Discrimination in the Media

and cricket's third umpire

Published on September 27, 2005 By Champas Socialist In Politics

Just a couple of unpublished letters to the editor from the past couple of weeks:

The Australian published an article about Aboriginal assimilation last week: Link

Gary Johns: Integration must take over from separatism
September 22, 2005

HERBERT C. Coombs's vision of self-managing communities on Aboriginal communal land is dead. The Bennelong Society - formed by former Aboriginal affairs minister Peter Howson and others in 2000 - gives space to those who were convinced of the intellectual dishonesty of the Coombs vision. Warren Mundine used the Bennelong conference earlier this month to speak his mind. As this newspaper reported, he laid waste to the shibboleths of communal land ownership and abominable cultural practices. The antidote to the Coombs vision is simple, if difficult. All children must have a thorough grounding in the Western education system and all that that entails for Aboriginal culture. In the words of pastor Paul Albrecht, the attempt to aboriginalise education has created immense confusion. Steve Etherington informed the society: "There is no way to move from the present dysfunction to mainstream employment without a hiatus period ... [The] question is which kind of discomfort yields the best outcomes: a period of transition or a further stage in the downward spiral. "I believe that people are infinitely more valuable in an absolute sense, than their cultures, which are often more valued by people who don't live in them and whose interest in their maintenance may be quite selfish."
What is the purpose of the land rights movement when Aborigines cannot live, indeed, do not wish to live, off the land?
Providing services to tiny remote communities, perversely, denies the inhabitants the opportunity to engage in a wider world. There are 1200 discrete remote Aboriginal communities throughout northern Australia.
Those who believe that Aborigines are already adjusting to the dominant culture, albeit in some cases poorly, realise it is impossible to deny adjustment.

For nearly 40 years, governments - persuaded by well-meaning but misguided intellectuals - have led Aborigines down a path to poverty. It was possible, the argument went, for indigenous Australians to escape adjusting to the rules of a modern economy, a modern legal system and a modern welfare state. Those days are over. Governments must now prepare Aborigines for the world outside of their communities.

I responded: It is not hard to spot that Gary Johns heads an organisation named after a 'noble savage' and that he was a member of a Government that promised much to the Aborigines, but whose promises disappeared just like writing in the sand, as Yothu Yindi put it (p. 10, The Australian Sep 22). He is right that a balance must be struck between Aboriginal and Western cultures, but this is no reason why we must go back to assimilationism (or integration as he wants to now call it because it doesn't make him sound so bad). There is no reason why Aboriginal cultural practices cannot be strengthened at the same time. Although he and city blackfellers like Mundine might like to ignore it, many Aborigines still take great pride and strength from their cultural heritage and regularly state so openly. One need look no further than the Yolngu groups to see that a healthy balance can be achieved. By all means, improve health and education, and give Aborigines opportunities to work. But why can we not learn from the Aborigines about Australia's history, natural resources and attitudes to land too?

To The Big Issue I wrote:

I am normally impressed with the way your magazine strives to promote appreciation of difference, but this was not evident in your rather shocking article "More than a Woman" about Pakistani Kushras. I found your reporter's reference to "defective genitals" quite offensive. Why must your reporter promote the idea that you must either be a "man" or a "woman" capable of reproducing in order to be a properly functioning person? Why can he not accept that there are people with a different physical make-up to him? He goes on quite insensitively referring to these people as "homosexual", a term which has no relelvance to this context. And the killer punch comes when he refers to watching the Kushras as providing a "misshapen view of feminine sexuality", rather than "a proper view of a distinct sexuality, unique to these beautiful people". This article did nothing to "remove the stigmas that marginalise them". I expect better of George Pell.

And to SBS's cricket commentary team I wrote (on a lighter note):

Dean Jones would refer the decision to go to lunch to the 3rd umpire if he could. With the amount of things Deano wants referred to the third umpire, they're going to have to add a 6th day. We've seen that umpires now refer just about every run out decision upstairs: imagine if they did that every time Warney thought he had an LB on the offchance they missed something! In the final Test, England received 4 bad umpiring decisions and Australia 3. Given the run of the series: that's pretty evened out. The technology for run outs is of a high standard and can be trusted, but Kerry O'Keefe described Hawkeye best when he said it was a BA student sitting in his loungeroom after a couple of bongs lookin' at it and goin' "F**in' yeah! That's out baby!"
"

Comments

No one has commented on this article. Be the first!

Welcome Guest! Please take the time to register with us.
There are many great features available to you once you register, including:

Richer content, access to many features that are disabled for guests like commenting on the forums.
Access to a great community, with a massive database of many, many areas of interest.
Access to contests & subscription offers like exclusive emails.
It's simple, and FREE!