Words by Aisha JK
Art supplied by SURLY
Article mentions; Roe v Wade overturn by SCOTUS, BLM and George Floyd, COVID-19 Pandemic, Brittany Higgins case, Vietnam War, Aboriginal deaths in custody & climate crisis.
How I Became A Socialist Activist at Uni
We live in a world that seems to be defined by constant and compounding crises. You’d be forgiven if you looked around at the world today and felt a bit hopeless. For the last three years we’ve watched millions die at the hands of a once-in-a-lifetime global pandemic.[1] Currently climate change is reaching new heights of irreversibility[2], yet politicians still speak of long-distant and unstarted plans for net zero by 2050[3]. And still today we’re faced with regular news stories about imperialist war in Ukraine, war crimes committed by Australian troops in Afghanistan[4], refugees remaining locked up by brutal Australian border policies[5], and Indigenous oppression reaching new heights as we pass three decades since the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody[6]. It’s this brutality that means so many feel dejected at our prospects of an equal, let alone liberated future.
This is exacerbated by the fact that political leaders we often look to to make change are just as committed to maintaining this status quo. You can glance to the United States, where abortion has been overturned under a Democratic government[7], and poverty and militarisation is rising simultaneously[8] [9]. Or even right here in Australia, where the Labor party has offered no real opposition to the Liberal Party, and now rules in the same way they have. Albanese’s Labor Party remains committed to opening new coal and gas projects[10], maintaining a border regime that has inspired the likes of Donald Trump[11] and has condemned thousands of refugees to lives in limbo, and ruling over an ever widening gap between the richest and the poorest – with workers’ rights in the gutter[12].
While all of this sounds gloomy, instead of feeling dejected by the crisis around us, we should instead let it power our rage at the very system that lays the basis for it. It’s this rage we can use to organise, mobilise, and take action to fight for a better world.
When I started at Monash, I had hopes of making the world a bit better. I was angry about the systemic racism that had killed George Floyd the year before, and had seen millions take the streets of America to fight for justice[13]. Brittany Higgins had just come out against sexism in the halls of parliament, and the accusations against Christian Porter further showcased the rotten and structural sexism embedded in the elite institutions that govern this country[14]. Tens of thousands of people across Australia linked arms and took to the streets to condemn this[15]. There are so many issues that can motivate us to take a stand, a loud one, in defiance of a status quo that is worth squashing. What turned my rage at the world into activism was striving to have an understanding as to how we can effectively fight back.
The way I turned my outrage into real action was by meeting the Socialist club on campus. It was with discussions with genuine, anti-capitalist activists that I learned about how the crises that make so many of us identify as left-wing are caused by the very economic system that governs our society.
It is the priorities of capitalism – profit above all else – that mean the earth continues to be pillaged for fossil fuels while climate change unfolds around us. It’s these same priorities that mean homes are built to be sold to the highest bidder and not to house the homeless, why university degrees now cost thousands of dollars instead of being free. Taking up the fight against capitalism is inherently taking up the fight against sexism, racism, climate destruction, and many other evils we see today.
It seems like a big task though, right? How do you fight the system? Well we’re lucky to have two-centuries of heroic examples to point to of ordinary people changing things for the better. That history continues to be made. Just last year in Melbourne 15,000 people came onto the streets of Melbourne to protest in solidarity with women in the USA who had their right to abortion struck by the Supreme Court with the overturn of Roe V Wade[16]. Weeks of protests outside the Park Hotel on Swanston Street organised by the Campaign Against Racism and Fascism ended when the refugees locked within this hotel prison were released on bridging visas[17]. We can look internationally to see strike waves and street protests shaking the Iranian regime, people of all walks of life standing arm-in-arm under the banner of ‘Women, Life, Freedom!’[18]. In 2020, Black Lives Matter demonstrations shook the world, 26 million people came out in the USA alone[19]. In Australia tens of thousands take to the streets every Invasion Day to condemn Australian nationalism and fight for Indigenous liberation[20].
It is these moments, moments of struggle, that have left bruises on this political system that breeds oppression and is founded on inequality. And I think it is this collective activism of ordinary people, of workers striking and holding the profits of the capitalists at ransom, of street protests of millions or small protests of hundreds, that have led us to where we are today. A world that might be crisis-ridden, but is filled to the brim with people who are sick of it, and ready to fight for a change.
As students, we can look to the university students of Myanmar[21] and Hong Kong[22] who have led struggles for democracy and against military dictatorship in the last few years alone. Historically, students have performed a radical role in sparking revolt. And even at Monash in the 60s and 70s where students took a stand against the Vietnam War by staging then-controversial protests in support of the Vietnamese resistance[23]. We have more time and freedom at this point in our lives than we have ever had, and we ever will have, so why not throw ourselves in?
I became an activist at uni, not through my course, but through becoming political, angry, and anticapitalist. By striving to understand the world, not to make small changes, but to do whatever it takes to be a part of the fight for a liberated society. You can get involved this year as well. On March 8th there’s going to be the International Women’s Day demonstrations, where we can take to the streets and demand resistance to sexism. March 17th is a National Day of Action for Climate Justice[24], organised through the National Union of Students Education Office, where university students across the country can skip class and strike for climate action. If you’re sick of watching things get worse, and ready to join us in fighting back, there is no better time than now.
Aisha KJ – Member of Monash Socialists
REFERENCES:
[1] https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/coronavirus-excess-deaths-estimates
[2] https://unfccc.int/news/climate-plans-remain-insufficient-more-ambitious-action-needed-now
[4]https://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parliament/Parliamentary_Departments/Parliamentary_Library/pubs/BriefingBook47p/BreretonReport#:~:text=The%20Inspector%2DGeneral%20of%20the%20Australian%20Defence%20Force%20Afghanistan%20Inquiry,Afghanistan%20between%202005%20and%202016.
[6] https://www.naa.gov.au/explore-collection/first-australians/royal-commission-aboriginal-deaths-custody#:~:text=The%20Royal%20Commission%20was%20established,General%20on%2016%20October%201987.
[7] https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/roe-v-wade-and-supreme-court-abortion-cases
[8] https://www.pgpf.org/blog/2022/06/the-united-states-spends-more-on-defense-than-the-next-9-countries-combined
[9] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-09-13/us-poverty-rate-rises-for-second-year-incomes-little-changed?leadSource=uverify%20wall
[11] https://www.ft.com/content/8fef57ba-9c7d-11e9-9c06-a4640c9feebb
[12] https://oxfamilibrary.openrepository.com/bitstream/handle/10546/621477/bp-survival-of-the-richest-160123-en.pdf
[13] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/07/03/us/george-floyd-protests-crowd-size.html
[14] https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/05/world/australia/parliament-women-rape-metoo.html
[15] https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-56397170
[16] https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/abortion-rights-rally–melbourne-20220702-h24the.html
[17] https://asrc.org.au/2022/04/07/park-hotel-empty-as-26-refugees-are-released/
[18] https://redflag.org.au/article/we-are-all-mahsa-riots-shake-iran
[19] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/07/03/us/george-floyd-protests-crowd-size.html
[20] https://www.smh.com.au/national/we-are-sovereign-tens-of-thousands-take-to-streets-for-invasion-day-rally-20230126-p5cfpr.html
[21] https://www.frontiermyanmar.net/en/inside-the-juntas-war-on-student-unions/
[22] https://www.science.org/content/article/hong-kong-student-protesters-demand-more-support-their-universities
[23] https://researchonline.federation.edu.au/vital/access/services/Download/vital:14628/SOURCE1
[24] https://fb.me/e/2A1OK8KRH
