Not asleep, not awake, just drifting

In its eagerness to appease supporters of Israel, the media is happy to ride roughshod over due process and basic rights. It’s damaging our democracy.

https://www.crikey.com.au/2025/02/10/australia-media-appeases-israel/ 

Australia, Australia,  
the name crackles through the airwaves, 
a signal bent, a story spun, 
headlines shifting like desert sand, 
settling only where the wind allows.  

Media hums, a low vibration,
fingers tapping, framing the frame, 
spinning the wheel, turning the phrase, 
careful, careful—don’t wake the beast.  

Power whispers, and the press bends,
smoothing rough edges, softening sharp tongues, 
words wrapped in velvet, meaning muted, 
a symphony of silence, conducted in suits.  

Dissent flickers, but the light is dim,
names tagged, voices drowned, 
not with chains, not with guns, 
but with labels, with levers, with laws.  

Parliament nods, a metronome of yes, 
bills pass, questions stall, 
debate dissolves like sugar in tea, 
sweet, smooth, and easy to swallow.  

Antisemitism—a word, a weapon, a wall,
stretched, contorted, held up high, 
not to fight hate, but to silence doubt, 
to steer the story, to block the view.  

Meanwhile, in the streets, in the margins, 
the forgotten scream in pixelated pain, 
but the cameras pan elsewhere, 
the script already set, the ink already dry.  

Funds flow, headlines glow,
aid arrives, but only where the map allows, 
compassion calibrated, empathy rationed, 
the story told in pre-approved lines.  

And the audience watches, eyes half-closed, 
lulled by the hum, rocked by the rhythm, 
not asleep, not awake, just drifting, 
adrift in a current they don’t control.  

But listen, man, listen close—
underneath the static, beneath the script, 
there’s a murmur, a tremor, a shift, 
questions forming like storm clouds on the edge.  

The story isn’t over. The words aren’t done.
Something’s stirring. 
Something’s breaking. 
Something’s waking up.