Milo Yiannopoulos’s much-heralded appearance in Parliament House, angrily opposed by the Greens, passed without disruption or much distinctive content.
The self-described purveyor of inconvenient truths had done his best this week to drum up controversy on his way to Canberra on Tuesday, a pit stop on his Australian tour.
The previous night’s appearance in Melbourne was accompanied by fighting between left and rightwing protesters – and police have announced they are billing the venue for the cost of the riot police required to attend.
The reported estimate is $40,000. “We have got our accountants in the background over the next couple of days to make sure the numbers are right and we’ll be sending them an invoice,” assistant commissioner Stephen Leane told reporters on Tuesday. “We send the invoice to the venue. It’s up to the venue about how they organise that with promoters.”
Canberra was a considerably calmer affair. Parliament House officials had set aside a small room. Roughly 150-200 people showed up. The majority of names on the attendees list were political staffers and media, and most of the names weren’t crossed off by the time it ended.
Pauline Hanson sat prominently in the first row, with her One Nation colleagues Brian Burston and Peter Georgiou, and her adviser James Ashby.
They were joined by Malcolm Roberts, the former One Nation senator and recently failed Queensland candidate, who was back in Canberra for the occasion. They smiled for the cameras before Yiannopoulos arrived. New senator Fraser Anning, who split with One Nation in his first week in parliament, sat behind them in the second row.
Liberal National MP George Christensen sat alone in the seventh row.
The local celebrity agent Max Markson stood up to introduce his client. To test the microphone, he started singing Strangers in the Night, which got some people laughing. Others exchanged looks.
“It’s great to have Milo here,” Markson said. “Alan Jones says that Milo Yiannopoulos is unapologetically one of the most clear-thinking minds in the world today, which is a great endorsement.
“Senator Leyonhjelm … has singlehandedly opened up the discussion about what it means to be libertarian, approaching issues not from a right or left perspective, but from the position of personal choice, liberty and smaller government.
“Please, would you put your hands together to welcome both Milo Yiannopoulos and Senator Leyonhjelm.”
David Leyonhjelm, who shared the stage with Yiannopoulos, asked the first question.
“I’m a libertarian, and some people have described you, Milo, as a libertarian, but others have described you as conservative. Which do you think is more accurate?”
Yiannopoulos began to speak, but his microphone wasn’t working properly. “Can’t hear!” yelled the audience. “We can’t hear you!”
Yiannopoulos apologised, and started speaking much louder.
There were some One Nation supporters in the audience, and young conservatives, who clapped when he made crude jokes or warned that politicians would lose votes if they supported progressive causes.
But it felt like the majority of the room had come there to hear something, and little was said.
Yiannopoulos talked about identity politics. He said it was a terrible tool with which to analyse culture because it stifles creativity and free expression and prevents people from being able to say what they want. He railed against the progressive left and Social Justice Warriors.
“I came to Australia as a sort of warning from America … to try to implore you not to go down the path America has gone down,” he said.
He said his fans didn’t believe the state should be telling them what language they can use, what books they can read or TV stations they can watch.
He beseeched the audience to reject identity politics and political correctness, saying if they wanted to “save your country and save western civilisation” they should reject “all of the tenets that the progressive left is attempting to establish in culture”.
“That includes from journalists, from the academy, from the entertainment industry, they’re all complicit in this,” he said, provoking sincere applause from his fans.
He was asked some serious questions. When asked by a journalist from Fairfax Media if he truly believed the things he said, he said people laughed at the paper because it was “ridiculous”. Leyonhjelm stood there beaming.
