Indigenous affairs
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Rare earths: a conundrum for our responsibility to care for country and kin
The increasing global demand for rare earth elements (REE) is driven by clean energy technologies. The electric vehicle in particular, is a strong driving force. The un-ceded sovereign lands of hundreds of First Nations – now colonised and called Australia – hold at least four per cent of the world’s rare earth element reserves. Continue reading »
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Genocidal attitudes masked in the trappings of patriotism
The decision by Australia’s federal Opposition leader to avoid standing by the Aboriginal flag is a dangerously divisive and cynical move. Continue reading »
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Farewell fair go, hello despair
It’s true. The night fears have come to pass. The evidence is too great to ignore any longer. My country, our nation, is racist. Continue reading »
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Thorpe’s genocide case against Netanyahu’s Australian advisor as back in court
Mark Regev is “an Australian citizen and he’s advocating for genocide,” Uncle Robbie Thorpe explained last week. Continue reading »
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When media and the state collude
It was the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, a day meant to mark the start of a 16-day global campaign to end the scourge of gender-based violence against women. Yet, on this day of reflection and action, The Australian chose to publish a follow-up story to its sensationalised splash just two Continue reading »
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A five-minute scroll
Up to 50,000 Māori mobilised and walked to the New Zealand Parliament in Wellington to to protest the treaty principles bill, which Amnesty International states should never have been introduced. Bob Carr states what he told us last week about AUKUS is now confirmed. A member of Knesset is forcibly removed for speaking out against Continue reading »
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The Australian colony: When will the ALP Government initiate system reform?
The visit of the British royals was for many Australians a non-event, an almost unreal formality that has to be experienced and processed. During the visit, Lydia Thorpe felt compelled to very publicly state: “You committed genocide against our people. Give us our land back. … We want a treaty in this country. This is Continue reading »
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I’m still dreaming of a Blak Xmas stamp
In 1962, a columnist with the Melbourne Herald noted that a 16th century sculpture of Madonna and Child would be on that year’s Christmas stamp. He went on to praise ‘Our Lady of the Aborigines’ as ’a real Australian Madonna and Child,’ before asking, ‘How about it for next year?’ Continue reading »
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No Australian should swear loyalty to a foreign king
So Bridget McKenzie thinks Lidia Thorpe’s protest against King Charles raises some “quite tricky constitutional questions”. Yes it does, but not the ones she thinks. Continue reading »
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A dangerous move toward a modern-day Stolen Generation
By focusing on punitive programs instead of community-driven support over a ‘youth crime crisis’ that did not exist, the incoming Queensland LNP government appears to be blind to the systemic issues that drive children toward vulnerability. Their policies will reinforce a cycle of criminalisation that will haunt our communities for generations. Continue reading »
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On not being in control, and learning to ‘Go Round’
“It was we who did the dispossessing. We took the traditional lands and smashed the traditional way of life. We brought the diseases and the alcohol.” – Paul Keating, Redfern speech. Continue reading »
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The foundation stones of reconciliation, truth telling postponed again
The failure of last year’s referendum still troubles the country. The focus on the Voice to Parliament took attention away from the far more consequential question of truth telling, while paradoxically displaying how much it is still needed. Continue reading »
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Lidia, I’m angry, too
A lot has been written in the past few days about Senator Lidia Thorpe and her courageous act of speaking truth to power when she confronted coloniser, King Charles, in the colonial halls of Parliament. Yet amidst the commentary, one voice remains absent: the voice of the criminalised community. As a formerly incarcerated woman, I Continue reading »
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Thorpe unmasks the coloniser who visited genocide on Australia’s First Nations
Both Charles and Camilla are having their gilt edged fault lines exposed on their Australian tour. We should be thankful for Lidia Thorpe’s courage and outspokenness. Continue reading »
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Myths of the Referendum
One year on from the defeat of the ‘Indigenous Voice’ referendum of 14 October 2023, some myths have arisen about the process and the outcome. These deserve further discussion. Continue reading »
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What will follow the referendum?
It is not surprising that so many of us believed that after the Voice Referendum 2023 Indigenous people would be recognised in the Australian Constitution and their voices valued. Continue reading »
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History’s wound, still open wide
Australia, land of Altjira, of oceans wild and skies untamed, Where stories of the Jukurrpa are told in songlines proclaimed. Continue reading »
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Indigenous cultures show other worlds are possible
‘I think the natives held privately that in taking such pains to make things grow where already things grew of their own accord I was maybe a little mad…. As for myself, there were times when…. it came to me with considerable force that perhaps in this private opinion there was a deal of truth…’ Continue reading »
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Northern militarisation overlooking Indigenous rights: Prof Henry Reynolds, History, University of Tasmania
Indigenous Australians have extensive land rights across Northern Australia where large scale militarisation is being undertaken, raising questions about processes of consultation and underlying Indigenous rights endorsed by Australia under international treaty arrangements. Continue reading »
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The military Americanisation of Northern Australia
The headline in the Weekend Australian said it all: NT Bases Key to American War Plans. Republican Congressman Michael McCaul, the Chair of the House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee, told The Australian, after a ten day visit to Australia that our geography offered key advantages to the US “as it sought to deter Chinese Continue reading »
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The campaign to persuade: the “Voice” among Chinese Australians
We live in an era of communicative abundance and post-truth politics, where networked digital platforms shape nearly every aspect of our daily lives, from information and communication to economic and social transactions. Digital platforms have transformed truth-claiming and fact-checking into an emotionally driven process, blurring the boundaries between information and misinformation, as well as opinion Continue reading »
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On fairness, our futures seem grim under Albo
Has the ALP read the Voice referendum loss as indicating limited voter support for First Nations rights, with an election soon? Continue reading »
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Political capitulation, moral failure
Anthony Albanese’s recent visit to the Gama Festival will certainly be memorable but not in ways that he will necessarily appreciate. It displayed, in a manner for all to see, his government’s final renunciation of the Uluru Statement From The Heart of 2017 and the attendant process of reconciliation. Continue reading »
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There’s no escaping the wrongs done to Indigenous people
Patricia Karvelas’s article reflecting on the Labor government’s ‘timid’, ‘pragmatic’, ‘realistic’ change of course in pursuit of bipartisanship on Indigenous affairs made for uber-depressing reading (ABC News, online, ‘Timidity reigns as Anthony Albanese backs away from Makarrata at Garma Festival’, 5th August). It confirmed that the institutional racism prosecuted by the No campaign, is alive Continue reading »
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Uncle Robbie Thorpe progresses Aboriginal genocide case in Victorian Supreme court
Krauatungalung elder Uncle Robbie Thorpe stood at the bar in the Victorian Supreme Court self-represented last Friday to challenge the Magistrates’ Court of Victoria and the state attorney general, regarding the lower court’s registrar having refused to accept a charge sheet he’d tried to submit. Continue reading »
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It’s the Voice of ‘Rural Nullius’ on a Jim Crow Country Hour
With just a few more stories farmers in the south of Israel would have been granted as much air time as all the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander nations in Australia put together. Continue reading »
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Eyes to see
It’s easy to turn a blind eye when the victims are Other, but what if the victims are us? What does it mean to ‘face away from what it means to be human’? Continue reading »
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Last chance for the War Memorial
The Frontier Wars were fought in every part of the vast Australian continent from the 1790’s to the 1920’s. How could they be overlooked in local or even in global history? The ownership and control of a continental landmass was at stake. First Nations’ warriors bled and died on, and for, their own country. Why Continue reading »
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The real truth telling
If anybody in Australia is interested in real “Truth Telling” then look no further than the continued operation of Don Dale Juvenile Detention Centre in Darwin, NT. Don Dale has, and continues to provide, the real truth for all to see as regards the disaster that is race relations in Australia and how distant the Continue reading »
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Canberra bureaucrats commissioning NT houses unfit for purpose
Labor’s $4 billion for Indigenous housing in the Northern Territory is set for failure unless it incorporates Aboriginal expertise. Continue reading »
