Of course, there is racism against Aboriginal people in Australia, but perhaps it goes much deeper than Stan Grant realises. And paradoxically, it may be unintentional. Or maybe not.

Affirmative action for Aboriginal people can have unintended effects: I've tried to tell my kids not to tick the box, which supposedly will open up jobs for them - BUT it also automatically shuts them out of mainstream employment, i.e. the 98 % of employment opportunities, and locks them into the Indigenous box. Since their qualifications are not easily incorporated into the Indigenous domain (they could be, but usually aren't), they have had trouble ever since they graduated.

Of course, there would be a simple way around this: if 'affirmative action' wasn't a matter of 'either/or' but of 'both', i.e. the mainstream opportunity structure AND the Indigenous opportunity structure.

But I'd still advise my kids not to tick the box, just to be on the safe side.

Of course, this has been around for a long time. I recall an Indigenous graduate, in Secondary Science Teaching, who may have been told, with extreme and sincere regret, "We're dreadfully sorry, dear, but we don't have any Indigenous secondary schools in SA." She got a job as a social worker. But imagine: how valuable as a role model would a female Indigenous Science teacher have been back in 1990. Christ protect us from our 'helpers'.

So, yes, there's racism around, all right.

And there's more than forty thousand Indigenous university graduates now, so there's a LOT of it around.

Joe

This article provides a good reason for the repeal of Section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act. As the author says, Jurisprudence regarding 18C is all over the shop; everything or nothing could be found in breach. Even the proposed modification suggesting the removal of the offences 'insult', 'humiliate', and 'offend' to be replaced by the higher test of 'harass'is too nebulous, leaving the way open for a wide range of interpretations.

To call Stan Grant's speech "hate speech", however, stretches any interpretation of what "hate speech" is. The speech was a passionate and factual account of how racist attitudes have destroyed his people and are continuing to cause harm and disadvantage to indigenous Australians. Its tone is inclusive, rather than condemnatory. "But we are better than that...And one day, I want to stand here and be able to say as proudly and sing as loudly as anyone else in this room, Australians all, let us rejoice".

I can't speak on behalf of Stan Grant.
Nor can I criticise his feelings concerning
what he and his family have experienced.
I am white of European ancestry and have not
experienced the type of abuse of which Stan
Grant speaks. I know that words do hurt as
does exclusion and not being accepted for
whatever reason. Today we can know a great
deal about the conditions that many of our
Indigenous people have lived with for years.
And the prejudices that they encounter in
their daily lives. I like to think that
for most of us tolerance and understanding has
broadened out and that bigotry is in retreat.
However, I can't really speak on behalf of
Mr Grant.- All I can do is try to
understand the points he's making and try to
be part of the solution and not the problem
by condemning him.

Some wise person once said words to the effect
that:

Not everyone thinks the way you think, or knows the
things you think you know, or believes in the
things that you believe, nor acts the way you act.

Therefore it is best to remember that and you just
might go a long way in getting along with people.
No matter who they might be.

The crux of this discussion is that the HRC did not go around looking
for someone to make a complaint against Stan Grant.

I wonder why ?

Could it be that the HRC is itself a racist organisation ?
That would have made for a really good cartoon for Bill leak.
If only I could draw !

Stan Grant has done very well for himself in 'racist' Australia; his father, too, an unskilled labourer, managed to achieve the 'Australian dream' by buying his own home in Canberra.

What I find strange is that anyone living in Australia even uses the words 'racist', so much has the word been misused and abused by the bullies. To the lunatic Left, anyone who disagrees with them on immigration or multiculturalism is a 'racist'. These semi-literate yobs don't event know the difference between religion and race, particularly when it comes to the religio/political organisation of Islam, whose adherents are made up of many different races, although the blame for Islam lies fairly and squarely with the Arab race, or some of the Arab race, as there are Christian Arabs.

In 632, when the Tuareg hordes conquered Egypt, the population of that country was 99% Christian; now it is 6% Christian. Same race. Different religion (if we must call Islam a religion).

Another tip for Australian knuckle heads: there is no such thing as an aboriginal race. The aboriginal population of what is now called Australia, were Australoids, called such to differentiate from Negroid. There are no 'Aboriginal' Australians. The the common noun, 'aboriginal', describes the original population of ANY country. Our lot was glorified with proper noun status for purely political reason by the viciously divisive Left. There were about 600 separate tribes, many of them little more than the one family. These tribal names are proper nouns, just as the those of aboriginals in other countries: Sioux, Apache etc in America, Cree in Canada, Ainu in Japan. Calling all Australian people descendant from of the many tribes (A)borignal and not (a)boriginal is an absurd piece of social engineering and abuse of the English language.

Until we stop the multiculturalism bulls..t and start seeing ourselves as Australians only, we will remain a bunch of idiots who deserve to lose the country too many people have died and worked for - most of them white fellas, whether some of you like it or not.

I think the whole 'accusing others of being racism' argument is misleading, and I'm kind of getting fed-up with the whole politically correct side of things.
I can almost imagine myself wearing a T-shirt with 'I'm racist' plastered in big letters across the front of it as some kind of affront to society, to the stupidity of it all; and so that I don't have to ever be unfairly accused of it.

I see news articles of immigrants doing the wrong thing, if I speak up I'm racist right?
Doesn't matter whether I actually am racist or not.

Half the people being accused of racism probably aren't actually racist but have good reasons to criticise immigrants for the way the lack of respect towards our country.
And these people either lack the literary skills or either don't care for putting their concerns in a politically correct manner.
Maybe some genuinely are racist, who knows.

I don't like the way Muslims accost primary school kids and force them to convert to Islam and read the Koran.
I MUST be racist.
I don't like the way people are being attacked on or in their own homes by machete wielding psychopaths.
I MUST be racist.

I don't like the way I'm accused of an offense for speaking up for what is right.
I MUST be racist.