Their economy is removed and renders their culture cracked. Cracked culture: cracked people. The descent of indigenous peoples into this sort of malaise seems a consequence of colonialisation. So it would seem as a post-colonial country we – Australian Society – bear Responsibility.

This, I think clearly differentiates me from those Whitewash View of History types who say the plight of Aboriginal people is not our fault and not our problem. It is.

Not so, SG.

If it were, say, the Japanese parliament passing a motion to apologise for their treatment of Aussie POWs, the hand-wringing would be “perfectly appropriate and well overdue”.

This is a classic right-wing talking-point, Adrien

So?

And attempts to redress it are always presented as dangerous personal sacrifice by the “oppressor”, as you suggest your liberal archetype mate told you.

I don’t think that considering solutions entirely in terms of the guilt of the oppressor has anything to do with dangerous sacrifice SG. I believe it is a pose. It’s not a sacrifice. It’s not even much of an effort.

Comment 117 is clearly scornful of attempts to improve things,

No it is scornful of the current mode by which things are supposedly changed. It doesn’t work. It is also scornful of Utopia.

And at 98 you made an off little comment about asians and their hedge-a-money – asians are racist too, don’t you know? Gee where have I read that sort of thing before…? (The last time was Pauline Hanson, I do believe).

Are you really that witless? Hedge-a-money is a play on hegemony. Lt Bourke St is Chinatown in Melbourne. The Chinese have had a longer continuous dominant civilization than anywhere else on Earth. I’m not referring to their racism. I didn’t mention their racism. You live in Japan don’t you? Well you’d well know that ethnic chauvanism is not something monopolized by Western Europeans. But I didn’t say anything about that. I’m referring to the fact that ‘white people’ aren’t the only ones capable of producing dominant culture. This has nothing to do with Hanson’s xenophobia.

How is it that an individual aborigine committing a crime is in your mind, first and foremost, an individual who should be judged as a dickhead first and a representative of his racial history second; but your liberal mate, telling you you deserved to get bashed, is first and foremost a representative of a putative liberal movement, and only in the second instance an individual who should be judged as a dickhead?

My anecdote viz my friend’s commentary was an example of an attitude widely associated with what Americans call liberalism. He is only representative anecdotely. Similarly when I brought up the Jones murder I’m trying to cite an example where, in an individual sense, there is a tragic and senseless killing where the responsible party is clearly identifiable and culpable. However I then ask the question: would he have committed murder if he wasn’t aboriginal? And concluded: probably not. I’m trying to illustrate that their is a relationship between individual choice and social determinism but that they don’t quite fit together. This contradiction is at the heart of modern ethics. Your summary bears no relationship to my comment.

Moral relativism – here’s a hint, Adrien, when you cite the “moral relativism” of the left you have a 99% chance of having degenerated into a right-wing rant. I shouldn’t even have to explain this.

You accuse me of erecting strawmen, neglect to define exactly what they are, and yet more than once you’re telling me that I shouldn’t be saying this stuff because it’s the sort of stuff Hanson says. Criticism of extreme cultural relativism is not solely the province of the Right. The Left do it to. What I said was that the problem won’t be solved by cultural relativism. How this is erecting strawmen I don’t know. But please feel free to explain to me how cultural relativism does solve these problems.

…because you disagree that the comments were racist. Where have we all read this faux Orwellian analysis before, Adrien?

It isn’t analysis, faux or otherwise. It’s a quip. And it’s apt. The strategy of certain elements of the Left, effective in institutional discourse, has been to banish the expression of utterances that fit within the standard sets of ‘oppression’: racism, sexism, homophobia etc. Anti-vilification laws being the strongest example.
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One of the results of this is that people who are racist now deliver their messages covertly thereby making it both difficult to identify their actual arguments and assisting them in producing non-racist lines to back their position up. The other result is that we can no longer have frank discussions about the reality of ethnicity because people are too intimidated to discuss it openly. Please feel free to locate a racist comment in the link provided at the top. I couldn’t find one.

Do I think that the starting point of the solution is a non-indigenous round of clothes-tearing flagelation expressing our guilt and despair? Of course not. That’s just daft.

This is a classic right-wing talking-point, Adrien, in case you hadn’t noticed – any kind of awareness of one group’s historical responsibility for another’s situation, and any attempt to redress it, is presented this way by the Blairs and Bolts of the world. And attempts to redress it are always presented as dangerous personal sacrifice by the “oppressor”, as you suggest your liberal archetype mate told you.

Comment 117 is clearly scornful of attempts to improve things, presenting those with an opinion on the matter as ivory tower elitists. Which I can assure you I, at least, am not – I have (as I mentioned) a reasonable experience of crime. My brother has a criminal history, I have been a victim of crime, I worked with criminals, and I have lived in high-crime suburbs.

Then you add, “Still pursuing Better Living Through Newspeak. Good luck with that one” because you disagree that the comments were racist. Where have we all read this faux Orwellian analysis before, Adrien?

At comment 90 you cite an example of a murder where the killer (falsely) accuses his victim of racism. Convenient choice of example. And finally after your convenient example, and a bit of straight talk about dispossession etc., you go back to the straw man:

It’s a very difficult situation. One that will not be solved by a reliance solely on relativism and moralization I don’t think.

Moral relativism – here’s a hint, Adrien, when you cite the “moral relativism” of the left you have a 99% chance of having degenerated into a right-wing rant. I shouldn’t even have to explain this.

You did the same thing in that animal rights conversation we had – attacked your imaginary animal libber and his imaginary ideas, not the actual theory of animal liberationists (which is like, you know, written down and stuff – just as are left wing views on crime and justice). You’re doing it here too, and presenting the whole thing in terms of this silly idea that we inner city dudettes don’t know anything about reality and are just being guilty white kids.

And at 98 you made an off little comment about asians and their hedge-a-money – asians are racist too, don’t you know? Gee where have I read that sort of thing before…? (The last time was Pauline Hanson, I do believe).

And riddle me this about what your “stereotypical lefty” mate told you… How is it that an individual aborigine committing a crime is in your mind, first and foremost, an individual who should be judged as a dickhead first and a representative of his racial history second; but your liberal mate, telling you you deserved to get bashed, is first and foremost a representative of a putative liberal movement, and only in the second instance an individual who should be judged as a dickhead?

Furthermore, there’s & constant demonstration of bitterness, envy & “chip on the shoulder” stuff that just doesn’t fit with how well off most Aussies are these days. Learned behaviours I guess, handed down proudly like biscuit & damper recipes.

It’s probably these atiitudes/reactions and so on that motivated the poor lads to JOY RIDE in the first place…based partially on genetic memory & stories told of how callous & mean some of their more privileged &/or whiter peers can be. The focus of films & journos on car racing, taking risks, taking to the wide open road to be free & idolising VILLAINS probably doesn’t help either.

In the long run they were a bunch of “out of it” frustrated kids lettin’ off steam. Angering if it was your car…or if they got close to hittin’ someone you love…but upon realising that the result is a great loss for them…& their families…any normal, compassionate, rational individual would feel sorrow, give their condolences…& look for ways to mend fences…give youngsters HOPE.

Good points Darlene, in fact well said & felt. Nabs, that retelling of the time when gentleman retired to the study to have cathartic acts by way of the “penny dreadfuls” is insightful. Some media moguls cater to their like even now, as tho it were an addiction. Or a profiteering venture. Perhaps both.

It’s far more practical than that. Of course, as a hyper-individualist (dare I say libertarian) it’s important for you to ignore the role of social structures in determining peoples’ criminal activities

SG I would suggest reading my comments further above. I have not ignored the role of social structures altho’ I believe that there are limits to the extent that they determine our behaviour. I don’t ignore the role of social structures.

Generally the view of most on the left is very simple – committing crime is bad, and criminals need to be punished, but punishment in an individualistic vacuum will never prevent crime,

One of the stereotypes attendant to those Americans call ‘liberals’ is of people who treat criminals as victims. This makes those who’re the victims of crime quite angry. I experienced this myself when a particularly stereotypical lefty of my acquaintance had the temerity to suggest I was responsible for an incident wherein a teenager attacked me without provocation or warning in an attempt to get my money. The assumption was that the kid was ‘oppressed’. Actually he wasn’t he was just an arsehole. But my friend kept insisting it was my fault somehow. To back this up, he brought up my middle-class background and my status (as he sees it) as a ‘cool inner city dude’ (his words) as if these were crimes.
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Now this sort of thing gets repeated quite a lot. Even liberals send up this quality. Please see Everyone Says I Love You for a wittier lampoon of this phenomena.
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So with respect SG your citation of the Left’s attitude to crime might be the official story but it ain’t the whole one.
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As for the rest of your comment it’s simply untrue in respect to what I am saying. You talk about the plight of the mother. Goodio. Please see above where I quote a friend of the family who, tho’ acknowledging that lads were a handful, points out that their sisters are lovely and tells everyone judging their mother to bugger off.
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But anyway the following:

You’re kidding yourself if you think that the reform required to do this is based on individual responsibility. And suggesting that redressing past injustice towards Aborigines is not a part of the solution is very glib.

Shows that you really haven’t taken in what I’ve said in entirety. I have not suggested that redressing history is not part of the solution. And I have not boiled down the solution to individual responsibility entirely. In fact I have not offered a solution. I have stated that I don’t have one. I have stated I don’t know enough, in fact, most of us don’t know enough. This country ignores the problem until it’s shoved in our faces and then band-aids it.
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Still individual responsibility is part of a free society. It has been since at least Pericles. Search the annals of democratic theory and you will always find the same formula: self-mastery + limits on State power = Democracy.
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But that’s not the issue here. The issue that I’m trying to address is that the Left has a blanket attitude to this issue. Let’s find the racists and Damn Them. Who are the racists? Anyone who says anything that is not a dirge for the injustices of the past and the present.
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I say: Dirges don’t help.
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What might help is if the Left decided to actually look at what is said and what is done from a detached vantage. Cold mindedness solves problems, hot minds start wars. But as my commentary above is summed up as ‘hyper-individualist’ dogma I really don’t see much hope there. In fact who am I kidding forget it. Y’know where progress lies? It lies in the Aboriginal Malcolm X wherever s/he may be.

I don’t know what the technical term is for the view that most leftists have about Aboriginal crime, but it is neither the kind of hopeless desire to reform crime through reversing the past, or the saintly “we had it coming” view you describe here. It’s far more practical than that. Of course, as a hyper-individualist (dare I say libertarian) it’s important for you to ignore the role of social structures in determining peoples’ criminal activities, and to boil as much as possible down to individual decision-making before you then castigate the left for suggesting we can all play a role. But that’s not what the left is doing.

Generally the view of most on the left is very simple – committing crime is bad, and criminals need to be punished, but punishment in an individualistic vacuum will never prevent crime, and will encourage it to the extent that the punishment forces individuals capable of reform (like my brother was) towards the edges of society, where crime is the only structurally viable choice. You can pretend as much as you want, fingers-in-your-ears-lalala-i’m-not-listening (like Steve in the Toilet) that a 10 year old rural Aboriginal boy is a morally competent and rational agent – but you’ll never reduce crime rates that way, and any social response based on that idea will simply push up crime rates for the 16 year old boys that these 10 year olds become. Saying these things doesn’t constitute a denial of individual responsibility or the need for punishment as deterrent/justice, but there’s more than one injustice in society which those who value society (unlike most libertarians) need to balance. That 10 year old boy’s mother is also suffering an injustice at the moment, and while it might be nice to just blame her for her son’s death (which is kind of incompatible anyway with the claim that he is a morally competent individual), we could consider that maybe, somewhere out there, there is some kind of structural reform we could implement that would enable all three people involved – the 10 year old boy, the car-owner and the mother – to have a better life.

You’re kidding yourself if you think that the reform required to do this is based on individual responsibility. And suggesting that redressing past injustice towards Aborigines is not a part of the solution is very glib. I put it to you that this glibness is driven more by your hyper-individualist viewpoint than any clear analysis of the social problems Aborigines face.

I read Darlene’s post as a comment on the ugliness of the “let ‘em burn” comments generally, not the racist comments particularly. I read her mention of race as a side point. Perhaps there are some sensitive readers out there?

Adrien, do I get the sense that you have fallen into the “asians are more racist than we are” trope somewhere in all this? I think your defense of whatever you’re defending (I can’t quite tell) may have gone off track in this instance.

I’m not defending anyone SG. My point is that those on the Left who are concerned with racism have certain tendencies and that these tendencies may be counter-productive. When I booted up Darlene’s link I saw a lot of hard-nosed ‘they’re crims, they deserve it’ schpiels. I saw one or two comments trying to raise the point of Aboriginal social problems and crime. At least one of these people wrote it in an apologetic mode.
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I didn’t see any overt racism or even much by way of covert racism. I didn’t read all 1500 comments more like 40 grabbed at random places on the thread.
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I was informed of course that many racists don’t express their views openly. This is true. However I don’t think that because this is true it’s therefore true that anyone who criticizes a criminal who happens to be Aboriginal is a racist.
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Now I’ve made it clear above that I regard high proportional Aboriginal crime rate as a social problem. But it also an individual problem. That however wasn’t what I was getting at.
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The topic is the spectrum of views expressed in the link. There’s no acknowledgement here that there even is a spectrum. But to me the question is do we discuss this spectrum or simply express disgust. Generally we’ve chosen the latter. I think this does the debate a great disservice.
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Now I’m not saying that the problems of Aboriginal people are entirely of their own doing and that the injustices attendant to the conquering of hunter-gatherer societies by imperial ones have nothing to do with it. They do. However that isn’t the entire story. And more importantly it’s not the solution.
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If an Aboriginal person feels entitled to wreak havoc because their life is fubar then does that do them or anyone any good? No. If a non-Aboriginal person is a victim of Aboriginal crime is it racist to do anything else save resign themselves to ‘we had it coming’? Well it would be a very Christ like noble countenance to do so.
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Naturally the idea that Aboriginals commit crimes against non-Aboriginals and not the reverse is total nonsense.
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However I do feel that, amongst the Left – the main site of concern for indigenous people – a certain tendency remains. This was expressed quite well by the Polish poet Czelaw Milosz in his essay “Speaking of a Mammal”. After the war Milosz wrote a film scenario dealing with a man trying to survive in the wreckage of Warsaw. The by-then Communist authorities did not like the fact that here was a guy by himself surviving in the apocalyptic ruins. To them it was bourgeois – smacking of Robinson Crusoe. They changed it from one man to several and included some heroic Russian para-trooper bring down the New Faith from the skies. This was historically ridiculous and of course destroyed Milosz’s theme.
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Of the ensuing discussion with the studio heads Milosz wrote:

“What is a man?” I wanted to ask. “Let us not stop at such a vague notion.” they exclaimed.” What we want to know is whether he is a friend or an enemy. How can we tell if in your film he appears alone”

Friends and enemies. This is the game of politics. When discussing the plite of Aboriginal people we are all inclined to simply extend this game without discussing whether or no it is relevant to the subject at hand. Some friends of mine (lefties) worked in Aboriginal communities in the NT. They told a few horror stories. They actually thought Pauline Hanson’s appearance was a good thing! Not because they liked her or agreed with what she said. They did not. But because it presented an opportunity to speak frankly about things that were being unsaid.
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As one of these friends said to me: “Adrien the thing is that we’re assuming that Aboriginal people are living their lives the way they did before we got here, or trying to. But they’re not. They watch TV, they see advertising. They want what we want.”
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There is a certain preciousness about Aboriginal culture amongst inner-city people that’ve never camped with a Koori. There is a dismissal of Aboriginal people as lazy amongst others. I have camped with Kooris and Murris and Oongas and I can tell you two things. The first is that ‘their culture’ has some attributes that left-liberals would find offensive if bespoke by non-Aboriginals. The second is that the hardest working person I ever met was a Koori guy – hard as nails. And a classic Bush entrepreneur to boot.
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But I’m not saying I know. I don’t. No-one does. I can’t help but feeling tho’ that the game of the Left which seems to me often to be about assessing whether someone is ideologically sound viz race is useless. It’s easy to speak correctly. That has nothing to do with who you are underneath. And it has nothing to do with your virtue. There are many places in this world where ethnic conflict is a nightmare reality and ‘racism’ is simply common sense. Judging those people doesn’t get you anywhere.
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Is the man a friend or an enemy? Perhaps neither? Perhaps just a person? For the studio heads this question was paramount. “Is he a friend or an enemy?” they ask. Milosz replies: “He is a victim.”.
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There are many victims. Because those lads who stole that car were victims doesn’t make those upon whom they exact vengeance any less so.
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And uttering something on this issue which isn’t easily classified into this or that side of the political fence doesn’t make one a racist.

I like the poem, BTW. What is the definition of ’shived’ in this context? As in sliced or fragmented?

Cheers Klaus. ‘Shivved’ is from American prison slang. A shiv is a homemade knife. It was a glib shot by way of a provocational operation. My point will be elucidated shortly…

“Settler liberalism has progressed since the nineteenth century. It can now accept individual Aboriginal people as citizens of the modern state, though it took a while. It is struggling however, to find an acceptable place for Aboriginality. This, it seems to me, is the latent meaning of Howard’s continual stress on Aboriginal disadvantage. Again and again, Howard says ‘Nobody can deny the disadvantage still experienced by many Aboriginal Australians.’ The word disadvantage tolls like a bell through his statements – insistently repeated in such a way, that it seems to me, to carry two meanings. The ostensible reference is always to health, housing, employment…But in its insistent repetition one can hear, I think, another meaning – that Aboriginal people were and are a disadvantaged backward people who need help to be brought up to our standards and take their place in the modern world.”

Judith Brett exposes the ideology concerning the hierarchy of races which was threaded through Howard’s (and some people’s on this thread) calls for practical solutions. Here is the unexamined, perhaps for some, unconscious racism which underpins benign white discourse which presents itself as a beneficient force for Aboriginal improvement. It is all for improving the ‘Aboriginal’s lot’, but not at the expense of acknowledging the strength of the Other. Even as it calls for the improvement of Aboriginal conditions, it always frames Aboriginality in terms of disadvantage. To acknowledge Aboriginal cultural strength might fracture white privilege, something that Brett noticed was missing in Howard’s own benevolent discourse:

“He does not balance such statements without an acknowledgement of the strengths and richness of Aboriginal culture, with the suggestion that Aboriginal culture has much to contribute to contemporary Australia as a whole, or with the acknowledgement that the traditional cultures are not locked in a stone age past but have [always had] within themselves capacities to adapt and grow.”

Not really the kind of affect I’d associate with most of the critical whiteness stuff.

From what I understand, the introduction of the category ‘white’ in critical whiteness studies is about challenging privilege rather than examining disadvantage. It means recognising that apparently neutral subject-positions – like that of the default Australian citizen – are also racialised positions, with privileges attached. It’s like the inverse of assessing Aboriginality (for example) in terms of the disadvantages attached to that subject-position. It’s a way of moving away from the constant scrutiny in social scientific and humanistic inquiry of marginalised ‘Others’, scrutiny which tends to mean that those marginalised are constantly asked to explain themselves. In fact, one of the privileges associated with whiteness is that you are rarely in a position where you are asked to speak for your entire race. In some ways, critical whiteness studies parallels the sociological move towards ’studying up’.

When tough measures against larrikins were called for, the larrikins were often found to be the children of respectable parents and in work. When they were prosecuted they could raise the money to employ a lawyer in their defence. The larrikin spirit is still a mysterious phenomenon. It was not the defiance of the damaged and excluded; it was the boldness that came from self-confidence, of young men who would not be confined. A prosperous working class, free of old-world condescension, had spawned in its native-born youth this baroque display of independence. In Sydney it was possible to argue that the larrikins were a residue from convict times, but larrikins flourished in all cities, particularly in Melbourne, the largest, which had only a faint convict heritage.