|
The Burning of the Minister of Gulags
A Report on the Burning in Effigy
of the Dishonorable Peter Dutton MP
Minister for Immigration and Border Protection
at the old Eureka Stockade Memorial, Ballarat
at dawn 3 December 2015
It's 5 am on the 3 December 2015, the 161st anniversary of the suppression of the Eureka Stockade, and sky is lightening and the circle about the brazier beside the Eureka Stockade Memorial is lantern lit and solemn.
About 30 have gathered this year and we are the dedicated, hard core, true blue reclaimers of the radical spirit of the Eureka rebellion. The City of Ballarat trades on Eureka, both in terms of tourism and business names, yet Ballarat ignores Eureka dawn.
Dr Joe Toscano , Melbourne's leading anarachist, is convenor, and now he is on his feet in full flight, broadcasting live to Radio 3CR. For 13 years he has beeen leading commemorations at dawn, on the day and on the site. We tell the stories, remember the dead and salute their courage in the face of tyranny and their ground breaking political success.
It's an inspiring and well practiced storytelling for, apart from caring for his beloved but ailing wife, running a medical practice, organising various campaigns, public broadcasting and Dr Joe is a writer of peoples' histories. For 13 years now Dr Joe has been convening this dawn remembrance ritual.
With his introduction done Dr Joe asks each to say their name and what Eureka means to them. The mike is passed like a talking stick. It is recording not amplifying, our PA organising has failed this year. Quiet voices in the dawn, some hesitant and others winged, words from the heart which sweep us all into communion on that hallowed ground of blood sacrifice.
So it goes. Everyone present, everyone standing alive - or sitting as is the case of these aching hips.
The first bird calls of dawn. Dr Joe interrupts the circle to observe that it was at this time 161 years before when the 276 Redcoats plus 300 Victoria Police lined up outside the Stockade and the shooting began. Only 104 diggers were in the Stockade at the time and at least 25 soon to be dead shot and/or bayoneted. All over in 10 minutes.
Others were to die of police pursuit and vengeance, of riot and massacre. For three hours after and for up to 5 km about the Eureka diggings, the Victoria Police, mounted and on foot, charged forth amongst the diggings shooting and sabre slashing suspected rebels and rebel sympathisers and burning their tents.
Now the mike has passed through all hands including the latecomers and Dr Joe introduces the effigy burning and passes the mike back to me. Dr Joe is beaming. He sometimes gives me the impression that he disapproves of the Eureka effigy burning ritual which i introduce 6 years ago. Maybe too close to voodoo than history for your average anarchist.
But the choice of the Dishonorable Peter Dutton MP Member for Gulags for the Eureka161 Face of Tyranny Award has won his enthusiasm. As a bastard Dutton MP is a natural, can't help but be wilfully mean and a repeat offender to boot.
Only days before the Minister for Gulags had helped promote the burning in his effigy by announcing that letters from Australian school children to children in detention cents would no longer be delivered. Nor would the Brigidine Sisters be permitted to take the kids out for a visit to the Zoo.
With mike in hand i stand by the fire and let words of fire come forth - about the importance of burning things, of reclaiming fire in our lives, of embracing fire as transformation and purification. Masters of change as masters of fire.
Calling the comrades to follow, i led around the Memorial to where the 1 meter high Dutton effigy is set up, mountedat eye height on a frame and lantern lit. Cameras crowd close. Gasps of approval from those seeing the effigy for the first time, amazement at the skill of my cardboard crafting.
Slander slips my lips as i try to explain Peter Dutton's career and his embrace of the meanness as a lifestyle and work choice. It began as a Queensland police officer and member of the Drug Squad. A Drug War warrior, once the bane of cannabis users, now the bane of boat borne refugees. Need i say more?
Well maybe one more thing. He is also the face of the militarisation of Immigration in the form of the newly created, uniformed and armed - guns plus powers of arrest and detention - Border Force. Which became Border Farce after its first promoted patrol was called off in the face of outrage from crowds in the street.
I hand on the mike so that Margaret Creage may do the burn calling for Radio 3CR listeners and with with minimal drama, set the effigy alight from behind with a splash of metho.
Knealing out front, i watch through the camera view finder, clicking on a hopelessly inadequate camera.
The smoke rises around neck and ears and a little flame appears at the shoulders. But this quickly grows in size and intensity. Fire soon wreathes the face on either side. The flames then enclose the face, blaze up in front and, in single fluid motion, the blazing cardboard facial features slide off.
The whole effigy becomes a ball of flame throwing up fiery embers. Cardboard morality up in flames.
All over in a minute. Four days cardboard cutting and gluing, up in smoke. Some people make calls of amazement and affirmation but most just grin, amazed and delighted, it had been a good burn. Better than Tv.
Joe calls and the commemorative circle reassembles about the brazier. Me and a couple of mates clean up. It is after all hallowed ground and an historic reserve. Permission seeking is not the Eureka way. Eureka spirit makes demands and acts directly. Ask Council for a permit to burn an effigy? 'Twould tie them up in time wasting knots. None the less we are careful not to aggravate unnecessarily the park carers. Eureka Park has a long story as a people's park.
Brushing ash from lawn, i reflect on the symbolism, the omen in all this flame, for Peter Dutton as just another suffering soul.
Making effigies requires one to do a lot of face gazing and what i see as singular in the Minister for Gulags' mug is, despite the receding hairline, its shining youthfulness. This combined with a look of menace which somehow he wants to be taken as a look of sincerity or tough love maybe. The face in his publicity shots is assured to bring nightmares to children in and out of detention.
Tell me if he doesn't remind you of your worst school prefect. Couldn't you imagine him as a judge donning a black cap to announce death sentence?
My omen reading tells me Peter Dutton will lose face. Big time for his defensive denial is entrenched behind defences of bony brow.
But like the flaming collapse of effigy face, it will all come undone and he will find himself, deserted by family, detested by friends and Party, in a no-rest hell realm of constant regret and perpetual justifications which will whirl and sear in his consciousness as endless mental fire storms which will bring neither sympathy nor end.
Karma cometh to Peter Dutton. Eureka spirit works in many and mysterious ways.
Graeme Dunstan
Peacebus.com
9 December 2015
Further Information
FaceBook event > Reclaim the Radical Spirit of the Eureka Rebellion 2015
Reclaim the Radical Spirit of the Eureka Rebellion poster and program downloadable pdf
The 2015 Eureka Dawn effigy completed 29 November 2015
| 