Lot's Wife Edition 3 2024

When I say I’m campaigning to end Woodside’s partnership with Monash, many people
consider this an extreme position. Can’t we work with this company that is supposedly
‘transitioning’ to carbon capture and storage (CCS) and green hydrogen tech, especially
when they fund plenty of good research? Isn’t it important to not get so extremist about
this? Can’t I take a moderate position?
I hope after this article you can understand why that’s not possible. That the company’s
history demonstrates the staggering legal, political and police power they revel in wielding
to protect their gas and oil mining empire. That their crusade against democracy, the law,
and community safety is truly a terrifying sight to behold.
That despite their greenwashing, less than 1% of Woodside’s profit goes towards carbon
capture technology, and they’re actively pursuing the largest carbon-emitting project the
southern hemisphere has ever seen. That they are an oil and gas company, and will
never transition to renewables. That the Woodside-funded engineering and environmental
research may look good on the surface, but that it’s been proven that universities funded
by fossil fuels produce skewed, biased, and unscientific conclusions. That Woodside are
a deeply calculating and insidious corporation that does not, and will never, have the
climate’s best interests at heart, let alone the interests of staff, students, and academic
integrity.
That continuing to frack, drill, extract and burn fossil fuels, in 2024, is itself, extremist,
and extremely dangerous for the future of Earth, and all of us who live on it. And that
Woodside, actively pursuing the destruction of the planet, doesn't deserve anyone’s cooperation,
moderation, or acquiescence, especially that of any scientific institution with a
moral backbone.
Woodside’s presence on Monash campus is a venture that serves their PR needs and theirs
alone, a co-option of the prestige and respect that Monash holds. Monash is respected as a
research university, not because of upper management or parasitic industrial partnerships,
but thanks to a hard-working staff and student body driven to find ways to create a better
future. Woodside is a company profiting off of our hard work, our university community
and our passion - using their ties with Monash in order to slow their demise in the public
eye, and maintain the unquestionable political status that has fuelled their domination for
so long. The Woodside-Monash WORDS Energy Partnership BY is undoubtedly MANDY a lucrative deal LI for the
university, but it’s an unforgivable one. Woodside is paying in cold hard, oil-slick cash for
the dodgy sale of Monash’s scientific integrity into fossil fuel’s pockets.
No amount of research grants or industry connections can justify the Chancellor, Vice-
Chancellor or the Board colluding with a company actively conspiring to destroy our future.
They must axe all ties with Woodside immediately, and implement a comprehensive ESG
policy that ensures this never happens again. I urge you to follow the Stop Woodside
Monash campaign, and to join your fellow staff and students in the fight.
Woodside, and the rest of the fossil fuel megacorps, are scrambling to protect their influence
because they are worried that the extraction industry will become a sociopolitical pariah,
scorned by any respected scientific institution.
We can only hope.
Referendum
By John Sopar
And for the next, I worry.
If the past is any indication of the future,
My fears are justified. But we will see.
May their efforts, our efforts,
Make a difference.
For if they don’t? What next.
When all is said and done,
And the pieces lie scattered and broken,
How far is the way back?
How hard to search, blindfolded, bound,
And dream of the sky.
So, I wrap myself in Country,
In possum skins and the wisdom of my Elders.
I soothe my scarred heart with the whisper of the wind in the gums,
With a mother’s crooning lullaby.
Will that be enough? I do not know.
Enough to heal.
Enough to forget.
Enough to reconcile past, present, future.
So, for the next, I worry.
Carina is a third year Law/Science student. She wants you to go to stopwoodsidemonash.
org or @stopwoodsidemonash on Instagram, and join.
14 15