In the late-1990s I lived in an intentional community – or hippy commune – near Yandina in Queensland called Starlight. Then in 2003, I bought into Goolawah Co-operative as it was being established near Crescent Head in New South Wales. Australia has a long history of co-operatives such as diary and fishing co-ops, and has dozens of land-sharing co-operatives established as a cheaper alternative to owning freehold land.
During my seven years on co-ops, I met the best and worst of people, and had the best and worst of times. The two co-ops, Starlight and Goolawah have different legal structures and sets of rules and guidelines to deal with social issues in the community. I still have friends from those days who live the dream and say things are easy to calm down or ignore, and its a liveable suburban feel although you have to live with the argey-bargey of ‘politics in the park’.
My motives for seeking community structure
In 1985, while I was working at the Australian Film, Television and Radio School, the movie ‘Bliss’ was released. Adapted from Peter Carey’s novel about life in the Australian bush, I was so impressed by the movie Bliss that I went to see the producer, Anthony Buckley, to present my photo portfolio in the hope of getting future work. The following year, AAP took my photography career in the direction of news, instead of film stills photographer.
In the late 1990s I was looking for acreage on the Sunshine Coast, having quit my Regional Economic Development managers job and completed a Permaculture Design Certificate, and the opportunity to move into Starlight came up. Peter Carey wrote ‘Bliss’ while living there in the late 1970s. I jumped at the chance!
Having encountered the Machiavellian machinations of politics which presents more problems than answers, and then finding permaculture which is answers looking for more questions and situations where it can be applied, I wondered if these community structures truly worked.
If I were to answer that now, I’d say that intentional communities are for people who can play well with people who rip up your fruit trees.
I’d worked for AAP and Reuters, which were both co-operatives and the community spirit from the workers was second to none so I had an idea that structure might work on a land sharing community.
Starlight Community
Starlight is a company with shareholders, structured to overcome the legal barriers imposed by the conservative Maroochy Shire Council of subdividing the land. On Starlight, residents have a cleared acre or two around their house and have surrounding acreage allocated to them, usually about twenty acres of old growth and regrowth tropical rainforest. My place was only five acres, possibly because it was stunningly gorgeous on the creek.
On one side of the stone and crystal cottage was a twelve step waterfall, and on the other was a two drop waterfall – when it rained. The twelve steps formed a few lovely natural baths.
My Number 7 – Happy Hippy Heaven Seven – fronted Browns Creek, just past the renowned Starlight Community Hall, and before the causeway. I have wonderful memories of the hippies coming out of their forest for the procession along the road towards the hall for the quarterly meetings which were theatrical displays of political soapboxing and debate.
The renters, like me, had it good. We were living the dream. Those that owned their places weren’t as happy. The reason that I had the opportunity to rent, as I found out at my first meeting, was a few of the male residents had ganged up on the woman who owned my place and had hounded her out. I was renting her place while she organised the sale of her dream home that she and her son had built.
There were extraordinary characters with interesting names like Brian Bees, Paul Trees and Mother Mick, named after a tattoo on his arm. I drove my old Mercedes up the mountain to see Mother Mick, only for the car to give up in a cloud of oily smoke. That created a problem – how to get the heavy old Merc that won’t start down a mountain on a pot-holed dirt track with a near sheer cliff as one edge.
I went into Yandina pub and talked a group of teenagers into hitching the Merc to the front of their car and drive down the mountain behind me so they could apply brakes if needed. A young Chris Vermeulen, who went on to win the 2007 French Grand Prix in MotoGP, was amongst the fearless teens who drove off the side of a mountain tied to a mad man in a dead old Mercedes Benz.
It turned out that a $2 o-ring on the gearbox had failed, and the Merc continued on in battered condition for another year or two.
“How many in your vehicles and how long are you staying?”
Police helicopters flying over the houses at tree top level was not uncommon at Starlight. The army regularly bivouacked in the neighbouring state forest for a couple of weeks over summer while they searched for dope crops.
One day I was standing on the dirt road talking with a neighbour, who’s hair went down to his hips, when a convoy of army trucks came up. Cousin It stood in the middle of the road and put up his hand, signalling Stop! The army obliged. Cousin It went to the door of the first truck and said:
“How many in your vehicles and how long are you staying?”
The soldier just laughed, so Cousin It repeated his question.
The soldier said “I’m not telling you that!”
Cousin It said: “You have to. I’m the local Fire Warden”
A quick radio call later and we discovered there were 12 of them staying for a week. Within a few minutes everyone for miles knew and were keeping tabs on them. One woman chased them off her property with a broom. “C’mon troops, this is private property!”
At dawn a few days later, we figured it must be our turn for a visit, so I walked out about 100m into the bush, sat on a log leaning up against a tree and rolled a smoke. Sure enough, 20 minutes later, the troops came sneaking in so I waited until they were all around me, stood up and pointed at each of them, shouting: “Bang, got you! Bang, your dead! Bang, I see you too!” Without saying a word, they stood, about faced, and left. HaHa
I stayed on Starlight Community with the forest dwellers for about two years before moving into Hidden Valley. Great times, the best of times!
Peter Carey wrote his book Bliss while on Starlight. he says “For a while I lived on the other side of Brisbane, at Yandina, in what was coyly labelled an Alternative Community by its inhabitants, and a Hippy Commune by the local press. Ever since I left there in 1980, I have recalled it fondly – the beautiful physical environment, my friends there.”
“I wrote a novel in Yandina and a great deal of the life in Browns Creek Road found its way between the pages of the book. In our bedroom in New York I have a small colour photograph of a red window frame in a stained timber wall. The glass of the window reflects a perfect blue sky and the clear spiky leaves of a tropical palm. This hut or cabin was once my home. Looking at the photograph always makes me feel good,” Peter Carey wrote.
‘Bliss’ available from Australian retailer Booktopia
Goolawah Co-operative
Goolawah Co-Operative is a co-operative structure, with shareholders. Of the 1640 acres (664 ha), each resident is allocated 1.25 acres for their house and garden, and they jointly own the natural bush, dams and roads making up the rest of the property.
My camp site was next to a young fellow Paul Martin and over the next five years, I watched him lay the foundations and sow the seeds for his own demise. We were the first two to settle on the land at Red Hill. Paul hounded at least 12 people out of their homes, including three women. All the people were a generation older, so perhaps his issue was their age. Who knows? Lifeline Crisis Counsellors are available if anyone needs them.
Usually what happens on land stays on land, but in Paul’s case, he got in the face of a lot of people demanding they move out of their homes, so I can share and confirm that he was not a nice person. One example, he went on a rampage killing the neighbour’s cattle with his car which caused a lot of problems in the cattle town of Kempsey. Two cars full of men arrived at Goolawah wanting a word with him. Paul promptly vanished, leaving others to deal with the angry armed cattle farmers. Paul punished a lot of people and they need reminding they aren’t alone.
It takes all characters to make a co-operative group, some to work at making communities better places to live and work, and others come to deal with their personal stuff. For these reasons, co-ops usually are selective about their memberships. Different states and local councils have different rules which means in some places co-operatives are fine whereas a company structure is better in others. DYOR
Peter Carey’s books on Amazon and from Australian retailer Booktopia
A peculiar people
In 2007, while I was deciding whether to leave or continue putting up with Paul’s nonsense, I read Gavin Souter’s excellent book, A PECULIAR PEOPLE: The Australians in Paraguay about the New Australia Co-operative. I’d advise anyone considering buying into an intentional community to read it first. The tales of the impact on the residents that the dramas created by these dissatisfied new colonialists are eye openers and I saw exactly the same thing happening at Goolawah.
A group of Australians formed a co-operative in Paraguay in 1892, among them writer Dame Mary Gilmore, who’s portrait appears on the Australian ten dollar note. William Lane was the founder and leader of the New Australia movement. The phrase ‘White Australia policy’ first appears in William Lane’s publication The Boomerang in Brisbane. I highly recommend to anyone considering buying into a co-operative to read A Peculiar People (from Amazon) or Booktopia
The same thing happened in Paraguay. Residents disillusioned with the realisation that their dream of Utopia didn’t match the reality began fighting and kicking each other out. Suicides followed. I left Goolawah in 2008 and like William Lane joined the conservative media, lasting four months as Group Picture Editor at Cumberland-Courier Newspapers, aka NewsLocal, after I sent my CV to the Wentworth Courier to help get my photo during APEC published. That transgression didn’t last long, but I digress.
I remember saying as I left Goolie-World that Paul would either murder someone or be killed. It turns out he did both by suicide in 2017. He murdered himself.
Paul had a troubled relationship with women. When his relationship broke down on Goolawah, he became distressed. One day, after he had been fighting bushfires near his home, he lost it completely. He tied one end of a roll of wire around a tree, the other end around his neck, and drove off, leaving his immediate neighbours to discover the carnage.
Coincidentally, as I check the date as I write this, discovered it was five years ago today that he ended his life. Blessed be Paul and those that have gone the way before you.
New Australia settlement, Paraguay, between 1892-1905 – unknown photographer, public domain
Do you want to live with other people who don’t fit in?
Co-ops aren’t for everyone. It’s like living in a committee situation 24/7. If you’ve ever seen a community group, like an arts or environment association, go haywire then imagine that magnified and the conflict happening all day, every day.
Cliques form. The Survivor television series strategy of forming alliances works in real life as a coping mechanism. Outwit, Outplay, Outlast. On both co-ops, I witnessed gangs form, gang up on innocent people and “vote them off the island”. As that turns out, it also happens in towns and along streets and in coffee shops as people decide who they don’t agree with, or plot how they want to “get rid of” their neighbour. I think its strange behaviour but now I see it everywhere.
Some people, like Peter Carey, move into communes because their lover wanted to … co-opted into co-operative living. Other people move into co-ops because they don’t fit into mainstream society, are questioning their place in the world, or are having climate anxiety and want to experience something different. I went in because I was studying real world structural pluralist political systems and wanted to watch people practising parliament in the park.
Here’s a few scenarios that might happen on co-ops that are out of your control – you’ll meet people who don’t fit into society because they have problems and are in co-ops to work through their issues or are trying to get away from them, or you’ll meet the best of people who understand the benefits of belonging to a ‘community’. A few co-operatives work because their common goals override personal differences.
Meet as many of the residents as you can and ask yourself – do you want these people to sit on the committee that rules your life? Land sharing co-operatives are cheaper than freehold title, but be aware there is a hidden cost. I’m looking at this cynically having lived through the establishment and start up of Goolawah, with its 80-odd members.
The ‘shared vision’ that forms the bond between residents is vital – it must be rock solid and transcend personal differences. Alternative communities are a great exercise in stoicism while saving for a freehold title property, imo.
Final words from me: check the ‘license to occupy’ between the company/co-operative and the shareholder entitling a home dwelling and buildings as some shares are just voting rights; ask a friend to come check its not a cult or sect because they are often successful examples of having a commonality and dispute resolution procedure. rent before you buy to get to know the residents, don’t be a stickybeak and gossip, and be nice to each other 🙂 Thanks for reading, Mark Anning
Peter Carey wrote his first published novel ‘Bliss’ whilst a Starlighter. Peter Carey, while accepting the Miles Franklin award for Bliss, told the London crowd, “It’s a long way from Brown’s Creek Road”. Peter Carey’s books on Amazon and from Australian retailer Booktopia
Related stories
Origin of “Welcome to Country” Nimbin Aquarius Festival 1973
Our Permaculture Design feature stories are a growing resource for organic & REGEN farmers
