Villanelle of the self-proclaimed larrikin

“I am Bob Katter and I am a proud western chauvinist. And it is us who brought civilisation to the world and we won’t be apologising for it… Don’t get in our way…”

Katter’s pledge to the Proud Boy far-right white hate group, whom he denies knowing anything about and putting the act down to: “My irresponsible larrikinism often gets me into trouble…”

Western chauvinists are proud to declare the world

are proud to pronounce against what they don’t want to be,

they make civilisation a larrikin act bought and sold.

Watch out when the self-styled larrikin is unfurled

in front of Proud Boys beating the chests of the “free”,

Western chauvinists are proud to declare the world.

Trouble is a giggle when a larrikin shouts over a canefield,

irresponsible affection an affectation of soapbox glee —

to make civilisation a larrikin act bought and sold.

Whiteness is an acclaimed commodity between foothold

& freehold, all that is loved is valued as the nation’s identity,

Western chauvinists are proud to declare the world.

All this irreverence, all this branching out from the battlefield

of polling booth, all this denting of what one is or won’t be,

they make civilisation a larrikin act bought and sold.

Such “boisterousness” is a transfusion of that “crimson thread”,

such reworking those rules of bias (by jingo!) to entrench their gameplay,

Western chauvinists are proud to declare the world

as they make ‘civilisation’ a larrikin act bought and sold.