“There will probably never be anything I can do to make my lifetime impact net positive”, Sam Bankman-Fried wrote in his diary after the collapse of his cryptocurrency company FTX. His high-profile criminal trial for corporate fraud is giving us another glimpse into capitalism’s moral abyss.
In a recent National Press Club address, prominent No campaigner Warren Mundine very clearly explained what the campaign against the Voice is all about: a racist pushback against Indigenous people. Mundine wants to convince people that “most Indigenous Australians are doing fine”. He thinks that Indigenous people need to stop being “angry and aggrieved” and “trapped in the past”. Instead, they need to ignore racism and “draw a line in history and move on from a clean slate”.
If eight people could build two bombs with $700 worth of material and destabilise the global oil market, “What does that say about the tactics currently being employed in the climate movement?” Quoted in an interview with Vulture, this is the premise of Daniel Goldhaber’s environmentalist thriller How To Blow Up a Pipeline.
The “catastrophic implosion” of OceanGate’s Titan submersible at 3,800m below sea level, which claimed the lives of five millionaires and billionaires last week, was a tragedy. But, as we have all learned in recent days, it was also an uplifting and inspiring event. OceanGate’s own press release found the bright side: “These men were true explorers who shared a distinct spirit of adventure, and a deep passion for exploring and protecting the world’s oceans”.
The destruction of the natural environment in the Stalinist regimes through the twentieth-century made it understandable that, for many, Red and Green seemed incompatible. Fast forward thirty years to our own era and the common sense has changed.
The federal election has sparked some discussion around what position the radical left in this country should take on electoral activity. The anarchist publication Red & Black Notes recently carried a contribution from Tommy Lawson, arguing for a principle of abstention from parliamentary elections.