If Australians knew the whole truth about Indigenous history, Lidia Thorpe’s royal outburst would not have been a shock | Celeste Liddle (www.theguardian.com)

submitted 8 months ago by NaevaTheRat@vegantheoryclub.org to c/australianpolitics@aussie.zone

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[-] Tau@aussie.zone 19 points 8 months ago

Last year, Australia showed how unengaged and racist this country remains by refusing to insert an Indigenous advisory voice

Convenient that the author forgot to mention that the very person they're writing about was a vocal No voter. You can say many things about Lydia Thorpe but politically unengaged is not one of them, and while she might be a little bit racist it's definitely not against Indigenous people.

I'll also note that the Tent Embassy had a giant banner hung up urging people to vote No, guess they're all politically unengaged and racist...

[-] yistdaj@pawb.social 6 points 8 months ago

Lidia Thorpe has also believed before the vote that a No vote would prove Australia is racist, just as a yes vote would prove Australia is racist. Given that, I think Lidia would agree with the author here.

[-] yistdaj@pawb.social 9 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

To clarify, Lidia claimed that both the racist no campaign and the yes campaign drowned out the progressive no campaign.

[-] metaStatic@kbin.earth 2 points 8 months ago

I had zero clue there was even a progressive no campaign until after I voted no.

[+] goodthanks@lemmy.world 2 points 8 months ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

[deleted]

[-] yistdaj@pawb.social 2 points 8 months ago

As someone who voted yes in a very no place, I was actually a bit frustrated by how poorly the yes campaign communicated with people - right up until those pamphlets came out, most of the people I was talking to had never heard of the referendum, and only after that most people started looking up what it was about.

I would argue the no campaign had a huge head start on the yes campaign, there was negative speculation going on a year before the referendum, and it gradually snowballed into misinformation before the yes campaign even started. So the stuff people found was all negative. For the people I was talking to, I was the only person they knew who thought a voice was a good idea.

One of the people I was talking to mentioned how they hadn't even encountered a single ad promoting a voice to parliament until a week before, and it didn't bother talking about how it would work or why it's a good idea. They did eventually vote yes, but only after I talked to them about what I understood about it. In fact, my experience is that most people leaning no were willing to vote yes after hearing enough about it.

I think a huge issue is that the yes campaign either failed to reach here somehow, or just relied on the media and self-research for informing people. And the media was very insistent on platforming no campaigners while almost never platforming yes.

One of the most confusing things to hear was how people in the capital cities had heard so much about it when people here had barely heard of it. Some people missed the referendum date entirely.

[-] metaStatic@kbin.earth 0 points 8 months ago

that's pretty fucking bad but anyone voting yes after reading the legislation was even worse.

it's sad to think without bigots like your dad we might have passed that nonsense.

[-] NaevaTheRat@vegantheoryclub.org 6 points 8 months ago

That's true, although she wanted a different voice and treaty right?

If you look at where majority no came from you'd have a hard time convincing me it was because people thought the voice wasn't radical enough.

[-] vacuas@aussie.zone 12 points 8 months ago

I know about indigenous history and I was still shocked. She’s unhinged. Not sure how lidia Thorpe gets away with her aggressive outbursts, especially after the racial abuse she spewed at that security guard that one time. She’s disgusting

[-] maniacalmanicmania@aussie.zone 11 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

No she's not. It was a protest and it was effective. The King of the United Kingdom and Commonwealth was called out on a world stage.

Lidia Thorpe is a legend.

[-] vacuas@aussie.zone 2 points 8 months ago

How was it effective?

[-] maniacalmanicmania@aussie.zone 11 points 8 months ago

She got the publicity she was after.

[-] vacuas@aussie.zone 4 points 8 months ago

Well fair point there

[-] sola@aussie.zone 8 points 8 months ago

Exposes people who I wouldn't want to associate with. The people upset at Lidia would definitely be more likely to screw me over to gain favour with someone more influential. Those don't align with my morals.

[-] Naryn@lemmy.world 1 points 8 months ago

All it did was show the world that she was a racist.

[-] UnfortunateDoorHinge@aussie.zone 1 points 8 months ago

Lidia Thorpe is an example of someone who thinks they are superior to everyone else, and who thinks everyone owes her something.

[-] CTDummy@lemm.ee 11 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

Last year, Australia showed how unengaged and racist this country remains by refusing to insert an Indigenous advisory voice

Right, those are the options. Either you voted yes or you’re unengaged and racist.

If I were, like so many others, to believe what it is I have heard and seen since Thorpe took to the floor, I would be convinced she had broken through the barricades, thrown open the doors, stormed to the front and then proceeding to call his majesty everything under the sun. I certainly wouldn’t get the impression that she, as an Australian senator, attended an event she had been duly invited to, engaged in an act of peaceful resistance by turning her back as God Save the King played and then proceeded to yell a few hard truths about the Crown and the history of this country

This writing is just floundering and bordering on dishonest. While I agree too many people are clutching pearls about it, yelling at the King is what it is. Other First Nations members and elders have stated their disapproval for obvious reasons. While the reactionary “shock” about it is tiring; this side of it is as well. As pointed out it wouldn’t be with the crown these things would negotiated anyway. It would be with the commonwealth/parliament. So yelling at the king during this sort of ceremony about it is not only inappropriate due the event but also due to it being the wrong person to bring this to.

[-] NaevaTheRat@vegantheoryclub.org 6 points 8 months ago

Right, those are the options. Either you voted yes or you’re unengaged and racist.

Got another reason?

[-] Tau@aussie.zone 6 points 8 months ago

The same argument that won the gay marriage plebiscite - people should be equal under the law and, by extension, our constitution.

[-] NaevaTheRat@vegantheoryclub.org 7 points 8 months ago

Yes yes rich and poor sleeping under bridges and all that. A convenient excuse that paves the way for never trying to improve things. Besides if we were all equal we would have treaty, as their ancestral rights would be recognised.

[-] metaStatic@kbin.earth 3 points 8 months ago

and a treaty was explicitly not on the table

[-] mranachi@aussie.zone 5 points 8 months ago

I'm inclined to suggest some minor edits... "Either you voted yes or you're unengaged and/or racist and/or have been manipulated by a brazenly racist no campaign."

[-] Naryn@lemmy.world 2 points 8 months ago

Loads?

How about not engaging in racial discrimination which is exactly what the referendum was doing, it was giving a group more power to decide the direction of the country because of their ethnicity.

It's blatant racism and an attempt to cement racial superiority in the country by using victim status.