Issue 107: 21 – 28 September 2022
# Italy
The election of Italy’s fascist-adjacent Giorgia Meloni is a public reminder that women can be just as awful as men
Van Badham | The Guardian
Rather than meeting enforced ideals as feminine objects, our demand is for women to be as individuated, complex and even – would you believe it – just as awful, just as evil or just as hopelessly shit as men.
What’s in a flame? Giorgia Meloni’s Italy
Giovanni Tiso | Overland
The flame in the emblem of Fratelli d’Italia—the ironically gendered ‘Brothers of Italy’ that are about to give Italy its first woman prime minister—is not merely vestigial, or part of the array of ‘mute symbols’ that, according to historian Alessandro Campi, can still be seen in our cities but could never ignite Fascism again.
# Collapsing Economics
Monetary policy is no longer fit for purpose
Ross Gittins | SMH/Age
It would be nice to imagine we’re gradually closing in on the one right way to manage the economy, but this would be a delusion. History tells us we keep changing the way we do it to better fit the particular problems of the era.
Workers did not cause Australia’s inflation woes. But they will be the ones who sacrifice the most
Greg Jericho | The Guardian
The Reserve Bank governor’s recipe for avoiding sustained inflation is for real wages to fall for three years in a row
RIP trickle-down economics – even the financial markets have given up
Michael Pascoe | The New Daily
Nobody – except perhaps Liz Truss, her chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng and a few supporters – is buying the trickle-down fantasy any more.
# Wraparound
We should fight climate change, not prepare for war on China
Sam Wainwright | Green Left
The determination with which our rulers and media are beating the war drums makes it clear: even if China doesn’t strike first, we are drifting to war anyway. It’s the stuff of nightmares
A house of cards: how the Ukraine war has exposed faultlines in the global economy
Guy Rundle | Crikey
The Ukraine war has revealed a state of global precarity. From political upheaval to economic turmoil, the way ahead appears uncertain.
Our Given Body: Roe v Wade
Alison Caddick | Arena Quarterly
The slogan ‘We won’t go back’ meant clearly enough that ‘we won’t go back’ to before there were open and safe abortion services, where women wouldn’t bleed to death at the hands of backyard abortionists; which effectively means before second wave feminism.
Exposed: “The Most Extensive Case Of Covert Pro-Western Information Operation On Social Media”
Peter Cronau | Declassified Australia
The covert operation to influence online audiences has been using ‘deceptive tactics to promote pro-Western narratives’, while ‘opposing countries including Russia, China, and Iran’.
# Protests, industrial action and First Nations struggle
Plasterboard workers fighting and management lockouts at Knauf
Adam Bottomley | Red Flag
In late August, around 50 union members at Knauf plasterboard held a meeting in their Melbourne factory to discuss recent EBA negotiations, which had begun a few months earlier. A new HR manager insisted on attending the meeting and wasted people’s time… As he spoke, one after another the workers turned their backs on him.
Racism allegations at Hawthorn AFL club shocked some but the ugly truths of the AFL mirror our society
Stan Grant | ABC News
We already know the ugly truths of the AFL. This is the game where a senior club official once said Aboriginal people were welcome if they acted like white people.
Santos loses landmark legal battle against Indigenous rights
Binoy Kampmark | Independent Australia
Mining giant Santos has been ordered to shut down a major drilling operation after it was found that local Tiwi Islanders had not been consulted.