The maturing of activism

When I was a teenager and in my 20s (last Century, in the 70s and 80s), I used to think it was enough to pass progressive laws, and then society and people would be "better" - more inclusive, not discriminatory, and more progressive.

Wow. Was I ever dumb.

Laws do have a role - an important role, one that goes beyond the great Dr Martin Luther King Jr.'s famous

“It may be true that the law cannot change the heart, but it can restrain the heartless.”

Laws open the door for positive progress - for instance, when we were campaigning for protection for TGD people in the late 90s, we knew that one of the most significant benefits would be that efforts to educate members of the public would be more successful.

In fact, by that stage, I had developed my political and human rights activism to the stage that I was becoming aware that "taking people with you" was important.

That awareness was also growing because of the reactions I was seeing in people who were being thrown out on the unemployment heap by the appallingly badly handled move to increased globalisation - an ineptness that has been repeated to the technological wave of recent decades (including by advocates of technology who think the benefits should be shared around, but lack political nous or economic realism to deal with what is required to make technological change fair for all of society).

Since then, my learning has been around the problems of balancing gaining power with maintaining one's personal ethics. My learning has also encompassed watching others going through the lessons I had to as well.

I am also seeing the Australian electorate as a whole finally start to go through this learning process as well, in response to the utter disaster that has been the Morrison "government".

I am hoping that the growing awareness may be enough to throw the Morrison "government" out of power at the next election (or before, if we wind up with a couple of MPs resigning - willingly or no), and to start reversing the great undoing of Australian society that began with the commodification of homes and the other evils of John Howard.