organisations denounced the October 7 Hamas attacks, the implication being that these organisations sanctioned or supported the massacres.
These statements are all, with all sense of irony no doubt lost on Bolt, demonstrably false; and yet they are now printed in black and white in a major Australian publication.
Grief, anger and the hard questions that follow
It’s normal to expect anger and outrage in the aftermath of moments like this; that is intrinsically human. We do not need to be holding hands and singing when something like this happens. It’s natural that at some point we will want to shout, yell, ask difficult questions, of ourselves, of each other and of our leaders. There will be questions around police intelligence, community engagement and protection, pathways to radicalisation, gun control – all is on the table.
But the only way to do so without fanning the flames is to find common ground. And that common ground is self-evident: that at its core, no rational, sane or good person from any side of politics or any ethnic group will condone the massacre at Bondi or seek to downplay its significance. Anyone who does so, regardless of their background, has no place in Australian society. We needn’t look any further than Ahmed Al Ahmed, the veritable hero of the attacks, who appears to come from a Muslim background. There have been countless similar examples, at home and abroad, of similarly courageous acts of humanity this in moments like this. Andrew Bolt harmony comments
On one point, I can agree with Bolt: that it is a lie that conversation about immigration intake is inherently racist.
We can certainly have a sensible conversation about immigration. It might be a difficult conversation, even a heated conversation, and with hard outcomes. That is okay. That is democracy, that is politics. But rational conversation does not begin by marginalising an entire ethnic group, the vast majority of whom contribute positively to Australian society. Andrew Bolt harmony comments
No, the world is not well, and yes, many fundamental aspects of humanity seem broken right now. It hurts to see innocent people slaughtered merely for practising their faith.
But harmony is only “bullshit” because of commentators like Andrew Bolt, regardless of what side of the political divide they occupy, or the lens through which they view world events.
Unfortunately, as has long been the case, Bolt’s commentary aids no one but himself.
READ MORE: Scanlon Report: Support for immigration dips, but social cohesion steady
