Just past 8am and the polling booths will have just opened for today’s election. There will be no surprises in Surry Hills where Labor is 100% sure to win. But nation-wide? There were those at last night’s meeting still saying “landslide to Labor” but it does seem it will be a very close thing.
I have [...]
Archive for the ‘Indigenous Australians’ Category
24 Nov
Polling Day in Surry Hills
27 Oct
Fully Australian
I found this when Googling for Tom Uren that great-hearted figure from the good Labor Left of perhaps another era, but a truly great Australian respected, I think, by most Australians. The blog, Desert Star is now on my blog roll, and the accompanying site Aboriginal Art and Culture: Desert Dreams I will add to [...]
12 Oct
National Coming Out Day 2 — Australia
But what a strange day it became. The syllabus itself turned out to be a model of cultural bipartisanship; for every cricket milestone mentioned, there was a nod to multiculturalism or a reference to Patrick White. Mr Howard modestly omitted the election of his own Government from the digest of “interesting things that happened [...]
2 Oct
Now I will confess…
I am a closet listener to country and western music. Mind you, not all country and western music. But there’s some that is just good honest stuff, so why pretend to look down on it? And this one contains images close to home.
21 Sep
Indigenous update
Courtesy of Journeyman Pictures, a wonderful source of documentaries — “London’s leading independent distributor of topical news features, documentaries and footage” — I preface this with David Bradbury’s Jabiluka: The Aboriginal Swindle (1997). You must visit the video here, as embedding is disallowed.
The lure of Uranium has proved irresistible to successive Australian governments and [...]
7 Sep
Friday Australian Poem #5: Judith Wright "For a Pastoral Family"
This poem is in the 1985 collection Phantom Dwelling, in a section labelled “Poems 1979-1980″. My correspondence with Judith Wright, who supported Neos from Issue 1, began in 1981. We exchanged only a few letters, but I really treasured them. Of “For a Pastoral Family” and the later poems, Ted Kennedy, late and famous Redfern turbulent [...]
14 Aug
Just something to think about…
WARNING: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander viewers are warned that the following video may contain images of deceased persons.
I spent so much time last night responding to Adrian’s comment on my The Secret River post that I missed Enough Rope on the road in Mt Isa; still that’s not a [...]
12 Aug
Powerful stories at South Sydney
Andrew’s homily today at South Sydney Uniting Church was a cracker, in my opinion. It stands for many things in my mind: as a contrast to the story from Texas I mentioned yesterday; as an example of what, concretely, reconciliation really means. I publish the homily with Andrew’s permission.
Sunday Ordinary 19South Sydney Uniting ChurchHebrews 1: [...]
4 Aug
Some good things on the Australian government and Indigenous Australians
So here I am right now downloading a podcast of last night’s jtv, not exactly for my demographic… However, as I half-watched last night I found myself drawn to an excellent segment on the current intervention in the Northern Territory: see Brough Love. While it confirmed that Mal Brough is one of the most interesting [...]
22 Jul
Further thoughts on child safety issues and Indigenous Australians
Even his greatest fans would admit that Phillip Adams varies in quality in his columns in The Australian but yesterday he excelled himself: Countless children in danger.
A 13-year-old girl dies in a wretched motel where her teenage pimp had forced her to service one more of many clients, a man in his 50s. [...]
20 Jul
This goes to the heart of the matter
A story in today’s Australian, but not prominently displayed, goes to the heart of the current crisis in remote communities: ‘Crisis’ in welfare of children.
FORMER Australian of the Year Fiona Stanley has told an international forum that the poor health and welfare of Aboriginal children represents a “domestic humanitarian crisis”.
… Professor [...]
13 Jul
Positive stories today
Sometimes it is good to back off from the argumentative and political and focus on stories that simply affirm goodness and humanity. There is one such story in today’s Sydney Morning Herald: Blazing a trail for half a century by Anna Patty, Education Editor.
EVELYN WEBB won a scholarship to became the first Aboriginal teacher [...]
11 Jul
Cold water for the Great Intervention
I have an ongoing page on recent developments in Aboriginal policy and the Northern Territory in which you may see I lend qualified support, as it seems do most Australians, to aspects of Howard and Brough’s activities. But that support is not without cynicism and doubt. Think uranium just for a start…
Yesterday I mentioned Bruce’s [...]
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