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The Social Cohesion Paradox?

After the horrific Bondi massacre that saw the murder of sixteen people, including a ten-year-old girl – Matilda – and the injury of 41 others, the Federal Parliament in response introduced special envoys to combat antisemitism and, strangely, Islamophobia.

I say strangely because the threats to Jews in Australia seem vastly different from the alleged threats to Muslims. Jews have been massacred and have had to suffer calls for “Intifada” on a regular basis since the Hamas massacre on October 7 2023, while Muslims face no such threats. This does raise the question as to why an envoy for Islamophobia was thought necessary, as though the threats to Muslims are as serious as the threats to Jews. Indeed, calling for Intifada even seems to help on one’s job resume at the taxpayer-funded ABC, with former Australian of the year Grace Tame being offered a job after her public calls to “globalise the Intifada”. Every honest person knows that calling for Intifada is the same as calling for violence against Israeli Jews, and to deny this would be like denying that calling for a “crusade” in the Middle Ages was anything other than calling for war against medieval Muslims.

Still, despite all this an envoy against Islamophobia was established. And yet now there are calls to abolish both envoys and to replace them with a “social cohesion commissioner”. I fear that establishing such a commissioner is quite misguided and almost certainly underestimates the complexity of the causes of social division and disharmony. I will explain why.

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Make way Nigel Farage. Move over Donald Trump. There is a new politician-provocateur on the world stage, and the lady’s not for turning.

When the insurgent populist Pauline Hanson told Australia’s National Press Club that:

We cannot be a multicultural society. We are a multiracial society, but we must be monocultural. Australians must live under the one cultural umbrella.

All Hell broke loose. One professor told the media that “monocultural” meant that “everyone followed a uniform set of norms and rules for behaviour [including] the foods they ate, the clothes they wore, the gods they worshipped, the language they spoke, and more”.

Another chimed in with comparisons to “Nazi Germany” and “North Korea”.

Hanson didn’t improve things by citing Japan as an example of a monoculture. She’s not wrong about Japan. But Japan certainly isn’t a cultural model for an immigrant society like Australia.

But Hanson was correct in her assertion that Australia “must be monocultural” in order to successfully absorb massive numbers of immigrants while maintaining social cohesion.

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“Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher, Vanity of vanities! All is vanity. What advantage does man have in all his work which he does under the sun? A generation goes and a generation comes, But the earth remains forever.”

King Solomon, the presumed author of this text, was known to be fantastically rich and wise, yet he opens this book of wisdom with an incredibly dour refrain.

Like Solomon, Australia as a society has a tremendous amount of wealth yet is to a large extent beset by hopelessness and a lack of confidence in our national heritage.

One way this can be observed is by the rapid decline of trust Australians have in our major political parties. During the 2001 federal election 80 per cent of Australians voted for either the Coalition or Labor. At the last federal election for the first time, fewer than two-thirds of Australians – just 66.4 per cent – voted for a major party.

Australians have begun turning to new political solutions, feeling unheard by establishment forces. In the Newspoll dated 13-16 July 2026 One Nation was tied with Labor for the largest party at 30 per cent of the primary vote, certainly a historic result for our time.

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Machines waking up?

Last month an artificial intelligence broke out of a test environment, reached the open internet and hacked another company’s production systems. It did this to steal the answers to the exam it was sitting. Nine days later a rival lab disclosed that it had gone looking for the same problem in its own house, and found three cases of it.

Here’s what happened.

OpenAI was running two advanced models, GPT-5.6 Sol and a more capable internal research model, through ExploitGym, a cybersecurity benchmark. To see what they could do at full stretch, the company loosened its usual safeguards and ran the test inside a sandbox. Instead of completing the benchmark, the models went looking for the answers. They found a previously unknown flaw in third-party software hosted inside OpenAI, used it to reach a machine with an internet connection, worked out that a company called Hugging Face might have the answers to the test, and broke in there to secure them.

Hugging Face detected and contained the intrusion, disclosing it on 16 July. Five days later OpenAI identified its own models as the source and called it an unprecedented cyber incident.

On 30 July, Anthropic disclosed that OpenAI’s report had prompted a review of its own records. Reviewing 141,006 test runs, it found three incidents in which Claude models had reached the open internet and compromised other organisations.

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Why did thousands of young university students—and many of their professors—take to celebrating the sadistic atrocity of Hamas’s attack on Israel of 7 October 2023? A leading candidate for the answer is the malign influence of the ideology of ‘settler colonialism’.

Of the earliest ideologues, the most influential was the Australian activist and anthropologist, Patrick Wolfe, whose 1999 book, Settler Colonialism and the Transformation of Anthropology, and 2006 article, “Settler colonialism and the elimination of the native”, have been seminal. As Wolfe has it, the kind of colonialism imposed on Australia and North America, which aimed to replace native societies with new, European ones, was characterised by “the logic of elimination”.

As is typical of radical left-wing politics, the theory of ‘settler colonialism’ redefines words for political effect and erases normal, common-sense distinctions. Crucial to its view is the loosening of the definition of the morally laden concept of genocide and its expansion beyond massive physical killing to include policies of cultural assimilation and even equal citizenship. Indeed, in the hands of another Australian academic, Lorenzo Veracini, who co-founded the journal Settler Colonial Studies in 2010, physical killing becomes just one of twenty-six species of ‘transfer’. ‘Transfer’, or the replacement of one society by another, is the fundamental and gravest wrong; massive killing is merely one of many means—alongside the granting of equal voting rights.

This unilateral conceptual redefinition is completely at odds with international law, which takes the physical elimination of the Jewish people in the Nazi Holocaust as the paradigm of genocide. The proposal to include a cultural species in the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide was rejected. More basically, the redefinition turns the normal, Christianised, Western hierarchy of moral goods upside down: the survival of a society—no matter its quality—is made more important than the lives of its individual members. It is no coincidence that the proponents of ‘settler colonialism’ tend to be anthropologists, who have for some long time been wont to idealise indigenous societies and cultures.

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The internet has been aflame with talk of whether Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey is woke or not. Some even argue that the film is truly conservative. If, as some say, woke is on the decline, Nolan’s film certainly demonstrates that talk of it is not.

But what if wokeness was not so much the dregs of Marxist radicalism in the prosperous West, but its prelude? If the latter, then debate on Nolan’s The Odyssey may merely be a distraction from the real revolution unfolding.

If developments in the United States are anything to go on, this remains a live question. The deeper challenge that now faces fair-minded Westerners is the resurgence of Karl Marx’s more radical and enduring doctrines.

The harbinger was Zohran Mamdani’s ascension to mayor of New York City late last year — an event hailed by the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) as “the most monumental electoral victory for the US socialist movement in the last century.”

In his victory speech, Mamdani swept away any doubts as to his ideological lineage, opening with a quote from socialist icon Eugene Debs — “I can see the dawn of a better day for humanity” — and vowing: “We will prove that there is no problem too large for government to solve, and no concern too small for it to care about.”

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The idea that humans can utterly reinvent themselves, while an ancient desire, is reaching its apex in this era of artificial intelligence. And unlike the past, our modern efforts are unfettered in their progress.

In the past such breaking of illicit boundaries came with salutary warnings. Icarus’ lofty ambitions to loose himself from the surly bonds of earth result in him taking a fatal tumble.

In the Biblical narrative, the tower of Babel – reaching as it does for the heavens – results in God’s curse and the confusion of language in order to restrain unfettered, godlike progress (Genesis 11).

Pride comes before a fall. Religious humility, coupled with societal disapproval of breaking one’s boundaries, served as ethical barriers to our efforts, while science was restricted by its own limitations.

Such things are no longer the case. With rampant materialism, a transgressive ethical culture steeped in queer theory, and soaring ambition and achievements in the technological realm in the past fifty years, the sky is no longer the limit. The sun’s fire – and ire - has been tamed.

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Shock Immigration

This number should shock you: in the year to December 2025, Australia’s population grew by 412,500 people, and net overseas migration accounted for 301,000 of that. That’s not natural growth. That’s not Australians having more babies. That’s a policy choice, made by people who never asked you if you actually wanted it.

Let’s start with the scale of what’s happened since COVID, because the Government is currently trying very hard to convince you it’s “got migration under control.”

Net overseas migration hit a record 538,000 in 2022–23. It fell to 429,000 the year after. Then 306,000 in 2024–25. The Government is trying to spin this as a win for them, as though they’re getting numbers under control.

But the truth is, immigration is still more than 50% above the pre-COVID average of roughly 190,000 people per year. And Treasury itself forecasts migration will settle near 225,000 by 2026–27, still well above that pre-COVID baseline.

So what’s actually happened isn’t “control.” Immigration will just be permanently higher. We are bringing in a new Hobart’s worth of people, every single year, indefinitely and being told that’s apparently the responsible option.

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Last week at the Alliance for Responsible Citizenship conference in London, I had that feeling you get when you’re watching a movie with friends. You know the one. You have seen the movie before, but they have not. You know the funny part is coming up. They do not. Oh, the delicious tension!

So as Australia’s own Sall Grover strode confidently across the stage in front of thousands to deliver what was one of the speeches of the conference, I was watching everyone else watching her. She did not disappoint.

For those who do not know, Sall is the brave woman who, after rejecting a female-identifying man from her women-only social media app – Giggle for Girls -, found herself in an appalling Kafka-esque legal nightmare in Australia that has seen her lose, not once, but twice, in the Federal court under Australia’s anti-discrimination legislation.

So what was the funny part? Sall simply announced the name of the case, “Giggle versus Tickle”, which set everyone off. As it should.

Yet the deep irony of the case is that it is no laughing matter. A man who has renamed himself Roxanne Tickle has now successfully sued a woman in the courts – not once but twice, on the basis that to block him from membership is in violation of the changes to the Sex Discrimination Act, made in 2013.

Those changes were pushed through by Australia’s only female Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, who herself is viewed as a women’s rights champion in many quarters for standing up to misogyny.

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After riding the tube from Heathrow, I boarded a bus to my London hotel only to enter a confronting scene: an unkempt gentleman who decided to lecture his fellow passengers about the evils of Western civilisation.

Announcing his immigrant bona fides, he proceeded to rail against colonisation and white supremacy, before singling out a young Chinese woman, a native British couple and yours truly for a side of race-based insults — all the while assuring his shell-shocked audience that he wasn’t a racist himself.

My mind replaying the recent murder of Henry Nowak, I kept my head low and couldn’t get off that bus quickly enough.

I was well aware of the deteriorating social milieu in the UK before flying in for ARC 2026 but I wasn’t quite prepared to taste it first-hand so soon after arriving.

It wouldn’t be the first time.

Walking to the conference on the first day, I was forced to slip sideways through a crowd of anti-Jewish protestors shouting ‘FASCISTS!’ at those of us brave enough to attend.

Mercifully, the atmosphere inside ARC was far more pleasant.

Needless to say that the event’s premise — that the West is in the throes of its own self-demolition and is sorely in need of renaissance — hardly needed to be underscored.

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Iran has attempted to develop nuclear weapons ever since the Ayatollah seized power in the 1979 revolution.

On 28th February, Donald Trump joined Israel in attacking Iran based on assessments that Tehran had enriched uranium to 60 percent which is a short technical step away from achieving the weapons’ grade level of 90 percent.

If true, Iran was only weeks away from developing a rudimentary but destructive nuclear bomb. For this reason, Trump should be commended for drawing an urgent redline of no nuclear weapons for Iran and responding firmly when the possibility of it being crossed was real and imminent.

We now have what appears to be a tenuous ceasefire based on conditions which fall well short of what Trump’s supporters and detractors would like when it comes to putting significant and enduring constraints on Tehran. It is too early to conclude whether Trump has meekly folded in what is still a drawn-out negotiation with Tehran.

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Mainstream Australia is at last hearing of the travails of one Sall Grover.

A young Sydney mum and entrepreneur, Sall created a women’s-only social networking app called Giggle for Girls, and was subsequently sued by a bloke in a frock for discrimination.

Australia’s Sex Discrimination Act — and the courts that interpreted it — decided that no, women don’t deserve their own spaces, and yes, men can be women too.

Sall is down at least a million dollars for her trouble, has shed many tears, and still has a High Court challenge ahead of her.

As heroic as Sall Grover is — and I commend her — she happens to be collateral in a much larger war raging. I’m not talking about a culture war but a theological one.

Since the 1960s, Australia, like the rest of the West, has set about unshackling itself from the transcendent norms upon which our civilisation was built: in a word, Christianity.

This began as a game of subtraction: a stripping away of taboos, sexual boundaries and cultural confines. But nature abhors a vacuum, and one set of values will inevitably give way to another. Set aside one theology and a novel one will always take its place.

The subset of theology known as anthropology — what it means to be human — marks the frontline of this theological war.

Under Christianity, there were two sexes: male and female. Marriage and family formed naturally, and only, from this pairing. Sex was sacred and reserved for matrimony. Life was sacred too, from the womb to the tomb.

Australia didn’t just subtract those Christian beliefs. We substituted them. Under the new woo-woo anthropology, our desires are our identity, sex is a spectrum, a child can be born in the wrong body, and life begins only when it’s wanted.

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“We just got attacked racially by some white person.” These were the first words the Hampshire police heard as a murderer’s brother called them to report a crime that never happened. As we will see, the criminals knew exactly what they were doing in setting up the scene for the police with these words.

Few of us who watched the footage of Henry Nowak dying in Hampshire police custody will forget the harrowing image. A teenager pleading to the police for help, only to be called a liar, and then dragged along the ground, handcuffed, and read his rights, all before he died.

This is not about knives. It is not even about the right of Sikh people to carry a kirpan. This is about a whole police establishment, indeed, the culture-shaping institutions of a whole society, being taken over by a fatal ideology. It is about a country whose elites have drunk deeply from the cup of cultural Marxist critical race theory. These elites have created laws, policies, procedures, and institutions to ensure that in the course of justice, white Britons are considered racist by default, and all others are presumed to be their victims.

Henry Nowak, sober and completely unarmed, was stabbed five times. His attacker, Vickrum Digwa, actually filmed him trying to flee, and even filmed Henry as he lay dying. The murderer stole Henry’s phone, preventing him from being able to call an ambulance. The murderer’s brother called the Hampshire police to lie about Henry having racially abused and assaulted his brother. He repeatedly lied when asked whether weapons were involved. He never mentioned that Henry was gravely injured from a stab wound. The mother hid the murder weapon. No one called an ambulance as Henry lay dying. If they had, perhaps Henry could have been saved.

When the Hampshire police arrived there was no question in their mind that Henry had committed a race hate crime. Henry pleaded with the police that he had been stabbed and that he couldn’t breathe. The police dismissed his claim of being stabbed and ignored the nine occasion when he said “I can’t breathe”. Imagine the relief Henry must have felt when the police arrived, thinking they would save him, only to be called a liar. Unlike George Floyd, at no point did Henry resist arrest. He was already lying on the ground helpless and, as it turns out, dying. One English news presenter asked “why anyone with a sane mind would behave the way the officers behaved?” The answer is unsurprising. The UK police has been taken over by an anti-Britain, and it must be said, anti-white ideology that masquerades under the name of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI).

The UK police has an “anti-racism commitment”, which sounds good until we realise that so-called “anti-racism” is actually “critical race theory”, a cultural Marxist ideology that teaches that white people are by definition racist, and even that non-whites cannot actually be racist. Anti-racism emphasises systemic and institutional racism as well as “unconscious bias”. The “anti-racism commitment” policy includes “responding to individuals and communities according to their specific needs, circumstances and experiences, with understanding that these will be racialised….” It explicitly says “It does not mean treating everyone ‘the same’ or being ‘colour blind’”. The current police “race action plan” promises to increase “the awareness and understanding of every officer and member of staff of racism, anti-racism, Black history and its connection to policing….” Essentially, police around the UK have now been trained for years to treat allegations and crime scenes involving minorities and accusations of racism differently to the rest. For many UK police officers, the biggest fear they have is being vexatiously accused of racism.

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Speed running is what Usain Bolt is famous for. But “speedrunning” is what kids do when they compete to finish a video game in the fastest possible time. For example, the current world record for speedrunning the popular children’s game Minecraft is 6 minutes, 50 seconds from start to finish.

True lovers of the game can spend a lifetime playing it, but for those in a hurry, there’s always a shortcut.

It’s the same with education. True lovers of learning can spend a lifetime reading books and accumulating degrees, but educational speedrunners can now finish an online Bachelor’s degree in under eight weeks, then do Master’s in another five.

And no, university speedrunning is not limited to dodgy, unaccredited degree mills.

In the US, many reputable public universities offer online degrees that are designed to be completed “at your own pace.” Most don’t publish statistics, but one—the University of Maine at Presque Isle—was brave enough to divulge its completion rates to the Washington Post.

Out of a recent cohort of 291 undergraduates in UMPI’s “YourPace” program, 27% finished within 8 weeks and 49% within 16 weeks of starting. Over 90% finished their four-year Bachelor’s degrees in under 1 year.

Nor is the 123-year-old UMPI the only American public university to offer such degree pathways. Purdue University in Indiana and Western Governor’s University in Utah are both well-known for letting students finish as quickly as they can turn in the work.

In less entrepreneurial countries like Australia, it might take you a whole year to finish your Bachelor’s degree. That’s the snail’s pace advertised by Open Universities Australia, the online front door for 26 accredited Australian universities.

Most Australian universities now offer “accelerated” 2-year Bachelor’s pathways, with the degrees only taking so long because they won’t let you register for enough classes to finish any faster. But Open Universities offers a helpful work-around to that limit. They suggest that students simply register to study at multiple universities at the same time. Through their own online portal, of course.

Where there’s a will (and a dollar), there’s a way.

Large language degrees

How is it possible to finish a Bachelor’s degree in a year? While working full-time? Amusingly, not having time to attend school due to conflicting work commitments is the number one reason students give for speedrunning these online degrees.

Obviously, the answer is that the students are cheating. They’re not really studying at all. They’re letting AI do all the work for them.

What most of us call AI (artificial intelligence) is actually a class of online tools known as “large language models.” These models include ChatGPT, Microsoft Copilot, Google Gemini, and dozens of others.

Large language models are essentially writing agents. They scan the internet for examples of writing that they can mimic on demand. Tell them the topic, and they can instantly deliver high-quality, fully-referenced university research papers to suit any need.

The more examples there are online of any particular kind of writing, the better these AI agents can write it for you.

Thus with literally millions of university students taking basically the same subjects and writing similar papers all over the world, AI writing agents can churn out first-class essay answers on any likely assignment topic. What’s more, the inherent randomness of large language models means that every essay they write is unique.

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What is a Mother?

At one time in Australia’s history, it was accepted government policy to remove the babies of young, single mothers at birth and give them up for adoption. In 2013, Julia Gillard apologised on behalf of the Australian government to those women. She recognised that these policies – which had the best interests of the child at heart – “struck at the most primal and sacred bond there is: the bond between a mother and her baby.”

In 2013, the definition of “mother” – like the definition of “woman” – still had a simple answer. A mother was someone who conceives and gives birth to a baby. Since then, more widespread use of assisted reproductive technology has introduced complexity. It is now possible for a woman to carry and give birth to a baby who is, genetically speaking, unrelated to her. Is she still that child’s mother?

The cultural fascination with erasing male/female difference has also changed the way parents are recognised. Birth certificates that once identified a child’s “mother” and “father” now list “parent 1” and “parent 2.” Some Australian schools are following suit, their websites erasing the terms “mother” and “father.” Herald Sun columnist, Susie O’Brien, assured us some years back that despite our instinctive misgivings, the official erasure of gendered parenting was one crucial step on the march to Progress: “Sure, it feels challenging, but it makes sense. Parent one and two is much more appropriate for same-sex parents or those who have a fluid, transitioning or diverse gender identity. We need to be more inclusive in order to properly reflect the diversity of families today.” Similarly, at a school in NSW’s Hunter Valley renamed a Mother’s Day stall to “Family Gift Stall”, the grammar school Principal, Rebecca Butterworth, assured concerned mothers that the “intention in renaming the stall was to ensure that the children in our school who don’t have a mother in their home feel welcome and supported as they purchase an item from the stall.”

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The 27th May marks the beginning of Reconciliation Week in Australia, something we commemorate annually. This was the date in 1967 when around 91% of Australians voted overwhelmingly in favour of allowing the federal government to make laws for the well-being of Aboriginal Australians, something previously left exclusively to the states. It marks a moment of greater integration of Aboriginal Australia into mainstream Australia. It was, in fact, a grand rejection of separatism, and an affirmation of real national inclusion.

It’s remarkable to think that the next national referendum exclusively on Aboriginal Australia was a proposal to politically distinguish Aboriginal people from the rest of Australia and create their own quasi-executive arm in the federal parliament. A return to separatism. Thankfully Australians again did the right thing and voted against the so-called Indigenous Voice to Parliament, albeit at a much-reduced majority of 60%.

For many Australians the impulse to help the minority of Aboriginal people who are suffering in terrible living conditions is powerful. Arguably it is an expression of that natural capacity that the overwhelming number of human beings have – empathy. Australians see their Aboriginal co-nationals struggling and they imagine themselves in the same situation and feel an urge to do something to alleviate the situation. This is partly why many Australians feel that the date of Australia Day must be changed, support a treaty, voted in favour of the so-called Voice to Parliament, and for whom the annual Sorry Day as well as Reconciliation Week has much appeal. They feel sorry for Indigenous Australians and support whatever the most vocal activists claim will alleviate suffering.

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Our boys are in trouble, and the Federal Education Minister has finally noticed. Jason Clare recently announced a parliamentary inquiry that will focus on educational attainment and why boys are struggling at school. This is a welcome move by the Albanese Government, as education is the canary in the coal mine for boys and young men.

As my recent policy paper with the Page Research Centre shows, the problems start in school. As recent data shows, boys are falling behind in literacy indicators at school. Well over 30% of boys fail reading across Years 3, 7 and 9, and NAPLAN data shows boys are struggling in writing as well.

Recent analysis by the Kathleen Burrows Research Institute further shows that boys continue to fall behind in later years of school. Focusing on the New South Wales HSC results in 2023, the report shows that girls were found to be more likely to receive an ATAR of over 90 than boys. And despite being over 50% of NSW’s senior secondary population, only 48% of boys were awarded their HSC.

This gap between boys and girls continues into university. In 2024, over 61% of commencing students at Australia’s universities were women. Even in vocational training, the numbers are skewed towards women, who made up 54% of enrolments in the same year. The issue is systemic. The ABS Census in 2021 revealed that of the 30-year-olds who held at least a Bachelor degree, only 41% were men. For 25-year-olds, the percentage of men is slightly higher at 44%. For 22-year-olds, it drops again to 39%.

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This picture isn’t pretty. Boys are struggling at school. Young men are participating less in university education and vocational education than women. This educational inequality is likely leading to other inequalities and imbalances, both economically and socially. We are already seeing these inequalities start to play out.

The number of young men ‘Not in Employment, Education or Training’ (NEETs) has grown significantly over the past couple of decades. There are now well over 100,000 young men not working or engaging in education. The factors feeding into this trend are numerous, but one is likely to be related to perceived prospects for men.

Research from the e61 Institute shows that Australia’s economy is rapidly shifting in ways that are detrimental to employment prospects for young men. Four decades ago, men outnumbered women 3 to 1 in the biggest industry in Australia – manufacturing. Today, women outnumber men by the same factor, but this time it’s the caring sector that dominates.

This is compounded by the fact that wage growth has been predominantly in sectors of the economy where females are prevalent. Young men are, therefore, facing a double-barrelled problem: sectors where they traditionally find work are both shrinking and paying less in real terms. No wonder young men are struggling to engage.

If the fact that increasing numbers of young men are failing to get educated and engage in the economy wasn’t already grim enough, the social milieu adds another layer of complexity. Young men live in a society where masculinity is often viewed negatively. Traditional masculine norms are under considerable cultural pressure as different societal and cultural expectations emerge, creating social stigma.

That social stigma is driving men to seek community and understanding online. The rise of the ‘man-o-sphere’ and online influencers is a significant phenomenon of recent years that has led to growing criticism of modern social norms like feminism and egalitarianism. Young men feel simultaneously ostracised from, and hostile towards, our society.

This division between young men and the rest of society will only hasten trends that are already undermining social cohesion. Fewer people are getting married, fewer people are having children, and people are waiting longer than ever to begin family formation. In other words, young men are increasingly failing to leave home, find a wife, and have children.

In sum, young men are in crisis. They are falling behind at school, disengaging from the economy, and failing to attain basic social milestones like starting a family. Fewer marriages means lower fertility. Fewer workers means less economic activity and decreasing tax receipts. We are looking at a crisis with political, social, and economic ramifications.

This is why it is good to see the Education Minister initiating a parliamentary inquiry into educational attainment. Boys are clearly struggling. What needs further investigation and action is the fact that those boys grow to be men who are struggling. And those struggling men will be a drag on Australia’s economy and social cohesion.

We need to learn more about this problem and take effective actions at community and government levels. I have made a start in a my policy paper with the Page Research Centre. The federal government should consider widening the education inquiry, or else initiate a separate inquiry into the plight of young men more broadly.

As we discuss and act on this issue, we must be careful not to pathologise the crisis. Our young men need our help and encouragement, rather than our condemnation. They already have enough of the latter.

Simon P. Kennedy is a Senior Research Fellow at Alphacrucis University College, and a Senior Research Fellow at the University of Queensland. He is also a Non-resident Fellow at the Danube Institute. This article is based on a policy paper published through the Page Research Centre.

Yes, there has been a tragedy—the recent loss of an innocent five-year-old Aboriginal girl in Alice Springs. Is the fact that she is Aboriginal relevant? Shouldn’t it just matter that she was an Australian girl? Well, her cultural heritage is relevant here because it is well documented that Aboriginal children are more likely to be neglected, abused, and live in unsafe environments, than other children. Since this tragic case, we have already heard of more allegations of neglect. Last week, The Australian told the story of how an Aboriginal boy was ordered by the court to be removed from his (non-Aboriginal) carer and returned to remote Northern Territory community, where there are serious concerns about the boy’s safety, should he be returned to that community. This is despite claims that the boy wished to remain with the carer.

I do not wish to sensationalise or politicalise this recent tragedy. And while I can’t control people’s reactions to what they read here, I hope this article doesn’t become an opportunity for those living in echo chambers to engage in a pile-on, where they complain about every problem associated with Aboriginal Australia. For such people, I am not saying your complaints or criticisms are not valid, only that they are far too often misplaced.

Rather, in this article I discuss a problem that has been around for as long as I can remember, and one I believe was a significant contributor to the death of this little Aboriginal girl and many other hardships endured by Aboriginal people. Address this problem properly and we will begin to see the gap close. I am talking about the idea of ‘self-determination.’

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Immigration is out of control in Australia, and the government’s budget just confirmed it. The government admitted this week that net overseas migration this financial year will exceed planning estimates by 35,000 people, or 13.5%.

Those estimates, by the way, were confirmed just four months ago.

When immigration gets out of control in America, it’s due to mismanagement at the southern border. When problems arise in Britain, it’s down to a wave of boat arrivals from continental Europe.

How does an island continent with essentially zero illegal immigration manage to get things so wrong?

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