Alex Antic (SA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

A wise man once said: 'Breaking someone's trust is like crumpling up a perfect piece of paper. You can smooth it over, but it's never going to be the same.' In 2022, Australians have a right to feel this way about many institutions they used to trust. Our government departments are now highly politicised. They subscribe to ludicrous ideological claims along the lines of race, gender and sexuality and refuse to deviate from them for fear of angering the intolerant diversity, inclusion and equity brigade. Yet they can't even tell us what a woman is. Why? Because they're highly politicised. Sadly, leftist political ideology has invaded every sphere of life, from sports teams being forced to wear Pride guernseys and bending the knee for Black Lives Matter to the entertainment industry relentlessly pushing propaganda onto our children and our educational institutions seeking to erase every hint of our great heritage from the curriculum.

We've also witnessed our educational institutions and once trusted academic journals become captured by ideological zealots. The key to understanding this phenomenon is understanding 'the long march through the institutions', a term coined by German Marxist intellectual, Rudi Dutschke, who advocated for Marxist revolution—not by violent means as Marx did but by a gradual infiltration of Western institutions and subversion of their principles from within. The revolution would take place not by tearing down buildings but by changing what occurs within them. They've gradually infiltrated the universities, the media and the bureaucracies where these theories don't have to work to be taken seriously. It's also why Marxists are interested in controlling our educational institutions, which shape the minds of future generations. There, left-wing curriculum makers seek to deny children the opportunity to learn about their Western heritage and replace it with a false notion that Australia is a racist country. This disrupts social cohesion and fosters resentment, making it easier to replace our heritage with a Marxist worldview of the power struggles between groups.

The long march has been successful. The principles of our institutions have been dismantled and replaced by a left-wing ideology obsessed with oppression and oppressors. People who don't subscribe are vilified and face social penalties for not conforming to the woke status quo, even losing their jobs.

You're right to question your institutions. The Therapeutic Goods Association told you that the experimental COVID mRNA shots were safe and effective. But they were neither. Your public health bureaucrats locked you in your homes, and it didn't work. Professional bodies have swapped professional advocacy for professional activism. All have failed because, rather than focusing on their work, these institutions have become exploited by politics. Public health is now politicised. The education system is now politicised. Sport is now politicised. Entertainment is now politicised. Advertising is now politicised. The corporate sector is now politicised. Even your job is politicised.

They're wrong to tell you that you're a racist for believing every Australian should enjoy equal opportunity. They're wrong to call you a transphobe for knowing what a woman is. They're wrong to call you homophobic for believing that our children deserve a mother and a father in the home. Their isms and phobias are meaningless insults, used to intimidate you into silence so that their revolution can proceed. The woke brigade lose their unearned credibility when we deny them the high moral ground. They attack people for opposing equity and social justice while trying to destroy their connection to history, their right to speak freely and their right to protect their children from these influences.

In South Australia at least, a grassroots movement is changing the trajectory, with the aim of building institutions that receive the wisdom of the past with gratitude. Many quiet Australians who hold the true values of the Liberal Party are joining our political ranks to support like-minded types and take back political ground from the radical left. The movement is one of regeneration—building up rather than tearing down and treasuring the traditions that our forebearers gave us rather than carelessly discarding them. We are slowly regaining ground. We will win back the institutions. We will straighten out that crumpled piece of paper and we'll win back people's trust.