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Episode 346 - The second part of episode 345
The discussion continues ... and finishes ... finally.
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Transcript
Okay, dear listener, this is a continuation of the podcast from last
Speaker:week, part two, the discussion I had with Paul and Joe, uh, to do with Indigenous
Speaker:matters largely, and here we go.
Speaker:Just getting back to the building analogy, and people might think this
Speaker:is a crazy analogy, but it's um, um, let's, let's, let's work with it.
Speaker:Um, so I say the solution was to consult with disabled persons and experts
Speaker:and come up with a plan to transition buildings to enable disabled access.
Speaker:Now, imagine, here's one of the problems.
Speaker:Imagine if they set up an advisory body made up of disabled people that
Speaker:define disabled people as anyone who's a descendant of a disabled person.
Speaker:Whether or not they've lived, they have lived experienced as a disabled person.
Speaker:That's to sort of highlight One of the issues of choosing people as
Speaker:representatives of Indigenous people.
Speaker:I don't think that analogy holds.
Speaker:Well, let me, you know, when we're looking at Indigenous issues, and, and
Speaker:overcoming Indigenous problems, our mind typically turns to remote communities
Speaker:as one of the first areas that we think about, and just the images that we
Speaker:see coming out of those communities.
Speaker:And if we have on these special bodies, people who are not from that background
Speaker:and not from that experience, they...
Speaker:You know, if, if, uh, if they don't have that lived experience themselves, they're
Speaker:no different to you or me, potentially.
Speaker:So just having an identity as Indigenous does not necessarily make
Speaker:you somebody who's appropriate to advocate on behalf of people who,
Speaker:whose experience might be completely foreign to an inner city lawyer.
Speaker:Indigenous person whose parents are both doctors and who went to private school and
Speaker:who is then purporting to, um, to speak on behalf of remote Indigenous communities.
Speaker:But I don't think that's, I, I feel like that's conflating very different
Speaker:contexts and to let, to sort of draw a parallel to the building, right, if
Speaker:If someone said, um, well, as a blind person, um, I'm the sole person that
Speaker:gets to decide how this building is constructed, then we'd say no, actually we
Speaker:should consult a wide variety of people.
Speaker:I don't think, Joe's gone, um, I don't think that anyone in the Uluru
Speaker:Statement is saying that a person from Redfern is the only person that's
Speaker:qualified to talk to from, you know, to talk about the problems in Yuendumu.
Speaker:That's why you have a council.
Speaker:That's why you have a wide variety of people, because the person that
Speaker:has come from Redfern may be well placed to talk about the problems.
Speaker:In Redfern might be, so you get the person, person from Redfern to talk
Speaker:about the problems from Redfern.
Speaker:You get the person from Uen to talk about the problems from Uen
Speaker:and the overall result of that.
Speaker:Maybe they have different problems.
Speaker:They may well be, and this is, this is obviously, and so maybe they're not,
Speaker:maybe they're not a homogenous group.
Speaker:Sure.
Speaker:But neither are Australians, so, so maybe it's not appropriate to have.
Speaker:An Indigenous commission purporting to speak on behalf of what is
Speaker:an incredibly disparate group.
Speaker:Maybe their aspirations and thoughts and feelings.
Speaker:Just going back to the analogy, just to point out how it works.
Speaker:Back to our Disabled People 1 body.
Speaker:So, imagine if the new body was tasked not only with advising about
Speaker:physical access needs of the disabled.
Speaker:but also tasked with promoting the commonly held ideological aspirations
Speaker:of the disabled community as if they have a common ideology on the basis that
Speaker:all dis I'm not sure how On the basis that all disabled people think the same.
Speaker:The point is, um, if you have disabled representatives speaking about the
Speaker:discrete topic of how do we fix disabled access to a building, Then, it's easy
Speaker:to imagine a common, a common response.
Speaker:by disabled people as to the best ways of fixing things.
Speaker:It's, it's easy to imagine they would have agreement on, on, on,
Speaker:on, but Joe's saying not even on that level, but, but I'm just...
Speaker:Not even on that level, because a blind person is going to have different access
Speaker:requirements to a person in a wheelchair.
Speaker:access, for example.
Speaker:If we're just talking about, we've got a set of stairs, we've
Speaker:got a way of getting through.
Speaker:To a lift or a ramp or whatever, it's easy to imagine people coming to a common
Speaker:view of, of how this is best solved.
Speaker:But when we're talking about Indigenous affairs, we're talking about, uh, it's not
Speaker:about, uh, such a physical, discreet, uh, topic that is, that is so common to all.
Speaker:We're talking about things where people have vastly, potentially different
Speaker:opinions on how things should be done.
Speaker:And for a, a body to purport to represent Indigenous people, smacks of, of.
Speaker:Well, they all think the same, so of course they're all going
Speaker:to think along these lines.
Speaker:But isn't that fundamentally what our government already asserts?
Speaker:In what sense?
Speaker:Like, representative democracy essentially asserts that the Prime Minister, as the
Speaker:elected person who's been elected by his party, or his or her party, to be
Speaker:the leader of that the party that wins the most seats in federal government,
Speaker:they get To represent Australia, um, that's what representatives...
Speaker:But they don't pretend to speak on behalf.
Speaker:They don't pretend to speak...
Speaker:They do all the time.
Speaker:Scott Morrison did this all the time.
Speaker:A good leader, a good leader often...
Speaker:Quiet Australians.
Speaker:A good leader after a victory has often said, Look, I thank the people who
Speaker:voted for me, but I recognise there were people who didn't vote for me.
Speaker:And I'm going to try and win your vote next time.
Speaker:Sure.
Speaker:Right?
Speaker:I mean, and that's the reality of how we think about, uh, our elected politicians.
Speaker:Is that we know that they don't speak on behalf of everybody.
Speaker:We know it.
Speaker:You know it.
Speaker:It's, it's, it's insulting to Indigenous people to suggest a body
Speaker:could, could speak on behalf of what are such different communities.
Speaker:The, the Indigenous community in a city.
Speaker:Compared to a remote community that the, there, there are the thought that
Speaker:they think the same, uh, is insulting.
Speaker:I don't think anyone is asserting that.
Speaker:They have to think that just by having a body that therefore everyone
Speaker:thinks the same in the same way.
Speaker:That's, that's my government analogy.
Speaker:The point, the point is that we would be foolish to assume that the Prime
Speaker:Minister speaks for all Australians.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Or that.
Speaker:Yeah, your local member absolutely, absolutely represents the views of
Speaker:every single person in that electorate.
Speaker:So the idea that what, what you seem to be, what I'm saying is that I, I reject
Speaker:the premise of your argument that the, The, there is a, an invalidity in having
Speaker:a First Nations voice because there cannot be one voice, and I don't, I don't think,
Speaker:firstly, I don't think it's purporting to be the, the true voice that speaks
Speaker:absolute truth for every single Aboriginal person, but also, What I would still say
Speaker:is it's much more likely to represent the actual views of Aboriginal people
Speaker:than Tony Abbott or, you know, whoever Scott Morrison might, um, um, appoint
Speaker:as his minister for Aboriginal people.
Speaker:Um, that, that is, you know, when...
Speaker:John Howard worked diligently to abolish ATSIC.
Speaker:He did it on exactly that basis, that we're all one Australia, and therefore we
Speaker:shouldn't have a separate voice telling us different things, which is a falsehood.
Speaker:What is the Uluru Statement?
Speaker:Is it not a purported statement on behalf of Indigenous people?
Speaker:it, it's it.
Speaker:There are people that walked outta that conference.
Speaker:There people that haven't there, there are aboriginal people
Speaker:that haven't signed up to it.
Speaker:That is, but does, does it, does it acknowledge in there that people.
Speaker:That is the form that the majority of those people came to after what I
Speaker:understand to be months of deliberation, of going to every community that
Speaker:they could, getting representatives from all across Australia, from
Speaker:the, from the, you know, from Redfern to the Pilbara, whatever.
Speaker:Um, it's, you know, so, so, so to me the reductionist argument that says,
Speaker:well, so this must be one true thing.
Speaker:So, so, so the body is a bad way.
Speaker:So the body is in representing indigenous people is going to say, uh, on this
Speaker:particular issue of, um, religious.
Speaker:Past as entering, uh, remote communities.
Speaker:45 percent of our members think this and the other half think that.
Speaker:And, uh, dear Parliament of Australia, please take that into account.
Speaker:Um, is that the value of it?
Speaker:Why not?
Speaker:That would be perfectly good if it was like that, because it would at least tell
Speaker:those members of parliament more than they get at the moment, which is only the
Speaker:representation of their own electorate.
Speaker:So do we need a body to do that?
Speaker:If that's, if it's really just, if it's really just a body that says,
Speaker:uh, we've surveyed our members and this is what they think.
Speaker:Because ultimately, they can't purport to speak on behalf of their
Speaker:members because they're unelected.
Speaker:For exactly the same reasons that we cannot trust builders to, um, to
Speaker:voluntarily build a building that is disabled friendly without having...
Speaker:laws and without having a consultative committee and without having a whole
Speaker:process built into the art, the whole engineering and architecture
Speaker:design of a building that says we need to think about these things.
Speaker:Where do we find that information from?
Speaker:From disabled advocates and from disabled support groups.
Speaker:Where do we find out?
Speaker:Yes, and let's have an ATSIC or let's have a group whose job is to find
Speaker:out what Indigenous people want.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:But, but what is this empower, this special power to be
Speaker:granted to Indigenous people?
Speaker:Because that's beyond, that's beyond a survey taking role.
Speaker:It is, it is an empowerment of some sort.
Speaker:And it's, and it's a power that's going to be wielded by some people.
Speaker:And it's going to be a...
Speaker:From the, from the, from the statement itself.
Speaker:It says, um, so it's the one, two, three, four, five, six, last paragraph.
Speaker:We seek constitutional reforms to empower our people and take
Speaker:rightful place in our own country.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:When we have power over our own destiny, our children will flourish.
Speaker:They will walk in two worlds, and their culture will be a gift to their country.
Speaker:I mean, I talked about the vision, so it's all...
Speaker:I feel like that's a misreading of power here.
Speaker:I don't think that that is saying we want power over anyone.
Speaker:I think that is simply saying we are disempowered at the moment.
Speaker:And we would like...
Speaker:our own self determination back.
Speaker:Well, well, we would like equal power with white people.
Speaker:Is that what you're saying, the meaning?
Speaker:That's not how I read it.
Speaker:That, um, I don't think it's particularly talking about the power of white people,
Speaker:but I think ultimately I would say yes.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Sorry.
Speaker:Sorry, Joe.
Speaker:Is this separate but equal?
Speaker:So, so we have our own effectively, uh, parliament the indigenous
Speaker:that is separate from...
Speaker:I mean, there's the, the, the Sámi people have a Sámi parliament in, um, Sweden,
Speaker:Finland, and that reports to the Swedish parliament and the Finnish parliament.
Speaker:on Sámi matters, and it helps them form laws that govern the Sámi people.
Speaker:Even though neither Sweden nor Finland recognise the Sámi as
Speaker:having sort of land that is like, here's the border kind of thing.
Speaker:Um, so I feel like that's a kind of separate but equal model, is that
Speaker:what you're talking about, Joe?
Speaker:If they're just reporting about the Sámi people...
Speaker:Then, that's not about power then.
Speaker:No, it's more, you know, um, if you take somewhere like Malaysia, if you
Speaker:are Muslim, there are Sharia courts, there are Sharia laws that apply only
Speaker:to Muslim people, and therefore would there be Aboriginal laws that only
Speaker:apply to Aboriginal people, or white people laws that only apply to white
Speaker:people, because that's the concern.
Speaker:I have no idea, but I can't imagine that getting very far, even with Aboriginal
Speaker:people, because nothing in that, to me, in the way that I read it, based
Speaker:on the discussion that I've heard about it, says we want our own laws, we want
Speaker:our, we want to be separate to you.
Speaker:It's in, it's in fact saying we want to walk with you, we want us
Speaker:together as Australian people, um.
Speaker:And, you know, on a practical sense, I don't think that they would, you know, any
Speaker:law that said, um, this law only applies to Aboriginal people, would actually
Speaker:get anywhere in Australian Parliament.
Speaker:Or...
Speaker:It applies only to, I'd hope not, you know, um, Swedish people or,
Speaker:you know, um, people who are left handed, you know, I don't know.
Speaker:See, it says here, these dimensions of our crisis tell plainly of the structural
Speaker:nature of our problem, which implies a structural solution is required.
Speaker:And it goes on, this is the torment of our powerlessness.
Speaker:Yeah, disempowered.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:But it's different, that's a different process, sorry, that's a different quality
Speaker:of thing to having, to taking power.
Speaker:So look, if it's just a matter of reporting what, uh, other
Speaker:thoughts and wishes and needs and problems of Indigenous communities.
Speaker:Then, no problem.
Speaker:Sure.
Speaker:And that's what happened to ATSIC.
Speaker:Bob Hawke brought about ATSIC because...
Speaker:Um, Gough Whitlam had formed one body to have, um, to be an Aboriginal voice
Speaker:to parliament and Fraser abolished it.
Speaker:So Bob Hawke brought back ATSIC, um, and John Howard abolished it.
Speaker:So what the, what the Aboriginal people are saying is we cannot trust anything
Speaker:that a parliament can then dissolve.
Speaker:We have to have this enshrined in our constitution.
Speaker:And now I will admit that.
Speaker:I don't think this is a great solution, because I don't really want these
Speaker:things written into our constitution.
Speaker:I think it would be great if there was an end date, but I absolutely cannot,
Speaker:I could not say, okay, by 20, you know, by At 2300, racism will be abolished,
Speaker:so I think no end date, and the point at which this becomes irrelevant, we
Speaker:will already have voted to abolish it.
Speaker:But until then...
Speaker:So it's the enshrining in the Constitution of a reporting function.
Speaker:I think that's a very, it's a simplistic way of looking at it, but yes.
Speaker:Interesting to see what he's proposed, um, I think the fear is, uh, that it's,
Speaker:it's more contemplative of special rights, uh, rather than just a reporting of,
Speaker:and a recommendation of, of assistance.
Speaker:But this is exactly the same argument that, um, you know, it was run against,
Speaker:um, uh, you know, pick a bunch of things like marriage equality or, um, the,
Speaker:the ability of making it easier to be divorced, um, you know, giving, I mean,
Speaker:even, you know, given giving women suffrage, the, the argument was, well,
Speaker:you know, Um, think of the consequences, what, what, what terrible things could
Speaker:happen if we allow women to vote.
Speaker:Uh, you know, it's turned out actually just to be representative of our society.
Speaker:Um, so I didn't, no one's saying that Aboriginal
Speaker:people can't vote, sorry Joe, but Aboriginal people can vote.
Speaker:Sure.
Speaker:This isn't an equivalent to suffrage.
Speaker:They already.
Speaker:I'm purely, sorry, I'm purely focusing on that issue from the point of view of, um,
Speaker:the, the, one of the anti You know, the arguments against women's suffrage was,
Speaker:My wife is a total ditherhead and she'll never make a good decision in her life, so
Speaker:she shouldn't be given the right to vote.
Speaker:Um, and that's, I feel, what any argument about You know, I'm, I'm afraid of what
Speaker:laws the, uh, Macarata Commission, um, comes up with that we need to pass because
Speaker:they could be terrible things that, you know, blight Australia for all eternity.
Speaker:That's, that's my, you know, that's where I hear that echo.
Speaker:I don't know.
Speaker:I'm just reading it.
Speaker:Have you made sense there or is the beer really kicking in now?
Speaker:I'm just, I'm just reading it as, as a request for power for a separate group.
Speaker:This is, I read it.
Speaker:And I don't think it'll fly with the people who are not in that group.
Speaker:The good news is, Trevor, you're in the minority there.
Speaker:Here's the other way of looking at it is, um, you know, if, if it needs to be
Speaker:enshrined in the Constitution, a reporting function about the plight of Indigenous
Speaker:communities, caring function has to be enshrined in the Constitution because
Speaker:the risk is that future generations...
Speaker:will want to ignore that responsibility unless they're forced to by the
Speaker:constitution, then the problem is not solved by the constitution.
Speaker:Do you know what I mean?
Speaker:Like, if your society has degenerated to such a point that inherently it doesn't
Speaker:care about Indigenous people and it's only doing something because it's in
Speaker:the constitution and that they can't get rid of it because it's too difficult?
Speaker:Then, then you've got a bigger problem.
Speaker:That's kind of a false equivalence to me.
Speaker:Um, the, you know, the, the point of the, the, this being in the constitution
Speaker:is because any other lesser, um, any other commission with a lesser,
Speaker:existence, something that just exists by virtue of the law, can be taken away.
Speaker:And therefore, um, you know, the, part of, part of this to me is kind of what
Speaker:I said before about trust, that the problem The problem in part here is that
Speaker:since the 67 referendum, there have been, the Aboriginal people have seen that
Speaker:there are governments that are perfectly prepared to take their rights away and
Speaker:ignore them and make them the problem.
Speaker:You know, the, and so the, in order, I guess the, the, the other way of
Speaker:looking at the commit, the, the, um, constitution part of this is to say, okay,
Speaker:we can see that we have done you wrong.
Speaker:by a bunch of bad decisions of previous governments and we would like to make
Speaker:sure you understand our commitment to you as an Aboriginal people by, by putting
Speaker:this in the constitution where we can't touch it until all of the people or enough
Speaker:of the people agree to touch it again.
Speaker:That's good.
Speaker:That's a good argument.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:I like that one.
Speaker:Um, that's, that's got some merit to it.
Speaker:Um, what, what would this, what would happen differently than what's
Speaker:happening now in terms of reporting and assisting and, I mean, it's, is
Speaker:there not enough consultation at the moment with Indigenous communities?
Speaker:Is, is it only an Indigenous body?
Speaker:What can an Indigenous body do?
Speaker:Look at what happened when Malcolm Turnbull, like Malcolm Turnbull
Speaker:went to the aboriginal, you know, communities and said, we'd like you to
Speaker:come up with something that as an an Australian people, we, you know, the,
Speaker:that all of us can agree will help the Aboriginal people going forward.
Speaker:And the Aboriginal people went away for months and months, did this, came back
Speaker:with the Uluru State Front in their heart, and literally the same day,
Speaker:without Even reading it, Turnbull said, no, no way, not even looking at it.
Speaker:That, that is how, that is how much respect some of those people
Speaker:have for that sort of process.
Speaker:And what was his reason?
Speaker:He didn't give one.
Speaker:He's later said that he made a mistake, as Barnaby Joyce did by when
Speaker:Barnaby Joyce said it was a third, you know, third House of Parliament.
Speaker:So that was Turnbull's reasons as well?
Speaker:Um, In that it seemed to set up a separate class of people with special
Speaker:rights, wasn't it along those lines?
Speaker:I don't remember a, I don't remember Turnbull even giving it a specific reason.
Speaker:I just, I think he just said the Australian people would not accept this.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And this was after him going to them and saying, please tell us.
Speaker:You want to then say, actually, no, the Australian people, me as the
Speaker:representative of the Australian people have unilaterally decided
Speaker:that, no, I'm not going to accept that, that that's the problem.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:But my recollection though, was he gave reasons along the lines
Speaker:of this sets up special rights.
Speaker:for certain people, certain group, as in a special rights problem.
Speaker:So, um.
Speaker:Yeah, and he later said that was a mistake, but.
Speaker:See, I.
Speaker:That.
Speaker:Alright, well, you know what we'll do?
Speaker:We need to, at another episode or another time, come back with what
Speaker:Malcolm Turnbull's reasons were.
Speaker:Because after all, it's entirely possible to say to a group, Hey guys, what's
Speaker:your view on what we should do here?
Speaker:And for the victim group to come up with a response where you just
Speaker:go, I think you've gone too far.
Speaker:Like, like, like, I can't wait to say, but I think you've gone too far.
Speaker:So, so, um, so, um, you need to take a break.
Speaker:You come back.
Speaker:Joe and I, will talk about other things.
Speaker:You come back and then we'll, um, Back in a sec.
Speaker:Yeah, you did that.
Speaker:We'll keep going.
Speaker:So, Paul's just having, uh, he'll be back in a moment, and, uh, oh look,
Speaker:why don't I, oh, I'm scared now, Joe.
Speaker:Do I dare look, do I dare look at the chat room?
Speaker:Start from the bottom.
Speaker:From the bottom comment, Anne says, his right wing party was Turnbull's problem.
Speaker:Uh, Bronwyn said, well said Paul.
Speaker:I think that was in the bit that I said was a good argument.
Speaker:At least it was.
Speaker:By enshrining it in the Constitution, you are indicating to Indigenous people
Speaker:how seriously you take the issue, which I think is a good argument.
Speaker:Um, uh, somebody's got a Mac that's giving him problems.
Speaker:Um, Chris.
Speaker:Um, let me see.
Speaker:He's been pouring beer on the keyboard, I believe.
Speaker:Has he?
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Uh, uh, Roman says, Surely it's obvious that such a commission should
Speaker:have diverse representation and it would be a governance requirement.
Speaker:for this to be assured.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Such a diverse representation because there is such a diverse, potentially,
Speaker:series of opinions, um, which is why, if it's purporting to take action or,
Speaker:or use power on behalf of a group, it seems dangerous to me because
Speaker:they can't purport to Um, I feel it's unlikely the group would be unanimous
Speaker:or not even, you know, on many issues would have very different opinions.
Speaker:Uh, what else is in the, I was just going, um, Paul, I was just going
Speaker:through the chat and, um, and I'm sure you've got plenty of support in
Speaker:there, uh, especially from Bronwyn.
Speaker:Um, and, uh, I, I just seeing Chris's comment there, I guess.
Speaker:Like I...
Speaker:My first reaction to that is...
Speaker:I'll just read it, so that for the people who are listening.
Speaker:Yeah, go ahead.
Speaker:Can I ask a truly blonde slash ignorant question?
Speaker:Should Aboriginals get special consideration slash rights
Speaker:over anyone else in Australia?
Speaker:Being that no one, like Trev said, from that generation is still alive.
Speaker:I'm not being racist, just curious what the answer is.
Speaker:So, this is, you know, What are we talking about with the issues
Speaker:here with Indigenous people?
Speaker:Is it their current plight of certain Indigenous communities and people
Speaker:who are doing it tough, or is it inherited grievance from what was
Speaker:done to their ancestors, or both?
Speaker:I...
Speaker:I think the, I'm absolutely not going to pretend to actually speak for these
Speaker:people, but the conversations that I've heard on this tend to just say
Speaker:the, we have a bunch of issues which are caused by structural problems
Speaker:in Australian society at the moment.
Speaker:And that's the issue that we want.
Speaker:Those are the issues that we want to deal with.
Speaker:Now, there have been other things like, um, the, uh, withholding or
Speaker:underpaying of pensions and salaries for Aboriginal workers in Western Australia
Speaker:and things like that, where, yeah, there's kind of been complicated...
Speaker:Um, this person was owed this, this much and they never got paid it
Speaker:and then, you know, and then their granddaughter, you know, tries to
Speaker:get the money, things like that.
Speaker:And that's kind of another separate question there.
Speaker:But I guess coming at it from the, the structural problem point of view here,
Speaker:um, I don't think that we need to.
Speaker:Um, well, the implication, the, the, the problem here is that we
Speaker:have a system which is, which is racist, but is pretending not to
Speaker:be because it doesn't mention race.
Speaker:And the way to solve that as the, as they discovered in the U.
Speaker:S.
Speaker:is not by making sure that the rules.
Speaker:The laws don't mention race.
Speaker:Sometimes it's by enacting positive discrimination that says these
Speaker:people are treated, um, okay, let's say are treated better.
Speaker:And I, as a white male, don't actually have a problem with that.
Speaker:There are so, the proportions of populations we're talking about here,
Speaker:if all of those people got, you know, a tenth of my salary for free, then,
Speaker:uh, we could probably hide that in the defence budget and no one would notice.
Speaker:You know, we probably spent more on, um, submarines than we did on, you know, That
Speaker:we then we would if we just gave people kind of a positive discrimination, just
Speaker:positive discrimination amount of money.
Speaker:And that's not really what we're talking about.
Speaker:Those people are wanting either.
Speaker:Is it about money?
Speaker:Because quite often it's about jobs.
Speaker:It's yeah.
Speaker:And you're saying.
Speaker:We are hiring people who are not necessarily the best person for the
Speaker:role but because they fit a certain demographic and therefore we are
Speaker:getting suboptimal, if that makes sense.
Speaker:Sure.
Speaker:Let me sort of touch on a thing that my work in particular has
Speaker:done over the last couple of years.
Speaker:Um, we had, in 2020, we hired four, basically, university graduates.
Speaker:And...
Speaker:We said, basically the deal was, if you're keen to work for the company
Speaker:that I work for, we will throw training at you for a year, and as long as you
Speaker:meet objectives along the way, then, um, you, you have a career path here.
Speaker:And the thing that really interested me about that, those four junior
Speaker:consultants that started it.
Speaker:was they were actually all, all four of them for different minorities.
Speaker:We didn't hire them for that, but we said, you know, actually fitness for job is.
Speaker:is irrelevant because we can throw job training at you.
Speaker:What we care about is, are you keen to work?
Speaker:And that was it.
Speaker:We didn't ask, are you from some special category or not?
Speaker:But, um, we, and we've done the same program this year.
Speaker:We have about, uh, you know, like a kind of a similar variety of people,
Speaker:not all from minorities anymore.
Speaker:But, you know, the.
Speaker:Um, I feel like the fallacy, there's a fallacy inherent in the argument
Speaker:that, um, we have to hire the best person for the job, just by virtue of
Speaker:the fact that actually, no, you don't have to hire the best person, the
Speaker:most qualified person, sometimes what you need to hire is the person who
Speaker:wants to work there the most, who's going to be the keenest to work there.
Speaker:But I'd also say that.
Speaker:argument suffers from, um, the, the implicit bias problem.
Speaker:That we, there's countless studies showing that as soon as you, you know,
Speaker:introduce information about gender into, um, resumes, there is, those, resumes that
Speaker:the ones with male names get chosen for specific jobs and the ones with female
Speaker:names get chosen for other specific jobs.
Speaker:And there's just this inherent bias, even though they've tested, you know, like
Speaker:they literally give the same, um, the same resume formatted differently with two
Speaker:different people's names and the male one gets chosen and the female one doesn't.
Speaker:For an IT job, say.
Speaker:Similar things with an Indian name as well.
Speaker:Sure, for sure.
Speaker:I would argue that the way to counter that is to blind your resumes
Speaker:rather than to say we're going to weight our outputs in a certain...
Speaker:I mean...
Speaker:Isn't that a kind of weighting?
Speaker:No, it's just blinding it.
Speaker:The...
Speaker:there's another bias in that.
Speaker:Um, so I...
Speaker:Yeah, I agree.
Speaker:I'm prepared to agree that by blinding the resumes, you've,
Speaker:you've eliminate one source of bias.
Speaker:There's also, uh, a study that was done where if, um, jobs in
Speaker:IT companies focused on technical skills, then more males, um, applied.
Speaker:And if even it was, if it was the same actual job, like a managing position,
Speaker:say, but if they focused on the people skills side of the job, then more women
Speaker:applied, even though it was the same job, and even though you might be looking at
Speaker:the same qualifications of candidate.
Speaker:Um, and then there's the third problem that Um, and yeah, there's
Speaker:another program that they're working on in the company that I work for,
Speaker:which is called Return to Work.
Speaker:And the basic idea is that people, if you've been away, uh, out of the
Speaker:IT industry, because I work in the IT industry, um, if you've been away
Speaker:from that industry for a while and you want to come back in, Then you apply
Speaker:through this Return to Work program, and again, we throw training at you,
Speaker:because we know that if those people are keen to work for us, then that gap
Speaker:in their resume doesn't really count.
Speaker:The, a lot of, there are a lot of professions where if you have that gap
Speaker:in your resume, because you've been a stay at home dad or a stay at home mum
Speaker:for a couple of years, you, because you needed to take care of an aged parent,
Speaker:then there are a lot of jobs which will just implicitly frown on that.
Speaker:Then you have the question, um, you know, I heard a fantastic interview
Speaker:from a lady, um, who was from, like, Liverpool and Sydney, and
Speaker:she's a high flying businesswoman.
Speaker:One guy literally stopped talking to her and walked away when he found
Speaker:out where she was from, because, oh, you're from the poor suburbs.
Speaker:You know, the problem is that for, you know, and he didn't look at her resume.
Speaker:He didn't look at her, you know, any of her qualifications.
Speaker:Um, a lot of companies are still going to do basically a you know, a
Speaker:video link or face to face interview, so you're going to, they're going
Speaker:to see your gender and their skin, your skin color sooner or later.
Speaker:There are still all these opportunities for implicit bias.
Speaker:There's the, do you go to Ipswich grammar or did you go to Ipswich high school
Speaker:or did you go to Brisbane grammar?
Speaker:Because, you know, their bus was, like, you know, close by.
Speaker:Um, you know, a friend of mine in the same suburb went to Twitch Grammar.
Speaker:Um, other people in the same suburb probably went to Kenmore High.
Speaker:You know, those...
Speaker:That, just that fact can bias a resume.
Speaker:Oh, um, a pretty face is going to get hired, a taller person
Speaker:is going to get promoted.
Speaker:Yeah, there are lots of biases in there.
Speaker:And a lot of this bias affects, you know, different identities.
Speaker:Not just Indigenous, and different social classes.
Speaker:So, working class.
Speaker:And, you know, one of the points in critical race theory is that the
Speaker:intersection of those, you know, an Aboriginal woman is going to face a bunch
Speaker:more problems than an Aboriginal person or a woman sort of combined, you know.
Speaker:But the concern is, yeah, where you get in the US.
Speaker:the College Admissions Board, who've now defined Asians as being white because
Speaker:too many Asians were coming to Harvard.
Speaker:And there was a special sort of Asian entrance kind of allowance.
Speaker:Is that, was that the point?
Speaker:Well, it was a reduced allowance.
Speaker:They were saying basically too many Asians were turning up because they
Speaker:weren't a good enough minority, uh, and therefore they reduced the number of
Speaker:Asians coming through because they were scoring consistently high SAD scores.
Speaker:So there was a discrimination against Asians in Harvard.
Speaker:Certainly a lot of, um, there has been a thing in the last few years in the US of
Speaker:the Ivy League schools have been pushing back on the number of Asians because
Speaker:it wasn't suiting the demographics.
Speaker:And it was almost engineering demographics.
Speaker:I mean, there is an argument, if you have large organisations,
Speaker:that you would want them to...
Speaker:Be representative of the community that you are serving, and that it would
Speaker:be good business practice to do that.
Speaker:So, um, Yes, and it would also be nice to live in a not racist society.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:So how does our current parliament fare in terms of Indigenous representation?
Speaker:I don't know, probably fairly, um, poorly, if you actually
Speaker:want representation, maybe.
Speaker:Um, it's actually, there were two.
Speaker:Uh, both the, uh, representatives from the Northern Territory
Speaker:were Indigenous, weren't they?
Speaker:Um, so we might actually be kind of close to the three percent, um, average, but
Speaker:you know, the, again, just because there is three percent, you know, say three
Speaker:percent representation in the, the federal parliament doesn't mean we've dealt with
Speaker:any of the other structural problems.
Speaker:No, no, but it is kind of relevant when we're talking about a voice to parliament.
Speaker:in that we are implicitly saying Parliament is not hearing what
Speaker:Indigenous people, uh, from Indigenous communities enough.
Speaker:And, you know, when we look at other identity groups, we would say...
Speaker:They're not required to.
Speaker:Yeah, we would look at other, uh, minority groups and we would say, you
Speaker:know, obviously there's a disabled community, a component in the community.
Speaker:There should be some disabled people in our Parliament if
Speaker:things are working out right.
Speaker:Um...
Speaker:Uh, so...
Speaker:So, let's look at Senators, because, let's face it, the House of
Speaker:Representatives is unrepresentative swill.
Speaker:Just flipping over the um, competing statement, because, you know, I mean,
Speaker:you've only got to look at the number of votes that the Greens get in the
Speaker:House of Reps, and the number of seats, compared to the number of votes that the
Speaker:Nationals get, and the number of seats.
Speaker:It's an unrepresentative chamber, in that sense.
Speaker:Whereas the Senate, uh, we're getting closer to representing the actual votes
Speaker:in terms of the number of representatives.
Speaker:So, 76 Senators, uh, four of them who identify as Indigenous, so 5.
Speaker:3%.
Speaker:And the, um, latest census figures were that, uh, in the Australian
Speaker:population, it was, um, 3.
Speaker:2%.
Speaker:So yeah, kind of over representative in the Senate.
Speaker:So so one counter argument to a special voice to Parliament would be well The
Speaker:Parliament is meant to represent our community and on the face of it Uh, the
Speaker:Senate does, um, except the, I don't know who those indigenous senators are,
Speaker:but I would wager that the Senate is not obliged to, you know, listen to them.
Speaker:I mean, I, I I think it's very interesting that the independents, um, are in
Speaker:the house of reps and Federal house of reps are, are, um, calling for.
Speaker:I can't remember where this got up to, but they're calling for more time to be
Speaker:given to independent bills, um, yeah, and for essentially for the government to give
Speaker:in, you know, give up the Dorothy Dixers and the Labor said no to that, but, um.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Again, the problem is just because they have a representative there does
Speaker:not mean, and to kind of borrow your argument from before, doesn't mean that
Speaker:that one person can truly represent, say, you know, any particular issue.
Speaker:I'm sure that Linda Burney, Ken Wyatt, Senator Pat Dodson, Jackie Lambie,
Speaker:uh, Maland, Mulundiri McCarthy and Senator Lydia Thorpe would be advocating
Speaker:pretty strongly for Indigenous rights and consideration as they
Speaker:deal with bills from time to time.
Speaker:Sure.
Speaker:Would they not?
Speaker:But the Senate doesn't have the ability to create new legislation,
Speaker:only the House of Reps has the ability to start that process.
Speaker:I mean, they're in the Parliament.
Speaker:Yeah, sure.
Speaker:You know, they get, they get some voice, but it's, it's all of them.
Speaker:And the voice to Parliament is not going to have any power to initiate
Speaker:any legislation either, is it?
Speaker:Because it's not going to have any power, apparently.
Speaker:Well, we don't know what that, what that looks like.
Speaker:I'm interested just to quickly pick something that Chris has said.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Does the Aboriginal community consider themselves our community?
Speaker:End.
Speaker:I guess I would just, my reaction to that is just to say, some of them do,
Speaker:but I can understand, um, the structural racism problem makes them feel like
Speaker:they are not part of our community, you know, in the same way that, you
Speaker:know, I don't know, I can go, you know, go down to the mall and, yeah.
Speaker:ask someone for a, you know, to borrow their phone to make a phone call.
Speaker:Um, they may not feel like they can do that kind of thing.
Speaker:Um, so, but I don't think that's, like, the thing I really wanted to kind of
Speaker:address on that is, was just that I don't think that's, Um, worth focusing
Speaker:on the question is whether they, whether some people might feel alienated or not.
Speaker:The question is, do we want them to feel alienated?
Speaker:And I don't think we do.
Speaker:If people were feeling alienated, do you think they'd be trying to
Speaker:hide their Indigenous identity?
Speaker:I mean, if you're a persecuted group and being an Indigenous was a disadvantage.
Speaker:So if you could pass as a white person, would you claim to be an Aboriginal?
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:If you were being systematically discriminated against.
Speaker:So I heard an interesting version of that from a Dalit woman from India
Speaker:and the Dalit are the untouchable caste, the people that you're not
Speaker:supposed to ever deal with and, and.
Speaker:And the real problem with the cast system is that there is
Speaker:nothing you can do to escape it.
Speaker:You cannot be born out of that cast.
Speaker:You cannot learn or promote yourself out of that cast.
Speaker:The only way you can escape is by pretending that you
Speaker:are not from that cast.
Speaker:But of course, as soon as you...
Speaker:encounter any other Indian person, especially the, um,
Speaker:the, uh, the higher caste people, they will ask, oh, where are you from?
Speaker:Oh, what's your surname?
Speaker:Oh, that's an interesting one.
Speaker:I have, you know, where's that from?
Speaker:You know, and they will track you down.
Speaker:They don't have to ask, are you Dalit?
Speaker:They can just work it out by your background and You know, your,
Speaker:your surname and your, uh, and so these people have to actually
Speaker:pretend that they are people they're not, they've changed their names.
Speaker:So because of their persecution, because of the hard time they get.
Speaker:They, they will take steps to downplay or, or hide that, that cast.
Speaker:Because that's, for those people, they, that is the only way they can escape that.
Speaker:And so I would agree that there are going to be some people that, you
Speaker:know, again, we're talking about a, we can't make a homogenous.
Speaker:judgment about a heterogeneous group.
Speaker:You know, there are some people that are going to say, no, absolutely,
Speaker:I will stand up and claim my race.
Speaker:There are some people that will quietly hide it.
Speaker:And there are probably situations in which some people would do both, you
Speaker:know, in one circumstance and the other.
Speaker:So, you know, I don't, but again, I don't think that Should be seen as a
Speaker:kind of unifying problem or unifying principle, like it's, it's not that,
Speaker:um, You know, if someone denies being Aboriginal in one circumstance,
Speaker:therefore they're no good, you know?
Speaker:I'm not saying they're no good.
Speaker:I'm just, I'm just, um, I'm just...
Speaker:Sure, but other people would make that judgement, so...
Speaker:You know, I'm not disputing that there is, um, you know, racism in
Speaker:Australia, different circumstances, but it's always going to be a
Speaker:question of, of how much, and there's always a spectrum, and if you, um...
Speaker:Look at the statistics on people identifying as Indigenous.
Speaker:Um, I've got this article from the Sydney Morning Herald.
Speaker:Uh, when Jaclyn Troy saw the latest census results showing a significant
Speaker:rise in the number of people identifying as Aboriginal or Torres
Speaker:Strait Islander, she felt delighted.
Speaker:The census released showed 812, 728 people identifying as Indigenous, which was a
Speaker:25 percent rise on five years earlier.
Speaker:And, uh, she said, it's encouraging to see people are no longer feeling suppressed
Speaker:or afraid to identify as Aboriginal.
Speaker:Um, I think it's reflecting the real demographics of the
Speaker:nation, it's a wonderful thing.
Speaker:But, not everyone was so delighted by the increase.
Speaker:Nathan Moran, Chief Executive of Metropolitan Local Aboriginal
Speaker:Land Council, said the Census increase demonstrated the need
Speaker:for an official review into Aboriginal self identification.
Speaker:Rather than the current question, which asks respondents whether they are of
Speaker:Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander origin, he wants the statistic, or
Speaker:the ABS, to ask, are you a verified or authenticated Aboriginal person?
Speaker:I think the ABS question is misleading, not productive and ineffective, he said.
Speaker:This has caused a skewing in the number of Aboriginal people it creates, for
Speaker:some the illusion that we have a much larger population than practical reality.
Speaker:Moran was echoing the concerns of Aboriginal Land Council of
Speaker:Tasmania Chair Michael Mansell.
Speaker:He said he found it unbelievable.
Speaker:that 5 percent of Tasmanians now identify as Aboriginal, or Torres Strait Islander.
Speaker:And he wrote that, um, the increase in Tasmania was largely due to identity
Speaker:seekers who are poor and white and believe they will have more cultural
Speaker:cachet if they identify as Aboriginal.
Speaker:Many poor whites.
Speaker:Sorry?
Speaker:Uh, it, that, that feels like a, a, a, a judgment rather than something
Speaker:he has actual statistics on.
Speaker:Well, what he's saying is that, uh, a 25% increase.
Speaker:from five years ago could not be due to birth rate.
Speaker:So it's, it's people who are undeclared five years ago.
Speaker:It's so difficult to believe that a bunch of people that were, were, were
Speaker:hiding their identity, um, because they actually felt ashamed of it.
Speaker:And now maybe they don't.
Speaker:Why is that difficult to believe?
Speaker:Well, uh, I'm, the point I'm getting to is that if inherent racism is, is,
Speaker:is, If racism is chronic, then people would not be putting themselves forward
Speaker:as indigenous if, if there was an extreme level of systematic racism.
Speaker:So, uh, so I'm just pushing back on the level of racism in urban Australia.
Speaker:And this is where the increase, where the increases are.
Speaker:Particularly in Canberra, I think, was a hot spot of increased...
Speaker:Indigenous identification.
Speaker:I've been told that's a complicated situation.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:So, um, so just, uh, uh, so yeah, just sort of where you painted a picture
Speaker:earlier of, of the discrimination in, um, sort of job applications and things.
Speaker:And I don't disagree that there's discrimination, but also, um, there's
Speaker:lots of areas of life now where being Indigenous is not a problem at all.
Speaker:And...
Speaker:Quite a nice life, thank you very much, in modern Australian urban environments.
Speaker:I feel that this is something that you can say, you know, when it's
Speaker:a hat you can take off and put on and no one notices the difference.
Speaker:It's much more difficult if it's Something that, you know, where the
Speaker:colour of your skin is very different, um, or, you know, um, the accent
Speaker:that you speak with, um, you know.
Speaker:I'm always wary of the They're getting the best of both worlds, some of these
Speaker:people, in that, in that they're not getting the walk down the street racism
Speaker:when they enter the pub of people looking at them twice or thinking they're about
Speaker:to shoplift when they're just Browsing in an electronic store, so they're
Speaker:not getting that racism, but they're, uh, But they may benefit from ticking
Speaker:the ATSIC box, the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island box, because, you
Speaker:know, in some form, because There's a requirement for those people to be seen
Speaker:by the doctor's surgery more urgently or something like that, you know, or,
Speaker:you know, in a culturally sensitive way.
Speaker:Um, yeah, I like where the, the bit that I really want to push back on is the
Speaker:way this whole argument reminds me of, um, Ronald Reagan's, um, welfare queens.
Speaker:Um, They never existed.
Speaker:They were a complete made up thing in a speech.
Speaker:What was that story again?
Speaker:So he claimed that there were sort of welfare queens living off, you
Speaker:know, multiple forged identities.
Speaker:that were living the lush lifestyle and getting all of the hundreds of thousands
Speaker:of dollars in welfare money because they claimed to be, you know, like getting
Speaker:five or six, you know, separate benefits.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:And, and that was his justification for cracking down on The benefits that
Speaker:were paid, who, you know, the identify identification needed, um, you know,
Speaker:all of that, that sort of stuff.
Speaker:And it suited the Republican agenda very well because it also meant that they could
Speaker:cut the services to a lot of those people, but those people never actually existed.
Speaker:There was no statistical, uh, group, you know, identifiable
Speaker:group that I, I definitely know someone who is white passing.
Speaker:But has a grandparent, I think, who is Aboriginal, and they
Speaker:have said, yeah, absolutely.
Speaker:If I, um, go and get a home loan, I can get a better rate
Speaker:if I identify as Aboriginal.
Speaker:Um, there are certain advantages.
Speaker:And yet, to speak to them, you wouldn't know that they were Aboriginal.
Speaker:So, I don't know that it's that uncommon, that there are a lot of
Speaker:people who, I'm not saying that they have a very good life, um, they are
Speaker:relatively, they're one of the battlers.
Speaker:Sure, sure.
Speaker:Um, what I'm, so every, every bit of help that you can get from the
Speaker:government, why wouldn't you accept it?
Speaker:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker:Um, my partner and I have this, had this joke for a long time,
Speaker:but sooner or later we will find some benefit that we can claim.
Speaker:We never, ever have never found it.
Speaker:But, and, and so part of what I really want to kind of get.
Speaker:to there is that the, the, the fear Reagan put out was that there
Speaker:are people making millions of dollars off your hard earned taxes.
Speaker:And the fear in this kind of agenda is that by Having a special, you know,
Speaker:even if you call it a special voice to Parliament, let's say it actually
Speaker:gets to make laws, the fear is that somehow that will be turned against us.
Speaker:White Australians or whatever, and firstly I think that there's no evidence for
Speaker:that, but secondly, to me, it is, uh, you know, it is a distraction from then
Speaker:saying, well, could we do good by this?
Speaker:Because yeah, okay, sure, there will always be some people that steal, there
Speaker:will always be some people that cheat, and there are, you know, stores just build
Speaker:in a certain amount of shoplifting, you know, that's just, we, you know, if, if
Speaker:I found out that someone Was, you know, ticking the box on the ATSIC, or sorry,
Speaker:the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander form and getting a better bank rate.
Speaker:And I'm like, okay, well, great.
Speaker:It's not, it's not actually costing me basically anything,
Speaker:you know, if you can do it.
Speaker:Personally, I don't have a fear of people rorting the system
Speaker:and getting extra money, even though I suspect it could happen.
Speaker:It's more, it's more the.
Speaker:Human rights, uh, distinction of deciding to have separate
Speaker:rights for separate people.
Speaker:Now you're saying the Uluru Statement is not about rights and power, it's just
Speaker:about recognising past wrongs and saying it's important, but without actually
Speaker:providing any special rights or powers.
Speaker:And if that's all it is...
Speaker:Well and good, but the other part of it is my concern is that the people who will end
Speaker:up in these bodies purporting to represent indigenous people are going to be people
Speaker:with a very different lived experience To the Indigenous people who actually
Speaker:really need the help and I will see them as, uh, as an, as being unqualified,
Speaker:uh, to give meaningful assistance, um, because, uh, their connection
Speaker:with remote Indigenous people needing help is, is, it just doesn't exist.
Speaker:So that's my concern.
Speaker:The problem we've seen with, um, advisory groups, I would say,
Speaker:certainly in terms of religion.
Speaker:Is that you get the ma the the minority and the minority.
Speaker:So there's been a problem in the UK with uh, what they call Asians,
Speaker:which we would call Indians.
Speaker:So people from the Indian subcontinent.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Um, where.
Speaker:The community speaks, and that there is a minority within that community who
Speaker:don't have the same values, you know, the gay people, who are effectively
Speaker:ostracized, because they don't fit in with the official voices representation.
Speaker:And so you get a very narrow view, and my concern would be that a...
Speaker:advisory body would be swamped by certain groups, for instance, the
Speaker:Christians, who would be very keen to engineer that, no, no, no, the
Speaker:Aboriginals are against abortion, uh, which I think we did see, didn't we?
Speaker:Yes, yeah, I think we did.
Speaker:Yeah, some purported to say that, yeah.
Speaker:Oh no, it was voluntary assisted dying.
Speaker:And, and another, uh, complication there was the slow uptake of, um, the COVID
Speaker:vaccines amongst Aboriginal people, in part because we've had a bunch of bad
Speaker:history of giving questionable medicine to Aboriginal people in the past.
Speaker:And I don't kind of blame them for not trusting us this time.
Speaker:But you know, that, that is also, was also fertile territory for
Speaker:the anti vaxxers and, you know, difficult territory to tread.
Speaker:And the same in America with Tuskegee, which is, yeah, a classic.
Speaker:What's, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker:The Tuskegee Massacre, where they, um, basically before antibiotics were, no, no,
Speaker:no, it was, um, so before antibiotics were really, um, around, they started measuring
Speaker:syphilis in a group of black people in Tuskegee in the Southern United States.
Speaker:When in the forties antibiotics became available and were a cure for syphilis,
Speaker:they didn't give them, um, uh, Penicillin, because they wanted to see what was
Speaker:the long term effects of syphilis.
Speaker:Ah, God, right, yeah.
Speaker:So they left syphilis untreated and continued through to the 70s, I think.
Speaker:Leaving these people untreated for syphilis just to see
Speaker:medically what happened to them.
Speaker:Coincidentally, all of them were black.
Speaker:Yes, um, and they were followed up, they saw nurses at the very least, I
Speaker:think doctors as well, on a regular basis, under the guise of being treated.
Speaker:They were never given treatments.
Speaker:They were just monitored.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So I'm not particularly surprised that, um, you know, you might
Speaker:get someone from one of those Aboriginal communities saying, no,
Speaker:we don't want your vaccines here.
Speaker:But again, that's just a minority and that may, they may not speak for everyone.
Speaker:Uh, the other example of that is there's been a bunch of mining companies,
Speaker:I think, especially over in Western Australia, who find one group within
Speaker:the Aboriginal community in a place, promise them a bunch of things and say,
Speaker:Can you be the Aboriginal Land Council here so we can tick off, that we've
Speaker:got the okay from the Aboriginal Land Council in this area to do our mining?
Speaker:Um, And then, um, the rest of the people go, Hey, wait, what?
Speaker:You didn't, we didn't vote for you.
Speaker:One final, um, aspect to this extremely long podcast episode.
Speaker:Joe, is anybody still with us or they just abandoned us?
Speaker:Uh, I can't see.
Speaker:There are six people still watching.
Speaker:Good on you.
Speaker:You're champions if you're still there.
Speaker:Chris is going strong there.
Speaker:Is, um, I look at, uh, things from a class issue.
Speaker:And for me, uh, the imperative in terms of Indigenous people is to
Speaker:assist those who are suffering in poverty and in bad circumstance,
Speaker:the lower class, if you like.
Speaker:And so I would be in favour of anybody that, that seeks to improve
Speaker:the needs of, of the lower class Indigenous community who are suffering.
Speaker:But I really don't really care about the middle and upper class Indigenous
Speaker:persons particular needs any more than I do the middle class, upper
Speaker:class, white persons particular.
Speaker:They're no different to me.
Speaker:They're the same.
Speaker:So I, I, uh, I just, um, I'm concerned about where we,
Speaker:where we are wanting to be.
Speaker:Cognizant of the Indigenous populations opinions and thoughts and needs
Speaker:and desires on whatever issue Which includes the middle and upper class
Speaker:segments of the Indigenous community and Um, I don't really care.
Speaker:I want to know about the lower class the suffering class That's what I want to know
Speaker:about so for me Yeah Indigenous Identity.
Speaker:I don't care.
Speaker:It's yeah, it's suffering poverty Class that I care.
Speaker:And my concern with, uh, and you know, is the left is, is the, and Kieran O'Reilly
Speaker:in the interview I did a few weeks ago had a sort of a, a passing reference
Speaker:to how the left has, uh, basically decided to pursue identity issues.
Speaker:Ignore class.
Speaker:Now, I'm sure Kieran is all in favour of, uh, Uluru's statement and everything
Speaker:else, but, um, I see an inconsistency there, so, I, um, I'm concerned about
Speaker:class and not the identity of Indigenous people, and I don't believe in inherited
Speaker:grievance of forefathers, I care about present circumstance, so, anyway.
Speaker:That's where I feel, again, the hijacking by inner city elites of the issue is
Speaker:what I could see easily happening.
Speaker:I kind of agree.
Speaker:Um, I certainly think that I would much rather trust any, any, uh, Aboriginal...
Speaker:university trained, um, inner city elite to speak, to be more in touch
Speaker:with, um, the issues of the Aboriginal people, um, of any, than, than, than a
Speaker:white person of the same qualifications?
Speaker:Sure.
Speaker:And by virtue of?
Speaker:Um, by virtue of mixing with those people, one of the things that.
Speaker:has really struck me in thinking about this is that I'm, I'm trying to diversify
Speaker:my friend group, but it is still very, you know, based around white and usually men.
Speaker:Um, I know only a handful of people from non European backgrounds, um, you know,
Speaker:people have, you know, friendships with those people, so, you know, I don't
Speaker:trust myself to say, yeah, I know what.
Speaker:Indian people.
Speaker:I don't even really want to, you know, say, I know what Aboriginal
Speaker:people want in this because I'm not.
Speaker:But you're insulting them to suggest they all think the same.
Speaker:Like that assumes that they would have a common view on something.
Speaker:I don't think I'm...
Speaker:Um, claiming anything about whether they all think the same.
Speaker:All I'm saying is that I would trust a person who identifies in that
Speaker:grouping more to represent them than a person not in that grouping.
Speaker:In the same way that I do not trust Tony Abbott to be the minister
Speaker:for women, even though he might know many women, you Um, and.
Speaker:I don't know.
Speaker:Yeah, I mean, we've argued, we'll finish this up.
Speaker:But we've argued previously about Prisipasko and, and the criticism
Speaker:in the, in the subsequent book.
Speaker:I can't remember the name of it, which was written by some white academics.
Speaker:And my reading of it.
Speaker:You're not going to, you're not going to, you're not going to dig this up
Speaker:at a quarter to ten, are you Trevor?
Speaker:Just because it's relevant.
Speaker:But you could well argue that the white people in that case had a
Speaker:better understanding of Indigenous culture than Bruce Pascoe.
Speaker:So...
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I...
Speaker:It's a...
Speaker:Yeah, that's a view.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I will...
Speaker:I'll concede.
Speaker:Um, I can see points of validity in it.
Speaker:I'm not sure I agree with it.
Speaker:Yeah, and you better not start an argument at five to ten.
Speaker:I'm not going to do that.
Speaker:All right, well if you hung around in the chat room all this time, congratulations.
Speaker:If you've listened to the podcast all this time, congratulations,
Speaker:you've made it to the end.
Speaker:Don't forget what I said at the very beginning, which was, if
Speaker:you're in Queensland, write to us, trevor at ironfistvelvetglove.
Speaker:com.
Speaker:au, tell me what state electorate you're in, tell me you're willing
Speaker:to meet your local member, and talk about religious instruction
Speaker:lessons, because we need some names.
Speaker:So, um, So, John Simmons is there, good on you.
Speaker:And good on you, Paul, for, um, uh, good on you, Paul, for your contribution.
Speaker:Thank you very much.
Speaker:So I've survived the Shark Tank?
Speaker:Yes, uh, that's, yeah, Landon Hardbottom will be very happy.
Speaker:Actually, he's disappeared.
Speaker:He was here earlier, but he's, looks like he's disappeared.
Speaker:Um, so, yeah, we've gone, oh my goodness me, that's a long episode.
Speaker:I'm tempted to split it into two.
Speaker:I don't know.
Speaker:Not a bad idea.
Speaker:I might split it into two.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:This might be divided into two in the actual podcast.
Speaker:We'll see how we go.
Speaker:All right, everybody, if you're in the chat room, thanks very much.
Speaker:We're going to end the live stream now.
Speaker:Talk to you later.
Speaker:Have a good one.
Speaker:And it's a good night from him.
Speaker:Fist, Glove, 12th Man, Hardbottom here.
Speaker:Your last episode was only one hour long and not the one hour and 30
Speaker:minutes I've become accustomed to.
Speaker:You owe me 33 cents.
Speaker:And if I don't get it, I'll be sending some rather large chaps
Speaker:around there to perform their own kind of knee surgery on you.
