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2009 was a year full of things that made me very angry.

The world is a terrible and unfair place. Some of the events that I found most shocking received extremely limited public attention. Obviously, not everything can be as important and exciting as Tiger Woods cheating on his wife. Below, I’ve listed four things that I felt were of at least as much significance as Woods’ infidelity. Some of them received virtually no coverage, some of them were simply covered inadequately in the mainstream media (Copenhagen in particular).

1) The coup in Honduras.

President Manuel Zelaya – freely elected – was kidnapped at gunpoint by the military and flown out of the country. There were massive protests, every other country in the region denounced the coup. Yet the US quietly supported it, refused to cut off aid, and organised bilateral negotiations with Costa Rica between the illegitimate coup government and the elected government, because Costa Rica is a small country with no leverage over Honduras. After months of no progress, and months of harsh repression, a fraudulent election was held, with two candidates running who both supported the coup. The US recognises the new government, effectively legitimising the coup, which it supported diplomatically and financially.

It was never in doubt that the US, with tremendous leverage over Honduras, could have restored democracy in a day, simply by withdrawing support from the US trained military, and the tiny elite that owns most of the country’s wealth. The US decided against this. A spokesperson for the Obama administration said it would be a good message if people in the region learned not to follow the Chavez model. That’s exactly what this was about: yet it received virtually no coverage in the mainstream media

2) The Intervention of Aboriginal communities continues.

Compulsory income management will be expanded over the coming years. Jenny Macklin can declare an area disadvantaged, and then begin quarantining half Aboriginal welfare income.

What does this look like?

People get put onto a Basics Card, which they have to use to spend their income, and which they can only use at certain stores. Right now, only Aboriginal communities in the Northern Territory are affected. So, when they go shopping, there are lines for blacks with their Basics Cards, and lines for everyone else, who presumably can be trusted with money. There’s a chance that future expansions won’t target Aboriginal areas, but I wouldn’t bet on it. Soon we may have more open segregation across Australia, like the Centrelink lines with blacks and whites. Stripped of their rights, some have said that this policy is a return to the ration days. And they’re right.

Macklin announced the cotinuation and expansion of these measures based on her “consultations”, despite the repeated urging of every UN observer, the review of the Intervention, and the authors of Little Children are Sacred to have genuine consultations with Indigenous communities so they could design and implement their own solutions. Instead, Macklin produced something like a vulgarly rigged public opinion survey. She has claimed these new measures are based on the evidence, and because people begged her to continue these lovely measures.

According to her own government report, the budget for the Intervention was increased a month before the consulations. Meanwhile, Aboriginal communities with their rights stripped away continue to live in abject poverty, with a complete lack of funding for basic services, schooling and so on.

And how is Macklin dealing with child sexual abuse, the rivers of grog and so on? Out of a budget of hundreds of millions of dollars, she is spending $2.6 million on alcohol and drug treatment services. And she is funding 5 child protection workers across 73 communities. That’s how deeply she cares.

3) Copenhagen:

There’s not much to say. The rich countries said in advance they wouldn’t do enough, and now they’re acting to destroy the planet. They’re offering a pittance in aid, refusing reparations for destroying the planet in the first place, and commiting to reductions that will lead to disaster and catastrophe for much of the planet.

Mr Hope himself has offered 4% cuts from 1990 levels, Rudd is willing to insist on 5%, though there’s no evidence his CPRS scheme will actually reduce emissions at all. However, money will continue to be found to hand out to big business. We have billions for corporate welfare: nothing for renewable energy that we would rely on if we planned on reducing emissions. Unless popular movements take on real power, we are going to quietly watch time pass by: we have a few years for emissions to peak before it’s all out of our hands.

Too few of us can say we’ve done enough.

4) Gaza:

The water supply is on the verge of collapse. There isn’t clean drinking water, so babies are turning blue, and developing intestinal and respiratory diseases. The water could be repaired, but Israel’s blockade is too severe. Before the attack on Gaza, already 80% of the water was undrinkable. And that’s for those with access to water: we also shouldn’t forget Israel’s destruction of Gaza water wells.

Israel’s policies are making life unliveable for 1.5 million people. What should also be considered shocking is how unimportant this is considered. Apparently, the view that a government should not force babies to drink polluted water is controversial. Or that one country should not so sharply limit the food supplies of a people that their children’s growth is stunted.

2009 had much to make me bitter. But in every issue there were also the seeds of hope. There is still strong resistance in Honduras and across the hemisphere to the coup. Opposition to the Intervention is growing. International solidarity movements on climate change are developing. And the upcoming Gaza Freedom March is just one of many demonstrations showing a world whose conscience has been aroused to the crimes of the occupation and the suffering of the Palestinians.

I once spoke to a very passionate, brave woman from Gaza. She was a leftist, feminist atheist, who strongly opposed religion, Fatah and Hamas, the Israeli occupation and so on. When someone asked what people in the West could do, she said “we don’t want your money, we don’t want your charity.”

They want our political support.

2009 was not a good year. But 2010 has promise.

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