If the wellbeing of desperate refugees was genuinely at the heart of the Abbott Government's policies, we would expect to see more empathy and sorrow over the self-harming of mothers in detention, writes Matthew Beard.

In a blog post on ABC's Religion and Ethics, Scott Stephens spoke of the "lucidity of madmen". By this, he meant the unflinching clarity of reason that is embraced by people whose way of interpreting the world is blinkered by a narrow, limited agenda.

Citing GK Chesterton, Stephens notes, "The madman is not the man who has lost his reason ... he is the man who has lost everything except his reason." Reason, de-shackled from empathy, imagination, or anything beyond the pragmatic demands of the present, provides a frightening self-assuredness.

It is the assuredness of this type of reason that enables Tony Abbott to speak today of the "moral blackmail" of distraught and destitute asylum seekers who, in a final act of desperation, have turned to self-harm in an attempt to have their plight, or perhaps the plight of their children, improved.

This self-harm may indeed be unjustified from an ethical standpoint - the circumstances in which suicide can be justified are few and far between - but when one considers the actual situation that these people face, we can at least understand why self-harm appears as a viable option from their subjective viewpoint.

However, for those with a narrow view of asylum seekers as criminals to whom no duty is owed, it must seem as though this is just a more extreme manifestation of "queue jumping". Just like the child who throws a tantrum when he or she doesn't want to wait in line, these refugees, who in the mind of this government have very limited rights, are seen to be cynically and selfishly demanding things to which they are not entitled.

Rather than being seen as a desperate cry for help - the act of a person who has completely run out of options - this self-harm appears to be a calculated marketing campaign exploiting Australians on an emotional level. And only the cold eye of reason can see through such a ploy.

Let's be honest though, the reality is that these actions of self-harm are unlikely to actually mobilise any real change; this government has shown itself to be as unflinching as a mountain in the face of dwindling public opinion. And even if there was a chance of success, it might not be that this fact alone could justify these acts of self-harm.

But even with all this said, litigious accusation and renewed commitment to a policy that is at best harsh, controversial, and unpleasant, and at worst illegal, immoral, and outright cruel, is hardly the correct attitude to adopt.

Even if the policy of the government is justified - and I think this is a difficult case to mount - one need not be bullish and pig-headed about its consequences which are, to any impartial observer, heart-wrenchingly tragic. Mothers are trying to kill themselves in attempts - depending on which report is read - to enable their children to settle in Australia, draw attention to their plight, or be transported to Nauru.

This is awful. Even if the Abbott Government is not morally responsible for this, there is a cause for empathy here.

Indeed, the lack of empathy and sorrow in Abbott's display is surprising given that the argument to justify Australia's harsh immigration policies is to prevent people from dying at sea. Operation Sovereign Borders is actually, if the rhetoric can be believed, an exercise of supererogatory charity on behalf of the Australian Government to save the lives of people who otherwise may needlessly die. If the wellbeing of these desperate refugees is genuinely at the heart of this campaign, however, one might expect to see more sympathy than has been shown up to this point.

Indeed, according to Abbott, the Australian Government is the victim here: "no Australian government should be subjected to the spectacle" of self-harm being used as a means of persuasion, he says. This is where unshackled reason loses all control. Beginning from the premise that asylum seekers are morally destitute queue-jumpers whose selfish actions undermine Australia's otherwise reasonable immigration system, self-harm becomes the unjust subjection of political leaders to the trauma of guilt and public outcry.

However, the reality is that Australia's immigration policy is the subject of global concern. That policy is not innocent in the self-harm that has been reported today, and it will not be innocent in further incidents that are sure to follow if nothing changes. The policy is implicated, the government is implicated, and Australia - including each of us - is implicated.

Starting from narrow premises, as the Coalition Government does, conclusions can seem obvious, and troubling events are easily explained. Narrow premises, however, beget narrow conclusions. A successful resolution to the asylum seeker problem is not obvious - that's why we've ended up here - because the story is incredibly complicated. The Abbott Government has falsely pretended that the story is much simpler than it really is, and the refugee remains the villain.

Matthew Beard is a research associate with the Centre for Faith, Ethics & Society at the University of Notre Dame, Australia. Follow him on Twitter @mattbeard89. View his full profile here.