Australians Have A Crippling Fear of Change
While White Australia is absolutely fantastic at being racist, nothing beats their ability to miss the point entirely.
Australia. A nation of hypocrites, built on the bones of Indigenous people.
It’s January again and I’m mentally preparing myself for the onslaught of drunk Australians who think they know everything. This time of year has me fluctuating between sadness and anger — I’m also overcome with nostalgia.
This day means reflecting on all the times that White Australia did what it does best: be very, very racist.
Since it’s all in the past and was ages ago, let’s reflect on these very recent incidences of racism in the last few years:
1. When I Was Seventeen, A Boy Called Me An Abo Bitch.
When I flew off the handle (and may have possibly thrown a plastic garden chair at him) he apologised and said he didn’t know I was Aboriginal. He’d only meant to be mean, not racist, never mind that using a race as an insult is…racist.
Don’t worry, I can still hear the cogs turning in his brain even now.
2. My sister-in-law comes to my house crying reverse racism.
Ignoring the fact that this is ENTIRELY the wrong house to do this at, let’s examine the facts. She was crying poor me because her white son didn’t get to participate in a trip for Indigenous kids, that was set up by an Indigenous foundation in order to encourage our kids to go to and complete school.
I’ll let you sit with this for a moment.
When a group of people are less likely to finish school, and more likely to wind up in jail due to entrenched racism, perhaps you could hold off on making everything about yourself. I feel like the fact that black fullas are more likely to be held back in life, due to systemic racism is more important that your son’s incessant, entitled whinging.
And why would you come to your BLACK sister in-law’s house to whine about it?
3. A Guy Hitting On Me Says He’s Never Hooked Up With An Aboriginal Woman Before.
Aside from the Mating Corroboree we perform beforehand, and the ceremonial didgeridoo interlude between sexual favours — I think it’s probably the same as hooking up with a white girl. Too bad you’ll never know.
4. Lest we forget only applies to Whites.
ANZAC Day is all about remembering the past so it doesn’t happen again, but Australia Day is all about celebrating the past because Australia is racist.
I mean, sure. Let’s celebrate the things that this, ahem, great nation, was built on.
Like genocide. Stealing our children. Stealing our land. Enslaving us. All the rape and molestation. The stolen wages. The disrespect for Indigenous veterans who died for a country that didn’t want them.
If you’re stubbornly clinging on to them for dear life and criticising those who are out there marching for change and a shared and equitable future, ask yourself why. Why are you so insecure and what the hell are you actually defending here? Why is a legacy of dispossession…
— Celeste Liddle (@Utopiana) January 22, 2020
White Australia celebrates our mourning and stomps all over the graves of our ancestors with a beer in hand, revelling in our pain. Whenever I inevitably hear that we should “get over it” I just can’t believe the audacity of people who have opinions over lives they’ve never lived.
You haven’t lived the life of an Indigenous person. What gives you the right to tell us what and when to mourn?
All in all, I hope this year that more and more people connect the dots instead of just drawing a line straight through it. Sadly, I don’t expect much, if anything at all, because while White Australia is absolutely fantastic at being racist, nothing beats their ability to miss the point entirely.
Nikki Erin is a proud Gungarri and Butchulla woman living in Meanjin. She makes white supremacists and bigots angry for a living.