We should always be worried when leaders get very chummy. Populism claims this is ‘team Australia’, but our…

We should always be worried when leaders get very chummy. Populism claims this is ‘team Australia’, but our Westminster federalist system is built on contestation. Without contestation it collapses, it ceases to work. As we’re seeing with Covid. /1 #auspol https://t.co/bCl8XRGDpJ

That contestation is where claims and decisions are tested. Say you were on trial, and your lawyer and the prosecution lawyer took chummy photos together like this. Who’s looking out for you? It may be your dream to be a ‘consensus’ leader. Consensus is not being chummy. /2 https://t.co/i0sy4hKsvd

Especially not when that chummy togetherness is group-based. Contestation then becomes like the proverbial fart in an elevator, violating the social norms of the small group. Conservatives know this, their ‘freedom’ from regulation replaces it with rigid social conformity. /3 https://t.co/AEDkyOvQCW

And they know how to manipulate that at will. How to offer that conformity unifying slogans that create a sense of group cohesion, like ‘border protection’, or ‘living with the virus’. All decoupled from any contestation, or other rigorous challenge. /end