“If we would just be a little bit braver we’d realise there’s power in numbers”. That was Dave Rubin’s message for the silent majority standing up to radical progressives from our 50 min chat with him this week for The Young IPA Podcast
Follow The Young IPA Podcast here on iTunes, or any podcast platform you use so you never miss an episode. And if you want to be the King or Queen of the BBQ/edgy inner city hipster house party, sign up to the IPA before March 15 and explain in 20 words or less why you are Dave Rubin’s biggest fan to win a t-shirt and stubby holder signed by Dave.
I should be surprised that a Coalition minister instructed the public to boycott a company for the sin of selling cheap milk. I should be. That’s what happened this week when agriculture minister David Littleproud on Tuesday urged customers to “switch their business” away from Coles and Aldi for selling a litre of milk for $1. Not to be outdone, Labor announced they’ll set farmgate milk prices if they win the election.
I feel like we’ve been here before. Politicians, celebrities and journalists in the US have gone curiously quiet as Empire actor Jussie Smollett’s story of being the victim of a racist and homophobic assault continues to unravel. Heather Mac Donald wrote in City Journal on Monday that as society incentivises victimhood, but actual racism becomes thankfully rarer, the search for “bigotry becomes increasingly frenzied and unmoored from reality”.
The Smollett incident, along with the Covington kids, also shows that the problem of ‘perceptual and judgement creep’ isn’t going away. The concept – that reductions in the prevalence of social problems may “lead people to see more of them” – “could turn out to be one of the most significant pieces of social science research published in recent years” wrote John Roskam in the AFR in June.
Meghan Markle has backed a campaign to “confront the legacies of empire” at universities, to “decolonise” the curriculum and make sure there’s not too many “male, pale and stale” professors reported The Daily Mail this week. Um… does someone want to tell Meghan what her new in-laws have been up to for the last 400 years?
Boy, am I glad I’ve finished university! The University of Adelaide has renamed its ‘Fresher Fest’ the ‘Get More Fest’ because the term ‘fresher’ is “potentially harmful to students”. The University of Sydney has replaced O-Week with ‘Welcome Week’ which will consist of consent training and bystander awareness workshops. I feel genuinely sorry for today’s youth.
But don’t worry young people, the IPA’s Generation Liberty program has got you covered! Senator James Paterson is offering a special discount price for Gen Lib members to attend his conversation with Senator Amanda Stoker and Miranda Devine on March 6 in Melbourne. Details and tickets here.
Article of the week:
If no one has assured you that the United States has become a xenophobic hellhole since President Trump’s election, you need to get out more. The terrific Robbie Soave from Reason wrote this piece on Monday making it clear there is no statistical evidence for the claim that hate crimes are surging in the US.
IPA Staff Pick:
Each week an IPA staff member shares what they have enjoyed recently. Today: Gideon Rozner
When then-candidate Donald Trump declared that “the American dream is dead”, he electrified a substantial segment of the American public, and triggered a populist revolution that catapulted him to the Oval Office.
In this 57 min Reason Podcast with Nick Gillespie from last Friday, Washington Examiner commentary editor Timothy P Carney discusses his new book, Alienated America: Why Some Places Thrive While Others Collapse. In the same vein as JD Vance and Charles Murray, Carney looks at American communities breaking under the weight of economic and societal collapse and what can be done to save them.
Here’s what else the IPA said this week:
- Dr Jennifer Marohasy, Bureau rewrites history – again, at Albany – IPA Today
- Tiffany Jenkins, We’re all victims now – IPA Review
- Renee Gorman, Six of the best – IPA Review
- Daniel Wild, Labor’s real tactics on borders, taxes – Sky News The Bolt Report
- Evan Mulholland, Journalists should stop relying on Twitter – Sky News The Front Page
