Should we sit down and be nice to Pauline?
No.
Sitting down with her and chatting to her gives credibility to her views that will actually help her. As if what she has to say is worth hearing. It isn’t.
What her voters are feeling and thinking is worth hearing but we should not assume that just because they voted for Pauline means they support everything she says and thinks. Swinging voters are far more likely to vote against something than for something. A vote for Pauline was a vote against the mainstream parties. The real question is not what they see in Pauline, but what they are not seeing in the other parties.
That’s why I suggest that rather then having a cup of tea with Pauline, we should make fun of the absolutely stupidity of her policies.
Making fun of One Nation won’t change the minds of her current supporters but it may stop her support growing.
Everyone likes to think they are smart. Successful advertising campaigns are based on this insight. ‘Buying this product makes you smart’ or ‘it will make people think you’re smart’ - never underestimate how important we value other people’s opinion of us.
Whilst we tend to self-select on some platforms (like Twitter) and are often speaking into a vacuum, that’s not the case for Facebook.
We usually have broader group of ‘friends’ there - people we went to school with, worked with, are related to - and they may well be the people who are currently considering what Pauling has to say. So use that platform to get in now before they make up their minds. It is far harder to change someone’s mind once it is made up then to get him or her while they are considering her.
“The real question is not what they see in Pauline, but what they are not seeing in the other parties.”
Make people realise that supporting Pauline isn’t a smart decision.
But I would also suggest not making every critique about Pauline based on her anti-Muslim rhetoric. Terrorism is real. So is bigotry. And, as Matthew Johns pointed out, there is a link between the two. We need to call out Pauline’s bigotry because it is dangerous - bigotry makes fertile ground for terrorist recruiters. But the irrational fear that fuels bigotry and racism is unable to be quelled by presenting rational arguments.
There is plenty of more fertile ground to challenge her policies, many of which have simply been plagiarised from other sites. (That Pauline Hanson did not come up with her own policies was the least surprising thing of the election.)
Will that be enough? No. Mainstream political parties have to offer an alternative to voters who feel the growing social inequality, who feel they are not doing well and are looking for someone to blame. Pointing out that One Nation’s policies will in no way help ordinary Australians struggling with the cost of living, who want job security, a decent health system and a good education for their kids is essential.
Pauline will continue to say and do dumb things. She can’t help herself. It will make the news. You only have to look back at the last time where her fall was as meteoric as her rise. And gradually the right will peel away from her, (just as they did with Tony Abbott) till just the die-hards are left. People who voted for Abbott ‘because he says what we think’ changed their minds pretty damn quickly once gaffe after gaffe started appearing on the news, along with the accompanying memes on socmed.
So in the meantime, make fun of her policies. Treat them like an idiocies that they are.
Dee Madigan is Creative Director of Campaign Edge and author of The Hard Sell.
