If the non-response to the marches against the Iraq war in 2003 confirmed a disabling political cynicism in many people, today we witness the political fruits of two decades of aggression in the Middle East and its fallout.
A war is being waged in and on Syria. Protecting the people from the dictator is no more than the usual pretext for attacks on Middle Eastern countries.
Women and children feel much safer now we are told. It is only when we go to the ground and recall that any relations between Aboriginal people and police in the present are built upon a deeply fraught history that the prospect of increased policing takes on a different inflection. By Jon Altman and Melinda Hinkson