Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
such as
Fatal Contact: Bird Flu in America
(2006) and
Pandemic
(2007) - in which
various Third World countries are blamed for fatal disease outbreaks, which, thanks
to the tireless efforts of American scientists, are deflected from destroying the entire
human population.
8
Such cinematic imaginations of epidemics visualise Third
World countries as dangerous viral breeding grounds of ignorant masses, which
ultimately function as symptoms of their morally and politically corrupt govern-
ments. These continue a much longer history that associates non-normative racial,
sexual and gendered minorities and the working class with disease and disorder (see,
for example, Bashford, 1998, 2004; Peckham and Pomfret, 2013).
Meanwhile, entomologists are busy trying to protect native ecosystems from the
onslaught of alien insects. Globalised world trade and mobility translocate alien
insect species by human agency at an alarming rate, we are told. Hawaii accu-
mulates 20-30 new insect species per year while 12-15 new species are reported
on Guam (Samways, 1999). These alien invasions, we are told, are devastating the
character and stability of natural ecosystems, landscapes, regions and islands, which
in turn decreases agricultural output (ibid.).
Within Australia, this entomological crisis has centred on bees. Western
Australia's Department of Agriculture's website warns of 'The Exotic Bee Threat'
because 'bees can carry exotic bee diseases'.
9
In particular, 'Asian bees' and 'African
bees', including the 'Africanised bees' of Brazil, are singled out, even though the
website informs us that all foreign bees are threats. Apparently, the Asian bee has
'spread to Papua New Guinea' and 'has a high propensity to swarm and will readily
swarm and establish nests on ships and cargo'. The website provides a picture
contrasting the European, Western or 'Common' honeybee with the Asian bee,
which appears smaller and darker. Due to Australia's proximity to Papua New
Guinea and other 'Asian regions', its sea ports are particularly prone to the Asian
bee danger. In contrast to the Asian bee, the African bee is portrayed as having
'aggressive defence characteristics', and through interbreeding this violent streak
has spread to the Brazilian bees, which are thus referred to as 'Africanised bees'. A
beekeeper explains that Africanised bees 'just keep on attacking in mass [
sic
] for
much longer than European bees would' and explains that a 'disadvantage of
Africanised bees is that they mate with European bees' and for this reason Australia
does not allow in bees from the US.
The barely hidden parable of Australian migration anxiety is striking. Replace
the word 'bee' with 'people' or 'culture' and one ends up with a neatly encapsulated
picture of White Australian stereotypes of race in a globalised world. On one side,
we have the yellow hordes swarming, or 'swamping' in Pauline Hanson's terms,
the nation from the North, which have been recycled in various invasion narratives
in Australian literature; and, on the other side, the Africans, often mistakenly
referred to as 'Sudanese' in Australia, who are prone to congregate in dangerously
violent gangs, as portrayed by mainstream media. Meanwhile, the non-native status
of European honey bees has long since been forgotten. The irony that we are meant
to protect the European from 'exotic invasion' remains unquestioned. But if this
apiarian theatre is a space to restage the naturalisation of European Australians, it
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