Most people embrace women in the sciences, including myself, as an exciting rejuvenation of the field and, not to be misunderstood, I’ve enjoyed great success and support as a science student and teacher. Occasionally, however, when I mention I do astronomy, it’s assumed I mean “star signs”. I’ve politely corrected that, usually without incident. There have been times, however, when merely making that correction has led to extreme violence being enacted on myself or attempted. Thus, my dilemma. If I did believe in fortune-telling or astrology or such things, I’d be an empty-headed woman. If not, a “Hitler Nazi” and “Soviet” for supposedly “oppressing other peoples’ beliefs”, as one person put it. For the record, I don’t care what people believe in, as long as it’s not hurting anyone; I respect whatever brings them solace, a personality trait that has always been respected in me by those who actually know me or have no vested interest in making presumptions. At a personal level, I couldn’t give a toss if people believe in astrology, fortune-telling or such things. I do care, however, very much, about being assaulted, accused and abused because I don’t, such actions somehow omitted from the accounts of those offended by the, solely verbal, educative, statements I make, in response, to their very material, physical acts of violence toward myself. People are free to believe what they want. They are not free to stalk, assault and abuse those who merely do not share their beliefs and nor are they free to attempt to coerce others into doing so by way of intimidation or any form of threats and duress. I do not engage in any such actions towards others for their beliefs. I do not approach astrologers, even to educate them, and I do not engage in any crusades against them. I don’t go around attacking astrologers for their beliefs and I should not be attacked for mine. I’m not sure why I attract so much attention, considering far better known people than I made public statements about such topics, eg the great Carl Sagan, without being called a “Nazi” or “Soviet”. I’ve never even commented on astrology in public; I just have no interest in it. However, for reasons unknown to me, myself having gained attention by a certain party for being scientific, without personal motive, malice or ill-intention of any kind, for the first and only time, I publicly state my thoughts on astrology thus:

To me, the determination of anyone’s character according to scientifically baseless, literal transposition of symbolism is as bad as any other form of racial profiling. People invoking a mish-mash of many ancient belief systems and projecting their own anthropomorphisation of animals and events, derived from myths and legends that haven’t been properly understood for millennia, onto individuals in any time, is meaningless. Should people really think they have the characteristics of what a person thinks are the “personality” traits of a goat, a ram or “fish”? Which fish? Poor Peter Benchley discovered that mistake with “Jaws”. That aspect aside, the movie was nevertheless excellent and we are capable of correcting the harm done to sharks by the traits assigned to great whites and, distinctively, appreciating the otherwise well-meaning aspects of the book and movie. So, surely, in a world that denounces certain practices as out-dated, primitive and cruel, such as bull-fighting and shark-hunting, we can do that with a concept as empty as astrology, without villifying those who state basic scientifc truth.

The issue is that science knowledge in the general public right now is so bad, that many people, through no fault of their own, really do not know the difference between astronomy and astrology. Astronomy is the scientific observation of the skies and the Earth’s place in it, whereas astrology attempts to read personalities, character traits and worldy events into whatver any one person thinks is happening in the skies at any time and according to how they see the world. Astronomers obtain detailed information as to how the material universe works based on scientific observation. They do not presume the character and personality of others, let alone people they have never met and know nothing about. Astronomers tell you what the tides will be doing according to the Moon’s movements and when there will be an eclipse. They don’t get paid for telling people who to like or dislike, how to act towards each other or what to do on any given day according to their “personality”. If you really want to know whether to go fishing one day, I strongly advise you look up the tides and not your horoscope.

Of course, for most people, reading their horoscope is just a bit of harmless fun and most of those “really into” it, and I am friends with many who are, don’t have malevolent intentions. My intention really is not to hurt people’s feelings or dissuade search for meaning, rather to prevent such and any harm done by those who do not have such innocent motives. People should be alerted to the dangers of seriously depending on, literally, invisible, unidentifiable sources for information about anyone or anything. No-one should be socially engineered into doing or not doing anything in life merely because of the random impositions of a stranger’s personal inclinations, impositions they attempt to assign divine or cosmic authority to, but which are, in reality and obviously, of the very Earthly origin of these supposed soothsayers’ imaginations. I am galled by the idea that people I do not know and have never met presume to “know all about” me. Likewise, if anyone has good things to say of me, I’d prefer to think it’s for my achievements and good deeds than what stars happened to be in the sky millennia before the coincidental date of my birth in modern times. Moreover, superficially asserting personality traits according to what constellations were in the sky during the time of other particular religious, cultural, social and political settings and contexts has no scientific basis and merely reflects lack of comprehension of the significance of such practices in their own time. This is especially so considering the constellations are random groupings of objects in the sky, determined by people of a time projecting their interpretations of the world onto the heavens as they see fit, not the other way around, and the constellations themselves change relative position in the sky over time.

As importantly, trivialising the knowledge and practices of earlier or other cultures into trinketry is a disservice both to them, the cultural evolution of our species and victims of modern exploitation. Rituals and practices enacted by people living hundreds or thousands of years ago served purpose in their own context, in their own time. Reducing that to the xenophobic enlargements or reductions of modern-day presumptions or prejudices, with empty, ritual repetition long after the original purpose has been forgotten, destroyed, altered, contorted or in whatever way lost to history, diverts from the original knowledge these practices represented. Whatever possibly, sensible, practical purpose or interpretation these practices served in a time is lost to the presumptions of another. The true study of history is fascinating. The thinkers of the past were as intelligent as we are, the same species, with the same mental capacities. As the technologies of recording knowledge emerged and advanced, according to whatever means were available, from rock paintings and pictographic monuments to cuneiform on clay tablets and, ultimately, writing, they recorded the acquisition of knowledge in all fields from agriculture to medicine, with that knowledge expanding and evolving over time. The sedentary lifestyle and organised co-operation that came with the transition from nomadism to the establishment of city states, made possible due to the domestication of plants and animals, facilitated the veneration and celebration of knowledge and the recording of it, as people moved from being part of the environment to controllers of it. No longer at the mercy of the elements, people now had the knowledge and technologies by which to craft the environment to human survival. With that, of course, came all the pitfalls, wrong turns and mistakes as, like Goethe’s “Sorcerer’s Apprentice”, people learned to God, making the recording of acquired knowledge and experience all the more important. Of course, there were also explanations that made sense to people in a time, which we now know to have been incorrect or the original meaning of which has probably been lost in translation through many millennia. In all times, as knowledge improved, the wrong or incomplete gave way to the more true.

However, greater assemblage of people requires greater organisation and control, inevitably politically, and inevitably with control of knowledge. As populations grew and new societies emerged and merged, so too, beliefs systems were merged, modified and adapted for purposes of continuity. Often, for political, rather than practical reasons, earlier rituals continued to be practised long after their original purpose had been forgotten and they had become empty repetition of rites that no longer served any meaning other than to preserve the status quo of a new time. Throughout history, much original knowledge was also lost intentionally. For example, Mesopotamian, Babylonian and Greek astronomy was destroyed when it acted against Ptolemaic geocentric systems and Church power, including with the destruction of the libraries of Alexandria and others and continuing into the Inquisition, when people were, literally, burned alive for speaking the scientific truth of the helicoentric system, knowledge that was certainly known to the ancient Babylonian and early Greek scholars. In 1543, Copernicus invoked the much earlier Greek scientist, Aristarchus, whose work on heliocentric astronomy from the third century, BCE, was among that destroyed. Following from Copernicus’ work, in 1633, Galileo was tried by the Inqusition, forced to recant for stating that the Earth revolves around the Sun and not the other way around. It seems ridiculous to us that uttering this now accepted truth was sufficient to be violently burned at the stake. However, we only need to see what’s happening in our world today to see how easily that can happen and that was the very fate of many, including Giordano Bruno in Rome in 1600, making Galileo’s decision to recant somewhat understandable.

The improvement and dissemination of knowledge is a long, winding and, at times, literally, tortuous business. Much of what we believe today will be overturned tomorrow. But truth is hierarchical. Not every thought on a topic is correct and, in a truly free society, what is wrong gives way to what isn’t. Even Isaac Newton, one of the greatest scientists of all time, practised a form of alchemy, an ancient belief from which the true science of chemistry emerged. However, we don’t teach his alchemy in school, we teach the laws of motion, gravity and optics. Newton, note, was not hounded to his death for his alchemy. We merely teach his good science, while making no mention of the bad.

Like the skies and the Earth, belief systems are neither fixed nor unevolving; as noted by many scholars and philosophers, like any other food, the bread of a religion that has gone stale is unfit for consumption. To remain relevant, systems need to change with knowledge. My aim is never to deprive people of whatever brings them solace or gets them through the night, merely to address the means by which unscrupulous or indifferent actors attempt to do so. My aim is merely to illuminate and place control of peoples’ lives into their own hands, instead of those who aim to control by fear or profit from it. With that in mind, the public’s knowledge of the skies needs an update. In short, astrology is bunk. Astronomy, the factually correct, scientific observation of the skies, reveals no link between the movements of the stars and planets and anyone’s personality. The only Earthly effect it has is to make certain people rich at the expense of others.

Most people are aware of that and are genuinely excited by modern astronomy and cosmology. The few who are offended by that really should just learn better.

Apart from the silly ending, “Brainstorm” (1983) is an excellent movie. Unfortunately, it’s no longer science fiction and we’re in a world with no legal framework to deal with the technological scenario it portrays. New technologies are exceeding society’s comprehension, oversight and regulation. As with environmentalists, more knowledgeable and mature-minded scientists are raising the alarm. They’re warning of the dangers of unchecked novel IT and applications, whether in “wrong hands”, as defined by the powers-of-the-day, or not. Like insighted scientists and tech pioneers, philosophers and commentators of the past, from Russell, Einstein, Popper and Kuhn to Asimov, Sagan and Clarke, they’re attempting to lead intelligent discourse beyond childish “us and them” warlike paradigms to recognition of the broader consequences of potentially world-destroying and, certainly, society-destroying applications. Who needs nukes when you can control lives and minds with neural chips and AI programs running all surveillance and financial systems. But, like environmentalists, they’re being censored, ridiculed, silenced, bullied and ignored by those with vested interests, overgrown adolescents playing out high school science project fantasies or superficial glorifiers of science living in the 1950s, who, unlike their 1950s superiors, have no grasp of social reality.

Time for Peter Pan to grow up.

My uncle, Phil Davis, would have been 88 today. Most people won’t have heard of him, but he was a backbone of great Australian journalism since the 1960s. He was a leading crime reporter in Sydney, breaking the Bogle-Chandler case, among others. He created the role of Press Secretary in Canberra in 1968, believing the public needed to be better informed by the government. He teamed with Mike Willesee as his Executive Producer from 1973 and was behind Willessee winning many current affairs awards, until Mike went to the 9 network in 1981. Phil then created Terry Willesee at 7, which then became TWT, also under Phil’s direction. Phil was Head of News and Current Affairs at 7, during which time he created female anchors on commercial TV and the male and female news anchor format. He created Newsnight, with Clive Robertson as presenter

Phil left 7 and “all of it” in August, 1988, due to enmity with Skase, after Skase acquired 7 from Fairfax, but he later assisted his friend and Gough Whitlam’s former speech writer, Graeme Freudenburg, in writing his book, Churchill and Australia. Phil’s partner at that time was Carol Summerhayes, Gough’s former PA.

Phil died in January, 2016.

Many years ago, in 1986, I was mortified when a musician friend said in a radio interview that the reason he chose to return from Europe and make his career in Australia was because he’d been to a fortune-teller, who told him to. At the same time, a rumour was circulating that another musician was refusing medical treatment for a life-threatening illness due to his “religious” beliefs. That rumour may or may not have been true, but it did alert to several dangerous ideologies that were gaining traction at the time.

My friend’s appreciation of music from non-western cultures and exploration of philosophies that challenged western musical orthodoxy was commendable. However, from the fortune-telling business and other comments he made, it was apparent that, for his musical ability, intellectual scholarship was not his forte. He was a musician, not an intellectual, and I considered a fine musician’s career shouldn’t be thwarted by unwise utterances unrelated to his talent and good heart, all the more so as his fame grew.

I was also concerned at the aggressive promulgation of superstitious beliefs taking place at the time via pseudo-intellectual occultism on the one hand and right-wing religious fundamentlaism on the other, both driving a psyche of doom that was pervading the public consciousness at the time due to the Cold War and manifest in a belief in the inevitable destruction of the planet, whether due to Nostradamus’ prophecies or “end-of-days” scenarios as interpreted with superifical, literal transposition of the Biblical Acts and Revelation onto modern times. I believed we needed to educate people above such superstitions, which act against critical thinking skills and render people helpless against seeming inevitabilities instead of taking action against them. I was also concerned for the environment and at how anti-science movements of the time were acting against the warnings by scientists of impending environmental catastrophe and means by which to avert it, believing we needed to be turning our efforts away from weapons and war to saving the planet from a much more inevitable destruction if we didn’t act against that instead of each other.

Privately, on 18 February, 1988, in a context known to him, due to our shared interest in Eastern philosophies, to clarify a potential previous misunderstanding, I imparted to my friend that I knew it had become trendy to delve into a variety of cults with conflicting doctrines but that my knowledge of Buddhism was not acquired in that way, explaining that my appreciation of its core tenets of compassion and humanity had different sources. To also forestall a former potential misimpression of disillusionment with the sciences, I said that that was certainly not the case and that “I believe that all the more knowledge needs to be generated in order to enlighten the vacuum of ignorance which is becoming quickly filled with superstition”. (I was being poetic, thus the split infinitve. 🙂 ) Also in a context known to him, I invoked embracement of Socratic self-knowledge as a source of inner peace, while invoking Spinoza and maintaining that objectivity should form the basis of truth, with subjectivity reserved for personal taste in recognition of the fascist dangers inherent in that situation ever becoming the reverse in a system supposedly set up to unite all to one purpose, but which could all too easily be used to implement the purpose of one. That was particularly relevant in a time during which racism and “us and them” war-mongering politics were on the rise, and I advocated embracement of peaceful, co-operative, egalitarian diversity over division. I was concerned at adversarial factionalism between the sciences and the arts that was causing a narrowing of perspectives and I advised broader knowledge for a more complete education. I reminded of the need to preserve arts for art’s sake, in a very politically charged time, stating that all creative endeavours should be simply, for their own sakes, pointing out that when any practice is more a quest for power and money than a genuine quest for knowledge or personal well-being, all such applications are as much prey to unscrupulousness as any other business. I said our time was one in which we were in danger of cutting off our futures at the brain stems and that I looked forwrd to a new Rennaissance than a regression to the Dark Ages.

Fortunately, he took my advice and when he died several years later, I’m sure it would not have been with the great reverence he had gained within his musical career, had he not. As it happened, choosing to remain in Australia, at least to restart his career, had been a fortuitous decision and with other incentives to stay and good support as a local figure, unlike many of our talented own, he enjoyed an excellent, if unfortunately, brief career, ended only by an AIDS-related illness in 1991.

Remaining constant, however, are both the divine aspirations and the human flaws of our species and we are now in a time during which, as our knowledge is expanding exponentially, it is outpacing the regulatory systems designed to keep less savoury intentions and applications in check. Unfortunately, we are in a time when we are again facing similar dangers and resolve is still needed against those exploiting ignorance with superstition and false information as means by which to take advantage of others and enact malevolent interference in people’s lives. That they are merely devices of misinformation renders them of no value at best, dangerous at worst. People with ulterior motives are still exploiting those too innocently-minded to realise the real intentions behind the curtain of propaganda imposed on them.

Ironically, or hypocritically, for those supposedly rejecting all things scientific, as technology has evolved, so too, have the means by which unscrupulous parties enact their craft. These manipulators excel at exploiting the normal human need for mystery, at elevation of the unknown and belief in the powers of “Lady Luck”, but are no more insightful than any gambling agency that operates on the same principles. That exploitation is a very exact science. Remember that, before you get as fleeced as if you were throwing away your money on any cyber scam.

Even more ironically, however, the danger is more, this time, from the other “side”. Now, again, the public are being manipulated as pawns, again, urged to enact violence against their fellows as false Christians, again, calling themselves “prophets”, peddle “end-times” madness, enacting every ideology but Christian as, in a state of delusional arrogance, they play out adolescent white supremacist fantasies onto a world they believe is theirs to dominate and destroy.

The danger of these apparently disparate, or even opposite, ideologies is their common denominator of depriving people of independent thinking skills, again, evident in our time, when we are, again, in danger of regression in every field, from environmental science to medicine. It’s now all the more important to address dangerous misinformation drawn from ideology or ulterior motives rather than fact. In our supposed democracies, egalitarian diversity is being subsumed by the motives of a few, as vested financial and ideological interests, dependent on exploitation of public ignorance and impotence, are being played out as government policy.

Unfortunately, the danger now, also, is as much from the enemy within, wolves in white lab coats, as it was previously from determined, sometimes well-meaning, crusaders leading a charge against “cold-hearted philistines”. People with good hearts but little knowledge are educable. However, while, previously, there were true leaders of reason and scientific thinking leading public awareness of ethical and environmental issues, such as Einstein, Bertrand Russell, Carl Sagan, Isaac Asimov and Arthur C. Clarke, there are now people calling themselves scientists and scholars peddling anti-climate science ideologies, racist pseudoscience and medical quackery, made all the more dangerous by the perceived credibility that a couple of letters after their name assigns them.

Navigating the ocean of misinformation to find any kind of scientific truth is even harder now than it was in the 1980s, but doable, with a few pointers in mind. With land and money-grabbing, mass-murderers presenting themselves as the face of science, these days, I don’t blame anyone for mistrusting science or rejecting it completely in direct refrain of the past association of science with the horrors of war. It’s getting harder to teach the pure beauty of science, when people calling themselves scientists are preaching the very embodiment of all that’s bad about it, confirmimg everyone’s worst fears of misapplication. However, while not everything about science and technology is great, and you don’t have to believe those telling you that it is, recall it was science that warned of the major issues we now face. While modern medicine may not have all the answers and even fails occasionally, it’s because of scientific medical advances that people are enjoying longer and healthier lives than at any other time in history. Just as it’s not a matter of throwing all things “non-western” or “non-modern” under one roof without discernment as though “they all look alike”, so too, science itself is only as commercial as consumer markets allow it to be. By all means, do Tai Chi and meditate, go on retreats, love nature, enjoy the wonders of the cosmos at a deep and spiritually-meaning level, but don’t entrust life-affecting decisions to what is really only ever charlatanism, whatever new tools are employed to enact it with. Do take vaccines, do get treatment for serious and life-threatening illnesses beyond prayers and faith healing. Importantly, take care with medicines that are more magic belief than genuine cure. “First Do No Harm” is indeed a code that must be observed. That includes not doing harm by way of promulgating dangerously ignorant misinformation that could deter people from accessing life-saving treatments. Yes, drug companies are unscrupulous *******s, but so are those manipulating people into buying snake-oil, of whatever ideological origin, instead of medicines that provably save lives and improve the quality of daily life for millions of people around the world. Paracetamol, for example, is a totally safe drug when used responsibly and those pushing hype to the contrary are those posing the real danger to your health. Doing no harm also includes that done to animals. Aspirin may have been refined from willow bark and there are many similar plant sources of potential, all the more reason not to destroy the natural environment and to pay attention to native peoples, but rhino horn, tiger tooth and bear bile do nothing but torture animals. There’s nothing environmentally friendly or nature-loving about “medicines” that inflict cruelty on animals or destroy entire species, which only increases the danger of deadly virus creation. And, on the other hand, vivisection in modern medicine is unnecessary cruelty, especially today, when science has provided its own alternatives and there’s no need for live experimentation, which has no more scientific value than any practices whose “value” is invisible, while its damage is not.

In our time of new technologies and enormous amounts of information outpacing scrutiny and regulation, finding truth can take a bit of work, but knowing the difference between a valid study and pseudoscience still only takes the same basic skills, no matter how over-dressed may be the language of purveyors of nonsense.

Importantly, don’t believe that all is “written”. Don’t succumb to the culture of helplessness against corrupt and unscrupulous governments constantly spending your money on their forever wars, conducted for their gain, or taking away your right to protest and contribute to decision-making in our supposed democracies. Don’t give in to either unscrupulous charlatans trying to convince you they know you better than you do OR corporations convincing you that being boiled alive under climate change is good for your health, like doctors in the 1950s paid by tobacco companies to tell you that smoking was!

The future is open to whatever you make it and really want it to be. It’s not written in the stars, it’s not written in tales told centuries ago by people writing for their time, not ours, and it’s not written in advertisements carefully crafted by manipulation experts. You’re not obligated to follow the dictates of anyone’s personal interpretations of anything, whether a fortune-teller, a health Minister with no medical qualifications, a race scientist with no knowledge of science or a madman thinking he’s Jesus.

In our time of pending environmental disintegration, we cannot afford the luxury of self-centredness. Bound by our material physiology and that of the planet, we need to recognise the life and death threat we collectively face, put all differences aside and co-operate to save the only environment in which we’re capable of living, for if it dies, we all do, and all our petty differences won’t mean a thing.

Pardon my scepticism regarding the anti-DEI mob and those opposed to Acknowledgement of Country, but every day I see proof that it really is just racism and misogynism dressed up in pseudo-scientific bullshit. It’s not the left being intellectually dishonest in relation to that; it’s self-opinionated “commentators” trying to hide prejudice behind “pc gone mad is common sense” sloganism. It’s those trying to fool everyone into thinking opposing DEI is about “merit” and claiming Acknowledgment of Country is “divisive”, when it’s blatantly obvious that neither is true. Although they’re careful to hide their real intentions, sooner or later, the guard drops and all is revealed, sometimes casually and often in the most unexpected ways. It’s been happening a lot lately, but I didn’t need to see it now to have always had valid suspicions.

Many years ago, in the early 2000s, I was doing a postgraduate course online. It was run by an Australian university, but open to international students. Although now quite common, at the time, it was one of the first of its kind and I was glad to be part of such an initiative. As an Australian, I very much enjoyed the interaction with fellow postgrads from all over the world, partly facilitated through our virtual course discussion board, which, with online courses then just starting as a “thing”, helped provide the more social and extra-curricula interaction usually associated with on-campus life.

As sometimes happens with these applications, a small clique of people, mostly international participants, began to dominate the discussion board. This particular set began to frequently use it to criticise the course, from its general administration to management of units within it. That’s not necessarily, in itself, an issue, although I felt that any material issues with the course would have been better raised through appropriate channels. It became irritating when a few started saying how much ‘better’ the colleges in their country were etc. etc. at which point, I was tempted to ask why they chose to do this course and not one in their home country. I refrained from commenting on those aspects and enjoyed admission to this “elite” set. However, I became concerned at attitudes displayed toward other international students, sometimes people of particular nationalities, in ways that reflected certain unsavoury aspects of their country’s politics and historical racism. The shunning of people from Mexico and similar countries, for example, was glaringly noticeable. My thought was that if people were studying at an Australian university, they should conform with Australian culture and leave theirs at home. For context, after some time believing that racism was a thing on the way to being defeated, I was teaching secondary school in a location where racism was prevalent, not among the students, but a few staff colleagues! Thus, my sensitivity to it at that time was quite heightened and I was acutely feeling the pain of my many First Nations friends and students. However, the attitudes on the online course discussion board being more tacit than overt, I didn’t make note of it until one day, the discussion strayed from course material into a lengthy tribute to the enjoyment of wine. That is not something I was or am offended by, but within that discussion, someone, shamefully, an Australian, actually, repeated a line from a 1970s Monty Python sketch, which states that a particular wine had “the bouquet of an Aborigine’s armpit.”

I didn’t know if there were any Australian First Nations people in the course, if they weren’t put off before they certainly could be then, but whether there were or not, I was dumb-founded that anyone would post such a comment, let alone that it, unthinkingly, gained laughter all-round. That the people extolling this supposed example of sharp wit also seemed not to know that the Chancellor of the university was a former Prime Minister of Australia, one of whose achievements was recognition of Australian Native Rights, to me, reflected ignorance of a university they were privileged to be able to study at.

For me, that comment, such insensitivity so casually made, was the tipping point and I “exploded” on the discussion board, expressing my objection to it and the general detrioration of the discussion board into just a sniping range, stating that people needed to be more sensitive in their online comments. [Such is the character of my “explosions”.]

When it was noted that it was ‘just a Monty Python quote’, I said that didn’t excuse repetition of it and that it didn’t make it any less offensive.

A couple made the “freedom of speech” speech and I replied with the ‘freedom of speech is not freedom to hurt’ speech. They noted the social role of non-course related discussions; I recognised the social value of discussion boards for online courses, but doubted comments such as that could be deemed “sociable” or would assist in that cause.

To my relief, several of the participants in the course of the same nationality as they, people of greater substance and also “white”, I might add, agreed with me and stated that they also had been concerned about some aspects of the discussion board for some time. Some of them and others said it was partly why they had been avoiding it. So much for the “social” function of online discussion boards, if a small clique merely drives everyone else, including the genuinely more “sociable” people, away from them.

There, the discussion of that topic on the course platform ended, with recognition of the need for some kind of “netiquette”, although a few of those involved moved to an external platform, with comments to the effect that ‘at least they’d be able to speak freely there’. ????

Importantly, when I reacted that day, it wasn’t because of “radical lefty intellectualism” or “champagne socialism”. It was sheer, personal heartbreak at how it would hurt my friends, many of them intelligent and educated, and my students, wide-eyed and innocent children, all trying to have a go, but having the same life others enjoy closed to them by this kind of garbage, garbage they have to put up with every day, along with all the other stereotypes and insults they’re locked into, after which, of course, they’re then abused for not pursuing the life others say they should but deny them. I’m perfectly happy for there to be programs that go some way toward countering that denial of opportunities and wrongs that there are people alive today still experiencng the effects of. I also don’t for a moment think my friends want to slit my throat as compensation for past wrongs when they ask for mere acknowledgment of their existence, something it took a referendum to only partially achieve in 1967 and a High Court case to do as late as the 1990s.

The Monty Python sketch referred to was from a while ago, in the early 1970s, and, personally, I believed the Monty Python gang would be ashamed of it today, much, I would say, to the relief of their devotees. No sensible person would repeat it today, only those with no friends who would be affected by it or those who have no knowledge of the topic or those with malicious intention or those who have no soul.

I’m glad to still do Acknowledgement of Country, a relatively minor gesture, but one that means everything to people who, despite the pretences of ignoramuses, still face major obstacles and prejudices, as the toxic “No” campaign surrounding the “Voice” referendum showed.

There was a time when horse racing served a purpose. Back when horses were the only means of transportation and work tasks, whether ploughing fields, carting goods or the means by which highwaymen and bushrangers eluded the police, tests for traits like speed, strength and endurance, were as important as car rally trials became when motor vehicles replaced horses. Contrary to popular belief, good people and businessmen rarely worked their horses to death. As with motor vehicles now, they knew that good maintenance made better economy, especially when one’s horse was one’s life or livelihood. However, along with known cases of mistreatment, which anti-cruelty laws were supposed to address, the use of horses for all tasks was, in itself, a cruelty which the coming of motor vehicles was supposed to end. As motor vehicles replaced horses and horse trials gave way to car rallies, horse “races” became obsolete. They now serve no practical purpose and merely serve the gambling industry or silly vanities, like pulling tourists to supposedly relive a romanticised “dream” of the past. All such practices are needless cruelty and should be banned. It’s time for the world to really move into the future and leave behind motives that are as outdated as their practices.

Anti-DEI lobbyists say they’re unfairly accused of racism and sexism for what, they claim, is unemotional factual science that they invoke to support the meritocracy and “preserve standards”. Like a 1970s Monty Python sketch, they invoke a common sense axiom, such as, “Surely, you want the best person for the job, not just anyone because they’re black or a woman”, an obvious concept most reasonable would agree with. But, unlike Monty Python, do those doing “PC gone mad” today really mean that “a person is unsuitable for a job because they’re “black” or a “woman”? When so “accused”, the anti-DEI campaigners demand “free speech” against what they call “woke, far-left censorship” and cry “Cancel culture!”, saying they’re afraid to publish “for fear of being called sexist or racist”. They’re very upset by the “accusations”, but their responses are more hurt feelings than convincing argument or are lengthy, but hollow, pseudo-intellectual diatribes that often merely raise more red flags. So, the question is, when anti-DEI advocates say that removing DEI programs is about “merit” and by “a” person of colour or woman is unsuitable for a job, do they really mean “no person of colour woman” is suitable because they’re black or a woman? Without accusing, I believe it to be a valid question and one that deserves a better answer than “I never said that”, “I’m being misquoted”, “I’m being taken out of context” or “People who think I said that are poo-poo-heads”. Qualification is especially necessary, as many comments by anti-DEI advocates are made in the context of both explicit and implicit accusation against others, whether in reference to competence, motives, effects or liabilities, sometimes with major effect on careers, livelihood and public perception.

First, there’s blame on “diversity-hires” for the fall of civilisation itself, without mention of nepo-hires, any rich man’s unqualified idiot son placed into positions of major responsibility. An incidental oversight, perhaps? No-one can say everything about a topic, all the time. But then, there’s a leader stating that certain academics claim they “fear” being called racist or sexist if they publish studies which, they claim, show that certain groups of people, innately, “underperform” relative to others. Clang!

Read further and find claims that racism and misogyny are “woke”, social constructs but race and sex are “real”, i.e. that certain physical racial and gender differences are of significance, including “disqualifying” physiological traits in specific contexts. In good faith, you read their articles, in full, and then realise you’ve just wasted a good two minutes on pseudo-intellectual gobbledygook, when you could have had more intellectual or scientific insight from an adventure game on the internet (or one of Isaac’s trashy David Starr Space Ranger novels, the ones he wrote under an alias to pay his way through uni! Not to be misunderstood, I’m an Asimov devotee. My point is that his rubbish was more intelligent than what these people churn out as what they call “great thinking”). Read a little further and find that when no reputable journal will publish their work, they cry “cancel culture”, as well as sulking that “People want their differences to be acknowledged and accommodated, then whinge when we acknowledge physical difference.”

Of course, not all of the anti-DEI mob agree on their reasons or every aspect of race and gender differences. They’re not a single person and no individual should be “punished” for the actions of another. But there are those whose intentions take a somewhat more ominous tone than “PC gone mad” when pressed beyond superficialities. There are those who, while carefully avoiding any mention of it too obviously, even eventually get to the old chestnut of IQ, and no prizes for guessing where they head with that. Suffice to say that, despite their claims that there are studies purporting to show racial or gender differences, to my knowledge, there are no reputable studies that show significant differences in IQ between races or sexes. Even putting the usual flaws in the concepts underlying IQ tests aside, there are, however, more recent, credible, studies that show unexpected results, results that, in fact, point to “superior” performance of women and people of colour in certain contexts, e.g. at certain ages, and how much environmental factors, such as educational opportunities, socio-economic standing and exposure to social and cultural influences can affect performance throughout life stages.

Particularly concerning are claims of studies showing propensity of certain “groups of people” to violence, or particular forms of violence, and claims that “studies” show that racism and sexism are inventions of the “woke, far left” and are driving false public perception. Many of these claims are made in op-eds, without provision of primary raw data and. therefore, can be very persuasive to the uninitiated reader. However, closer inspection of these “studies” reveal flawed interpretation and sometimes dodgy sources. Wider knowledge and familiarity with more credible studies and raw data tends to reveal more sensible analysis, incorporating more or all relevant variables necessary for accurate interpretation, leading to very different conclusions from those stated. That, in certain cases, these interpreters have stated that by “more likely to” they mean are prone to “due to innate characteristics”, raises alarm bells for obvious reasons. Incredibly, among those propounding such views are those who don’t cite physiological studies, but incarceration figures, from which it is concluded that a certain group of people are more likely to commit a certain type of offence. Another, more broad-sweepingly, said that high incarceration figures of a particular group of people proved they were more “violent”, a ridiculously superficial interpretation with as much merit as comments made by average, MAGA internet trolls on X. However, all that drawing broad conclusions from limited data “proves”, is ignorance of how science works and relevant knowledge of a topic, in this case, for example, that such statistics are merely evidence that certain groups of people are more likely to be reported, convicted or incarcerated. Other scholars cite the same figures as evidence of prejudice against certain groups of people, which, taken with other information and experience, tends to be a more reliable interpretation. Importantly, sources such as incarceration figures are not “scientific” studies. These are sociological or legal matters from which conclusions are being deduced that are in no way “scientifically” based. Moreover, what has it to do with refusal to recognise native peoples’ rights or support for political parties that campaign against it, positions which several of the anti-DEI advocates vehemently take? What is the connection between supposedly “scientific” observation and political views?

In general, with few exceptions, op-eds barely constitute literature reviews of any recognisable standard, let alone genuine science. No scholar worth the letters after their name would rely on one study from which to generalise an opinion, let alone a “proof”, thereby contravening the basic principles of verifiability and falsifiability, principles at the core of science, principles which help define science and make it valuable. Worse, when people self-publish opinions on their own sites, outside of mainstream scientific journals, they’re circumventing the essential process of peer review. That, in itself, is not a crime against science and, these days, in some cases, it’s the only way for genuine information to reach the public domain. It is also true that censorship in relation to some topics is ominously, both overtly and clandestinely, inhibiting “free speech”. In such conditions, open discussion with public responses can, to some extent, provide semblance of ”peer review”. But, not all these sites allow comments or more “erudite” discussion that raises questions, notes flaws or attempts more in-depth examination and a small cabal of like-minded people self-confirming each others’ biases hardly constitutes valid invitation to criticism. Moreover, claiming to be “hiding” studies for “fear” of criticism does break the rules and, in the absence of further information, is just avoidance of scrutiny of unverified fairies-at-the-bottom-of-the-garden silliness. Many of these opinionators are hardly Galileo, facing imprisonment by the Inquisition. In response to that justification for cowardly “secrecy”, I invoke one of the most important golden rules of science – “Put up or shut up.”

Such scholarship merely reflects the general issue with science reporting in the media, when people with little knowledge of how scientific analysis works, frame headlines like “Study proves starvation cures cancer!” gleaned from a study that shows that mice on low-calorie diets tend to have less bowel cancer than mice that eat lots of barbecued meat, with such reportage, incidentally, sitting alongside news of government departments cutting free meals to school children. I make no accusation of such ulterior motives in the anti-DEI mob. I merely point out that the right to bear the stamp of “scientifically proven” depends on more than just “opinion” or framing of secondary sources to suit it.

Of course, not all opinions or interpretations of studies are faulty and there is scientific evidence for some physiological claims. Of course, there are studies that show that some men are innately physically stronger than some women, an obvious point I concede without hesitation. Certain “analysts”, however, are not so objective when, for example, invoking stats that show that women tend to live longer than men. That is true and in many societies. But in that instance, certain “analysts” are the first to point out that that’s more than likely due to environmental factors and not innate, “superior, longevity genes”, factors they go to great pains to detail. According to them, it’s because women, apparently, are masters at “enslaving” men into doing more physical labour and for longer hours than they etc. etc. To my knowledge, there are no reputable studies that show significant differences in “performance” between races and sexes in relation to any trait of innate “worth” or “worth” to “civilised society”, as these people often frame it. Nor do I know of reputable primary studies that prove certain characteristics, such as propensity to violence or particular types of violence in certain groups of people specified to be “innate”.

Importantly, superficial physiological traits are not preclusive to job suitability. The workplace has accommodated the physiology of men for millennia. If women had been there first, the arguments would be the other way around. Minor physiological differences, like accommodating menstruation, were solved easily when the first barrier of just being “allowed” into certain positions was lifted. World War II, when women had to do the jobs at home while men were away on the battlefield, dispensed with most of the objections to women being able to do certain work, it having been proved by necessity that women could do just about anything men could. Even Queen Elizabeth was a mechanic and drove a truck. She was also the Head of State and reigning monarch, living negation of any objections to women being in positions of power. Attempts to put the genie back in the bottle when the men came home merely resulted in the big break-out during the sixties and since then, the “issues” thrown out as the major “gotcha” hurdles, i.e. pregnancy, parenting and child-care, are now also gradually being accommodated, with nothing less than a quiet cultural revolution.

In many fields, technological or other solutions have dispensed with such puerile inanities as “Would you want a women rescuing you in a fire or a big, strong man who can carry you down a flight of stairs?” Like modern firefighters even do that these days or there’s no such thing as muscly women. It’s like saying women can’t drive big rigs, when there are a lot of lady truckers who have proven themselves more than capable of doing so and women train drivers who know how to push buttons in computerised cabs. As many trains now are fully automated, run from computer centres thousands of kilometres away, the point is now moot. “Give me a lever and I will move the world”, said Archimedes. Tools have rendered most arguments about physiological suitability for many positions obsolete, for all people. Discussions as to how the ability for human beings to manipulate the environment impacts on survival, potentially making physical natural selection irrelevant, are of far more scientific interest. The more applicable issue now is artificial selection and how that may impact on the future of our species, including its survival, And that makes the issue of social, cultural and economic manipulation via DEI purges and the culling of DEI programs of significance to everyone. (And, actually, I would feel safer being carried out of a burning building by a big burly Pacific Islander man or woman, than a puny, white male desk jockey. 🙂  )

Unfortunately, inertia, resistance and the backlash to MeToo, BLM and DEI is still restricting women to a pyramid workplace model – lots of women in the typing pool but nearly all under a male supervisor, and people of colour to token representative roles in select positions. So, yes, as the anti-“feminists” shout, workplace participation rates for women are up. But, presence in managerial positions is still very low. The critics of “feminism” point out the large number of women on the boards of Fortune 500 companies but neglect to mention that only 10% are CEOs. Those who claim racism is a “woke” delusion, point to Clarence Thomas serving on the SCOTUS, a reference so facile I squirm at the idea it’s even made. It does also have to be asked if the fierce warriors against DEI, claiming to be “great thinkers” and quoting facts and figures by the shovel-load, really don’t know how social, cultural and economic factors impede success. Do they really not know the impact of exclusion? The effect of formal policies and unofficial practices that prevent people from gaining the necessary skills and experience that would make them the best person for a job? Are they really that ignorant of how a fine mesh of fibres, from daily encounters to evasive, “official” excuse, entraps people into stagnant class immobility within an illusion of success, or into poverty, relative or otherwise? Let’s not kid ourselves that all of these supposed utopians are naïve, cushioned, ivory tower “idealists”, who merely have little experience or knowledge of “the real world”.

Some of the anti-DEI mob magnanimously concede that inequity exists in the world, but claim the whole of civilisation shouldn’t be brought down by the faults in society acting against equal opportunity in “earlier” years, before people get to lofty places like universities. There, they say, the highest standards must be maintained and, therefore, no “lesser” person should be admitted. However, that they actively oppose equity programs designed to bring people up to required levels of admission, miss the point that all graduates are still required to meet all course requirements before being conferred a degree and overlook legacy inductions, raises valid questions as to their true understanding of the real world and what equity and equality are about. That they apply the same “magnanimousness” to kindergarten and offer no solutions as to how the inequalities in “earlier years” and society as a whole can be addressed, makes their observations irrelevant to the discourse.

After women and people of colour, the current targets of the anti-DEI mob’s most vocal virtue-signalling and soap-boxing are “Muslims” and native peoples.

Personally, I’m happy to be treated by any doctor qualified for the job, regardless of sex, race or anything else. In Australia, we’re very lucky. We’re a diverse nation with national standards and few barriers to the workplace and I can feel confident that whomever I see is suitable, regardless of any irrelevant superficialities. Likewise, in any workplace situation. Suffice to say, I don’t run out of a building screaming “The Muslims are coming!” when served by a man of colour (even the Sikh, Buddhist or Hindu “Muslims”) or a woman in a hijab. And, in fact, the only “issues” I’ve experienced in any setting, professional or otherwise, have usually been due to privileged “white” people. The most helpful person I’ve encountered in a supermarket recently was a young woman in a hijab, who patiently came to my rescue when I got into an argument with a self-serve checkout, and, fortunately, her understanding of how supermarkets work these days far superseded mine!

The hypocrisy of those belittling sex abuse of women and opposing affirmative action for women, belies any claim that they’re “saving women from Islam”. Likewise, the crusade against “trans people”. The diminution of women in positions of power or responsibility overshadows any sensible argument there may be for opposing safe spaces for women or categories in sport. But even those are practical issues with easy solutions that the disproportionate ideological fanaticism with which certain people throw themselves into that “cause” merely highlights the bigotry within the glaring question of why these people don’t devote themselves to far more significant, culturally-entrenched, prolific and immediate issues of abuse of women with equal energy. That such superficiality ties itself in knots in slightly deeper waters raises genuine questions of motive, for example, saying women should have the choice of not having to undress in front of a trans person, but that people are being “racist”, “sexist”, “absurd” or encouraging “dangerous DEI-hire” practices if they say they’d feel more “comfortable” being treated by a doctor of their own race or sex.

I didn’t think “The blacks are taking over!” during the Voice referendum, nor do I think “they” want to slaughter me in my bed in revenge for the sins of the colonial fathers. All that’s being asked for is recognition of past wrongs and some kind of reparation to address the inequities that have resulted from those past wrongs, so that people still living the effects of them know justice and have opportunities made available to them that, by law and all that’s moral, they should never have been denied, even if that means forced quotas, affirmative action, by its former title. In a wealthy country, it’s not a race for limited spaces. It’s a matter of making more spaces available to accommodate everyone. No-one’s taking from someone else. Unless, of course, funding’s reduced by people who do want to make it about competition for limited spaces and competition based on criteria determined by those reducing the funding. Countering that sub rosa means of enacting fascism and hollow elitism is just one purpose of DEI and why, regardless of innocence or ulterior motives behind it, any attempt at Musk/Trumpian DEI purges and DOGE-style cuts in Australia must be countered at every step. Yes, there are occasional absurdities, when PC really does go mad, but what could be more absurd than Donald Trump as President of the United States or the totally unqualified RFK jr as Secretary of Health, people who most certainly are in their positions because they are entitled, privileged, white males. The real absurdity is claims that women and people of colour are now “more equal” than privileged, white men.

So, my answer to those saying “Don’t you want the best person for the job?” is “Absolutely! Being why I don’t want any unqualified idiot in a position merely because they’re white male, which the removal of DEI programs almost certainly ensures.” The world is certainly not in a safer or more “intelligent” place with the cabal of privileged white males now leading it and leading the removal of able, qualified people because they happen to be women or people of colour.

Trumpism is something we do not want reflected in Australia, in any form, and one of the most essential ground-level defences from that is maintaining our egalitarian diversity through equity in a more sophisticated social and economic model than that offered by fascism by stealth, which, regardless of the best of intentions in certain people, removal of DEI policies abets.

The ’60s and ’70s were a time of great optimism, but by the 1980s, the “energy crisis”, the danger of monopolistic economies and life in the umbra of the threat of nuclear war were having marked effect on the global psyche. As the world slid into the darkness of uncertainty and pessimism, my ethos and philosophy on life, however, was still optimistic and based on high principles, from which I never wavered. Believing in a better future and passionate enough to do it, I did what I could to encourage the same level of energy and optimism in others. Education is key and I took whatever opportunity I could to give people the knowledge they needed to improve their lives and that of others in a world that really did need saving.

In the 1980s, I was expressing concerns I had as to emerging attitudes that threatened egalitarian ideals and independence of thought. I said I believed that all the more knowledge needed to be generated in order to enlighten the vacuum of ignorance which was becoming quickly filled with superstition. “Poetic” split infintive aside, I still say the same, as emphatically, against the rise of ignorance and anti-science, again threatening the planet and humanity. Back then, it was an inane “US v USSR/USSR v US” mentality and environmental destruction that threatened the planet. Sinister warmongers, exploiting religious fundamentalism and superstition to drive end-of-days scenarios, had succeeded only in creating mass hysteria, a collective psyche living under a belief of inevitable nuclear destruction. The ideology of “Armageddon” in our time, as one President put it, had to be fought with knowledge and the undoing of religious extremism and superstition, so people could take control of the future and change it, instead of slavishly just allowing it to happen by believing there was no other way. Simultaneously, the very material, existential threat of environmental destruction was going unchecked, as climate and environmental science were under attack from both those with commercial and political interests in undermining it and those proliferating anti-science ideologies, claiming that scientists were just “educated barbarians”, who did nothing but make nuclear bombs. Factionalism between the sciences and the arts was creating a divide as ridiculous as material extension of the idea that anyone has either a “left” or “right” brain. Here’s some news – every individual has both a “left” and a “right” brain and, equally, society needs both for survival. The truly wonderful and sincere peace movement of the ’60s had given way to “normal”, curious people seeking meaning and purpose in life by delving into a variety of cults with conflicting doctrines, eagerly exploited by those with more sinister motives, not keen for these dives into “alternative” cultures to be too deep. Thus emerged pretentious, privileged “white person’s” dehumanising, superficial, stick-figure commercialisations of “Eastern” philosophies, all thrown under one roof in a western/non-western divide, as though all “non-western” people “look alike”. These movements led to inane absurdities such as pretend “Buddhists” doing occult astrology or thinking it ok to kill “brown” people, concepts antithetical to Buddhism and so much for embracement of “Asian” cultures. Supposed “nature-lovers” and “holistic-healers” were slaughtering rhinos and tigers, solely for their horns and teeth, as “medicine”, at once proving their “environmental” aim was a sham. Fundamentalist evangelicals with THEIR Bible in one hand and nuclear weapons in the other were joined by fraudsters claiming to have equally supernatural occult powers, with Nostradamus’ prophecies in one hand and nationalistic superiority in the other and the result was a perfect storm of anti-science, pseudo-science and pseudo-philosophy driving the world to moral chaos and environmental destruction as fantasies of “THE war between good and evil” was played out on the real world, that becoming more of an existential threat than any perceived “enemy”.

As the attack on science is regaining momentum in every field from environmental science to medicine, it’s all the more important to address dangerous misinformation drawn from ideology or ulterior motives rather than fact. Not everything about science and technology is great, but it was science that warned of the major environmental issues we now face and while modern medicine may not have all the answers and even fails occasionally, it’s because of scientific medical advances that people are enjoying longer and healthier lives than at any other time in history. Do take vaccines, do get treatment for serious and life-threatening illnesses beyond prayers and faith healing. Importantly, take care with medicines that are more magic belief than genuine cure. “First Do No Harm” is indeed a code that must be observed. That includes not doing harm by way of promulgating dangerous misinformation that could deter people from accessing life-saving treatments. Yes, drug companies can be unscrupulous *******s, but equally so are those manipulating people into buying snake-oil instead of medicines that save lives and improve the quality of daily life for millions of people around the world. Paracetamol, for example, is a totally safe drug when used responsibly and those pushing hype to the contrary are those posing the real danger to your health.

Home-grown or organic food is healthier and better for the environment and vegan or vegetarian diets are generally better for health and the planet. Aspirin was refined from willow bark and there are many similar plant sources of potential, all the more reason not to destroy the natural environment and to pay attention to native peoples. However, when practices are more a quest for power and money than a genuine quest for knowledge or well-being, all applications are as much prey to unscrupulousness as in any other business and there’s nothing environmentally friendly or nature-loving about “medicines” that inflict cruelty on animals or destroy entire species, which only increases the danger of deadly virus creation. Rhino horn, tiger tooth and bear bile do nothing but torture animals and are as bad as vivisection inflicted in modern science labs. It’s not a matter of throwing all things “non-western” or “non-modern” under one roof without discernment as though “they all look alike”. On a planet of billions of people on several continents with thousands of years of history, they really don’t. And it’s not a matter of dividing between “the West” and “the rest”. It’s a matter of equal values applying to all. The monetary ones certainly do, so why not the moral?

Science certainly is not the answer to everything and I have more respect for a forest child or a true Christian with good principles than a scientist without ethics. But, with the world being railroaded toward destruction, it is important that other visions of the future are made known to combat end-of-days scenarios being forced into people’s perceptions and leading the march to inevitable doom, not as genuine foresight or scholarly interpretation of religious text, but as self-fulfilling prophecy emanating from artificial nonsense, putting the horse well and truly before the cart, on a very wrong road. People need the confidence to think for themselves, reason above the political propaganda being inculcated into them and question bad leadership as a basic democratic right. I defer to Spinoza, who claimed the superstitious have no other aim than to reduce people to their level. I’d rather see a new Renaissance than reversion to medieval anti-egalitarianism and rule by fear and hate.

Previously, due to the efforts of peace protesters, the Cold War subsided, the wall came down and the future was “open” again, and for more people, with affirmative action policies ensuring it. Rights for women and people of colour were taking hold, Obama was elected and environmental awareness was gaining respectability. But the far-right backlash was lurking in the shadows and is again resuming power. The players may be different, but the game is the same. We’re now threatened by the same forces that were holding back all progress in the 1980s and the same is needed now as then to defeat it.

A few decades later, we now face the same dangers – extremist religious fundamentalism and superstition again driving world affairs with forever wars and the environment in more danger than ever as true knowledge is rendered invisible within a morass of unthinking and irresponsible ignorance.

As I also said back in the ’80s, it’s important to reserve subjective perceptions for aesthetics only and stick to knowledge for truth, given the fascist dangers inherent in that situation ever becoming the reverse. If one madman’s truth becomes the perception of all, aided by superstition, nationalistic jingoism and lack of reason, as has happened on a few notable occasions in history, if the social and economic order so allows it, the results can be catastrophic in a system supposedly set up to unite all to one purpose, which can all too easily be used to implement the purpose of one. Against a brief time of hope, here we are again, as everything that was good about western democracy and international humanitarian law is now being trampled by a powerful few. The current Trump administration is the realisation of the nightmare I warned of in the 1980s – arrogant American colonialism replacing the British and European colonialism of the past, with the same MO of commercial and military force, upheld by an undercurrent of “white” supremacism now driving militaristic expansion, the reversal of DEI policies and the imposition of “superior v inferior” cultural perspectives and belief in the right to dominate. The invasion of Iraq was an overture to the catastrophe right now being played out in the Middle East, as greed, cynically fuelled by those exploiting ignorance, religious fundamentalism, racism and fear, now again has a framework within which to do its worst. As self-appointed “defenders of Western civilisation” define and market “civilisation” as a realm of “righteous” violence, within which mass slaughter of innocents is embraced as a “higher virtue”, and false “Christians” do unto others worse than is done to them, true civilisation and virtue are lost, along with any credibility that the “West” can lead the world into the future.

Unfortunately, unlike in the past, when great figures in science or science communication, such as Carl Sagan, Isaac Asimov and Arthur C. Clarke spoke against militarism and war-funding, this time, the far-right tide has gained added momentum with the emergence of a new breed of supposed science advocates, standing for the opposite, several of them dangerously giving white-supremacist ideologies feigned respectability within politically-motivated nonsense no respectable scientist touches. Circumventing genuine peer review, on their own platforms, they self-proclaim and aggrandise pseudo-scientific anti-DEI/BLM sloganism as ‘superior thinking’, superficial soap-boxing that, in reality, is no more scientific than an average MAGA battle cry. Not only do they fail to genuinely educate the broader public with true knowledge, by giving science a bad name, they undo the work of real scientists attempting to genuinely educate the public on matters such as climate change, the environment, medicine, vaccines, and importantly, critical thinking skills. For example, by loudly advocating against DEI policies, they merely ensure the appointment of anti-science quacks, such as RFK Jr in right-wing governments and by inciting war-mongering violence, they merely confirm the public’s perception of science as being the domain of Frankensteinian stereotypes. With the prospect of a JFK-type leadership from the US, at this time, looking dim, the framework of injustice and humanity must be addressed “from the ground-up”, and as joint effort by good scientists and non-scientists alike.

The dismantling of the Cold War brought great optimism and within less than a generation, the sense of inevitable doom that had over-shadowed the world for decades was only a memory in those who had been there at the time, proving that it is doable.

Diversity and democratic input are needed for true unity, survival and progress. More heads are always better than one and diversity precludes destructive “us and them” and superior/inferior mentalities from taking hold in social and political frameworks. Combatting xenophobia, whether as fear or stereotyping of “the other”, is essential for our survival. Now, as before, we are again in danger of cutting off our futures at the brain stem as a minority of uneducated but well-facilitated fools, with free reign to enact their personal motives, control the fates of the majority and threaten survival of the planet itself. Now, as in the 1980s, there is a way out and we need to be doing everything we can to achieve it.

Uniting the world in a white-male-superiority-versus-everything-else divide is just that – a divide. It’s not unity. It’s not unity of all people. It’s a divide and conquer strategy, exploiting fear and ignorance, designed to serve only the infantile purpose of a very select few. Instead, embrace the spirit of diversity and envision a bright and optimistic future for all, as a people of all peoples, united not to implement the purpose of one, but to secure the future of all.

I applaud the ICJ for recognising the “plausible case for genocide” in Gaza and the ICC for issuing an arrest warrant against Netanyahu and others for war crimes. What is happening in Gaza, the West Bank, Lebanon and now Syria is absolutely unacceptable, and the world must be united in stopping this descent into complete lack of moral and legal standards.

I condemn the Hamas attacks on October 7.

I condemn Israel’s actions in Gaza and the West Bank.

I condemn the genocide that Israel is carrying out against the Palestinian people and the atrocities being committed in the name of “self-defence”.