Real Truth-Telling – NAIDOC Week Is Racist

It’s that time of the year again, NAIDOC Week, the National Aboriginal and Islander Day Observance Committee, and this year, it’s even more racist than ever! Ill get to that soon. Aboriginal people already have a whole bunch of significant dates: Survival Day (instead of that pesky Australia Day), National Apology Day, Close the Gap Day, Sorry Day, Reconciliation Week, Mabo Day, International Day of the World’s Indigenous Peoples, just to name a few. But in case that wasn’t enough, NAIDOC Week, another week assigned to Aboriginal causes.

In 2021, the theme was “Heal Country, heal our nation”. Remember, the only way to heal country was to get the prescribed medication as dictated by the Australian Government. Adam Goodes did it. “I did it for my mob!” Remember, it was the act of love needed to support the survival of Aboriginal people. NAIDOC 2022, “Get Up! Stand Up! Show Up!”, OK, a call to action – sounds somewhat reasonable. In 2023, “For Our Elders”. Again, that sounds OK. But this year’s theme is, “Keep the Fire Burning! Blak, Loud & Proud”. Blak, Loud & Proud? How is that not racist? If we changed it to say, “White, Loud & Proud”, imagine the uproar, and rightfully so. As they intentionally spelt black wrong, I better spell white wrong, just to keep with the “I can’t spell” grammatical theme. If this sort of thing ever happened, you can bet the ABC would be publishing articles about the far-right taking over Australia. But because they’re Aboriginal, we’re just going to give them a pass here and let them openly be racist?

But it gets worse. On the ABC they published this article, “This year’s NAIDOC Week theme is ‘Blak, Loud and Proud’. Here’s what it means”, with of course the obligatory photo of Cathy Freeman winning gold at the Sydney 2000 Olympics. That’s funny, that was almost 24 years ago! It would be like us honouring Simon Fairweather every year. Who’s Simon Fairweather? He’s one of the world’s best archers. He also won gold at the Sydney Olympics, but we rarely hear anything about him. Cathy Freeman on the other hand is constantly being brought up every year because she is, well, you know why.

Anyway, in the article, they quote a lady by the name of Maddy Norris who seems to be a very unifying voice during NAIDOC Week. Blak, loud and proud. “I’m proud to be a blackfella. I’m not proud to be Australian.” Hmm, perhaps I was very wrong about her being a unifying voice. In her words, Australia is just a bad place. She continues, “I’m not proud of how Australia and the Australian government continue to treat First Nations people and communities.” How the Australian Government continue to treat First Nations people? Doesn’t the Australian Government throw billions of dollars every year at Aboriginal causes? Aren’t there a plethora of payments and programs to help Aboriginal Australians? What the hell is she talking about? Clearly, it doesn’t matter what we do, she, and others like her, hate modern Australia, and the ABC give this hatred a voice.

They also quoted Aunty Lynette Riley, who said, “Australia is still not proud of Aboriginal people”. Another very unifying voice.

On the NAIDOC website, we’re met with this message acknowledging the First Peoples and honouring their Elders. Why do they only ever honour First Peoples? Do the rest of us not count, you know, the ones that helped build modern democratic Australia? Why is it only the First Peoples that are acknowledged?

They of course have the obligatory “this website may contain images and voices of deceased people” message. My question, if this is a website for Aboriginal people, why would you put photos and voices of deceased people on there? If you know that’s offensive to some of your people, why do it? It just seems all so stupid, if you ask me. Of course, they’re flying the Blak, Loud and Proud message in the largest font possible.

You can also download their Supporting NAIDOC Toolkit, which is completely not racist, such as, “Make a purchase from a Blak business – make sure profits go to First Nations makers.” Again, imagine the outcry if we ran a campaign to support white businesses – make sure profits go to white makers.

Universities are of course in on the act. The University of Queensland for example are “celebrating the oldest, continuous living culture on earth”, they’re celebrating “Blak Excellence”, and they’re hosting a “Mini Blak Market”. As I said, just replace the word Blak with White, and prepare yourself for the public outcry.

This year’s NAIDOC Week isn’t promoting unity. This year’s NAIDOC Week is promoting division based on skin colour.

MUSIC
Allégro by Emmit Fenn