It is sensible to be afraid of a crocodile sharing the river you are playing in. It is not sensible to be afraid of monsters under the bed. It is not sensible to be afraid of a puppy begging to be friends.

Australia is in a great lather of fear over the Voice. Australians, overall, are only moderately concerned with planetary ill health, and our government continues flagrantly to aggravate its illness.

The Voice is being portrayed as a terrifying monster under the bed. There are a few legitimate concerns, but most of the negative noise about the Voice is hysteria about things that ‘might’ happen, but that are just nonsense made up by those who want to scare us.

But the Voice is a friendly puppy. We will not lose our backyards to First Peoples. They are not part of the great socialist-greenies conspiracy to turn us into North Korea. They have asked to be heard, and they will continue to have very little actual power. They have offered the hand of friendship.

The planet, on the other hand, is becoming less and less friendly to us, because of what we are doing to its waters, forests, soils and air, and the foul pollution of many kinds we dump on it. It is the lurking crocodile, now becoming clearly visible across the river, and heading our way. We would be very wise to stop what we are doing and get ourselves out of danger.

We are being frightened into jumping at shadows. We are being lulled into ignoring the really big threat, pretending the crocodile is not there. If we don’t soon get a grip, it won’t matter which scary thing gets us.