Well, as I noted on another thread about Germaine Greer, I’ve bought and now read On Rage. I’d like this post to stick to discussion of the merits of her arguments, which I continue to think has been something largely absent from most of the debate to date. I also think that very few people who’ve rushed into print have actually read her book, and instead taken the odd comment here or there that she’s made in the course of promoting it and projected all sorts of things onto her.
Even those who have seem to be reacting to parts instead of the whole – for instance, Marcia Langton, describing the remarks about her in the book as an “astonishing attack on me”. That’s quite odd, because Langton is being challenged rather than attacked in the book – challenged to agree with Greer’s view that – on the basis of the evidence – the literal appropriation of Indigenous women’s bodies by white men, something Greer documents with footnoted citations from both historians and contemporary sources – is part of the reason for Indigenous male rage. All the rest of what Langton says – accusations of “a 1970s style argument”, a “panoply of protest slogans deployed as social theory” and so on – unless I’m missing something, appears misdirected, or at least based on inference rather than the text itself. On p. 88 of the book, any reasonable reader would see that Langton is not the one being accused of “collusion” with the state, what she took umbrage at, and that in fact the point being made is that the differential impacts of gender on the colonised is still used by whitefellas as a lever to avoid responsibility and to divide people. There’s a disagreement of view, but not an accusation, and it hardly justifies Langton’s claim that the essay is “racist”.
What Greer is doing in On Rage is a provocation to the degree that it’s asking a range of people differently positioned within Australian culture to reflect on the totality of what has occurred and how ineffectual slogans are – and there are slogans within the talk of the “responsibilities” crew as well – in the absence of both understanding and a genuine coming to terms with the parade of extraordinary horrors that is the story of Indigenous dispossession. Greer’s essay doesn’t make for comfortable reading, and that’s the point. Langton may be justified in taking umbrage at some of the things Greer has said in the course of promoting it, and I can quite understand that, but I think in this instance it’s vital to separate the force and quality of the argument in the text itself from the personality of its author. Much of what has been published and said elsewhere, for instance in Greer’s Sydney Morning Herald op/ed adds to (and in a way detracts from) the argument in the book, rather than reproduces it. Greer might be her own worst enemy in this case, but that doesn’t absolve her interlocutors from reacting with their own rage, or at least spleen.
Unfortunately, and again here Greer is not an innocent in all this, I need to dispose of the “howlers” claim before moving to address the substantive arguments in On Rage. There’s been commentary on a previous thread about errors of fact in some other articles Greer has written over the years. But some of the factual inaccuracies – such as the claim that Bob Katter has a following in the Northern Territory are not in the book itself, but made in interviews by Greer. I could only find two errors in the text itself – the claim about the absence of younger Indigenous men at the apology on February 13 2008, and a slip where Katter is said to have been a Commonwealth rather than a State Minister. I suspect the first is an artefact of watching television coverage from outside Australia, but it doesn’t imply that distance devalues everything she says. It’s clear, for instance, that she does maintain contact with Indigenous people. The second, I think, is most likely an error that is easy to make when writing – and raises the issue mentioned here in the context of very slack editing and fact-checking at Melbourne University Press, which is a real worry and calls into question the rhetoric from Louise Adler and Glyn Davis about its role.
So while I think the whole question of why Greer herself attracts such personalised loud denunciation (and I find it hard to believe that any male Professor would be described as a “bint” and a “termagant”, for instance) is an important one, and one that throws its own (pretty unfavourable) light on aspects of Australian culture, I don’t want to discuss that further here – it was considered on this earlier thread.
I want to focus on what Greer actually has to say about rage. As she pointed out when interviewed by Leigh Sales on Lateline last week, in one respect, she’s reflecting on rage itself. It’s a good rule of thought, I think, not to do so in the absence of a concrete context, but to some degree anyway, her phenomenology of rage can stand on its own merits – though in practice it’s closely intertwined with a historical aetiology of rage in colonised hunter gatherer populations. Indeed, Bob Katter is mentioned because he’s relevant – he articulates rage on behalf of a particular group – farmers who he thinks have been dispossessed in their own way (whether Katter is right is of course neither here nor there, but it’s true to say he is representing pain in a real fashion). Greer questions what motivates Katter – who must know he is tilting at windmills – and wonders whether he thinks of himself as somehow sacrificing himself for “his” people. That’s a relevant question because she points to a range of clinical studies which show that extreme anger and rage are incredibly deleterious to human well-being. That’s because it’s turned against oneself – the position from which one expresses rage is an inarticulate one – one deprived of power, one dispossessed from the ability to negotiate – a last and futile act of resistance which eats up and destroys the self, and which is far too often turned against those closest to the self.
[Greer remarks that women tend to grieve while men rage. That may be true, and probably is, but it's unclear whether she recognises this as a cultural artefact. Perhaps the biggest problem I have with the essay - and one which commentators like Langton have rightly highlighted - is a certain essentialisation of gender that's not really foregrounded.]
Greer points to the prevalence of suicide among young rural white men, something Katter has made one of his causes. That leads her onto a consideration of the differences as well as the similiarities between white and Indigenous male despair and rage. Without diminishing the reality of the suffering of rural folk who have seen a way of life torn away by forces much greater than they can seemingly influence, she notes what life possibilities and resources remain to them, which are absent in the case of Indigenous dispossession. She is right to see dispossession as a secular and continuing process rather than a once-off act, and also rightly pings the casual intermingling of disparate cultural groups, which has a lot to do with much of the “dysfunction” Noel Pearson complains of in North Queensland – and it was going on as recently as the 1970s – Palm Island, too, being an effective dumping ground. That’s something I’ve heard myself from Murri people I’ve known.
I don’t actually want to follow her argument step by step, because my hope is that people will read the book itself and consider it on its merits, which are considerable – it’s well argued and passionately written. She doesn’t make this exact analogy, but the story she tells – of how Indigenous women were actually essential to the “frontier” and “progress” – as chattels, sexual objects, servants and how the Stolen Generation was a state action to re-impose norms against miscegenation among other motivations – reminded me of a post Mark wrote here last year on Charles Taylor’s characterisation of Native Americans as having suffered “culture death”:
A culture’s disappearing means that a people’s situation is so changed that the actions that had crucial significance are no longer possible in that radical sense. It is not just that you may be forbidden to try them and may be severely punished for attempting to do so; but worse, you can no longer even try them. You can’t draw lines or die while trying to defend them. You find yourself in a circumstance where, as Lear puts it, “the very acts themselves have ceased to make sense.”
Greer argues that hunters can’t survive in the absence of gatherers – and the gatherers had effectively been appropriated by white men, even if the whitefellas refused to recognise the kinship and cultural obligations of the women they took. She quotes the well respected Indigenous scholar Judy Atkinson on this:
Sexual violence, as well as physical violence, was rampant on the frontier. What must also be named is that the experiences of colonisation were different for Aboriginal women in comparison with Aboriginal men. This created tension and dichotomy in relationships between Aboriginal men and women that continues into the present.
According to Greer, this is the elephant in the room.
And the sexual violence of white men is still effaced and denied – she asks why the evidence that much of the sexual violence against girls in remote communities was perpetrated by transient white men and often in an organised fashion was totally absent from the justification of the Northern Territory intervention. Greer’s focus on Indigenous male rage is a gender aware anthropology of the discarding of Black men as useless by the colonisers, while Black women were to be used. It’s not unreasonable to believe that this dynamic continues to do its vicious work, although one can see why discussion of it provokes such affect. But it’s certainly not the case that Greer is in any way either justifying the incredible rates of self-harm and violence or that she’s somehow betraying feminism by focusing on the differential effects on Indigenous men of dispossession and cultural death. Much of what she is doing is just asking questions about the displacement of responsibility – if the reason for heavy drinking is disinhibition to allow rage to express itself, disinhibition driven by hopelessness and cultural death, will taking away the bottle salve all ills?
Finally, it’s also clear that Greer is not writing a prescriptive or a policy text. She’s arguing that a political structure needs to be created that brings all Indigenous people to the table, and that we all need to confront a whole range of things in our present as well as in our past which we would very much rather not see. In making this argument, she is in effect suggesting that incitements to responsibility and a fictional mutuality (as I’ve discussed previously) are forms of a displacement of a deeper and very painful wound that many of us – Black and White – don’t want opened. But we need to face our demons. All of us. Rightly she’s not prescriptive about how we do that. But she does insist that we do.
Mark wrote in the post on “The great Australian silence” I referenced earlier:
Recognition of your interlocutor in their own uniqueness and difference is, after all, a precondition without which there can be no meaningful reconciliation whatsoever.
Is it too much to ask anyone who professes concern about the condition of Indigenous Australians to try to see what the world might look like from their point of view?
Elsewhere: We’ve already linked to Legal Eagle’s post, but since then the comments thread at Skepticlawyer has developed quite a bit and makes for an interesting read.
Kim please stop jerking our chain. Greer as an anarchist was fine. Her thesis about black rage is fine. Whats fucking terribly wrong here is her recent self-outing as a ‘Marxist’.
That’s whats seriously wrong here.
What decent democratic or libertarian socialist can defend her vile red-fascism now?
I ask you. Authoritarian socialism is so last century.
What did I just say about engaging with the arguments and leaving aside ad fem stuff?
Sounds different in emphasis to the SMH article. I can’t really say anything else until I’ve read it! Might be a while, as I’m on maternity leave, I’ve got to restrain myself from buying more books.
I guess, LE, at 20 bucks, it’s cheaper than some. Very small book too – literally – a quick if very unsettling read. But I think we need unsettling, and all the assumptions on these issues – including those that are the new Pearson/Mundine/etc orthodoxy – need shaking up.
That’s a relevant question because she points to a range of clinical studies which show that extreme anger and rage are incredibly deleterious to human well-being. That’s because it’s turned against oneself – the position from which one expresses rage is an inarticulate one – one deprived of power, one dispossessed from the ability to negotiate – a last and futile act of resistance which eats up and destroys the self, and which is far too often turned against those closest to the self.
It is much more than just some “psychological issues” Kim and given your comments I’m suspect Greer is also aware of this. In my view Greer is hitting on something very important here but most people seem to be interpreting it within a mentalistic frame of reference. It goes much deeper than how we think, sustained rage and violence can have extremely detrimental effects on cognition and behavior. It can also pave the way for a whole range of physiological changes that increase the risks for cardiovascular conditions, cancer, depression, psychosis, will exacerbate virtually any chronic inflammatory condition, and at a stretch, though there is some suggestive data on this, probably increases the likelihood and severity of diabetes.
Obviously I can’t go into all of this here, a very long and complicated story. I must stress though that until we get away from thinking about these problems solely within a mentalist frame of reference we are not going to adequately address these issues. I wish someone of the calibre of the S. Aus. psychiatrist Jon Jurideni would get involved in the policy debate because he is well across these issues and understands these at levels of analysis that the general Aus public has little or no awareness of.
In all this concepts like “individual responsibility”(the Right) and “self determination”(the Left) are largely vacuous and without merit. These are concepts that will become useful in the future but at present we are confronted with a population of individuals whose life history makes changing their behavior so difficult and problematic that we must completely rethink this issue. Given the known association of low serotonin and stress response dysregulation with significant trauma in life, particularly when such trauma occurs during childhood, and that these changes are strongly associated with violence and depression, I will even go so far as to suggest that psychiatric drug based interventions will be a very necessary but not sufficient strategy in an unfortunately large number of aboriginals.
Greer has made us think again. Great, very much needed, particularly given the Rudd govt, like the Howard govt, doesn’t have a clue about how to handle the problem. I congratulate Greer for that and I hope it brings forth the relevant professionals into the fray.
John, I think you’re right, on the first bit anyway, not necessarily on psychological interventions, but I don’t want to take that bit up. In practice she is trying to show how rage is both a damaging psychological condition and one that is the direct consequence of social and historical factors. But she doesn’t make the physiological and cultural arguments mesh as well as they might.
Like LE, I’m now going to have to wait until I’ve read it in its entirety (it’s not available in any bookshop in Britain). I’m assuming the Clarence Thomas howler was inserted by the SMH, and perhaps the provocation argument as well.
Bloody newspapers. Bloggers get fact-checked by their readers, newspapers get fact-checked… oh, never mind.
Clarence Thomas certainly doesn’t get a mention in the book, SL!
There is a serious problem with bad or non-existent editing and sub-editing in this country, that’s for sure.
Why do McCarthyists always have to turn up at these threads? The topic is about anything but what the lying rodent suggests it’s about. It’s not about Greer’s personal politics, but about whether or not an adequate description/prescription is being offered as to a major Australian and wider human problem of being.
I have not read the actual book. Does this exclude me from comment?
If so, disregard following and move to next post.
If not…
Firstly, genocide, and rape and several other modes of violence, seem always employed consciously and/or unconsciously against subject populations. The idea is to end resistance by breaking the individual and collective spirit. Eventually the self loathing and self surveillance become self perpetuating and hence a social system based upon neurosis is entrenched. Even down to the repressive tolerance of institutionalised social welfare system.
This our current stage of history, as a species. It involves a still prevalent misuse of anger and its expression, out of ignorance; i.e. false cconsciousness.
A real power kick is unleashed, accessible to weaker members of a conquering group under the new suite of power relations that denies the competent of the subjugated group any inputs. A means of social reproduction/reification is set upon which an entire system operates on institutionalsed absurdity, where the overtly unfair crushing of a victim group ( even if healthy ) rather even than a rational consideration of economic efficiency itself, since the issue is actually distribution of power wealth and sexual access. In the end, all social relations seem to become an offshoot under a dominant rationale. And without meaning to over determine, Dominance, rather than cooperativeness, seems the underlying and habituated principle replicated.
With indigenes, if violence has been the “norm’( also a norm in working class groups within the class ridden settler society, that have had the most regular contact with aborigines ), then how can it be expected that a destructive tradition passed down over several generations now, could be considered as anything else but “normal”, by those inscribed with self defeating traits.
Could be “reform”, which the unemployed know about; be a variation of sado economics and the economy of plenty? That experience, mild tho’ it be by comparison, allows even some of us an insight into what it might mean to be black.
paul, I’m more than happy with any comment on what I’ve presented as being the arguments in the book, and any valid tangents therefrom. Remembering that I haven’t tried to summarise the argument with rigour or reproduce in its entirety – I really think the book itself is worth the read, and I hope as others who choose to do so, we can have a well informed conversation of a higher quality than some of the personalised and dichotomised ones the publicity has provoked.
Well done again, Kim, stick with it. I have not read the book, but I would just like to add the following about the debate surrounding it. Hope this is a “valid tangent”!
When I was at the bookshop the other day, I was astonished to see that Germaine’s essay is a very small pink book, and is actually part of series of essays published by MUP, including Kosky on ecstasy, d’Alpuget on longing, and Malouf on experience. See here:
http://www.mup.com.au/
Two women and two gays, yes? Perhaps MUP was intending to give us the existential meditations of four classic “outsiders” on the big questions, and perhaps Germaine, expected to write on rage in women, decided to do the less obvious and write on rage in aboriginal men. Good on her, she never shied from the hard questions.
For those with some historical perspective on the way Greer is treated in this country, you would know that The Australian newspaper has been running a jihad against Greer for the past decade, sneering madly at her in editorials, publishing the worst possible photos of her, and running multiple op/eds against her. She is an icon of The Left, and must be destroyed. Other lefty icons like Mick Dodson have been similarly victimised by the Oz (for example, by publishing a full page spread on his $350,000 home in Canberra where he works, gasp, what is this black man doing living in suburbia!).
On a previous thread, someone wondered where all the hate for Germaine comes from, and whether it is really wide-spread. It comes courtesy of the slavering idealogues at the Oz and is not at all representative, in my view. Most people don’t give a damn, but for those who are engaged, women of a certain age love Germaine for her typically Australian way of shouting and laughing, and her incisive intelligence, and many younger women are amazed at her forthrightness and enjoy her slamdunking the silly dusty old men around her.
I laughed out loud when it was reported that an Oz journo pretended to apologise to her for trying to grab her attention, and she snapped back “no, you’re not!”. The report noted that she was “holding a glass of wine”. Really.
As for Marcia Langton’s “reply”, I have never met an angrier woman than Marcia, who has been given plenty of space in the media and academe to lash out at white Australia, especially in the pages of The Australian. Marcia’s towering rage is unusual, and interesting, in a black woman, and over the Howard years her star has risen, not least through patronage by the Australian newspaper, who no doubt invited her to blow off at Greer publicly. Like Pearson, Marcia rages like a good little Hayekian at times, so she is on board. Good for ratings. I wonder if she realises how she is being used?
My comment got away from me, and on reflection, its totally OT!
But the question does arise for me (prompted by Greer’s essay, through Kim’s review): where is female aboriginal rage?
Is Marcia the only one shouting?
Germaine Greer is on 3RRR talking to Tony Biggs, right now. Stream from rrr.org.au
“Why do McCarthyists always have to turn up at these threads? The topic is about anything but what the lying rodent suggests it’s about.” – Paul
Way to go Paul. Using terms like that about them will really make McCarthyists see the error of their ways – not.
Oh, and grace it’s a bit ridiculous to complain of the way Greer is “victimised” when she clearly goes out of her way to court it (of course it is hard to think of anyone less like a victim).
She loves being a shit-stirrer, and good on her for it because we need them. We need them to stir us from our complacency even when they’re dead wrong, issue which I think she often is (though perhaps not on this issue).
It’s just that when you stir shit you have no right to complain of the smell. She doesn’t, neither should you.
This is perhaps a little off-topic, but I think it relates to what Greer was writing about. (Not having read the essay, I’m just guessing.)
I spent many years in the Army, as a cartographer, and I remember being quite repelled by something a workmate said about a field trip (to the counrty around Marla Bore, I think) the squadron had been on: “There’s nothing quite like rooting a jin against a shithouse door.” (And this bloke was married! I guess I’m a bit straight-laced.) Actually, it still disgusts me, 25 years later, so I can understand why Aboriginal men are filled with rage.
I can’t help wondering if the concept of post traumatic stress disorder is more helpful than rage. Rage is more of a symptom. (Of course, On PTHD would not be a very evocative book title)
grace and dd, please refrain from further discussion of Greer’s motivations and personality on this thread. The other one’s still open, as indicated in the post, if you want to have that conversation.
Good for Germaine bringing up RAGE.
Some individuals rage at the fact some people have supportive, fairly consistent in their ways, parents…parents who have the money…or at least the compassion & responsible attitude to support their kids learning, interests…help pay for their education & such…others don’t get the same support, so it possibly pisses them off.
They feel that bitterness anger welling below everytime they see somebody else being praised for achieving when in their hearts they know they are just as capable but have to spend so much time dealing w/ the emotional ride that comes w/ family angst, frustration w/ parental inconsistencies, race issues, working at a young age, abuse…&/or the loss of parents/guardians…even forced separation (I went thru this myself so I can empathise w/ the Aborigines who had family disruptions).
Add to that the prejudices directed at them…& pervailing stereotypes & perceptions…knowing/sensing that some people think you’re a lesser person due to circumstances beyond your control (I was a child in a divorced family in the early 60s, looked down by some in those days, people treat you differently, some like you have a disease…the same occurred at school due to my chronic asthma and too oft hospitalisation)…imagine what it’s like to come from broken families & you haven’t got the skin color goin’ for you?.
Say you have what is perceived as a physical abnormality…we know how Humans love to finger-point in order to make themselves seem more desirable…hope others don’t pick up on their oddities/quirks…imagine if that so called “abnormality” is pretty obvious (in my case it was a slightly hunched back partially due to my thinness of frame & height shooting up so quickly & bending over due to asthma etc…& I’ll tell ya, some girls & their wee male followers can be downright cruel with their taunting & facial expressions)…it must be dreadful for an Aboriginal person to watch & listen to the taunts of idiots like Howard (tone of voice, obvious hostility during certain speeches…followed years later by this condescending, paternalistic “we use soldiers cause we care” approach…I mean f*ck me, how gullible & stupid & unaware does he think people are?…after all the “intentional negligence” & bashing by the Howard supporting media did he really think people were gonna fall for that BS?).
Add to that the looks & “tut tut”s Aborigines must receive in bars…or if a tourist passes by a home & sees litter around & turns their nose up…or the ignorance of cow cockies as they use Aborigines for cheap labour whilst making jokes about their women or work pace at their expense…or hearing comments made by influential Nat Party supporters whilst trying to swim in the public pool along the lines of “Any Abo that thinks they can setup camp on my property & go for a land rights decision is going to get it right between the eyes” (I witnessed that exchange out in a rural town…that sentiment was commonplace)…
I’ve got a visible twitch…over the years i’ve learnt to deal w/ the occasional DUMB, RUDE, IGNORANT comment from ocker bast*rds in this country who should know better considering how filthy, smelly, ugly & stupid most of them are. The way I had to deal w/ the other things I mentioned above.
But ya see, I still RAGE now & then. The past abuse by peers & adults & sense of being screwed over on the parent security front whilst others had the security & consistency that provided them w/ peace of mind & time to gain/achieve sometimes lit a FIRE in me…I wish it hadn’t… but don’t forget, children/adolescents FEEL more than they rationalise…as the foundations are built…& constant stress/anxiety in a child can construct different neural pathways than in those who live a more secure, consistent life
…& add to that the frustration of realising down the road I had a chemically addled brain in tandem w/ the building of some weak character foundations, unstable that was hindering my career prospects (which can lead to income problems & self-medication)…& being told repeatedly by cocky arseh*les I had undesirable behavioural patterns & response mechanisms (sometimes it was the fact I’d lived in various countries & the response was to a cultural way of acting rather than being a flaw or such…but it gets confusing)…imagine what it must be like for an Aboriginal who doesn’t speak as fluently as some might like, employers demand…or if they tend to look at the floor, avoid your gaze & that might be considered as lacking confidence? After awhile certain comments directed at that Aboriginal might drive them to STARE at you hard…in pride…& anger.
And sometimes when i’m feeling low…& see others being rewarded & promoted as some kinda freakin’ HEROES & CAPITALIST GODS, and find out that they rarely had hurdles to overcome…& come from RICH families & TOFF schools…& have the looks that make journos & agents & dopey younguns looking to conform crawl, kneel at their altar…I feel that FRUSTRATION welling up…and i might turn to the bottle to alter my mood…well, at least in the past…less so now.
There are those days when sometimes the frustration just won’t go away…and it only takes someone looking at me in a disrespectful way for the bubbling of lava to begin if it’s that kinda day…or hearing some manager or boss talk condescendingly to an exhausted, powerless worker (done plenty of sh*t labour intensive jobs as a youngun to know how bosses can be…& even teachers can be treated like children)…or watch on TV some banking pr*ck walk away w/ a sh*t-ar*ed grin & millions after helping mates rip off thousands of small investors & pensioners & mortgage payers…or read about some corporate mobster not paying their fair share of tax and in the process be praised by an obsequious media &/or politicians…or see some mongrel pick on a small animal…or see/hear someone nick your ideas w/out giving you due credit knowing that due to their privileged position they can get away w/ it (the workplace is full of it)…or hear some woman fart on about what a victim she is because she can’t have an abortion, a career, a husband, a lesbian girlfriend, a husband who cleans house, a baby w/ maternity leave & enuff time to shop til she drops & have a “day of beauty” all at once as tho she didn’t realise that plenty of women around the world are lucky if they have a healthy baby, access to water & consistent food sources…the list goes on…
& so I start to feel that lava rising…those eyes bulging…that blood pressure rising…feel that HULK-like RAGE comin’…feel the urge to throw some CORRUPT POLITICIAN or GREEDY CEO or BSing JOURNO or lying after killing MILITARY LEADER like a doll across the room…I feel the BEAR roaring inside…
but…over the years i’ve learnt to redirect much of that energy. Do meditation. Write as an act of catharsis…turn off the drink tap if I feel myself gettin’ too agro…go for a walk…or hit the exercycle. Put on comedy shows…or uplifting music. Scream into a pillow.
I’m one of the lucky ones. I made enuff money, did enuff satisfying work, have a HOME & loving wife & supportive friends…now…& have made up w/ my parents (to a degree…old enuff to know that you can’t blame parents forever…you’ve got to look beyond YOUR situation & try to walk in their shoes too)…and i realise that the education i did receive…& the colour of my skin did give me advantages…JUST ENUFF to crawl out of the hole. If we can put aside these prejudices & provide OPPORTUNITIEs & look beyond skin colour…we might just…
but then there’s the RAGE BELOW…that which SEETHES. The history of negative experiences…& genetic memories.
And the idiots who still refer to the APOLOGY as “token symbolism”.
Yep, the RAGE must be pretty intense for some Aborigines. Ignore it at your peril Australia.
N’
PS Good topic Kim.
Mark, my only response is that I regretted using the word “victim” the minute I posted, and dd is only doing what comes naturally…
grace, I know dd was responding to your comment, but I’m just suggesting we move on from that tangent now. Thanks!
I can’t help wondering if the concept of post traumatic stress disorder is more helpful than rage. Rage is more of a symptom. (Of course, On PTHD would not be a very evocative book title
Yes, and when this occurs in early childhood it may precipitate a range of disorders that tend to come under the banner BPD: borderline personality disorder. In the USA they are currently trialling propranolol for PTSD and it is having some remarkably good results.
The problem with psychiatric drugs is that these tend to be used as a first resort and then nothing is done. However it is clear that for a great many conditions the initial use of psychoactive drugs can be very effective in getting the patient moving in the right direction. Thereafter however it is imperative to institute a range of other measures with the long term goal being to move the patient off the drugs. That is one reason why I mentioned Jon Jurideni, he is probably the most vocal critic of drug based therapies by psychiatrists and I his concerns. Nonetheless in circumstances such as many aborigines face it could be a very valuable first step.
Rage has a recognised and legitimate place in many societies.
For example, in Malay and Indonesian cultures, the practice is called “running amok”.
It is said that the man running amok is expressing his sense of impotence and shame at having his honour taken away. Often running amok is a form of assisted suicide.
Perhaps Greer has done everyone a service by giving this behaviour a name.
But a word of caution: running amok is characterised by more or less indicriminate public behaviour.
Aboriginal men, on the other hand, tend to commit violence on women and children in private. This looks less like rage than revenge.
Perhaps if Aboriginal men took their rage out on some white men…
And John Pilger is presently in Melbourne for the writers festival.
It is always difficult to figure out who causes more outrageous rage. Germs or John.
Love ‘em both.
An interesting experiment on primates found that aggression is typically aimed at those perceived to be lower on the social hierarchy. Eg. It is typically believed that administering Testosterone will increase violent behavior. Not entirely true, in primates when this experimental paradigm is employed the violence is directed towards those lower on the pecking order. Hence aboriginal men are being only being what they are: primates. Even studies on racism have highlighted this trend. In the US the opposition to migrants comes from the demographic sectors that perceive the new migrants as being a direct threat to them.
nice post Kim, i’m looking forward to this essay. two songs have jumped into my mind while reading this, the first was Ted Egan’s ‘The Drover’s Boy’, which i’ve seen described as a tribute to aboriginal stockwomen, but is a bit too brutal to be just a tribute, and a Judy Small song that i think was called ‘Don’t disturb your father’ which i’ve only ever heard in concert, and before i ever knew what PTSD was, but which reminded me of some of my friends fathers who were veterans.
Ciao
John Hasenkam @ 25, I have no idea what your point is. Can you please attempt to rewrite your post into something resembling sense? I’m specifically referring to sentences 1 through 6.
(an explanation of when Aboriginal men have ever been ‘administered testosterone’ would also be appreciated thanks)
Amidst all the spite and claptrap, John Hasenkamp’s insight stands out like beacon. At last someone has moved the subject on a step. A pity Katz and several others hadn’t read his post. It would have answered their questions as to why certain folk behave as they do; what FORMED them as humans!!
Some of the stuff in this thread is so self-indulgent, over-egged and knee jerk reactionary as to even cause someone like Miranda Devine to blanche.
Get off yourselves, some of you!
As for young white men killing themselves in the rural areas. Probably has alot to do w/ intolerance. I wouldn’t be surprised if some are gay. Plenty of those communities are as WIDE THINKING as Rush Limbaugh on a bad day. The conversation is generally abrupt, dull, restricted, unimaginative, ocker, dry, & riddled w/ comments that criticise or take the piss out of “pooftas”, “urbanites”, outsiders (anyone not conforming to the town ways…unless they’ve been there a good long time & are NEEDED for their services…or have a real hard back & good sense of dry humour).
Some older men in rural areas, even in some city areas, spend inordinate amounts of time ripping the bark of those young fellas they don’t see as working to their standard…& they fart on about how much they do & work continually…as tho needing to justify their existance. Most white men in the rural areas have a distorted view of how hard they work. Some of that work is valuable…but there’s plenty of griping & acting HARD. And taking welfare whilst pretending they don’t…& finger-pointing at some Aborigines…or highly uneducated, poor families who are stamped as the “criminal types…good for nothing…dole bludgers”. There’s alot of deceiving oneself out there.
Some men direct their rage at groups like the Aborigines because they fear them. For various reasons. It’s sad. And it does relate partially to fear of “dispossession”…& not wanting to feel like THE INVADER. Footy & fighting contributes too. Sometimes.
Take the obsession w/ weather (understandable considering how much income & corresponding self-worth is related to it out there)…the general lack of cultural diversity (that’s obviously changing in some areas)…the sense of ISOLATION & boredom…the predictability…the constant griping & HARD (lacking compassion) attitudes of the white elders…sometimes even the women…even black women…the intolerance…& the LOOKS & critical words that come if a fella even begins to show signs of DIFFERENCE…and then you’ve got the FEELING of never escaping…and letting the oldies/folk down if you do think about taking off…& then seeing young men in other places by way of the TV/AUSTAR/visits etc. living freer, seemingly under less pressure & obligation…well, it’s not surprising that a young man can lose it…show RAGE…be knocked down/criticised/humiliated…& then head to the shed w/ a rope.
That INDIVIDUAL RAGE can also feed on group rage…it’s a feeling of solidarity…a justification for rage…an opportunity for the animal in men to bellow…shake fists…sometimes act out violence “in the name of…”. But I think you’ll find that the RAGE begins as a personal one. And no drug or STAMP such as “borderline personality” will banish it.
Opportunities to SPEAK help. To be listened to…guided without condescending attitudes. Opportunities to be RESPECTED help. A hand that does not continually moralise & judge helps. Compliments help. Deep relationships/love help. As does some luck. A secure place to live. And the opportunity to get an education & make money. And the learning of alternative ways such as meditation & yoga…or sitting by the fire w/ positive, wise, storytelling elders…or going for a LONG walk/marathon…& feeling valued by workmates & part of a community. Not being ripped off by those w/ more privileged positions…& being taught about con-artists. After-school tutoring by kind but firm coaches & teachers helps (I’ve seen it). Learning about the POSITIVES of your culture/family helps. Spending time experiencing different cultures w/out those judgemental looks everyday helps.
That’s why the media need to get their sh*t together & stop working for political & business interests who make a buck out of creating DIVISION/CHASMS & racial conflict & driving people off their farms & land.
This is a HARSH land full of many HARSH people. History & even refugee intake has sometimes determined that. Add greed (think 80s business types & just about everybody the last decade, particularly those who SELL themselves continually American Corporate style or yap on about THE MARKETS & INVESTMENT homes all the time) & continually “knocking” & “taking the piss” & comparisons of TOUGHNESS & constant yapping on of “hard yakka…mate I work so hard”…it can drive an individual into a cage of RAGE…
Then take away compassion (shock jocks, knee-jerk & racist polies, agro pensioners/baby boomers verbally attacking youth, refugee camps like gulags)…& then you’ve got HIGH FLYERS gettin’ away w/ murder on a daily basis & media justifying it & invoking “mate, she’ll be right” or “suck it up…just get on with your own business…makin’ money is good” sh*t…and off the mongrels walk into the sunset…
whilst the average fella sees his superannuation go down the gurgler…again. Or his land is taken by some bank whose manager he’s never met…not permitted to speak to…or his land is invaded by soldiers…and he’s described as a “potential pedophile” & the bit of work he has is stopped & referred to as “welfare work”…& legislation of politicians FAR FAR AWAY determines he needs to go to the city if he needs a drink (and the irony is he was one who rarely drank…but now…in protest…)…& after years of working w/ OK whiteys on stations & such he’s told his pension will be controlled…again.
And the young white farmer & his Dad are told, “nope your crops aren’t good enuff for ethanol…only BIG CORPORATIONS & wealthy farmers get access…you’re not one of THE CHOSEN few”…and so the debt gets worse…& once the media HYPE the “land rights grab” that young fella is a RAGIN’ for himself & the depressed, deeply lined, hard workin’ (some do) Dad he sees slumped in the chair. And he learns to hate the Aborigines he thinks are rorting him, the taxpayer…those who might come for his land.
And never learns that the media are full of sh*t. Stirring again.
It’s not surprising that individuals rage…& then look for GROUPS to rage with. Some are right on their doorstep. Their tribe. Their people. Their community. Their political party.
If you had little to do w/ the so called “prosperity” & feel you have little chance of ever doing so…then your rage can be mighty intense.
N’
Nick,
You have completely misunderstood my point. That being: people in a state of rage are either consciously or unconsciously directing their rage. The T experiments proffer one possible explanation as to why aboriginal women and children are subject to so much abuse: in hunter gatherer societies, and in ours not so very long ago, men unequivocally are at the top of pecking order. In relation to immigration issues it is interesting to note that the most violent opposition to immigrants often comes from those immediately above them in the socio-economic ladder.
These problems are extremely difficult and complex to understand, let alone find solutions for. The history of psychology and psychiatry is largely one of failure and the reason for that is dead simple: these professions are trying correct problems in the most complex things in the known universe: us. Single cause explanations of human behavior are often doomed to fail. The current frame of reference for approaching these problems is woefully inadequate. On this forum it is impossible for me to put forward all the potentially relevant factors, that would be an extremely long post. More like an essay approaching 5,000 words. And that would just be an introduction.
OK, back on topic. I’ll try and stay unnaturally on the issues.
I grew up in an outback town with a sizeable aboriginal population. I lit out for the big smoke just as soon as I could and have never, in 38 years, been back. These places are sinks of poverty and ignorance for black and white alike, but it is indeed the blacks who got the worst of it.
I’m not sure its true to say that black mens’ problems stem from anger but there is no denying they have a right to be angry. Their women, though, have a right to be much angrier still.
I’ve yet to read Germaine’s ‘essay’ – her words on the Lateline interview – and am wondering if any significant indigenous male voices have said anything. I’ve got plenty of time for Marcia and agree that her rage is useful and probably speaks for many. I admit to being surprised a few years ago when boxer Anthony Mundine was voted overwelmingly by NAIDOC participants as their most popular and respected first Australian. It suggests to me that a professional in the field of controlled violence/rage who can also give voice to his concerns for the fate of his people ad infinitum, much to the disdain of many other Australians, has something in common with Greers. Can we get the man a copy?
I read Greer’s book in the bookshop, sorry Greer, I couldn’t help myself and it is a quick (but interesting) read. Great summary of the themes here Kim too, by the way. I agree with what Greer is arguing/raising in her book but I still find it uncomfortable to see domestic violence, at its most brutal, explained as the rage of men hurt/humiliated by oppressions/circumstances which are hurting equally women of that same community. Eg. domestic violence in farming communities, domestic violence in poor urban communities etc. I believe explanations for domestic violence must always include a big role for personal responsibility.
Note to self: you like the “/” too much.
Sit in a unit of any Queensland detention centre while a State of Origin game is on. You won’t ever doubt the rage, violence, and strident hostility there. With your eyes shut it’ll take your breath away. Then check how many caucasian and non-caucasian faces are there.
Sit in any house in Queensland and you’ll see the same.
But this is perfectly normal. We all feel that way about New South Welshpeople. For did they not spawn John Howard and Philip Ruddock and how many times have we seen rage, violence and strident hostility directed towards them on this very website?
Thanks John @ 30
You shifted a mile from:
“Hence aboriginal men are being only being what they are: primates.”
To:
“The T experiments proffer one possible explanation:”
Regarding your earlier post @ 5 (I haven’t read the booklet just yet either), have you read Greer’s SMH op/ed, linked to from the post? She makes very clear she’s aware of the physiological effects of rage/sustained rage.
That’s probably an exaggeration, GregM, and not true of everyone in any case. But this is to miss the whole point – not ritualised rage as in football matches – which is itself a socially sanctioned disinhibition probably allowing a lot of steam to be let off which comes from other sources, nor strong feelings in politics. Note that in the latter case most people will feel obliged to make an argument.
What Greer is talking about is rage that is all-consuming, that results in actual violence and self harm and which is more or less a permanent condition.
Queensland supporters and Howard “haters” both spend most of their life at work or with their friends and/or family quite happily going about their business. It’s a completely different phenomenon. Political violence is very rare in this country.
It’s not particularly helpful in my view to blur the distinctions rather than sharpen them here, and I’m not sure why you’re trying to do so. Greer’s book itself makes them quite clear.
Ps – thanks to everyone who said they appreciated the review!
And do you have any evidence that this is not also true of most Aboriginal men, other than your self-referential point of Germaine Greer’s opinion, of course?
Blue milk, I agree about personal responsibility but I think what she’s trying to do is say that this is necessary but not sufficient.
For two reasons:
1. We need to understand why these behaviours occur with such frequency and how they link to other forms of harmful behaviour;
2. Just demanding ‘responsibility’ can be a cop out, if it’s not accompanied by an understanding that more is going on than individual pathology, and that ‘responsibility’ doesn’t magically wish away ‘dysfunction’ in the absence of all sorts of other preconditions including mutuality.
GregM at 40, the men she’s talking about are the ones who live on remote communities who spend all their time on the grog or otherwise intoxicating themselves. It’s not middle class urban domestic violence she’s discussing.
And if you read the book – although again I can see how it’s come across differently – I think it’s pretty clear she’s not talking about “all Aboriginal men” – at least not all the time. It would be useful, as I’m suggesting, for people to read it and also to do some work of thought to appreciate the argument rather than just mesh it in with all sorts of dichotomies in which these issues are usually framed.
Great post Kim. Keep up the good work.
Cheers, adrian!
Interestingly, I think this is the first actual review of Greer’s book to appear anywhere. I’m open to correction. But surely all the papers would have had review copies?
How many pages disd she devote to the well-known toxicology of alcohol then Kim? Maybe that’s all she needs to write about. You give enough alcohol to most men and quite a few women and they pretty quickly lose impulse control and become violent towards anyone around them, including their partners and children. You don’t need one hundred pages to write about that. And you don’t need any elaborate, contrived and fake theories about dispossession to explain it.
But that would bring her too close to Noel Pearson wouldn’t it? He’s quite unqualified to speak on the topic being an just an Aboriginal male and therefore not in the league of experience and knowledge to speak authoritavely as Greer is.
Why are all the white men allowed to have brothels and “adult” porn shops?
Why doesn’t anybody say anything about this revolting degradation of indigenous and non-indigenous women?
(If indigenous men opened up brothels or porn “shops”, like white men, they would be shot).
Why do we women have to be subjected to harassing offensive billboards encouraging white men to have “longest-lasting” sex as if we are just shattle?
Why the silence in government, academia and media?
Is the silence because all the white males, who run the government, academia and media, going to the brothels?
How have academic women been silenced? How have all women been silenced?
How have we all been bought off?
Why are we all walking around denying our own feelings and intuition that things going on around us are all grotesquely wrong, intimidating and offensive in this supposedly free and democratic country?
Why are we covering up for our depraved white ruling-class? (Aren’t white men supposed to be the civilised ones?) Why aren’t government, media and academia outraged and stopping the basic raping of women in brothels, who are 99% victims of child abuse or child sexual abuse. And therefore highly traumatised women.
How is it allowed that men are allowed to walk into a brothel and have “sex” with our sick, compliant Australian women for a couple of dollars?
How can our “civilised” white men call that civilised?
I’m looking forward to a review in the SMH tomorrow, written by Paul Sheehan or Michael Duffy no doubt.
Otherwise they’ll just ignore it.
Thank you for your passionate post Leo. It’s not affect-laden at all and that is all-important.
But to answer your question, Well not all of them. It’s probably true of most of them. But there must be one or two among them who don’t go to the brothels, at least not regularly.
I think you’re on to something there Leo. Do you reckon you could knock out a quick one hundred page essay on white male depravity. I’m sure it will be controversial.
And a best seller.
GregM, I’m interested in discussing the book she did write, not the one you’d like her or someone else to have written. And please spare us the snark when you disagree with someone else. It’s quite possible to disagree without laying on the sarcasm.
Somebody should have told Greer about sparing the snark when she wrote about the Bali bombing, Kim. But then, as you have rightly pointed out, that’s what free speech is about, of which you are a champion and about which her detractors don’t have the slightest notion.
I hpope that you will be prepared to stand by your stated beliefs on free speech and not abandon them because they have suddenly beconme inconvenient. After all Greer’s right to free speech is indivisible from mine, isn’t it.
Regarding your earlier post @ 5 (I haven’t read the booklet just yet either), have you read Greer’s SMH op/ed, linked to from the post? She makes very clear she’s aware of the physiological effects of rage/sustained rage.
I just read it. She touches on the issues but goes no further, which is appropriate for the medium. However I don’t think she is that aware, she appears to relying primarily on the source Mind. What I don’t understand though is that upon recognising this aspect of the problem she does not elaborate upon it.
For example, one study found that persons who had experienced a cumulative total of 4 years of major depression had lost up to 20% of their hippocampus, this being a region of the brain that is involved in a great many functions, in particular memory and, most importantly, modulation of the stress response axis(techo term: HPA axis). It is well known that even a single major depressive episode makes another more likely and this shrinkage of the hippocampus may explain why because it is believed that hippocampus can have a dampening effect on the stress response. In fact antidepressants show some unusual properties: they increase neurogenesis and reduce the stress hormone cortisol. As it happens the hippocampus is one region of the brain that is strongly fed by neurogenesis, just under it is a region called the dentate gyrus, which keeps spitting out neural stem cells. These then migrate to the hippocampus and become functional there, or at least under best conditions 50% will, most just die(though there are many strategies we can use to increase the survival rate). Unfortunately though the stress hormone cortisol is not only great at killing existing neurons, it can very much inhibit neurogenesis. The same sort of dynamics is present in mice, monkeys, and us.
Now this is where Greer goes seriously wrong: she is not using the data from Mind to as a means to gain insight into solutions she is using it to buttress her “male aborigines are severely damaged and consequently enraged” argument. In fact her argument is extremely fatalistic because there is nothing that can be done about what happened x number of years ago. I’m not even sure about her point about moral authority because my impression is that male aborigines still very much “call the shots” in aboriginal communities.
It is also interesting to note that the public discussion about this essay focuses more on Greer than aborigines. That is an indictment on all of us, we appear more concerned with her argument than aborigines.
She states in the op ed piece:
When an insult or threat is perceived, long before the cortex can bring judgment to bear, the part of the brain called the amygdala sends out the rage signal.
—-
For a full and readable account of these dynamics read Joseph Le Doux(a former doyen on such matters): The Emotional Brain
She is correct about the dynamics here but again fails to realise the particular significance this has for aborigines. The frontal lobes, which do the work the inhibiting the amyygaloid complex, can be severely impacted by sustained stress. In fact some studies even suggest that in severe depression the neocortex can go on “holidays”, so it is not surprising to find cognitive deficits arising in depression. The other very important issue here is that the key region of the frontal lobes involved in this inhibition, the orbitofrontal cortices, lie at the very front of the brain and is amongst the last to mature. Aborigines experiencing trauma, chronic malnutrition, and lack of learning opportunities, will have a very high risk of those frontal lobes never maturing to their full potential. That is, their life experience not only makes them very vulnerable to sustained rage, it also can potentially make it very difficult for them to control their rage. For example,
J Affect Disord. 2008 Jul;109(1-2):107-16.
Gray matter reduction associated with psychopathology and cognitive dysfunction in unipolar depression: a voxel-based morphometry study.
Mol Psychiatry. 2007 Apr;12(4):360-6. Epub 2006 Dec 5.
Fronto-limbic brain structures in suicidal and non-suicidal female patients with major depressive disorder.
At a personal level I have 3 disabilities that have resulted in a great deal of discrimination against me, so much so that in these days I very much keep to myself. But I am happy because I don’t take peoples’ opinions that seriously. I learnt long ago that most of the time our opinions about others are for the most part just spurious conjectures. As one wit quipped: we spend too much time trying to impress people we don’t know and don’t even like.
Nick, I did not shift as you suggest, I was simply trying to keep it short and sweet.
Paul, thanks for the kind observation, perhaps the above will reveal why I am trying to find another way to understand this.
Greg, perhaps it is reaching the stage where you are “jumping the snark”?
GregM, don’t be obtuse, please. I’ve specifically said I don’t want a rerun of debates about Greer’s personality and motives and other work on this thread. The other thread is still open for that purpose. It’s not a matter of “free speech”, but of respecting the intention to keep this thread on topic.
You’re quite right Kim. So back on topic. How many pages in her essay did she devote to the well-known toxicology of alcohol? This is a serious question and as you’ll appreciate I’m highly unlikely to ever read her book so I won’t find the answer from it. And yet for the reasons I have given it requires a serious answer.
Has she addressed that issue at all in her essay?
Sadly I can’t give you an accurate report, GregM, because I lent my copy to a friend today! I don’t know if some sort of page count would prove anything one way or the other, though. However, my recollection, not having a copy before me any more, is that she introduces the point about alcoholism very early in the essay, and makes a specific comparison between the reasons why Indigenous males and non-Indigenous Australians drink, and points out that the violence is often worse with Indigenous men and much more prevalent (again my recollection is that there are footnoted references to public health studies). I recall also that she pointed to documentation of Indigenous men acting out extreme violence while stoned on marijuana, which is not usually known as a drug that provokes latent violence!
She’s very well aware of the damage alcohol does and refers to that, but she’s not writing a medical treatise, so I don’t know that she goes into “toxicology”, although I’m not personally sure what that word means!
The thrust of the argument is that the violence is not just provoked by the grog, and there’s a reasonably logical and convincing argument to demonstrate that’s so, which I’m sure a statistical study could demonstrate – along the same lines of the figures she cites about the over-representation of Indigenous men in prison. That’s not ascribed to racism in policing or sentencing, but to actual higher levels of violence among Indigenous men.
By the way, you may be interested to know that she quotes Pearson with approval on at least one occasion. Where she questions Pearson, it’s his contention (or what appears to be his contention) that removing or restricting access to grog will remove the causes of violence. She also refers to the very common practice of smuggling grog into “dry” areas which has been going on for years and years, and which is perpetrated by whites.
I don’t think it’s as simple as “Greer v. Pearson” as you seem to imply.
Ps – unless you’re afraid of picking up “Germaine germs” by handling the book, GregM, I can’t see why you’d actively refuse to read it. It doesn’t give me much confidence that your apparent desire to attack her at every opportunity comes from anything objective – surely you should treat the text on its merits, as I’ve suggested people should? Incidentally, Langton is quite wrong to suggest it’s a “1970s style argument”. It’s certainly not the standard “left” argument as that dichotomy is usually set up. I actually suspect from what you’ve written, if you gave it a chance, you’d find yourself agreeing with parts of what she has to say.
But I kinda can’t see the point of discussing something with you that you refuse to read for reasons I can’t fathom.
Kim, it is my intention to post my critique of Greer’s Bali piece in full on the other thread over this weekend. My limited critique thus far has received favourable reviews on this blog and on LE’s blog. Even Katz gave it approval, though not perhaps on its merits but for pointing him towards what he described as a farrago of nonsense. Heaven help Greer if he got stuck into her instead of me. He is a veritable pit-bull compared to my critical poodle.
We’ll have to see the reception of the full opus, which will be posted in stages. Be assured that my critique treats the text on its merits. You appear to be concerned that I have an apparent desire to attack her at every opportunity, which you believe is anything but objective. I cannot see that you should have that concern about me doing that when that is what Greer does all the time. You seem to find no fault in her for doing so to others, so why be concerned about me doing that to her?
When you have read my critique you will understand why I would rather swim in raw and undiluted sewage than sully myself with anything further that she has written. One has to maintain some standards of decency.
Please don’t condemn this post as being off topic. It is just in direct response to yours above and should therefore fit within the rules that you have laid down about freedom of speech.
Happy reading on the other thread over the weekend.
PS. Have you read my reply to your question regarding Greer’s opinions on Australian isolationism and her points on the “so-called” war on terrorism on the other thread? You might find that in certain ways Greer and I are in agreement. I will look forward to your response on the other thread.
These Germaine Germs. They come from Girl Fleas (ikkk!!).
……
Stop Press.
“Abbott does Aboriginal welfare bash”, in GG.
Miserable scum he is, considering how little he’s done to deserve his own massive pile.
I FINALLY got around to watching Q&A and seeing Greer summarise her arguments on Aboriginal male rage and reading your own reply to me, Kim, I must say I’ve moved away from my initial difficulties with this discussion of domestic violence. An explanation is not an excuse, particularly when the author specifically says so. I get what you’re (both) saying. And I think ‘rage’ is perfect terminology for what Aboriginal men are experiencing, not only because it seems to hold up as a good explanation for what is happening, but because ‘rage’ is an emotion men (particularly) can legitimise and cope with in other men. Eg. jealous rage has historically been seen as not only a valid emotion but an understandable motivation for men. By Greer moving our ‘Intervention’ discussion away from Aboriginal men as sexually depraved savages towards Aboriginal men in a state of rage, white Australia has a chance of finally understanding, and even taking responsibility for some of the causes behind this rage.
Well, I have to buy a book for research purposes this afternoon, this review has made me desirous to also getting a copy of On Rage, and unlike some others, I will refrain from any specific commment on it until I have read it.
“….. I would rather swim in raw and undiluted sewage than sully myself with anything further that she has written.”
Good GregM. Some peace for all.
GregM, I have read that comment now and I think a lot of what you are saying relates to differences in opinion and I’m not particularly interested in arguing the merits of those issues at this point – the point I’m making here is that it appears – for whatever reason – that GG’s op/ed pieces are less carefully researched than her longer work. I’ve said repeatedly that I’m not setting myself up as her all purpose defender, and all I’m really interested in discussing at this time is the actual arguments in On Rage.
Blue milk, yep, I think that’s right, though it looks like at least in the short term the discussion hasn’t moved on in that direction. Fingers crossed!
Hear hear to Naskin above.
Greer’s argument (as channeled here by Kim) may be ultimately unverifiable, but it doesn’t sound so outlandish as all that at all. Rage is the proper response to affront – think, in particular, of “jealous rage.” Greer’s approach seems not dissimilar to the arguments offered on behalf of other marginalized groups (Muslim youth in Lakemba, for example. And she’s not just talking about Aborigines anyway.
It’s interesting to wonder why people are so easily stung to rage (or at least a mild indignation) on this point. Mission accomplished for Greer, who must be laughing all the way to the bank.
FWIW, the essay gets a small write-up in today’s Age as part of James Ley’s cover-all review of the four MUP On… series (not online unfortunately). Malouf gets the most praise for On Experience.
On Greer:
And (sifting through the weekend Amazon Basin editions) Paul Toohey takes what looks to me (not having read Greer’s essay yet) as a fairly specious swipe at G.G. in the O.O., implying that she is trying to let men off the hook for egregious domestic violence. The impression I get is that Greer isn’t trying to justify or excuse violence (as Toohey implies), but to (partially) explain it.
Though I’m open to being corrected on that, or correct myself after I next visit the local bookstore.
(Too many brackets in this comment.)
Good post Kim. I think it’s worthwhile mentioning that Greer expressed a certain cynicism re the Apology. I did at the time and got blasted here and in the non-virtual world for doing so. It did feel vindicating somewhat, but anyway….
This is true from experience. Men do not cry as much as women. And crying has a biophysical cathartic effect, it makes you feel better. I often wondered whether this is ’social’ or ‘natural’ I can remember getting hassled along the ‘boys don’t cry’ line quite early in life – by girls as well. I don’t have much by way of information.
.
However as Greer says anger can be pent up and stored to be released (by alcohol) with hugely destructive consequences. She had one anecdote about a settlement she was staying on that was alcohol free and then the bootlegger arrived. An hour later the fellas went ballistic and smashed a medical centre to shards with an axe. This is crazy behaviour but as Greer says pent-up rage + alcohol = crazy behaviour.
I didn’t count the pages but she describes the drinking on the fringe very well; they don’t drink to become sociably tipsy, they do it to become oblivious. That is what people do if they’re in the grips of despair.
Greer is one of those ‘idiots’ herself, so am I.
Thanks, Adrien.
Greer has made me think again about how uncritically excited we got about the Apology. Though I think it was understandable!
Cheers Kim.
To be sure Kevvie does seem to at least want to put the money where the mouth was. And the Apology was the least we could do.
Oh yes, it was certainly needed!
Then they beat up their wivezs and kids. And so it goes on.
And Greer writes a book about it and makes a motza out of it, and her simple-minded acolytes hang off her every word and feel good about themselves for their shallow insights.
I reckon Greer posited these theories/ideas/speculations because she wanted people to seriously open up a few debates. She’s attempting to break taboos, blast us out of THE CAGE again. Part of a long march, so to speak. I doubt it’s about earning more money & providing others w/ kudos for their reviews.
It’s about LISTENING…READING in depth…thinking outside of the box. walking alternative paths so we might deal more appropriately w/ some REAL problems in this Country…& elsewhere.
It’s about saving lives. And creating a more aware & compassionate society. Blowing away the STALE, constrictive air.
Ironically, some of the answers & clues exist within this thread. And some are being ignored. Exactly why so many people grow fed up w/ academics.
Some wide thinking tho. Sometimes the egoists are the HURDLES…& not always who you might think upon first glance.
sigh.
I still have to write something in relation to my OTT comments last year in relation to Greer, but it would seem reading your review Kim and some of the linked pieces including Greer’s own summary in the SMH, there are few questions arising, the major being that indigenous crime and incarceration rates increased hugely after the 1960’s, although they had been steadily increasing related to less close control via missions and reserves, the stats. also take in towns and cities etc, so can’t be explained away entirely etc. Suicide was also a rarity in indigenous communities even up until the 1970’s.
I haven’t read On Rage, nor am I an expert in indigenous crime/incarceration but it would seem however that the biggest impact on indigenous crime and community breakdown etc – is related to increased alcohol consumption post the repealing of laws restricting alcohol purchase/consumption, (and more recently poly-drug use) totally coinciding with male unemployment rates vis a vis the impact of the equal wage decision esp.. on pastoral workers, and the first recessions of the 1970’s onwards, and gradual decline of manufacturing jobs and the mechanisation of most rural/regional jobs etc.
And I’m not suggesting that dispossession, the stolen generations and inter-generational poverty etc haven’t impacted, nor did not impact previously on dysfunction in many indigenous communities, but it would seem from the stats. and observations of indigenous people themselves, that the current levels of dysfunction in indigenous communities could be more directly linked to substance abuse in and of itself, rather than substance abuse linked entirely to indigenous male rage.
It’s a really thorny, chicken and egg situation, but that similar increased patterns of family/community dysfunction and breakdown are observable in white under/working class communities over a similar period, obviously unrelated to indigenous dispossesion should be noted.
However if Greer’s more recent remarks 22/8/08 about the apology have been correctly reported – they are pretty insulting to all the indigenous leaders who worked constantly for more than a decade to get an apology from the Australian Govt. And possibly Greer didn’t see the entire broadcast most especially the crosses to the screens set-up in Redfern and other indigenous communities.
“Ms Greer, speaking to about 2,000 people at the Melbourne Writers’ Festival at the Melbourne Town Hall, said indigenous Australians had never accepted the apology by Prime Minister Kevin Rudd for the stolen generation.”
And this comment is beyond embarrassing:
I doubt Langton, Pearson, Mundine, Dobson (both of them) O’Donohue, Yunupingu, Ridgeway etc., will take many weeks to reply and they maybe standing up when they do.
I think your point Kim about Greer’s more considered work being totally overshadowed by her almost reckless public speeches and op-ed’s is probably right.
I get the impression that Greer’s aim isn’t simply to presnt the idea of rage as the reason for dysfunction, but more to push for the creation of a treaty as the only solution to the problem of rage. In the final few pages of the book Greer states ‘All over the world, except in Australia, hunter-gatherer peoples have organised resistance’(96) and ‘All of them, except the Australians, have a treaty and can exert themselves to enforce it’s observance.’(97) I noticed Greer’s comments on Q and A about a belief in Permanant Revolution, and I can’t help wondering if her somewhat unreasonable criticism of Sorry and the demands for a treaty fits this idea of constant, and somewhat violent, progress.
Reading On Rage, I couldn’t help agreeing with something Marcia Langton mentions, Greers concept of a generic hunter-gatherer rage. ‘Any description of the action of rage in a hunter-gatherer society anywhere will provide a carbon copy of Aboriginal dysfunction.’(28) This seems to render discussion of the specifics of Aboriginal experience somwhat irrelevant, as rage is simply a product of tension between hunter-gatherer groups and colonists, and the specific policies and abuse that occurred in Australia become a footnote, rather than an explanation of rage.
One comment that I haven’t seen referred to anywhere reminded me of Greers contentious views on transexual women. She states on page 71 ‘The white person may choose to become Aboriginal, but, though the Aboriginal person may have three or four grandparents who are white, the converse is not equally true. It is as if white Australia will not accept anyone of colour while black Australia may not exclude anyone.’ This seems to ignore the fact that for people to change from identifying as white to black they had to have been accepted by white Australia already, or no change would have been possible, and it also implies that those who decide to identify as Aboriginal are somehow inauthentic. These seems to echo rascist tendencies to dismiss the Aboriginality of figures like Michael Mansell as being inauthentically indigenous.
Finally, I’ve been reading some of the responses to On Rage, and stumbled across this quote from a Jesuit newsletter while looking up a reference in Marcia Langton’s response.
Comments at the launch of Holding Men: Kanyirninpa and the health of Aboriginal men. reported in Province Express
It struck me as similiar to some of Greer’s much criticised comments about Aboriginal men losing their last threads of self-esteem to the intervention, and that this will simply continue the dysfunction in communitites rather than intervene to create change.(pg 88) These comments didn’t seem to create the same level of debate at the time, unfortunately, and perhaps Greer’s real value is that her comments will always cause debate and bring these ideas to the front page.
“And this comment is beyond embarrassing:
She said the treaty had to be established at a political level and politicians may have to sit with Aborigines for weeks before learning what they want. “If we go to listen to them we will have to be patient, because it won’t come all at once. It may take weeks before people begin to speak to us and the words they say we won’t like,” Ms Greer said.”
Not embarrassing at all but spot on, from my experience, if you want to know what is going on amongst many of these peoples, literally, on the ground. You are imagining that she is talking about the standard spokespeople. We already know what they think.
She is suggesting a deeper conversation, Jo, which I believe she has already had the gutse, and time, to take on herself.
Nasking three seems to be a problem with your computer. It randomly generates words in CAPITALS. I’d take it off to an electrician if I were you. There’s no point having your computer make you look like an idiot, is there?
GregM, Nasking uses capitals and you can’t spell.
Big deal!
Talking to Aboriginal people: sitting down, listening, respecting, being silent. Open to the fact that what you think you heard may not be what was being said. Time, to have a go at chucking out (cherished, well-meaning) preconceptions, and learning.
There’s a lot of really frustrated people in remote communities out there who are sick of not being listened to, or taken seriously, or given self-determination/responsibilities. Women and men.
From the outside, as a non-Aboriginal person looking in, I see a lot of women (and girls, and boys) obviously feeling and displaying a lot of rage, not just men. One gendered difference in the effects of rage though, that men have sexist ideas about being able to physically resort to violence when all else fails. Most white men don’t tend to get driven that far.
Well said, kite.
Jo, what I think may be missing in that story is the removal of restraint from the missions and state.
Greer proposes that only a political solution can ultimately treat Aboriginal rage. The Apology was one of the small steps taken till now. Unfortunately most Australians will not go further at present. For now a political structure from within which Aboriginal grievance can be voiced is needed.
And when the new ATSIC falls over, something else should takes its place. Permanent agitation. Intervention type actions also required from time to time. Economic assimilation and Pearson moral movements to side-step history , when and where they happen, also good as a lot of lives get lived, rage and all, happens before any ultimate stage is reached.
But finally it can only be a political settlement that ends forever the agony of dispossession. That or cultural annihilation.
So you’ve just downgraded the indigenous leadership of this country to ’standard spokespeople’. How very John Howard of you, joe2. Very similar tactics employed during Mabo/Wik btw…. Indigenous people don’t have leaders, they have ’standard spokespeople’. Ok, next.
In respect of consultation – Government Agencies/NGO’s/Churches/Land councils/Researchers etc. have been consulting with indigenous people for decades. From most interviews I’ve watched when they talk to people in remote communities – they mostly and firstly say how damn sick they are of saying the same things over and over again, and what they want is action on housing, health, education, law and order restored, alcohol/petrol sniffing rehab and restrictions etc.
The likelihood of remote indigenous people having had some Minister jet into their community and also having had their opinions inscribed by some Govt employee or a researcher or other bureaucrat is factors higher than any non-indigenous persons in this country. It’s not that the Govt or agencies or politicians don’t know or have not been told.
Now that the ‘Intervention’ has had the sneaky land grab elements and other right-wing ideological touchstones removed – a more cooperative focus on housing, health & education, more creative job creation (while keeping the CDEP schemes) and dealing with substance abuse and related law & order issues can take place, I’m hoping.
And while I don’t believe that things are going to change overnight, I think there is more hope than previously, and although I know that many people including Mark B. for eg. are not in favour of welfare quarantining, I’ve always felt it was necessary to breach some individual’s rights to restore the rights of others, mostly the children. Of course, this would be better if only affected families rather than whole communities were involved but still it’s this type of report, that we can all only hope is just the start of many similar ones: “Alice Springs murder rate plummets”. http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/06/10/2270329.htm
Kim, it was mentioned by me and in the Royal Commission Report.
Oh I’m sorry, Jo, I wasn’t reading carefully enough. But I think the point reduces the force of your argument.
And there’s a point to be made about leaders. It’s obvious on many issues that there isn’t unanimity among those who are represented as such. The question is how representative and accountable are they? Langton, for instance, is a Professor, but so is Judy Atkinson (who doesn’t get called a “leader”). Warren Mundine, can’t figure it out at all – he only seems to have become a “leader” by virtue of having held a position in both the ALP and on Howard’s handpicked advisory body – and all he ever seems to say is mutual obligation of the biggest stick possible kind… Who’s he speaking for?
The thing with ATSIC may be that it wasn’t actually representative enough, but before people are lionised in the press as “leaders” we need to enquire carefully into how they are regarded according to Indigenous protocols of representativeness. That’s why it’s important to have some sort of body which respects that, and can articulate a voice above and beyond those of individuals who naturally have their own agendas themselves.
At least Nasking is capable genuine, logical and unencumbered thinking, Greg M. Eat your heart out!
“Now that the the Intervention has had the sneaky land grab and other right wing elements removed…I’m hoping”: Jo, 82
I maybe pessimistic, but I think not. and I think the point about elements of the aboriginal leadership self-alienated from their own constituents is sadly, too true. Starting with Langton and (non) Pearson.
No, Jo. Sooo hope you are right, but fear not and ever so sadly…
The current aboriginal “leadership” of Pearson, Langton, Mundine and sometimes Sue Gordon etc, are not elected representatives – they are the ones selected by Howard and now News Ltd to speak, because they are articulate and outspoken, and because they are more than prepared to criticise and disempower their own in the crazed assumption that even harsher medicine is needed (notwithstanding two hundred years of same).
If you don’t see one of these characters on the front page of The Australian each day, calling for the abolition of welfare, the re-location of individuals a thousand miles away to pick fruit, and the removal of their children into boarding schools, then there must be something else on, like BCA rent-seeking for example.
Putting aside the final tragedy of the election of a rapist to the top job by his five or six fellow commissioners, and the inevitable instances of localised corruption, a lot of trouble was originally expended in ensuring ATSIC was properly representative of aboriginal communities across Australia – so much so that many thought the geographical/tribal regions could well be a model for Whitlam’s Regional Governments to replace the States. In 1990, 1993 and 1996 elections were conducted by the AEC in some of the remotest corners of the country, touching the lives of some of the most neglected people on the planet, and they were gradually learning the benefits of voting and taking political responsibility.
When Howard abolished ATSIC in 1998 and rolled aboriginal matters into mainstream departments, this was merely bureacratic code for abolishing any further funding for aboriginal affairs, as every public servant knew. Then followed a decade of enforced POVERTY on communities and the winding back of the few services that were available, so that they would eventually resemble failed states with dysfunctional families struggling to survive, and their lands could be re-appropriated (anyone who has read Naomi Klein’s “Shock Doctrine” will see a pattern here). Shock horror, these communities have no future, “thirty years” of socialist planning has led to this, and everyone must be urgently rounded up, moved out and assimilated.
The fact is that there are no properly representative voices for the aboriginal people at present, and until ATSIC is properly re-constituted and aboriginal people again have some say in their future directions, and until all governments recognise that communities are routinely entitled to the same services made available to all other remote australians, then we will continute to go around in circles.
Meanwhile I will continue to splutter with rage whenever I hear the likes of Pearson, Langton and Mundine purporting to speak for aboriginal Australia, while the ideologues at News Ltd set them up to advance the neocon cause (and put some value back into that Cheney/Halliburton railway line into the red heart of uranium rich NT). The lastest manufactured catfight between Langton and Greer is just another nasty little venture in rescuing their failing circulations.
67 Adrien
The blurb I linked to at 75 includes a quote from the author about the perception of medical clinics.
If the clinic is seen as a female space, and there is any truth to Greers assertion of a divide between Aboriginal men and women, then the destruction of the clinic could be seen not as ‘crazy behaviour’ but as an intentional attack on a female space within the community. Whether looking at the event that way could help avoid a repeat of the event I don’t know, but it seems more useful than viewing it simply as ‘crazy.’
“Most white men don’t tend to get driven that far.”
Kite @79 I agree with you up until your last sentence.
White men get driven and act in particularly large and nasty ways.
They just cover their explosive tracks better.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_War
Greg M -
I was very courteous to you on the other thread and intend to remain so. However I’ll caution you that I am very good at issuing cutting remarks…
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Quoting me and by association characterizing me as a simple-minded acolyte of Germaine Greer; inferring that I’m attempting, in discussing this issue, to feel good about myself by issuing shallow verbosity illustrates well that you are characaturing your ‘opponents’ on this issue.
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I’m not anyone’s acolyte and my political views are the result of grim contemplation and even more unpleasant experience. I do not need them to feel good about myself. For that I have my startling beauty
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Thing is I’m not even certain what your views are on this issue. Perhaps you are tired of the polemic that seeks to excuse criminal behaviour for sociological reasons. So am I. I don’t think FUBAR backgrounds can excuse bad behaviour. I do however think they can explain it. There is a difference between understanding and toleration.
B Lyle -
With respect it is crazy. The medical centre is needed; it takes time and money to put it there – destroying it makes no sense. It’s nuts.
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However your point is excellent.
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My mother used to work at Glebe’s Community Health centre, lots of Kooris. She really dug them but was often bemused and sometimes frustrated by their cavalier approach to administration protocols. She realized that they thought it was whitefella bullshit but it still caused problems.
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What also caused problems was the tendency to not consider their particular perspective on things. For example there was a bit of a fuss when a safe sex seminar was to be given to men using a white dildo. Obvious really. But it did give my mother an excuse to go shopping for sex toys.
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In respect of axe-smashed clinics: An administrator, literate in the Aboriginal culture, may have deemed extra expenditure on sexually segregated clinics worthwhile. If only because the women would’ve still had their’s after the dudes went ballistic.
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A lot of it is simply inter-cultural misunderstanding. And of course there’s the nefarious deeds of the usual plethora of arseholes.
“But it did give my mother an excuse to go shopping for sex toys.”
What did your mother do with the black dildo Adrien?
Sorry, but just askin.
Grace P –
I’m only recently familar with Prof Langton so I won’t comment on her but I think there’s a lot more to this ‘leadership’ then you imply. Anthony Mundine and Noel Pearson and obviously very different characters with differing appeals. They are, as you say, not elected. And I agree that they should not be regarded as representative.
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However representative leadership is not the whole hegemony story I think you might agree. Pearson’s polemic is currently unpopular with the Left in general but the Right likes it. This is because his rhetoric has been tending to stress things the Right like to talk about like individual responsibility, law & order and so forth.
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But this does not mean he’s wrong necessarily.
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Doubtless News Ltd have a tendency to conservatism including the support of
govt regulation favouring a News Ltd monopolyneoconservative and neoliberal agenda. Haven’t the space here but I think it’s an over-simplification to regard The Daily Rupert simply as an Agit-Prop for the New Right. Still your point is valid. They’ll tend to like ‘leaders’ who fit in with their policies..
But just because they like them doesn’t mean those leaders are wrong about everything. Neither Mundine nor Pearson I suspect are primarily motivated by an attachment to Dick Cheney’s bloodless notions of ‘the good life’. Pearson’s ‘radical centre’ rhetoric simply means that he’s inclined to take a transideological view of his people and their plight. It doesn’t mean he’s Andrew Bolt. Just sayin’.
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Incidentally I don’t think Rupert’s into Cheney anymore. He only likes winners. As long as those winners let The Daily Rupert get bigger and bigger and bigger…
Oh you won’t find me disagreeing on this. The more privileged, the less that overt violence has to be used to assert power – other means can be used that don’t end up in crime statistics. And men do like to assert power over others. And yeah, let’s not pass the buck to testosterone on this.
Joe2 -
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The black dildo was public property in aid of sex education Joe. We’re still trying to find out what happened to the white one. Suspect perhaps my mother’s a bit saucy.
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Kite -
Indeed. They’re alive.
“And men do like to assert power over others.
Indeed. They’re alive.”
Adrien, if asserting power over others is the only thing that males can do to prove that they are “alive”, we might end up in George Bush Era.
OK, your right.
* Adrien, I wrote this earlier today, just acknowledging your recent posts.
Kim,
In respect of leadership, as I mentioned earlier the same claims were made by conservative forces when land rights were the issue, which is interesting.
Firstly, I wouldn’t expect indigenous leaders to have unanimity. I would expect a lot of consensus on some issues and some like-strategies and also disagreement.
As to who gets to be called a ‘leader’ – prior to ATSIC and Land Councils etc, indigenous activists who were at the forefront of the civil rights movements for decades, those involved in setting up Legal Aid & Health centres and those involved in the Land Rights struggle were self-evidently ‘the leaders’ of indigenous Australia.
Land Councils cover much of indigenous Australia and are representative bodies, although I am not entirely sure of the electoral processes in each Council or states – I think they differ vis a vis incorporation or associations status or under Acts of Parliament etc?
from Wiki:
Patrick Dodson was a former Director of the Central Land Council and the Kimberley Land Council, A Commissioner into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody, 1989, Chairman of the Council for Aboriginal Reconciliation (1991-1997)
In 1990, Pearson co-founded the Cape York Land Council, where he was Executive Director until he resigned in 1996. Pearson’s first official appointment was to a Queensland government taskforce which was formed to develop land rights legislation. He was also a legal advisor for the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission. In 1993 Pearson acted as representative to the traditional owners in the first land claim to the Flinders Island and Cape Melville National Parks, a claim which was successful, although the owners have yet to receive title. Following the Mabo decision Pearson played a key part in negotiations over the Native Title Act 1993 as a member of the Indigenous negotiating team.[3]
Adrien – Marcia Langton was one of the country’s leading activists in the 70’s, she also worked for different Land Councils etc. before she headed into academia. I remember seeing Langton a few times when I was a kid at rallies etc. Her and Gary Foley were tres black cool – v. sexy.
Ridgeway was elected onto the first ATSIC Sydney Regional Council, a position in which he served two terms of office. He joined the Australian Democrats in 1991. In 1995, he became the executive director of the New South Wales Aboriginal Land Council. He continued in this position until 2000.
Warren Mundine (Adrien – Anthony Mundine is the world champ boxer, muslim convert and ex NRL player whose father Tony was also a very famous boxer) Anyway, Warren Mundine was the Deputy Mayor of Dubbo for a decade, which is fairly large regional centre in NSW with a big indigenous population and was the President of the ALP.
Grace, of course you can disagree with Pearson’s or Langton’s or whoever’s views in respect of mutual obligation, welfare quarantining and whatever other policies/views etc. but to call into question their bona fides and call them neo-cons after decades of hard slog work on Native Title, Reconciliation, the Stolen Generation’ etc, isn’t fair, in my opinion. And what Adrien said in relation to News Corp.
Re: Judy Atkinson – here is an APO piece – written last year:
http://www.apo.org.au/webboard/comment_results.chtml?filename_num=154957
Judy Atkinson’s On Rage:
As to the issues in respect of incarceration rates, I mentioned that the rates included cities and towns etc – therefore even taking into account the loosening of close control on missions, it can’t explain away these stats entirely and this was my point. It is mentioned in the Black Deaths in Custody report that there isn’t a huge amount of data to rely on – but this is where I would expect oral history to replace such, as was done with the report into the Stolen Generations, and although the Pearson quote is the only one I can find online – I’ve heard elders in interviews state the same thing over and over. Will do more digging!
And if the trends continue in Alice, as per that incredibly positive news report I linked to – and are widely replicated, and if Macklin and the Feds can actually get some dollars on the ground for housing and education/training, if Twiggy or whatever his name is and others incl. all levels of Govt – can provide major new business/job opportunities etc (not holding breath) then revisiting national indigenous representation is probably something that should be undertaken. But hopefully the whole community will be in a much better place to make these types of decisions. ATSIC btw. wasn’t viewed entirely positively by many in the communities, whether or not Howard used the opportunity to suck back resources, which you point out Grace.
And I’ve always assumed that most remote communities have varying layers of community representation already in place relation to administration, aside from the Land Councils, whether they be perfect/competent/have any power/ or otherwise.
And btw. I don’t doubt that some indigenous leaders may be past their prime or have ‘agendas’ (what elected official anywhere doesn’t come with an agenda) or that there are families which have been top-dogs for generations etc.
Anyway, that’s it from me on this topic, I just hope that Greer is wrong not because I want her to be blah, but because her prognosis is almost terminal, whereas I’m hoping for good outcomes in the very short term, let alone the mid-long term. (And possibly the 5-12 people not murdered in Alice Springs this last year might agree with me!)
Speaking of “Rage”, just stumbled across a curious story in today’s Canberra Times, “Public servant found guilty of leak”.
It seems dusky Tjanara Goreng Goreng, a fifty y.o. public servant is just about to be jailed for a long time. This is for
for passing information;
“… about government plans to introduce sexual health checks at Mutijulu…to a long term friend who was a member of the community council”.
A
“White men get driven and act in particularly large and nasty ways.
They just cover their explosive tracks better.”
Spot on joe2…
Ya know, the obnoxious mainstream media & political DIVIDERS spend their lives backing up…or diverting attention from…the greedier grog sellers, the sex-crazed truck drivers & miners, the racist cops, the tricky dick “I’m kinda One Nation…& I don’t mean the Obama kind, more like Brit National Front kind” politicians, the religious wackos, the mind-f*ckin’ coaches, the psycho-film & video makers, exploitive music producers (think of the origins & money-makers involved w/ RAP), the weirdos in education (I’ve come across a few racists in my time), the ripoff merchants (think art for starters), the petrol suppliers, the top drug & weapons pushers & many others who have helped CONSTRUCT this social MALAISE.
Occasionally the media trip over one of these culprits…but then they vanish like vermin into a hole…as the media beam conveniently shifts to some other “moral panic” issue…another “beat-up”. Or like many of the white sportsmen who get exposed for RAGE…it’s not long before they get the LIMELIGHT interview that leads to FORGIVENESS & the road to gold lolly land.
These CONSTRUCTORS OF MAYHEM would rather let a community fall into disrepair & enhance/HYPE up the discord/issues & make moolah & gain reputation from “stirring the pot” than promote the positives or delve into the roots of problems.
Then they act like SAVIOURS…concerned “values-driven” (puke) citizens when CHAOS &/or emergencies ensue in the black community…using &/or blackmailing/buying selected so called “experts” & “definers” to support their claims & moral campaigns…campaigns that generally ignore the real ILLNESS & CRIMINALS and instead focus on the helping hand of many who are really only out for a “quick buck” or owning the rights to an individual or land that will bring in long-term profits.
These ENABLERS have no problem promoting the view that Aboriginal women should act like “moral guardians” & finger-pointers/dobbers. Certainly it’s understandable that if an act of aggression is beyond the pale or recurrent then it may require intervention & “speaking out” but unless you deal w/ the root problems self-medication & turning to mood suppressants will continue…and the RAGE will re-emerge…& in the long run many men will feel more justified to RAGE due to the sense of being completely isolated, betrayed & fingered by family members &/or friends & associates who might possibly be committing acts of violence/abuse themselves, even against the perpetrator…
It’s too easy to paint MEN as the potential aggressors…domestic abusers…women & children can also be bullies…damage can be inflicted on an individual using many techniques.
The Federal government intends now to use the tools at their disposal to drive truanting kids back to school…ensure some parents become more responsible…fair enuff…but I hope they remember they might be directing some of the RAGERS back into schools that are desperately trying to bring harmony & learning to their classrooms & playgrounds. They better make sure that the schools are equipped with more counsellors, security advisors, alternative educational pathways routes & “time out” rooms & trained teacher aids…& homework centres…& motivate councils to build more community centres in the area. Educators & peaceful kids deserve protection from RAGERS…they deserve safe, quality educational environments. RAGERS deserve assistance. Therapy. Opportunities to grow.
Teachers are not wardens. Or full-time counsellors.
Thnx Paul Walter, marcelproust & joe2…
N’
Jo,
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Thanks for the Langton bio. I’m familiar with Mundine and Pearson perhaps the result of subconscious masculunism perhaps? No I’m not being sarcastic.
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I am, of course, now being introduced to Prof Langton the academic.
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Speaking of which I saw Gary Foley in one of Melbourne University’s thousands of bloody food joints. Looked very professorial himself. I wonder what Langton and Foley thought of Greer’s assertion that this country is unique because the absence of aboriginal resistance.
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Methinks she be a merry prankster myself. That’s my theory which is mine.
And if you’re inferring that I’m a middle-class white guy lives in the city, knows next nothin’ ’bout what’s going on out there. On this subject you’re 90% correct.
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Used perhaps twice in a sentence, clumsy.
Yes, Nasking.
You are across so much of the immanent essence of what all this so-called policy is about: The onscuring of white middle class flaws through the forgrounding of indigene traits and not only out of legitimate concern involving these, but as a psychological means for white society to avoid a decent look at itself on a number of levels. What we whites have forgotten if we ever understood, is when we look at the clumsiness of dysfunctional out back indigene people, we are actually watching an disguised, overtised, performance of our own pathology encated by our victims. ( although we, too are victims also, except as much unknowing ones as our victims )
Why the need to obscure white abusiveness?
Why do we have to mask our motives and pathology in such a furtive and futile manner?
Why are the powers that be allowed to slander others to justify their programs of exploitation also preventing us, through the exploitation of our own apathy, from a knowledge of OUR own natures as revealed in our apathy or complicity, that prevents our advancement as matured people and a matured nation?
This inner sickness in white society is as much a crime as the evidential inflicted sickness laid upon indigenes, typified in this grubby pursuit of what remains of Aboriginal life and wealth, for overt rather than the covertly base motives that bring about our (white) destruction also. This sad blindness and denial lies at the core of all this NT Intervention vaudeville, which itself only the latest in a whole series of unsavoury incidents over two centuries.
Expressed at an abstract and pathetically sad level, why is denial of even the possibility, let alone the fact of, existance of the “animal”traits in humans recognised so eagerly on Indigenes, so vehement in so called white “civilised” people”?
Wasn’t the James Hardie episode, epitomised in the example of Bernie Banton for example, the evidence of a barbarian savagery every bit as crass as anything a drunken black person does during a Friday night brawl?
“Wasn’t the James Hardie episode, epitomised in the example of Bernie Banton for example, the evidence of a barbarian savagery every bit as crass as anything a drunken black person does during a Friday night brawl?”
Well said Paul Walter.
When I watched war criminals like Gen. William Westmoreland walk away scot-free, and die an honored man, the inner-rage I felt was deep and burning.
Furthermore, the acts committed by corporate executives & their political puppets…whether it be in the area of smoking, asbestos products (as you mentioned), oil (think of the conflicts, environmental degredation), the use of trans-fats & such in food, particularly fast foods (think obesity & heart problems, diabetes…even in children…good onya Anna Bligh, Premiere of QLD), carconigens in food & drink, the promotion of diets that kill &/or cause hospitalisation…the list goes on…these are the oft HIDDEN criminals that do damage on a widespread level…reaping in profits & distorting media messages by way of money & shareholdings…and they lie and smile at the camera every chance they get…lie to courts…lie to their consumers…and reward themselves continually for damaging peoples lives.
And they work hard w/ their allies to ensure the people fight each other, get agro w/ each other, accuse each other, argue each other, vote against their own interests…in order to DIVERT attention from their own actions. They set-up “strawman arguments” continually…send the TV viewers & radio listeners on long journeys of fear & hate & division…on trips down “Red Herring Road”…to ensure that they are not EXPOSED.
Marx & Engels knew it. The propaganda methods & technology THE FEW, the CORPORATE ARISTOCRACY use to HIDE & DISTRACT might be different. But their greed & insatiable appetite to CONTROL remains the same.
Is any wonder that the insidious knowledge of their greedy, controlling existence causes fires in each of us?…that which burrows into each individual’s life, every person who has that memory &/or story of their labour power being exploited…or that of their family member’s, past and present…their land ripped out from under them, their health destroyed, their businesses crushed by uncompetitive practices & monopolies, rigged games, uneven playing fields…their families divided by unjust court decisions, tax systems that benefit the few, companies that callously allow raiders & equity groups to cut staff, reduce pensions, cut conditions…yet continually reward the thieves, executioners & con-artists…& those who FAIL to bring about secure & healthy & satisfying conditions for those workers who keep the wheels of that company turning.
Is it any wonder that as we fight amongst each other…whilst the FEW pull the strings…move the chess pieces that determine how much more WE WILL BE RIPPED OFF…KEPT DOWN…CONTROLLED…that the fires in each of us burns brighter…?
Is it any wonder that those who LOST the MOST here in Australia…remembered acutely, whether it be by GENETIC MEMORY…or by way of EXPERIENCE…or KNOWLEDGE LEARNT OF THEFT AND EXPLOITATION AS STORIES ARE TOLD…and those who gained the least in this period of so called “prosperity”…should feel those fires burn in an all-consuming way?
Is it any wonder that when the media FOCUSED on the ABORIGINES unrelentingly, for over a decade, in negative, finger-pointing fashion that that RAGE should increase. As politicians filled w/ HATE & jealousy spoke of their inability to govern themselves, protect their children, handle a drink…is it any wonder that some could no longer quell the RAGE fires?
Imagine the humiliation…the sense of ongoing injustice, lies & deceit…the knowledge of “intentional negligence” by authorities…the sense of being CONNED & FRAMED & SET-UP…AGAIN…the fear of losing their children…again…the barrage of media accusations…combined w/ the supply of rivers of grog & petrol & porn & agro music & blood sports by greedy opportunists…some working for the MORAL CAMPAIGNERS…those pointing fingers…it would have bent the back, destroyed the will, screwed w/ the rationality of any person.
But for this to be done to the group most generally disadvantaged…those w/ the most HURTING…those w/ the least avenues to SPEAK OUT & defend themselves…it was…is…CRIMINAL!!!
The RAGE in Aboriginal men must be put out. But those who helped CONSTRUCT those fires must also be exposed…& some brought to JUSTICE.
The APOLOGY is merely the beginning. But it will be used to create distrust & hate in those they want to manipulate to gain power. Unless the government, media & people WAKE UP to this politics of DIVISION for GAIN.
That’s not to say these RAGERS & ABUSERS should not be stopped…some brought to justice themselves…for in the long run INDIVIDUAL RESPONSIBILITY must play an important role. But if the CONSTRUCTORS of MAYHEM are seen to get away…w/ their profits & lies…& the system they CONSTRUCTED is not altered…then we will see more EMOTIONALLY DISTANCED & ENRAGED Aboriginal…& other working poor children walking this LAND acting out the vengeance they feel against the parents they perceive as weak & humiliated…and the society they suspect, feel
DOESN’T WORK FOR THEM.
Good on Anna Bligh for listening…& respecting. Providing opportunities.
N’
make that “degradation” & “carcinogens”.
Who remembers watching this story on Sunday in ‘99?
[link]
Nasking – Do you work for one of Rupert Murdoch’s tabloids? People magazine perchance? You took Graeme Bird’s class “The Caps Lock Key Is Your Best Friend”?
.
Enquiring minds wanna know.
Adrien, Greg M already picked on Nasking for that.
Nick, thanks for link- do not usually follow commercials, and think the above has those flaws of gross reductonionism and blame gaming- at worst. However, much in the episode parallels content and substance of public broadcasting docos, even since the nineteen sixties.
Nothing has been done or if it has, has not worked, or not worked enough.
It’s intractable and it’s intractable because of the inscripting of the victims.
“Nasking – Do you work for one of Rupert Murdoch’s tabloids? People magazine perchance? You took Graeme Bird’s class “The Caps Lock Key Is Your Best Friend”?”
Knock off the insults dude. Did someone copy my style…or have it before me? Who gives a toss? The issues are far more important. I’ve been using the capitals for years. You should know that Adrien. It works for me…I’m comfortable w/ it. I won’t stop…not gonna be CAGED by any f*cker. Get it!
As for working for Murdoch & such. I’d chop my right arm off before I took money for my comments.
I MEAN what I say. And have no NEED to SELL OUT.
As one highly animated character once said:
“I yam what i yam?”…take it…or leave it.
N’
Just thought I’d mention that Germaine Greer’s speech at the Melbourne Writers Festival(?) will be shown on ABC Fora tomorrow morning (Friday the 5th) at 8am on ABC2. They showed a bit of John Pilger’s speech tonight and I thought it was impressive.
Kim, have you read William Grier’s book called “Black Rage”? It was first published in 1969 (I believe). It sounds like Greer’s book is very similar to Grier’s book in that they both deal with Rage/Anger in non-Caucasian/Colonially-experienced communities. So what Greer is talking about is nothing new – only a different application.
Well, isn’t that the point of knowledge and wisom, applying what you’ve learnt to emerging identified situations when a discernible pathology or pattern emerges, II?
On the other hand Greer, identifying this issue was maybe obviously therefore, using similar language because the situation is similar, without necessarily even knowing about William Grier’s book?
Great minds think alike.
Or if there is no problem with racism, fools never differ?
Thanks for the heads up, II. I haven’t read it but I’ll track it down.