Hello No Award.

Today we would like to talk to you about Australia’s racism, or what we here at No Award refer to as Australia’s post-racial lols.

Here’s a terrible opinion piece at The Australian titled ‘No contraception, no dole’.

IF a person’s sole source of income is the taxpayer, the person, as a condition of benefit, must have contraception. No contraception, no benefit.

This is not an affront to single mothers or absent fathers, or struggling parents. Such a measure will undoubtedly affect strugglers, it undoubtedly will affect Aboriginal and Islander people in great proportions, but the idea that someone can have the taxpayer, as of right, fund the choice to have a child is repugnant.

Are you laughing? I’m laughing. In horror. This opinion piece is repugnant (thanks, pal) and also amazing, in that it accurately pinpoints who will be targeted but uses that classic argument, ‘I’m not racist’ or ‘I’ve got a brown friend who says it’s okay.’

Eugenics is never okay. Saying people who are poor can’t procreate is eugenics. Saying this policy will impact ATSI people and they won’t be able to procreate is eugenics. That it can list things that might contribute to terrible domestic situations and say the answer is contraception, rather than government services, counselling, and support; that’s eugenics. Woooo good SOSE lesson, everyone.

(Do not read the comments)

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Channel Seven loses legal battle after ‘racist portrayal’ of tribe.

Ignore those quotation marks, as if maybe it wasn’t a racist portrayal but Ch7 sure has lost the legal battle. Because it sure was a racist portrayal.

Raffaele claimed that the Suruwaha believe that children born with birth defects or born to a single mother “are evil spirits and should be killed in the most gruesome way possible”.

“They take these poor little innocent babes out into the jungle to be eaten alive by the wild beasts or jaguars or they bury them alive, this is one of the worst human rights violations in the world,” he said.

In his federal court judgement Justice Buchanan backed Acma’s original report when he said he found the statements made by Noonan and Raffaele “would be likely to provoke or perpetuate intense dislike and serious contempt of and for the Suruwaha tribe and its members on account of their practices and beliefs”.

Here at No Award we talk a lot about representation and culture, and that’s not just because we like media (we love media). It’s because representation matters, as Buchanan J has handily summed up here. Attitudes are influenced by representation, especially when we’re talking about representation of a minority. It’s irresponsible and basically a hate crime to act any other way.

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Reading Waltzing Matilda in Aboriginal History on Salty Hair:

I’m not really much of a Banjo Paterson fan — he comes across as a sort of discount store Rudyard Kipling, and I’ve never really liked his poetry either. But when you skim through his work it jumps out that Waltzing Matilda is a really, really odd poem. And the idea I can’t get out of my head is that it’s not really about a minor skirmish between white pastoralists at all: it’s about this country’s founding conflict between black and white.

Roll around in Australia’s racist history, my friends. Understand it. Remember it. Know that it’s still here with us, infecting us every day.

Relatedly, you should be following #blackfullafacts, even if you’re not Australian, definitely if you’re not Indigenous Australian. Some of it’s fun knowledge, some of it’s terrible knowledge, all of it’s important knowledge of Indigenous Australians.

We’re never post-racial. We’re racist, quokkas.

Happy New Year.