In June, Eurydice Dixon was raped and murdered as she walked through Princess Park in Melbourne late at night.
In response police, conservatives and regular people gave condolences, lamented the evil perpetrated and gave practical advice to women to be aware of their surroundings and to take precautions to mitigate against meeting the same fate.
Leftists responded by accusing those who gave this practical advice of blaming the victim. This was typified by a nonsensical monologue by Lisa Wilkinson on the Project in which she effectively blamed all men for the rape of Eurydice Dixon with the argument, rather than telling to women be aware of their personal safety, how about we teach men not to rape:
It is akin saying that advising motorists to lock their car doors is victim blaming if their cars get broken into. It does not make sense.
This divide played itself out in federal parliament last week as a motion to allow women to carry non-lethal weapons for self defence was solidly defeated. (This right should be extended to men and women, as should be the right right to bear arms, but that argument is for another article.) The grounds given for opposing giving women a greater ability to defend themselves was the same illogical argument which had been made in the media; that women shouldn’t have to defend themselves, men should just stop raping women.
This is of no help to women, for the aforementioned reason that evil people are not going to be deterred by being told not to rape. The fact it is against the law already sends this message, yet it does not always stop evildoers. This is also deeply insulting to men, as it collectively blames all men.
This collective blame is what Greens Senator Sarah Hanson-Young did when she called out, as claimed by Liberal Democrats Senator David Leyonhjelm, that men should stop raping women. Leyonhjelm responded by calling out that Hanson-Young should “stop shagging men.”
Leyonhjelm has given an excellent explanation of why this forceful response was appropriate:
“She called out somethng that I’m 99% sure was “if only men would stop raping women”, so she was saying that in the context of why do they need something for self defence, the inference being that men are collectively responsible for such attacks as happened to Eurydice Dixon. I responded by saying “stop shagging men.”
“She was effectively saying “men are the enemy.” I responded by saying “you’re sleeping with the enemy.”
Naturally, Sarah Hanson-Young got upset, demanded an apology, and when Leyonhjelm did not back down, neither in parliament nor in interviews since, has sent him a legal letter accusing him of “defamatory actions”.
There is a standard operating procedure in politics: Someone on the left enacts a reprehensible policy or says something reprehensible – conservatives respond forcefully to said reprehensibility – sooner or later a conservative says something which, according to rules of engagement set by the left, is claimed to cross the line of acceptable behaviour – said conservative either caves in, apologises, and loses the entire battle, or said conservative doubles down and escalates, forces the leftist to back down, and wins the political battle.
In general since World War Two, conservatives have eventually backed down and allowed the left to dominate the key posts in the institutions of our society, and to frame the very nature of reality itself.
So it is stirring to see Senator Leyonhjelm stand his ground against leftist charges of “misogyny”, and to respond to Hanson-Young’s legal letter with his own set of demands.
It has been disappointing, although not really surprising, to see a host of conservative journalists and politicians criticise Leyonhjelm and to call for him to apologise.
By accepting the left’s frame of reference they are continuing the cycle of conservative defeat.
This is a potential disaster because what is in dispute is the fundamental difference between how conservatives and socialists view the world. Conservatives and regular people understand that evil exists in and of itself. It can be understood, and very occasionally redeemed, but the best approach is to defend ourselves against evil and punish those who commit evil.
Marxists, on the other hand, believe that marginalisation causes anti-social outcomes, which can be remedied by socialising brainwashing people to behave how they want them to behave. Their denial of basic economics is why socialism always fails and causes starvation and death for millions. Their denial of basic human nature is why socialist regimes deliberately slaughter their people due to their belief that to make socialist economics work, they have to change people.
Thus when a woman is raped and murdered, conservatives and libertarians acknowledge the evil, take measure to punish it and advise people to take precautions against it. Socialists are offended by the very notion that they are at the mercy of human nature, and that they have any kind of responsibility to protect themselves against it.
So this is more than a case of a man who proposes action which will make the world safer being accused of hating women, by a woman who is actively making the world less safe. This is more than blaming all men for the actions of one evil man. This is more than the left’s conflation of so-called disrespectful attitudes toward women with sexual harassment and rape. This is more than the left’s demonisation of masculinity, and its determination to deny biological reality and the biologically complementary roles of the two sexes.
This is about who holds power in this country, and what values determine how our society operates. Just as emotional appeals to compassion and “equality” are used hypocritically to justify voting down a policy which would make Australia safer, such emotional appeals are used to justify socialist economic policies which increase Australia’s unprecedented debt. Emotional appeals to “diversity” and “tolerance” are used to justify an immigration policy that further expands our housing market bubble and is overturning the demographic make up of Australia.
David Leyonhjelm recognises that we are fighting over fundamental principles which determine how the world operates, and is not going to be intimidated into submission when accused of violating speech codes set by the left. Conservatives need to recognise this and back him to the hilt, otherwise we will lose an important battle in the Culture War, and continue Australia’s capitulation to Marxists.