While 2018 was not a story about counter-terrorism laws, they brought an uncomfortable focus to a government that accepts no limits to its power to cleave and quarter society at will. The final days of parliament did not institutionalise protections, instead institutionalising fear.

The government used these final days to bully, harass, intimidate and politicise any opposition to an encryption bill allowing security agencies access to our encrypted private messages. While it attacked those who opposed the bill or sought greater consideration of its impact, it also proposed amendments to extend the powers and conditions under the Australian Citizenship Amendment (Allegiance to Australia) Act 2015 to strip dual nationals of their Australian citizenship. It was yet additional evidence of an Australian government with already considerable and unprecedented power in this arena, intending to give itself more.

Australia's war on encryption: the sweeping new powers rushed into law Read more

Terrorism may indeed be an exceptional set of crimes which require an exceptional set of laws and powers, but this government is not prepared to explain, after almost 80 counter terrorism laws, why more are still required.

In 2011, Professor Kent Roach of the University of Toronto, in his comparative study of antiterrorism laws across the US, UK, Canada and Australia, described the Australian government response to terrorism as one of “legislative activism” – in part because Australia’s response exceeded that of Canada, the UK and the US, but also because “Australia’s hyper-legislation strained the ability of the parliamentary opposition and civil society to keep up, let alone provide effective opposition to, the relentless legislative output.”

Fear and control are increasingly the defining feature of our government and crossbench

Since 2001, our failure to mount any meaningful resistance to the unforgiving legislative agenda of the government as it gave itself and its security services unprecedented powers has rested on the belief that those laws would only apply to Muslims. But this view misunderstands both the threat of terrorism and the threat of the laws themselves and what our parliament has become.

It is hard to miss that fear and control are increasingly the defining feature of our government and crossbench.

In the litany of abuses and the raging white noise emanating from parliament about Muslims, commencing with Liberal senator Jim Molan’s sharing of Britain First’s anti-Muslim video, to Pauline Hanson’s numerous stop Muslim migration efforts and her wearing of the burqa in parliament buffoonery, to Fraser Anning’s maiden speech, to the government’s vote on it’s OK to be white – it has all seemed that a particular type of racialised madness has taken hold of both our houses of parliament.

The vilification of Muslims and racial politicalisation of minorities as a political strategy has not remained within the confines of federal parliament, it also became a key feature of the Victorian state election, barely concealed in the rhetoric of African gangs violence and white people hiding in their homes for fear of gangs. Throughout all of this, migration has been presented as a consistent and constant threat to our way of life. This is a picture of us as a nation under attack from strangers within and at our borders.

Having tested the limits of its power to vilify and marginalise Muslims, the government has been slowly moving to everyone else.

A case in point is the government’s decision to force us to vote on marriage equality, something it knew already had our broad support, and as 2018 ends, we are told that the rights of religious groups must be protected from LGBTI children attending religious schools. The halls of power, both religious and political, have now pitted themselves against children.

Bourke Street attack: Morrison accused of 'scapegoating' Muslim community Read more

After the Bourke street attack, prime minister Scott Morrison called on Muslims to do more – in fact he held Muslims partially responsible by suggesting that they were not doing enough. As an experienced minister, he would know that the role of Muslims in preventing terrorism is limited and that communities were already active in that space. Since 2001, Muslim leaders, activists and professionals have acquired a certain political acumen and, even in the face of irrationality and farce that is now a constant feature of our parliament’s approach to Muslims, community actors have nonetheless persevered in their work. Most of them understood that Morrison’s message was not to Muslims but about them, and most of them will continue to work with government, because they see their efforts to ensure social cohesion as a moral imperative, not as a service to the government.

The cost for the Muslim community of constantly trying to placate people’s anger and fear by justifying itself is increasingly apparent. It is rare, especially for Victorian Muslims, to turn their back on a meeting with government. This is a sign not of anger, but of a community that has no hope in the political system.

But the fight here is no longer one about or for Muslims. In allowing our politicians free rein to do as they will with Muslims – criminalise, surveil and pathologise them – those strategies are now available for use not just against minorities, but as the encryption laws attest, all of us.