Australia鈥檚 political history is a dark tapestry, woven from the repeated redrafting of truth with a litany of political lies, writes Suzanne James.
First Nations justice and sovereignty
Paul Gregoire lays out the context to the massive and youthful Stop Black Deaths in Custody 鈥 Black Lives Matter protest that took over the centre of Warrang-Sydney.
The recent destruction of a major cultural heritage site,聽Juukan Gorge in Western Australia, was undertaken in the name of Rio Tinto shareholders' profit, writes聽Samuel Knight.
A tweet by Victoria鈥檚 deputy Chief Health Officer Dr Annaliese van Diemen on the 250th anniversary of Captain Cook鈥檚 arrival in Australia, which provoked a furious response from right-wing culture warriors, has led to a greater awareness of the legacy of colonialism, writes Chloe DS.听
At the height of the fire crisis over the New Year an Aboriginal elder, who had evacuated from Lakes Entrance to Bairnsdale in Victoria, joined other evacuees in registering for emergency relief. But he was told by a St Vincent de Paul staffer that the agency had 鈥渉elped enough of your people today鈥, given a $20 fuel voucher and told not to tell other Aboriginal people about it. The elder walked out, humiliated, and asked his niece to return the voucher.
Bruce Shillingsworth, the Yaama Ngunna Baaka Corroboree Festival tour organiser, said on October 1 that First Nations people need to be given back the power to make key decisions about water flow and the rivers.
Yamatji First Nation members gathered in front of Geraldton police station on September 18 to vent their outrage and grief over the death of 29-year-old sister Joyce Clark, who was shot dead the night before by a police officer on the outskirts of the town.
Gill Boehringer, an honorary senior research fellow at Macquarie University, has been studying the Murray-Darling Basin crisis and believes that the New South Wales government鈥檚 reluctance to assist affected Indigenous communities is connected to their dispossession, discrimination and exploitation.
As a kid, the way I was taught about Indigenous people was terrible. For one thing, the understanding of the Indigenous economy and technology was non-existent.
I had this picture of people living in homes basically made of a bit of bark and maybe grass and sticks leaned up against a tree trunk. The impression was they spent their time wandering around and occasionally spearing a kangaroo or goanna for dinner.
Over the years I picked up bits and pieces of a more realistic and less insulting picture of Indigenous life, but it wasn鈥檛 really until I read聽Dark Emu by Bruce Pascoe that it all fell into place such that I can maybe imagine in some detail how people lived.
I was privileged to be invited to observe a National Gathering of First Nations peoples on November 4鈥5 at the Aboriginal Tent Embassy in Canberra.
Representatives from many different clan groups from a large number of First Nations across the continent attended. It was a direct response to the events at Uluru earlier in the year, with regard to Constitutional Recognition. Its initial purpose being to discuss the formalisation of a process of recognition of each tribe鈥檚 sovereignty.
The Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) has launched the First Nations Workers' Alliance to represent the 30,000 participants in the federal government鈥檚 Community Development Program (CDP), most of whom are Aboriginal people.
The move followed a resolution adopted by the ACTU executive authorising all means at its disposal to be mobilised towards dismantling the program. The resolution will kick-start the exploration of legal and legislative challenges to the program, as well as the mobilisation of campaign resources.
Early last year, an academic debate over Invasion Day erupted at the University of NSW. Apparently, some well credentialed people are offended that the term 鈥渋nvasion鈥 is used to describe January 26.
I would be quite happy not to have to use that term. Stop and think for a few minutes: that would mean altering history or going back in time and ensuring the invasion of this country, now called Australia, never happened.听
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