1. She believes in reverse racism
I’m not just saying this based on her policies. She has actually used the words”reverse racism” before. In her maiden speech to the House of Representatives in 1996, she said,
“We now have a situation where a type of reverse racism is applied to mainstream Australians by those who promote political correctness…”
Reverse racism would not exist unless there was a society where for centuries, all institutions of power were run exclusively by people of colour (POC) whose intention was to oppress all other races across all levels of society. So for Pauline Hanson, a woman who enjoys more privilege than countless other Australian women who come from ethnic backgrounds, to use this sort of rhetoric is totally ignorant of the enduring suffering of victims of real racism in Australia.
2. She wants a royal commission to determine if Islam is a religion or a political ideology
This is an actual One Nation policy. Now I don’t know how many people would actually be able to give religion a concrete definition, but if you were to just Google the definition, as many of us do in current times, you would find that religion is: the belief in and worship of a superhuman controlling power, especially a personal God or gods. Seeing as Allah is believed to be the controlling power in Islam, I would say that you can safely classify Islam as a legitimate religion. So whether or not you agree with my conclusion, I doubt that you support spending taxpayer dollars on investigating if a religion is actually a religion.
3. Her party promotes climate change skepticism
This was possibly my favourite out of all of One Nation’s ridiculous policies. You don’t need to be a scientist to understand that climate change is real. The record heatwaves that we experienced last summer in Australia and the increasingly unpredictable weather patterns are proof enough. Add to that, the scientific proof from numerous academic sources, and it’s pretty clear that climate change is happening. Despite this, One Nation’s Policy on Affordable Energy, presents a very different view on climate change. Here are just some of the solutions proposed in their policy:
“Hold a Royal Commission (or similar) into the corruption of climate science and identify whether any individual or organisation has misled government to effect climate and energy policy.”
“Review the Bureau of Meteorology to ensure independence and accountability for weather and climate records including public justification of persistent upward adjustments to historical climate records.”
“Remove from the education system the teaching of a biased and one-sided view of climate science. Teaching of climate science will begin in secondary school and will be based on the scientific method of scepticism until proven.”
4. Her party is against multiculturalism
You don’t have to do much digging to work this one out. I simply clicked on the link for multiculturalism under the federal policies page of One Nation’s website. The very first sentence reads:
Multiculturalism has failed everywhere.
Now, first of all, I would really like to know who came to that conclusion and how. I live in a hugely multicultural area and I can tell you from personal experience that I see absolutely no failure in the wonderful and interesting mix of people that I interact with on a daily basis. The great array of cultures. languages, foods and music only enriches the lives of everyone. And I’m sure that many Australians would say the same thing. The uniqueness and diversity of our country is a result of our multiculturalism. Pauline Hanson and One Nation are a threat to what it is that really makes Australia beautiful, its people.
5. Her party wants to abolish the Racial Discrimination Act (1975)
This is possibly the single most ridiculous policy I’ve ever heard of in modern times. Why would anybody want to abolish laws which protect its country’s citizens against discrimination? The only possible reason I can think of is that they don’t really understand what discrimination is. But I can tell you with absolute certainty that many Australians do. Discrimination is when you volunteer to serve meals to the housebound and the client tells you, “I won’t be served by a blackie”, discrimination is when our national sports players are called names by spectators because of their race, discrimination is when people refuse to sit next to you on the bus because you could be dangerous. One Nation is proposing that we abolish the laws which hold people accountable for such behaviour. And if by some chance they succeed, Australia could become a very ugly place indeed.
