Did you hear the one about the man in the tree who wiped millions off the mining companies stock?
It would be funny if it weren't true, and more so if the poor bloke weren't being dragged from pillory to post for an act that reflects more on the vulnerabilities of the Australian stock exchange and the gullibility and lack of rigor amongst financial reporters.
The short version is an anti-mining activist by the name of Jonathan Moylan released a statement under the guise of a major bank. In this statement he claimed that the bank had refused credit to a mining company because of concerns over their environmental record. This was in turn picked up by the media and in turn by segments of the share trading public. They proceeded to get rid of their stock and it dropped in value, until such time as trading was suspended. There's a lot of reporting going on around this topic but it seems from what I've read that Moylan was trying to create the impression that a major bank was speaking out against mining and environmental destruction. Oh and he did all this from a protest camp in a forest with indifferent wifi...
Let's look at this another way; Moylan who is a nobody, at least in the grand scheme of banks and mining companies realised he wasn't exactly going to make a big splash sitting in a tree blocking bulldozers (my interpretation). So he impersonates a somebody, or in this case a banking institution somebody and makes a statement that adheres to his environmental beliefs. He does this reasoning that Jonathon Moylan doesn't get much attention but maybe major bank will.
Problem is he's a little too clever. If he'd just stayed chained to a tree or whatever the hell he was doing it would all be fine and he'd only be pissing off some poor day worker trying to get the job done. Instead he ignited a stock run, got the politicians polarised and worst of all, dared to tamper with peoples money!
The leader of the Australian Greens, Christina Milne, declared Moylan's act a part of a great tradition of civil disobedience in Australia. Possibly she was having a slow day and worried that she hadn't suffered any recent vitriol as the leader of Australia's third party released an honest, unambiguous statement. The statement got both her and party comments that make unflattering references to mental illness. But she raises a good point about the presence and role of civil disobedience and protest within Australian society.
Protest generally seems to get negative publicity in Australia, or perhaps more correctly the protests that get the most attention are the ones that end in confrontation and violence. This is unfortunate and I don't intend to speculate on journalistic integrity in reporting these issues prominently or rogue activists turning peaceful protest violent. What I would like to raise is the philosophy of civil disobedience within a society and specifically what role it might fill in Australian society.
Myself, I think civil disobedience definitely has a place. At the core of it's philosophy is questioning and taking action against unjust laws. I don't think any society can claim to be free from the stink of such laws and it is not always the legislators who are motivated toward change.
This will be my taking off point and I will endeavour to explore further the role of civil disobedience in a modern society like Australia. In the mean time I will be having a think about some of the changes that we can see right now that came about as a result of people standing up: female suffrage, the Franklin River's conservation and the acknowledgement of indigenous people immediately spring to mind. Can we add further environmental protections and rights for refugees in the future?
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