Also because it’s because I’ve been hiding under a rock that I haven’t been able to say anything but-
One of the major universities in my state (pfft why am I being so secretive about it, it’s UWA) comes out with this parody newspaper every year called PROSH. I get that a lot…
I also don’t trust white people in this country because of the Pacific Islander slave trade that was going on in Australia from 1842-1904, which til this day is either ignored or in describing it, words like recruited, encouraged and employed are used. When in reality South Sea Islanders were coerced, kidnapped, forced, and sold. Slavery by any other name, is still slavery.
And the only reason this stopped is because of the ‘white Australia’ policy that was brought into place to try and keep Australia for white people. When thousands of the men and women who were stolen from their homes, were returned, some being returned to the wrong Island (because brown and black people are all the same to white people) and others dying on the journey home.
Also, to add on to this is that during the period of labour that was forced onto Pacific Islanders, many of those people did settle down and have families with Indigenous communities in the places that they were made to work.
They had already built new lives for themselves, with the means that were given to them- they had families and new identities, so when the white supremacist policy took place, not only were these people displaced AGAIN but they were FORCED to leave their families AGAIN there for harming their own community but also the Indigenous communities in those areas.Australian history is a load of fuckery and so is the federation that this nation is founded upon and don’t let anyone tell you otherwise
The town of Parkes is famous for the annual Elvis Festival and for its role in helping to beam astronauts onto the moon (as seen in the movie ‘The Dish’).
Something you may not know about this town is that each week over 1,000 people learn the Wiradjuri language. That’s around 10 per cent of the population. It’s taught in every primary school as well as high schools and at TAFE. As you drive into Parkes and neighbouring Forbes, you’ll pass prominent ‘Welcome to Wiradjuri country’ signs along the road. As you walk into the main building at Parkes Public Primary school, you’re greeted with a bright wall filled with Wiradjuri nouns and verbs. In the prep classroom, the colours of the rainbow are plastered around the room in language.
A few years back, Forbes North primary school won an award at the Eisteddfod music competition for singing ‘Waltzing Mathilda’ in Wiradjuri. Festival organisers were so impressed that they created a new category, ‘Songs in Aboriginal languages’. Now Forbes competes in that category with the primary schools up the road in Parkes.
Last week, a student bounded up to Wiradjuri teacher Ron Wardrop, exclaiming, “Mr Ron, I wish I was Aboriginal! Even for just for one day!” For a man who spent most of his own childhood and adolescence being made to feel ashamed of his Indigenous heritage, Ron was at a loss for words.
Great article on indigenous (Wiradjuri) identity, language and history, and engendering change
Destiny Deacon, Ku Ku/Erub/Mer, born 1957 Last Laughs 1994, printed 2004
Throughout her career, Destiny Deacon has created a rich archive of cosmopolitan Aboriginal people who live on the edges of the city but have been conceptually filtered out of the quintessential Australian space of the quarter-acre backyard block. For her, Aboriginality is inextricably linked to these urban spaces, and she speaks out against the reflexive thinking that renders Aboriginal people invisible. The majority of Aboriginal people actually live on the eastern seaboard of Australia in large cities and towns, but this urban reality is only loosely embedded within the national consciousness.
In Last Laughs, a multiethnic trio of women, looking like the day after the night before, laughs conspiratorially at a private joke. They appear loud, brash, and confident and embody in this photograph that wonderful human quality of being able to laugh at oneself and be completely oneself with others.
(via The Owen and Wagner Collection of Australian Aboriginal Art)
So apparently cultural appropriation only matters if it’s an American culture! Good to know!
Seriously, I see people getting up in arms over white girls in war bonnets - and that’s fine, that’s as it should be. I see people getting up in arms over people portraying Ratonhnhaké:ton with a warbonnet when he’s Mohawk, not Plains, and that’s fine and as it should be too.
But nobody cares that they put Aboriginal Australian trappings onto a European animal? Specifically a European animal that was introduced here, became feral, and destroyed a huge portion of the ecosystem Aboriginal Australians depended on to survive?
No one?
why ROTG’s easter bunny was gross to me
Okayyy disclaimer I’m neither Australian nor aboriginal, so this is some second hand stuff, but hey America does deeply shitty things to its own native populations so it’s pretty easy to spot when we’re doing it to other people’s!
when I read the part about creating Australia as a haven for rabbits I think my body automatically tried to turn inside out with rage
they are the number one invasive vertebrate villain here. number one! they have driven dozens of species to extinction or endangerment by out-competing natives for food and shelter, destroying soil stability, spreading weeds, and facilitating the spread of cats and foxes and feral dogs (because rabbits with their crazy reproduction rates can shrug off feral predation, but their native counterparts just plain can’t)
but no, sure, dress up the worst ecological disaster to happen to this country* as a cute thing, go for it
*amongst other things (original post does say besides people but yes)
it’s funny the things that make me mad
like the rabbit in this movie
i watched the trailer for this and got really super angry about the boomerang and it all went downhill from there
TextaQueen leaves gallery over an ‘interesting debate’
I recently left my Melbourne representation, Gallerysmith, when I realised the gallery had begun representing Lucas Grogan, a white artist whose work has appropriated Indigenous Australian art, depicted black figures often in misogynistic scenes involving alcohol and sex, and otherwise traded on the exotification of ‘the other’. I don’t believe his work ‘raises an interesting debate’ and am offended by justifications of it ‘expressing a universal humanity’ and ‘creating dialogue between Indigenous and non-Indigenous art’ (quotes from his supporters) as I don’t believe that is a role for a non-Indigenous artist to undertake.
As a non-Indigenous person myself, it isn’t my voice in this ‘interesting debate’ that should be prioritised either. Paola Balla has written succinctly on the subject in her correspondence with Gallerysmith. If people want to contemplate artists who discuss contemporary Aboriginality, which I feel is what Grogan’s work falsely alludes to via appropriation (regardless of his supposed intentions), then they could look to Balla’s work, or that of proppanow’s Tony Albert, Richard Bell, Vernon Ah Kee, Gordon Hookey, Laurie Nilsen, Megan Cope and that of many other Indigenous artists speaking from their own experiences.
Cultural appropriation is not a new or personally ‘interesting’ phenomenon. White artists adopting the expressions of people of colour have historically held greater cultural currency than those made my people from the cultures the white artists appropriated. It should be obvious how colonialism, racism and other dynamics of privilege have informed that history. Yet artists such as Grogan (and he is definitely not alone in appropriation and exotification) feel entitled to pillage the forms and aesthetics of as many ‘other’ cultures as they please and are then celebrated by many for their ‘edginess’.
If you are a non-Indigenous person and consider the work of Lucas Grogan to ‘raise an interesting debate’ or to be ‘bravely’ ‘pushing the limits of what is socially acceptable’ (Grogan’s words) then perhaps you could consider what privileges you may have to find it interesting rather than offensive. Perhaps, if you consider yourself anti-racist, you could try de-prioritising your voice and Grogan’s intentions in what should be a discussion centred on Indigenous opinions and experiences.
I am a non-Indigenous person of colour, I am not culturally connected to the various forms he has appropriated (though as he continues to adopt the forms of additional cultures, he might get around to my own heritage soon) yet his work reminds me of my own position as exotic ‘other’ and how, in the art world and beyond, otherness is commodified and otherwise exploited by those with privilege and power. Though I am grateful for my ongoing presence in the art world, that reminder is a depressing and depleting one. I could not continue to show my work, which often discusses race and cultural identity from my position of lived racialised experience, at a gallery that has chosen to represent an artist who, already benefiting from systems of colonialism, racism and patriarchy as a white man, further exploits his position through his art.
Regardless of whether or not Grogan’s work of the moment claims to directly appropriate specific Indigenous art styles, he has tried to build a career trading on controversy over this appropriation. His work is built on this association with (false) Aboriginality and it would be refreshing if galleries, artists, and others in the art industry and beyond would recognise the racist implications of supporting him. Perhaps you could show that you do not support him nor those in the industry that support him via correspondence to the various galleries that have chosen to represent him.
Jan Manton Art, Brisbane
Gallerysmith, Melbourne
Hugo Michell Gallery, Adelaide
Rather than further investigate Grogan’s art, why not pay (more) attention to those culturally connected to the styles he has appropriated, and to proppanow; Tony Albert, Vernon Ah Kee, Richard Bell, and many other Indigenous artists speaking from their own experiences. And read Paola Balla’s correspondence with Gallerysmith.
Please do not contact me personally via email nor via fan page to defensively discuss Grogan’s work. Instead I recommend reading through this online resource of links discussing racism and how it links to cultural appropriation.
Sincerely,
Texta Queen
Feel free to forward or copy this post on FB, email or otherwise
Now, listen: I wasn’t there. I don’t know if it was Harvey Weinstein’s media/buzz plan to have the charismatic O’Dowd do every single press engagement for the film. I don’t know if the rest of the cast just flew in for the premiere and then flew out again (I doubt it, though, since there are also shots of Jessica Mauboy at a press call for the film). And, obviously, I haven’t seen the film - none of us have.
However, I hope I’m not the only one that thinks it’s, well, bullshit that no major coverage was given to either Blair or the rest of the cast. It’s unfortunate at best, and sinister at a stretch, that a film made by an indigenous director and starring four indigenous women seems to have been heralded solely by fawning over the white dude in the cast.
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Hey world media, how about letting The Sapphires shine? | thevine.com.au Well, someone had to say it. (via clambistro) |
We request the refunding for critical support services and counselling for criminalised women pre and post release prison in North Queensland by the LNP who cut the funding last week.
Why is this important? Criminalised women have the highest rate of sexual and physical abuse perpetrated against them in our community. Due to this horrendous abuse women turn to self medication with illiiegal drugs and / or alcohol. Nearly 60% of the women have a mental illness.
In Townsville women’s prison over 80% of women are Aboriginal and over 90% of the women cannot read and write. These issues have to be addressed, so that women when released into the community can move on with their lives and not return to drug and alcohol abuse and offending to feed their addiction.
Housing is also a fundamental part of their success on release. The support of our services assists women in healing their traumas and practical needs so when released they can reconnect with their children and families and move towards their goals and being a part of their communities.
(via Save Sisters Inside | CommunityRun)
Sister’s Inside is founded and run by primarily ex-inmate women and some lawyers. It’s been an internationally recognized success model of a service that helps;
- inmate mothers and their children re-establishing or maintain functional relationships during/after imprisonment.
- improved prospects of literacy, safe accommodation and finding work on release.
Allowing how many female inmates in Qld are ATSI women being punished for defending themselves in domestic violence situations, or arrested for petty ‘offences’ related to homelessness, this being top of the list for service shut down tells you exactly where real state priorities are.
Probably not coincidentally: they host the Is Prison Obsolete? Conferences, being one of the few regional public forums about changing the overall high imprisonment of marginalized people, not just services.
Oz folk - pls. signal boost on your other networks, not many politics Oz folk on tumblr. Non-Oz folk - ATSI = Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Native + Black.
Video shows bloody ending to teen joyride
http://m.news.com.au/TopStories/pg/0/fi1171757.htm
A POLICE officer unleashed a series of savage blows to the head of a teenager bleeding from a bullet wound to the neck during a brutal arrest early yesterday.
Moments after he was pulled from a mangled car wreck in Kings Cross, Sydney, shocking footage shows police repeatedly striking Troy Taylor before dragging his limp body across the street.
An officer then places a knee on the teen’s blood-soaked back to handcuff him.
The 18-year-old, one of two teenagers shot by police during a dramatic chase, is then left lying in a pool of blood as dozens of stunned bystanders look on.
The teenagers, one just 14, were in a serious condition in St Vincent’s Hospital last night.
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All of the boys and young men are Aboriginal. Yep they did the wrong thing by driving the car onto the pavement but also they seemed to be frightened of the police and there was no need for the cop to bash the kid after the car crashed.
This is what Mick Mundine had to say:
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/mick-mundine-horrified-by-video-of-arrest-of-shooting-victim-troy-taylor-in-kings-cross/story-e6freuy9-1226335217914
“ABORIGINAL elder Mick Mundine was shocked and stunned by the way police arrested shooting victim Troy Taylor, 18, describing it as “pathetic.”
“It’s very wrong - this has to stop,” Mr Mundine said.
The respected Aboriginal community leader watched the dramatic and disturbing video footage in the offices of The Sunday Telegraph yesterday.
“I mean, how are they training them? What’s the training for? Where’s the commonsense?” said an emotional Mr Mundine, who is working with respected Redfern police commander, Superintendent Luke Freudenstein, to calm tensions in the inner-city suburb.
“They never had guns in the car, so why did they even shoot the kids?”
White Australia has this baffling conceit this is not a racist country.
HOLY FUCK
you know the story I heard on Twitter from the mainstream media?
Their line is that these teen’s struck a 29 yr old woman, then was revving the engine with cops telling them to get out, with the woman still under the tyres, and so they were shot at.
Obviously the video shows otherwise.
I hate mainstream media.
Hi everyone,
Via the Aboriginal Tent Embassy on Facebook, more info and rally:
“Via Raul Bassi
THIS TUESDAY 24TH AT 1.30 NSW PARLIAMENT HOUSE
Dear friends:
Indigenous Social Justice Association is calling for an emergency rally this Tuesday, the 24th, at 1.30, at the NSW Parliament House to demand two points: first, stop the police investigating police and second, organize a credible independent investigation to start to give justice to the victims of police violence. The footage of what happened has been publicized in couple of the papers and is graphic enough. (See at the bottom.) The way that these young aboriginal people have been treated by police is anything but human. They were injured people, couple with bullets, incapable of offer any resistance, let alone been of any danger to the officers. Never the less couple of them, already bleeding, one in coma, were thrown from the car as a sack of potatoes, handcuffed and in some cases repeatedly beaten.
The police, even that has presented different versions, is justifying all, the Assistant commissioner said yesterday that the shootings were justified because there were people in danger with the car running on the footpath. The Police Association has said that they will be backing the police offices regardless. The police also, have said that they recognized the suspects. So quick questions arise. Why instead of shooting people 13 and 14 years old, that they knew, they didn’t try to stop the car shooting the tyres?
So, even still none has die and is our heartfelt wish none will, are we confronting another similar situations to TJ or Roberto Laudiscio Curti?
So came on Tuesday to tell the government, the parliament and the police, that we had enough and we demand justice.
Family members of the people involved, have invited to participate of the rally.
More information Raul Bassi 0403037376”Also these young people are from western Sydney.
National Close the Gap Day - 22nd March 2012
This is the Reconciliation Action Plan of the National Trust of Australia (WA).
If Australia is the lucky country, why do Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples have a lower life expectancy than other Australians – and many people in the developing world?
Power through partnership
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples are still dying 10 to 17 years younger than other Australians. The only way to close the gap in indigenous health equality within a generation is to work in partnership with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.
National Close the Gap Day (NCTGD) is a way for all Australians to join together and remind our political leaders of their commitments to close the life expectancy gap between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians within a generation. The focus for 2012 is on the need for genuine, meaningful partnership with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities and organisations at all stages of health planning and delivery.
Rodarte Fall 2012
Oh no, Rodarte. Tell me you didn’t put Aboriginal dot paintings on your ready-to-wear fashion… The worst thing is that, unlike the (rightful) fuss kicked up over appropriation of Native American culture, nobody seems to care enough about this to even raise a peep. This is truly shameful, guys.
“Art is one of the key rituals of Aboriginal culture and was and still is, used to mark territory, record history, and tell stories about the dreamtime. But its importance to traditional Indigenous life is difficult for non-Indigenous people to understand. To quote Morphy (1991):
“Art was, and is, a central component of the traditional Yolngu way of life, of significance in the political domain, in the relationships between clans, and in the relations between men and women. Art was and remains an important component of the system of restricted knowledge, and at a more metaphysical level is the major means of recreating ancestral events, ensuring continuity with the ancestral past, and communicating with the spirit world.”
[x]
“Doesn’t matter what sort of painting we do in this country, it still belongs to the people, all the people. This is worship, work, culture. It’s all Dreaming. The Dreaming is all over Australia. We must teach the whitefellas.”
- Wenten Rubuntja, Aboriginal Australian landscape painter
To some of the Aussies clogging up the Indigenous tag
TW: talks on genocide, racism, privilege denial, Australians who don’t know history
Namely those who are quite upset by the PM losing her shoe and have now resorted to engaging in hateful rhetoric directed at the Australian Indigenous communities.
I’ve noticed a few trends going on in the racist, ignorant and possibly written-in-an-inebriated-state, rage posts. And it’s only fair to address these things.
1. There is this misunderstanding that the genocide and ill treatment of Indigenous Australians “happened” 200 years ago. Allow me to correct you (Aussie to Aussie of course, because some of you seem rather flustered when a non Aussie attempts to address your racist disposition)- The Genocide and ill treatment of Indigenous Australians STARTED roughly 200 years ago.
The effects of the genocide, the negligence and abuse by the government, the ongoing institutional oppression of them is still happening today. Whilst you were mourning over the PM’s lost shoe, the NTER was (and is) still running. Police brutality against Indigenous Australians is still happening. The rates of infant mortality, sexual abuse and assault are still disproportionately higher in comparison to the general population. If it comforts you in the slightest- the PM will get another pair of shoes. However, these issues will not experience such an instant fix.
2. Many of you seem quite upset by the fact that Indigenous Australians can access a free education. Now this surprises me because we do have government schools where education is free (and if there are certain payments to be made, government subsidies can still be applied for) which is available to all Australians. And even up to a tertiary level (though the HECS is far from perfect) there are still ways of lessening the financial burden- provided by private and public institutions which all Australians can access.
3. Since we’re talking about university, I’ve also observed a lot of anger due to the fact that apparently Indigenous Australians can get a “free ride” into university because they apparently “swim in” scholarships.
Again- if you actually took the time to research our nation’s Universities, you’d notice that despite there being 2-3 max Indigenous focus scholarships per uni, there are plenty more scholarships on top of that which any Australian and apply for if you meet a set of requirements (and fun fact, even the Indigenous focused scholarships have a set of requirements to meet as well). Also, another point to be made- Indigenous Australians are not exempt from HECS.
4. Many of you seem quite bitter about how Indigenous Australians apparently get free-to-access dole. And the fact that you cannot access such magic dole which you seem to blame Indigenous Australians for. In the time that it took for you to write your hate post, if you had done some research- you would have learnt that applications for the dole are open to all. It doesn’t mean that you will get the dole (because you have to meet certain requirements to qualify for it) but the same way your application will go through a process of assessment- so will an Indigenous Australian’s ( and they must meet a set of requirements as well). And where there will be some application that will be accepted, there will be those which will be rejected- the same applies to Indigenous applicants as well.
I would go into further detail on the numerous ways the Indigenous community here has been abused by the government institutionally and individual wise, or the 5 acts of genocide this community has experienced- but the Prime Minister losing her shoe, or a flag being burnt (because those who wrapped themselves in the flag as they participated in the Cronulla Riots are not offensive at all.), or you not knowing that you can access a lot of these things which you accuse Indigenous Australians for- is clearly more important than all that.
Reblogging again because there is a hate post on how Indigenous Australians Are The Worst because they can get cheap milk in Western Australia.
Fun fact: EVERYONE IN WESTERN AUSTRALIA CAN GET CHEAP MILK
$2.00 FOR 2 LITRES WHAT A BARGAIN YOU PEOPLE ARE RUNNING OUT OF EXCUSES GO TO FUCKING COLES BEFORE POSTING THIS SHIT
They steal and kill and murder and take entire countries…and complain when a few drops of what does not belong to them is sparingly and with much backpatting “given” to the original owners and inhabitants. If I could get a superpower, it would the ability to induce the missing conscience that so many white people appear to lack.
Here’s the event that the original post references. This Aussie wants to print out the OP and hand it out to everyone.
More FACTS here:
Mythbusters (debunking myths about Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples)
Some questions and answers about Indigenous peoples, migrants and refugees and asylum seekers
The Tall Man
One Morning Indigenous man Cameron Doomadgee swore at a police officer and 45 minutes later he was found dead in a police cell.
Watch this documentary here.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander viewers are advised that this film contains images and voices of deceased people.
Respect to all Australian Indigenous peoples on this Invasion Day.
Terra Nullius was bullshit.
Check this awesome interactive map of Indigenous languages
