Indigenous leaders back Kerri-Anne Kennerley in racism row

“Has any single one of those 5,000 people waving the flags saying how inappropriate the day is, has any one of them been out to the outback where children, where babies and five-year-olds are being raped, their mothers are being raped, their sisters are being raped. They get no education,” Kennerley said on the Ten morning show.

Join the dots for indigene artifice, righto

The narrative of white people protecting indigenous women from their own culture (and from indigenous men) makes me uncomfortable.

Incidence and responses to violence in Indigenous communities
"The Women's Task Force report paints a frightening picture of violence that is increasing not only in numbers but also in severity (2000: xxiii). The Task Force was formed when the degree of suffering in many Indigenous communities had reached a crisis point." (2000: ix)

Any discussion of sexual assault in this context must start by examining the wider issue of violence that occurs in Aboriginal communities. The statistics are nothing short of staggering. Blagg (2000) reports that Indigenous people are 4.6 times more likely to be the victims of violent crime than non-Indigenous people. Indigenous women are particularly at risk of violence, being 12 times more likely to be the victims of assault than non-Indigenous women.

An open letter to ‘racist’ Kerri-Anne Kennerley

Dear Kerri-Anne Kennerley,

I must say, I have always enjoyed seeing your warm face on TV but your Studio 10 segment yesterday confirmed something I was unaware of — Yumi Stynes called it — you sound like a racist.

So just in case you ever read this, let’s start by debunking your word vomit.

SEXUAL ASSAULT AND VIOLENCE

Weighing in on the weekend’s “Invasion Day” protests, you asked whether any of the protesters had “been out to the Outback, where children, babies, five-year-olds are being raped? Their mothers are being raped, their sisters are being raped. What have you done?” — and were shocked when it was pointed our what you were saying sounded “quite racist”.

I in no way am de-legitimising sexual assault and violence in Aboriginal communities. Of course it occurs in indigenous communities as it does in the wider community.

However, when it comes to indigenous people, I can’t get past the fact that people like you perceive violence as something ingrained in Aboriginal culture.

Violence is a part of Australian culture. To prescribe it as a characteristic of one race is narrow-minded and rooted in the racist ideology that labelled Aboriginal people “savages”.

After all in Australia, one woman a week and one man a month are murdered by current or former partners...

“In 2014–15, indigenous women were 32 times as likely to be hospitalised due to family violence as non-indigenous women, while indigenous men were 23 times as likely to be hospitalised as non-indigenous men,” the report said.

“In 2015–16, indigenous children were seven times as likely to be the subject of substantiated child abuse or neglect as non-indigenous children.”

I agree, these statistics are grim, however society holds this assumption that all violence upon indigenous people is perpetrated by other indigenous people.

The fact is, 74 per cent of married indigenous people are married to a non-indigenous person. Don’t you think holding the assumption that indigenous women only have indigenous partners is more than a little ludicrous and probably racist?...

You can't separate crime from the bigger questions of culture and the effects of colonization

The way that crime is defined...is entwined with culture.

This is just one example of how Colonization forced European cultural ideas on aboriginal cultures.

I am not suggesting an answer

Quote:

This is just one example of how Colonization forced European cultural ideas on aboriginal cultures.

Recognition of this is necessary. It is also impossible to reverse. The only possible way then, is the way forward. The question that needs to be answered, is 'how do we move forward in a way that has positive affects?'

I don't think there is any way forward that has "positive" effects

This is a process of replacing aboriginal cultures with European cultural beliefs. The aboriginal cultures have already been disrupted, so now the process must be completed I guess.

I do find it troubling that all of the news accounts of this are White people telling us what "an aboriginal leader" says. I don't see the voices of actual aboriginal people being represented.

The best way forward would be to let aboriginal communities speak for themselves even when they are defying White cultural values