She who stumbles

From a mailing list:
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/02/27/2174099.htm

Welfare restrictions for WA Indig families

Federal Indigenous Affairs Minister Jenny Macklin has announced welfare restrictions for some Western Australian Aboriginal families in the same way they apply in the Northern Territory.

A Western Australian coroner recently delivered a scathing report into service delivery for the state’s Aboriginal people and called for welfare restrictions.

Ms Macklin has announced that she will adopt his recommendation.

“I am announcing that the Australian Government will proceed with a trial of welfare payment conditionality and income management to combat poor parenting and community behaviours in selected Western Australian communities including in the Kimberley,” she said.

Ms Macklin says the WA Government will be partners in a trial and will fund parent responsibility teams.

“[They will] work with Centrelink to improve parenting where children are being neglected and are at risk of abuse,” she said.

“As part of the case management of a family, Western Australian child protection officers will be able to request Centrelink require that a person be subject to income management.”

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,23249316-5013172,00.html

Outback taskforce gets star chamber

Simon Kearney | February 21, 2008

A FEDERAL investigation into child sexual abuse and violence in Aboriginal communities has been given star chamber powers to imprison unco-operative witnesses after its 18-month investigation hit a wall of silence in the outback.

The granting of the status of a special intelligence operation is a significant upgrade of the Alice Springs-based taskforce running the investigation, and came only after members had to argue its case in front of Australia’s eight police commissioners.

The new powers put violence and child sexual abuse in Aboriginal communities on a par with outlaw motorcycle gangs and international crime syndicates as priority for law enforcement. The powers investigators will use are similar to those granted to people investigating a terrorist plot.

The Australian understands that investigators, while having significant success uncovering information, have been frustrated by the unwillingness of non-government organisations to provide formal disclosures.

In addition, people in Aboriginal communities are often intimidated into not disclosing crimes, such as child sexual abuse and domestic violence. Critically, the investigators have uncovered many communities run through intimidation and standover tactics by men involved in criminal activity, including abuse.

Anyone questioned in what is known as the star chamber is legally prevented from revealing that the interview occurred, except to their lawyer.

Australian Crime Commission chief executive Alastair Milroy told The Australian yesterday the aim of the new powers was to obtain specific intelligence relating to violence, child abuse and related offences of substance abuse and pornography.

“Coercive powers will provide a clear legal basis and protection for non-government organisations, state and territory authorities, service providers and individuals to provide confidential information, as well as an environment that is more conducive to gathering personal testimony,” he said. “The approval of coercive powers was considered essential to overcome impediments in accessing information collection relating to indigenous violence and child abuse.”

Mr Milroy said the powers would not be used to target victims. The star chamber may travel to communities, if necessary, taking into greater account the need in many cases to protect the identity of witnesses being questioned.

The 31-strong National Indigenous Violence and Child Abuse Intelligence Task Force has made significant inroads exposing an epidemic of child sexual abuse and violence similar to revelations contained in the Little Children Are Sacred report, which was released in June last year and prompted the Howard government’s emergency intervention in the NT.

As of Tuesday, the taskforce had provided police and child protection authorities in every state and the NT with 236 reports that could be used in subsequent investigations.

The star chamber inquiry is carried out by an independent examiner.

The findings of inquiries cannot be used in court but the disclosures can be passed to police to investigate later.

Initially, the powers would be used to force organisations and individuals to produce documents from which further inquiries would be launched, Mr Milroy said.

“The ACC will utilise coercive powers in a culturally sensitive manner in order to identify offenders and obtain specific intelligence relating to violence, child abuse and related offences of substances abuse and pornography,” Mr Milroy said.

The taskforce is expected to continue its work until the end of this year before presenting a comprehensive report to the nation’s police commissioners in the middle of next year.

There are NO WORDS.

None.

I absolutely cannot believe that they would do this and have the nerve to try to cover themselves in glory by “apologising” for kidnapping Aboriginal children at the same time as imposing this authoritarian, racist horror on Aboriginal children now.

Here’s a newsflash, Kevin: if you apologise, but keep doing the same harmful things you were doing that you had to apologise for, then it becomes clear that you’re not only insincere and untrustworthy, but also an opportunistic, manipulative abuser.

A message forwarded over e-mail lists:

26th January 2008

PUBLIC ANNOUNCEMENT

TO ALL AUSTRALIANS

On this 26th Day of January 2008, in commemoration of the 20th Anniversary of the proclamation of SURVIVAL day, it is hereby announced that the month of JULY 1-31st is now proclaimed BLACK history month in Australia.

From this day forth and for all years to come, JULY will remain a month of significance and symbolism for the unity of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Nations, in celebration of Australia’s rich, vibrant Indigenous histories and cultures.

JULY will provide an opportunity for ALL AUSTRALIANS to recognise the true Australian identity, giving Schools, Government, Multicultural Australia and most significantly Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Communities the opportunity to respectfully promote greater awareness of the diversity, innovation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander splendour.

Australia’s BLACK history month, will join the worldwide celebration of Black History Month, giving a greater international profile to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander nations, alongside Canada, the United Kingdom and the United States of America.

The Australian community is hereby advised to BLACK out JULY in their diaries annually as a month of pride and celebration of all tribal groups and people throughout Australia and the Torres Strait.

1st JULY ­ 31st JULY AUSTRALIA’S BLACK HISTORY MONTH

WE HAVE SURVIVED

Stand up for Aboriginal rights on the first day of the new parliament!

Tuesday, February 12 2008
Meet Aboriginal Tent Embassy 11:30am
March to Parliament for 1pm rally

Turn back Howard and Brough’s racist legacy!

- Reinstate the Racial Discrimination Act
- Demand immediate review of the NT intervention
- End welfare quarantines, compulsory land acquisition and
‘mission manager’ powers
- Implement the UN Declaration on the Rights of Aboriginal People
- Aboriginal control of Aboriginal affairs

In the final months of government, John Howard introduced a package of discriminatory, unfair and punitive measures against Aboriginal people in the Northern Territory. Aimed at controlling Aboriginal lives and land, the legislation was a stark violation of basic human rights and dignities.

Federal Labor is promising a new era in Aboriginal affairs. They are pledging to say sorry to the stolen generation and to sign the UN declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People. They have promised to restore both the CDEP (Community Development and Employment Program) and the permit system, which will ameliorate some of the worst effects of the NT intervention.

Unfortunately there are aspects of ALP policy that is still disturbingly similar to the Liberals’. Plainly discriminatory measures such as mandatory welfare quarantines, compulsory land acquisition and the presence of non-Aboriginal “business managers” with extraordinary powers are being suffered under right now. There has been no move to allow the operation of the Racial Discrimination Act. The cry for immediate review of the legislation coming from across the NT has been ignored.

The Labor Government must comply with accepted international human rights laws and standards of non discrimination, equality , natural justice and procedural fairness. Legislation being implemented in the NT breaches commitments Australia has made as a signatory to major human rights treaties and conventions; such as the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. The Human Rights Commission must immediately review the legislation to ensure compliance with these obligations.

The federal election revealed overwhelming opposition to the intervention among Aboriginal communities. When Labor MP’s in affected areas emphasised political differences to the Coalition they consistently received over 80% of the vote; with 95% in the town of Wadeye.

Despite government claims that the intervention is a response to the Anderson & Wild “Little Children are Sacred” report, no new community-based services to ensure the safety and protection of children have been established, and there has been a notable duplication of services - particularly in the area of child health checks. There is an urgent need for delivery of essential services, infrastructure and programs genuinely targeted at improving the safety and well being of children and developed in consultation with communities. Huge amounts of public money have been wasted, with $88 million alone going towards bureaucrats to control Aboriginal welfare.

Moving Forward
A vibrant, mass convergence Canberra on the first day of parliament will be an important step in challenging the lingering legacy of Howard’s racism. We can strongly push for an immediate end to what Aboriginal communities have themselves described as an invasion. We can send a strong signal to Kevin Rudd and his new government to put Aboriginal rights at the centre of their agenda; to massively increase the resources available to communities across Australia and to respect Aboriginal control of Aboriginal affairs.

How to get there!
Buses will be leaving from the Block, opposite Redfern Station, on Tuesday 12 February. Get there at 7am for 7:30am departure.

Ring Janene to book a seat on the bus – 0416 490 481 - $20 ($10 concession).

If you are interested in going down to Canberra on Monday 11 Feb, let us know that as well. Bus times for Monday are still being confirmed.

Initiated by the Aboriginal Rights Coalition, Sydney. Come to the meetings 6pm every Monday at Redfern Community Centre, Hugo St.

Contact:
Shane Phillips 0414077631
Greg Eatock 0432050240
Read the rest of this entry »

Answer: when it happens to Aboriginal women.

Recently Cairns District Court Judge Sarah Bradley sentenced nine men, aged between 14 and 26, who pleaded guilty to the rape of a 10-year-old girl, to probation. I.e. no conviction is being recorded for this offence, according to Judge Bradley’s judgement.
One of the men has a prior conviction for child sexual abuse. Despite this, the Crown Prosecutor did not ask for custodial sentences for the men.
[***EDIT: Correction-- No conviction is being recorded against the juvenile perpetrators, who are getting probation. The adult perpetrators will have suspended sentences with convictions recorded. Articles were a little ambiguous on that point.***]

The lenient sentence was justified on the basis that the girl apparently “was not forced and she probably agreed to have sex with all of [them].”

Many of them are from powerful families in Aurukun, the remote Cape York community in which the rape occurred; the girl is not. She has now been placed in foster care.

The Queensland Attorney-General Kerry Shine is planning to appeal the sentence, although the appeal period of 28 days has expired, and the state Premier Anna Bligh will review all sentences handed down in Cape York over the past two years.

More details:

• Row over gang rape of 10yo - The Daily Telegraph
• Cape York sentences to be reviewed after rape judgement - ABC Online
• Qld A-G to appeal gang-rape sentences - The Age, Melbourne
• Indigenous leaders slam sentence - Courier Mail

The issue not being discussed in any of these reports is the whiteness of the judge who handed down the non-sentence. Why did she play havoc with the life of a young Aboriginal girl? Why is her life worth so little to this white judge? Why is she being kinder to rapists (black though they may be) than to young women? Isn’t it because Aboriginal women are considered worthless by the white legal system?

And why has this girl been removed from her family? In the Age article it suggests that the girl was initially placed in care in the Aurukun community.

I think Auntie Shirley said it best: for Aboriginal people, child removal equals paedophilia.

I think this case reveals the corruption and hypocrisy of Australian governments in dealing with child sexual abuse in Aboriginal communities. While the state is enabling confessed abusers, it is also chastising the entire Aboriginal population of the Northern Territory with punitive welfare quarantines and paternalistic community managers. While Aboriginal leaders condemn the enabling of abuse and the malevolent neglect of governments, the state congratulates itself on taking military action. For eleven years John Howard let report upon report about abuse, poor health, inadequate housing, unemployment and poverty pile up and he did nothing but take a knife to the guts of Indigenous leadership and rights. And now all Aboriginal people get is their money quarantined and threats to roll it out to the entire country.

It looks like the ALP is tripping on whatever ideological sauce the Coalition was on. It’s the only way this kind of bullshit could possibly make any goddamn sense.

I want to scream. I want to cry.

The Indigenous Land Council has announced that it will set up a system of boarding houses to give Indigenous children an education… This article is so disgustingly racist that I need to make fun of it to make sense of the fact that the things it’s reporting on are deathly serious.

“Think of the children!” has been uttered before in Australian history. It produced the Stolen Generation.

Prime Minister John Howard has just announced a series of extremely repressive measures for Indigenous communities in the Northern Territory, including taking control of Indigenous townships through a system of leases and increased police intervention into Aboriginal communities.

Did I mention that there have already been proposals for nuclear waste dumps on Indigenous lands in the Northern Territory despite the PM’s assurances there never would be?

And oh gods, I need a rest so I’ll just offer you these two terms for consideration:
“divide-and-rule”
“comprador”
Seriously, they explain a lot more than you’d imagine.

I know I just said I’d take a break from blogging, but I really thought these articles needed to be passed on.

1. The Sydney Morning Herald reports on white sexual abuse of Aboriginal children in the Northern Territory with characteristic power-aversive race talk that downplays the colonial violence occurring there.

2. Academic Larissa Behrendt says that there’s a racist discourse of Indigenous issues in this country which is destructive to Indigenous peoples’ rights, health, safety, and wellbeing. (What about self-determination, Larissa?)

Since The Anti-Essentialist Conundrum has closed, Sylvia has asked me to re-post the first Carnival Of Radical Action (CORA) here.

Welcome to the first Carnival for Radical Action!

Fire Fly and I are pleased to dedicate this carnival to the phenomenal WOC blogger BrownFemiPower. This carnival idea is her brainchild. Fire Fly’s encouragement, along with these excellent submissions, gave it wings. So we thank her and all of you, first and foremost.

There are many reasons that people may choose to hit the pavement, the group meeting (whether as small as the local PTA or as large as the United Nations), the netroots, the writing pad, or the telephone. For example, what do you do when you notice a white male colleague acting extremely out of line with a young black female student, like in Miss Profe’s situation? Do you speak out? If so, how? What do you say? How do you say it?

Conversely, what if you know what to say and how to say it, but your support system is lacking? Like the dynamics in VJack’s situation, you need to organize and coordinate large groups of people who hold different views under a generally agreed-upon umbrella issue. How do you recruit and get some action started? Do you choose advocacy? Coordinated letter writing? Rallies? Create your own organization?

For the duration of this carnival, bloggers from across the ’sphere will offer answers, experiences, and encouragement for instituting radical change. From writing a letter to your local newspaper to coordinating a large rally with multiple organizations, there’s a little something for everyone who wants to learn about making a substantial impact. So let’s get started!

Methods of Organizing

Bloggers have offered their wisdom and experience to explain some of the nitty-gritty details of organizing campaigns, organizations, and events. These wonderful bloggers emphasise clear and effective communication both within the organizing group and with the rest of society.

The incomparable BFP offers, along with some great anecdotes, a comprehensive introduction to organizing from her experience with Incite! Women of Color Against Violence:

I wanted to post the national chapter of Incite!’s guidelines to organizing. It is a very very basic “how to” guide–it doesn’t tell you how to confront people’s hurt feelings after a major fuck up, for example. But it does give you a good place to start. One of the biggest mistakes newbie organizers make is starting too quick. The euphoria of finally deciding you have the power to make change is amazing and exhilarating. But ultimately it’s unsustainable. Recognizing that you have the power to change the world is necessary to get yourself into organizing–but recognizing that you personally aren’t going to change the world in your life time is also necessary. Thus, what you do needs to be done with that in mind–how can you lay a strong enough foundation such that your daughter, your granddaughter, your great granddaughter, can continue to build upon your work?

I offer Vox offers guidelines for groups and individuals who want to increase the public profile of an issue in the news media:

Political action that is mainly unknown or doesn’t toe the established party line goes mainly unreported unless there’s a proven demand. Smaller papers that could establish that demand are mainly limited to covering local issues with their own staff and whatever runs on the AP wire for everything else.

The thing is, though, it doesn’t have to be that way. There are plenty of ways to get important issues into the mainstream press; they just need proof that there will be reader interest.

The Organizing Experience

Activist organizing takes both skill and good organization. Radical bloggers have written about their impressions of organizations, and their effectiveness, inclusivity, and structure on all levels — from small reading groups, to large-scale social movements.

Petitpoussin talks about the co-operative skills she needed to run a successful reading series:

Over time I’ve become more and more interested in the idea of collaborative or collective projects — and I’m excited to see them developing on the blogosphere, through various carnivals, sites like AfroSpear, Ally Work, and arts and cultural projects like Birds of Lace press or make/shift magazine. When I read and think about community among activists, it’s not just about some realpolitik conception of critical mass to create change on a point. It’s about experiencing change in our daily lives, with the people we love and respect, as opposed to working ourselves ragged towards change as the ideal.

In a comment to this blog, Nena Lopez offers insight into the key questions for grass-roots organizations:

Coordination and organization of activists for a grass root operation is extremely tough.

[…]

We began by taking a poll of who wanted to assist in a leader & activist position while changing the issues throughout the nation. We had a meeting (teleconference)
First discussion, Are we a campaign or are we an organization? If we are an organization we must comply within the laws of our state and become organized. We established leaders by state, through a meeting (someone must always take meeting notes). This was the first tier at a corporate level.

In an older post at her (oldschool!) Blogspot blog, BFP posted about a number of principles and issues generated out of communities involved with Incite! Women of Color Against Violence efforts at community-based anti-violence strategies:

How do we incorporate justice into community accountability strategies? If we do not rely on the state to adjudicate cases of gender violence, then how do we ensure justice and fairness before holding perpetrators accountable? How do we ensure that we do not turn into vigilante groups? If we do develop processes do judge cases within a community context, will we just replicate a mini version of the oppressive state apparatus within our communities?

And another older post from Ideas for Change discusses the relative effectiveness of authoritarian and non-authoritarian organisational structures:

There is a problematic history of coercive, authoritarian and inadequate approaches to activist and citizen learning and political practice in Sydney, that is ingrained in many of our activist cultures.

You cannot really point the finger and make accusations, because it is actually very difficult to overcome the authoritarian cultural obstacles to useful and liberatory activism. There is a fine line between having an efficient operation, and excluding members from decisionmaking.

Micropolitics of Organizing

Once in the midst of taking action, sometimes it is hard to keep up the initial momentum. Either the initial problem is more complicated than expected, the supporters do not arrive as readily, or the chosen method falls short of the anticipated goals. Either way, there’s an obstacle. How can these obstacles be confronted? Here, bloggers speak of their experiences with obstacles and activism, and they share some insight on how to perceive them and how to keep moving along.

Fabi shares her personal experience and insights about how to prevent discouragement and unsustainability while working as an activist:

But what I want to focus on are my thoughts on radical actions specifically personal contributions to a organizing project and the feasiability, effectiveness and sustainbility of change and activism. Especially as a mother and full time worker, I divide the two becuase all mothers are working mothers, most of the time and energy is constrained so I always ask myself how is this {fill in the blank} organizing?

Sudy lays out Donna sends out a rousing cry for people to get off their asses and warns against accepting the “wait your turn” mentality:

I can see a day coming when the crowd at the bottom is going to overwhelm the few at the top. The majority of Americans are already discriminated against or oppressed in some way, but this is as it has always been. The difference is that today there are more of us discontented, alienated, and unrepresented since the turn of the century. Many of us are people of color and it’s time for us to come together and shove each other to the top and pull those behind us up too. I’m tired of us vs them in every discussion. I’m tired of people saying to each other, “I must have my important issues first, then we will get back to you”, and always it isn’t enough.

And in this post, Fire Fly discusses the impact that agitating for social justice can take on mental health in a personal and enlightening way:

The nexus of issues — mental health, social justice, and activism — is very confronting for me. In the discussions at university, I haven’t mentioned that I’ve been diagnosed with a mental illness, and I’ve been in and out of the mental health system since I was very young. For me, depression is still something I treat as private, almost secret, and a matter of managing my own time and energy. This is because I’ve felt an intense amount of stigma around it from a lot of circles, especially left activist circles.

Organizing: The Aftermath

You’ve recruited. You’ve organized. You’ve planned. You’ve laughed. You’ve cried. You’ve called and written and photocopied and mobilized. What does the final product look like? Riversider has given us an example of how organizations and volunteers all meshed together in a joint effort on May Day. It’s a photoblog journey of the day’s events, so be prepared to absorb thousands of words in a blink of an eye about activism!

Thanks so much to everyone who submitted to this carnival!
We absolutely couldn’t have done it without you!

This is a fantastic example of how networking across the internet can inspire and empower people to work together for liberation. If you can spare some money, BFP has a list of bloggers who are raising funds to go to the Allied Media Conference next month who could really use your help. We support all kinds of online organising and radical collaboration!

We hope the carnival has a long life ahead of it, empowering many more in the months and years to come. Please spread the word far and wide, and start thinking about what you’ll submit to the next carnival!

The next carnival will be hosted at Fire Fly’s blog She who stumbles. Look out for more details!
Sylvia’s Note: I’ve already set up the newest submission form for entries to be sent to Fire Fly here.

UPDATE: Fire Fly has posted a call for submissions; the deadline for carnival submissions is June 21st. If you are interested in hosting future editions, please let me know by e-mailing me at sylviasrevenge [at] gmail [dot] com.

Much love,
Sylvia and Fire Fly

Since my visit to India this February I’ve been thinking hard about my Hindu faith and how it sits with my commitment to social justice.

I think perhaps the only thing I’m sure of regarding the status of Hinduism is that it’s very, very contested. Reading about it only serves to confuse me, because every discourse is underpinned by a political position, all of which reflect positions in a material reality. Given the complexity of the subcontinent, the length of its history, the size of its population and the very density of practices, values, discourses within it, I’m reluctant to approach them. After visiting India, and comparing my point of view from there to mine here, I know that distance distorts these issues. Reading isn’t a substitute for participating in a society.

But of course, as a Hindu Brahmin woman from Bangalore, with a strong intention to return there to work in “aid and development” (a set of terms which, to me, is a respectable way of talking about fighting imperialism and capitalism) I need to understand what all that history, practice and social complexity means.

Until now, most of my knowledge about Hinduism has been religious — explicitly religious and not historicised or taken in its political and social context. This is the identitarian logic of how Hindu groups seem to operate in Australia. Knowing how heavily Hindu revivalism has influenced the practice and discourse around religion, this blindness now strikes me as gratuitous. How can we talk about morality without politics?

At the same time, I feel like a hypocrite for being so invested in Hindu spirituality while at the same time feeling defensive about being a Hindu where Hinduism is a minority religion.

I can’t win, but I don’t have to.

It’s in this spirit that I read these articles about contemporary Hinduism:
Whatever Happened to the Hindu Left? by Ruth Vanita
Hinduism Versus Hindutva: The Inevitability of a Confrontation and A Billion Gandhis, by Ashis Nandy.

While these make me feel better about being Hindu as well as left-wing, I’m not so sure they’re helping me understand the responsibilities of my social position. I know that overcoming privileged guilt (and turning it into practical self-knowledge and conscious action) is an important part of being a good ally, though. I wish I knew what would become of these confused sentiments.

More later, with added Fanon!