Be disturbed. Be very disturbed

Abbott as Indigenous affairs envoy? Be disturbed. Be very disturbed

Jack Latimore

Cometh the hour, cometh the return of the mission master

 @LatimoreJack

 

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Wed 29 Aug 2018 12.22 AESTLast modified on Wed 29 Aug 2018 13.06 AEST

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 ‘A slew of articles have been published since the offer was announced explaining precisely why the nomination of Abbott was offensive to blackfellas.’ Photograph: Tracey Nearmy/AAP

As the infighting within the federal Liberal party last week deteriorated into Friday’s high-noon leadership spill, the levels of anxiety among Aboriginal political observers continued to escalate. Ultimately, a pair of hardline rightwing cabinet ministers in Peter Dutton and Scott Morrison were vying for the role of running the country, each with a political record that did not augur well for improvement in the government’s consideration of Indigenous affairs.

Generally, over half of the Australian populace sighed with relief when the result went to Morrison instead of Dutton. Certainly, government spinners and moderate “small-l” liberals assured all within earshot that calamity had been averted. But First Nations onlookers recognised the two were cut from the same cloth. Now, with Tony Abbott accepting the role of special envoy to the new prime minister on Indigenous affairs, our immediate misgivings have been fully realised.

Tony Abbott accepts job as special envoy on Indigenous affairs

 

Read more

It’s ironic that the bloke essentially tipped out of the big chair in 2015 for a series of poor decision-making is now, as the “captain’s pick” of Australia’s latest PM, welcomed back into the cabinet fold of the federal government. For Morrison’s decision to appoint Abbott to that role is every bit as tone-deaf as Abbott’s 26 January 2015 decision as the then PM to bestow upon Prince Phillip, Duke of Edinburgh, husband to the Queen of England, resident of the United Kingdom, and an abiding symbol of a bloody colonial empire, the controversially reintroduced Knight of the Order of Australia.

Overnight, it emerged that after some deliberation around what he might bring to the role (read: how the gig could potentially yield enough political capital for a full-blown return tilt at the frontbench), Abbott accepted. Be disturbed. Be very disturbed.

A slew of articles have been published since the offer was announced explaining precisely why the nomination of Abbott was offensive to blackfellas. Just to reiterate: Abbott as PM – despite that whole Mabo decision thing – asserted that Australia was unoccupied at the time of white invasion; described pre-invasion Australia as “extraordinarily basic and raw”; stated precolonial Sydney was “nothing but bush” before the arrival of the First Fleet in 1788; and suggested white invasion was a positive, “defining moment”. But put those comments aside for a moment.

In 2015, again as PM, Abbott advocated for the forced closure of around 150 remote Indigenous communities in the state of Western Australia, remarking that taxpayers should not “subsidise lifestyle choices”. Rebukes from his own Aboriginal advisory council ensued, as did mass protests around the country.

The tension fuelling those demonstrations stemmed from the Abbott government’s 2014 budget and the implementation of the Indigenous advancement strategy, which ripped over $530m in funding from frontline, essential Indigenous services while Abbott paid lip service to closing the gap on Indigenous disadvantage and inequality.

Another $145m, including $46m in Indigenous health, was cut the following year as the bloke who previously described himself as the “Prime Minister for Aboriginal Affairs” oversaw the centralisation of the management of Indigenous expenditure into the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet. That strategy of consolidation in the pursuit of boosting the federal budget’s bottom line continues to cost Aboriginal lives.

Abbott is wrong for the job, but his boss, Morrison, is himself too paternalistic to bother much about it. In both men there is a hulking paternal arrogance.

 Abbott wants to be Indigenous affairs minister? Well, he ain’t qualified for the job

Paul Daley

 

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Morrison’s image has, in recent years, been purposefully “softened” from hardline right ideologue to a conservative, centrist, flexible politician. The glossies and fawning news media would have the Australian public view Morrison as their daggy uncle who’s popped into the backyard to get the barbie fired up and the drinks on ice in time for footy finals in September. But make no mistake, his form-line in terms of neocolonialism is right on par with Abbott’s. No amount of spruiking for the Sharks NRL team should conceal that fact.

Vulnerable people in detention died during Morrison’s watch as minister for immigration. Vulnerable people experienced added hardship and distress due to his welfare system overhaul as minister for social services. There’s also his position on climate change: last year, as federal treasurer, he brought a lump of coal into work to boast of his party’s commitment to coal-fired power over renewables. Let’s not forget the sick joke of the proposed allocation of $50m for a memorial to colonialism in his own electorate, which literally includes a towering $3m “aquatic” effigy to its namesake, Captain Cook.

And overnight we’ve learned precisely the nature of advice Prime Minister Morrison will receive from his new special envoy on Indigenous affairs. Enthusiastically and shamelessly harking back to the same loose-leaf sheets of his failed prime ministership, Abbott says he intends to lift school attendance rates for Indigenous kids by adding the pressure of tougher penalties for already struggling Indigenous parents.

Cometh the hour, cometh the return of the mission master. Expect to see suggestions of similar “incentives” in regards to Indigenous employment and social security being poured into Morrison’s ear directly.

• Jack Latimore is a Guardian Australia writer and columnist

Claiming again

I reviewed this blog tonight and came across the entries from December 2012 where the state government held a commission of inquiry into the abuse in the school hostels in the 60's and 70's..... I contributed my story to the commission at that time and I was encouraged to make a claim under that scheme.  I did so and I was given the maximum compensation......  but the actual process of preparing the claim had a big impact on me and it took months for me to recover from that impact.

Now the National Redress Scheme is operational ..... and it began on 1st July.  I prepared a new claim at that date ...... and the process of preparing this claim has  had an even greater impact than in 2012.  This deeper impact is largely due to the different frame of reference ..... this redress scheme specifically focuses on sexual abuse ..... so I had to dig into memories that I hadn't disturbed ..... and then record those memories for the assessors.  I have found the after effect of this to be deeply upsetting emotionally and physically.

I have engaged with medical and counseling help and the effects are being overcome.

For the purpose of a record, I will include the wording of the claim.

___________________________________________________________

1. Physical abuse

I came to St Christopher's as a boy who had already been abused.  I was vulnerable, hurting, wary, terrified. I needed a caring nurturing environment  but instead I was thrust into a world where I was literally the prey for more  abusers.  Only the moments of sleep were free from the awareness that more pain and humiliation was a breath away.  Mostly this was at the hands of peers ... but then I discovered that my  supposed protectors .... the adult staff members who were employed to supervise ... were also another form of torment. This was disguised as 'corrective discipline'! The hunting time was bedtime and "lights out" time in the dormitory.  The knowledge of what was coming meant that I (along with the other sufferers) would be in fear.  I would attempt to hide under the bed covers .... hoping that maybe this night I would not be noticed.  At these times my peers would be entertained by tormenting me ... trying to get a reaction or simply enjoying being able to inflict pain.  I would try to  escape their attentions and the noise created would usually summon the staff  members from their lair.  The staff member would select the likely noisemakers  .... and since I was frequently the reason for the noise, I would often be selected for discipline.

Discipline was by the cane or a length of garden hose. Both of these were administered to the buttocks or upper or lower thighs.   The implement chosen depended on which teacher was 'on duty'. It would usually be applied with  clothes on but if it was a bad night we would have to have the cane on bare skin.

Much of the memory of those times has been suppressed by my mind.  The  very act of  writing this account is reviving much of the memory.   I am in tears  as I write this and  I have to stop often.

Who were the staff members?  I think there were two or three but I can barely  remember.  One I  remember clearly because he was married to a girl who  lived next door to my parent's house in Beverly.  Jim XXXX.  Six years later I was involved in a church in Scarbough and I found that Jim XXXX  was also related to friends in that church.

How severe?  This memory is very clear because all the sufferers  would compare the welts inflicted when we returned to the dorm.  The test was to see how deeply you could lay a finger in the welt.  The extent and severity was also compared .... the daily showers were conducted with around 50 boys all naked and the injuries were extremely public.  The shower sessions were usually supervised by the principal Roy Wenlock .... I often ponder why he did not enquire about the apparent anomaly that the 'runts of the pack'  were receiving such punishment.    I never suffered broken skin from the caning but I remember another  boy ... he was diabetic and was particularly targeted .... he sometimes had broken skin resulting from the caning.  The bruising was bad enough that it was hard to walk the next day at school.  The episodes of discipline were frequent enough that they weren't unusual ... nights without a session were something to be remarked on.  They continued the whole time I was staying at St Christopher's.   I can clearly remember the dorms that I was sleeping in for each of  the three years.

2. Sexual abuse

I have been asked to add this to the record.  It was not included in my first draft as I still find this very painful to think about or to talk about. 

I began my time at St Christopher's as a complete pre-pubescent innocent with no knowledge of the 'bird and the bees' and no idea why I would even have an erection.  I can clearly remember that  I was in my second year at the hostel before I experienced my first orgasm. 

Situation A    During year 1, was taken off into a nearby field by a boy who in hindsight was very sexually experienced.  I can remember the other boys discussing the sexual experiences of their parents which they had observed.  The field had some ditches giving seclusion and there the other boy introduced me to masturbation and fellatio.  From that time on I was used as the 'plaything' at night when I would be forced to give oral sex to several of the other boys.  I would be taken from my bed at night and made to kneel at their bedside and then give them oral sex.  I have utterly clear memories of this right down to the physical shape and characteristics of their cocks.  I have no idea of how many times this happened but I can remember the three different dormitories that I was assigned to for each of the three years I was there.  In one sense this was not too bad as there was little malice involved  .... just force ... I had no choice in the action .... I was a useful toy to them I suppose.  In today's  attitudes, I guess this was rape.

Situation  B   A frequent "game" played on we boys at the 'bottom of the pecking order' ... was the "flush" and the "royal flush".  These episodes happened at random with no warning.  A group of the boys would see that the situation was OK .... no staff or prefects around .... and they would grab the nearest victim.   The "flush" was when a boy was immobilised  by force and the pushed into a toilet cubicle and his head was forced into the toilet bowl.  The toilet was then flushed.  The "royal flush" was similar except that a toilet bowl containing excreta was used  ...... so the experience was particularly traumatic.  If the tormentors were being energetic they would invert the victim and lower them vertically.  This was worse than the normal kneeling in front of the toilet bowl method.  I remember being subjected to both forms of flush but I could not say how many times.  Of course I resisted these episodes as far as I could ..... and I remember how the tormentors would be delighted if I did resist as it was then a great source of entertainment for them.  I remember them calling their mates to come and watch.  I was physically much more immature than them I had no chance at all of fighting against these boys who were much bigger  than me .... and hardened by farm work.

Situation  C   In the hostel, each boy had a locker in which his clothes were stored.  All the lockers were in one room and they were arranged in aisles and there were many obscured areas.  I one particularly bad episode a tormentor sought me out during the time after showers.  I was naked.  He grabbed me by the balls and then dragged me round the locker room by the balls in front of about 30 or 40 other boys.  The pain and humiliation was extreme.  

At all times I had to avoid attention and I learned to find ways to hide.  The lockers mentioned above were often a place to hide. I could get right inside the locker and pull the door closed .... if I was very quiet I could escape notice for a while.     In dry weather I would sneak into the fields which surrounded the hostel.  When the fields had high grass, I could make a refuge in the grass and stay there till I had to emerge for meal times.  I had to attend meals as there was a head-count.   Meal times were relatively safe as only non-obvious attacks could be employed while in the lines or in the dining hall.    In wet weather, I would sneak into the laundry/boiler room and I could usually find a refuge behind the boiler or under the mounds of washing.  I remember watching till the tormentors  were attacking some other victim .... and then I could sneak away and hide when the tormentors weren't watching me.

The only friends I had during these years were the other boys who were being similarly abused.  I sometimes wonder what has happened to them.  During my first year at the hostel, my older brother was also there .... he was a 17 year old final year prefect.  I think I was a nuisance for him as he ignored my presence and the tormentors seemed to delight in this.  

When I reflect on the descriptions above, It all seems rather trite and innocuous ..... but the horrible thing was the unrelenting, day after day, continual nature of the abuse ... for year after year.  When I went home for holiday breaks I would be terrified of returning to the hostel ..... but I never told my parents.   I never spoke of these experiences to anyone .... family, peers,  teachers, authorities.  The effect was so great that I could not speak  of it for thirty years. I think my parents must have suspected something because they removed me from the hostel in mid-term in 1966 - my third year.  That removal to private board was in itself very traumatic  as  I still had to attend Northam High school with the boys I had left behind ... I was seen as a deserter.

I still struggle daily with the memories of those times and I frequently think of suicide.  There have been several occasions in the years since when I have come very close to suicide or attempted it ... obviously without success.  Other impacts on my daily life have been deep.  I have little self esteem, little self  confidence and it has had a deep effect on my ability to have any form of friendship or social contact with other males.

The experience of those time has deeply scarred me and I have had many years of counselling and therapy as a result. All counsellors who have worked with me have diagnosed PTSD.  If in current times, I hear media accounts of abuse or bullying, I cannot stop myself identifying and so  reliving the distress.  Part of my mind is almost constantly thinking of those experiences  from over fifty years ago.  I exist on two levels ... one part carries on a seemingly  successful business and family life .... while the other part of me struggles with the memories and their effect. Depression is a constant battle and my plan for suicide is a constant solace and refuge in my every day life.  I know that if things get too bad and I can't cope, I can put my plan into action and end it all.  I have planned a method and assembled the means for a non violent, non painful  suicide when the time comes.

To this day I have frequent nightmares and my wife is probably very weary of having to wake me to stop the nightmares.  Remembering the nightmares is bad too .... I cannot erase  the memory  of the nightmares ..... and many of the nightmares were ghastly.

I have no hope of recovery or 'normality'.... I just try to keep going  .... to look after my  family ...  and I look forward to the ending of the torment when I die. 

Beverly District Hich School 1961 - 1963 ages 10 - 12

During my years in primary school classes at this school, my father was employed by the local shire council as the Health Inspector and the Traffc Inspector. In the traffc role he would frequently be confronting the young men of the town and their younger siblings were students at the high school. As a means of gaining revenge on my father, these boys would constantly attack and physically abuse me. My memory of this time is of unrelenting terror and torment. I remember trying to gain refuge in the classroom .... but being told that the room had to be locked during recess and lunch breaks and I could not stay inside. Without the protection of the teacher I was "fair game" for the abusers and they would come for me in a group and take me to a secluded part of the school yard to extract their revenge. Their favourite method was to stand behind me and .... using their projected knuckles poked into the spot below my ears ..... they would lift me right off the ground. I mentally separted my self from the pain .... the internal part could watch what was being done to the external part.

There was no sexual abuse during this time .... purely physical.  But this time laid the groundwork for the abuse that was to follow at the hostel.

I never spoke of this to my parents ..... nor to any one else till about 35 years later in the mid 1990's when I was in relationship counselling with my wife. Part of the counselling was because I could not speak .... I could not tell even my wife of what had been done to me. The counsellor likened my defence mechanism to me being a small child inside a tank ..... the child could drive the tank and the "tank" would function in the outside world .... but the small child remained locked inside and unable to communicate. The counselling undertaken over the next 25 years has meant that I can now think about the experiences in my mind .... and talk about it with diffculty .... and write about it with shaking hands and many tears.

But my childhood dreams of what I could accomplish as an adult had been ripped away from me. I had dreamed of a career as a doctor and one time I was essessed by the guidance counselor at high school ..... he just looked at my testing and dismissed me with the comment that I was capable of doing anything I wanted to do. I sometimes wonder why that counselor didn't look deeper to fnd out why I was unable to cope academically .... I knew ..... but I could not speak. Throughout high school I struggled academically .... and this continued in adult life when I attended and failed at uni ... and then attended Teachers College.  It had a deep effect on further study that I completed as a Company Secretary.

(In the previous section it asked if any person in this institution knew what was happening. The school had a policy of locking classroom doors during breaks and there was no place of safety that a child could retreat to .... so no staff were able to know. Probably they would have protected me if it weren't for the locked door policy.)

Democracy is dead

The latest leadership spill proves one thing — democracy is dead in Australia

Joe Hildebrand, news.com.au

an hour ago

AUSTRALIAN democracy is dead. The Labor Party killed it and the Liberal Party dug up the body and stomped on its bones.

Both our parliament and our parties have now descended into anarchic farce. And the carnage has been so mindless, the idiocy so virulent, that it can no longer be contained.
No matter what happens in the next days or weeks the Coalition is already headed off a cliff and the Labor Party has only managed to save its body by sacrificing its soul.
By the time the Liberal Party gets its next leader, be it Peter Dutton or a desperate rearguard action from Scott Morrison or Julie Bishop, they will be the seventh prime minister in 11 years. And just like that other 7-Eleven they got there by selling crap and dipping into workers’ back pockets.
One wit quipped that Australia was now just like Italy without the good food but that is too kind. We are more like the Middle East without the submachine guns or Central America without the CIA.
And yet of all these coups that have cost the nation a generation of good government, not one — not a single one — has been in pursuit of a genuine cause.
They have been the work not of true believers but party rats who roped millstones around the necks of their victims and then kicked them to the gallows for no other reason than that they could.
The first victim was of course Kevin Rudd, who once described action on climate change as “the greatest moral challenge of our time” only to later decide the challenge was so great it belonged in the too hard basket.

‘I’ll just sit at the back quietly.’ Picture Kym Smith

Mr Rudd was forced to dump his emissions trading scheme and tried to bring in a mining tax instead. He then got knifed by Julia Gillard, who had urged him to dump the emissions trading scheme, and Wayne Swan, who had urged him to bring in the mining tax.
Where else but Australia could a prime minister get executed by both his deputy and treasurer for the capital crime of following their advice.
Having killed off Mr Rudd’s carbon price, Ms Gillard then reinstated it in order to win power with the Greens, who had killed it off first.
This in turn paved the way for Mr Rudd to kill off Ms Gillard and her carbon price and replace it with his carbon price. However neither could save either from Tony Abbott, who had previously killed off Malcolm Turnbull for his carbon price.
For a country that doesn’t have a carbon price that price seems very high.
Labor thought they could play the public like a cheap TV hypnotist. Kevin Rudd was back again, the carbon tax was no more, asylum seekers were somewhere else, it was all just a dream …
But unfortunately for Labor the only dreams were Tony Abbott’s and they had all come true. In 2013 he romped home in a landslide victory not seen since, well, Kevin Rudd’s. And on the way through he famously promised almost everything under the sun: “No cuts to education, no cuts to health, no change to pensions, no change to the GST and no cuts to the ABC or SBS.”

Mal’s big problem is he can’t tell a lie. Picture Kym Smith

It could be argued that Mr Abbott broke every single one of those promises but the latte left obsessed almost exclusively over the ones that affected their favourite TV shows.
More saliently, you would have to wonder why on earth Mr Abbott would bother to say such a thing when cuts to the ABC and SBS were precisely what his core supporters were hoping for.
Either way, that election eve pork barrel quickly became a barrel of lies. So much for the conviction politician. He also threw in a surprise tax hike for good measure, which set a lot of blue blood boiling.
But Mr Abbott did keep his three word promises. He stopped the boats and he axed the tax and they were the two things the Tory base cared about the most. So why was he rolled again?
Ah yes, because he wasn’t a very good communicator and he’d lost 30 Newspolls in a row. Doesn’t that seem the very definition of irony now.
At least in launching his own late night coup Mr Turnbull had the decency to admit the cause was purely cosmetic.
Indeed, Mr Turnbull’s Shakespearean flaw may well be that he seems incapable of telling a lie — which is probably why he waffles so much.
In the real world this is of course a great virtue but in politics it is a death sentence. Instead of constructing a compelling bullshit narrative of why it was vital for the party and the nation that he seize control, Mr Turnbull instead chewed on his spectacles while speculating that he would probably be a better spokesman for Tony Abbott’s policies than Mr Abbott himself.
That confidence has served Mr Turnbull well in his private pursuits but in public it is about as effective an armour as the emperor’s new clothes.
He confidently advocated for a republic in 1999 and got rolled, he confidently advocated for action on climate change in 2009 and got rolled and he confidently brought on the leadership spill in 2018 and … Well, watch this space.
But again, why is Mr Turnbull now subjected to a leadership coup? What principle is so noble and pure that it requires yet another prime ministerial assassination and the almost certain decimation of the Liberal Party?
Well gosh, let’s see. First it was that Mr Turnbull and Josh Frydenberg had crafted an energy policy that promised to lower electricity prices while at the same time meeting the international reduction targets Australia had signed up to in Paris and which had been overwhelmingly passed by the Coalition party room. Targets that Tony Abbott had endorsed. What a monster.
And so in an effort to placate his opponents, namely Tony Abbott, Mr Turnbull offered to pull the targets out of the legislation so that the government would no longer be bound by them.
But then those same Liberal opponents accused him of placating the Labor Party because the ALP would not be bound by the targets when they won government, which they were almost certain to do because his Liberal opponents wouldn’t let him get his targets up.
Cute.
Suddenly the only target in Malcolm Turnbull’s energy policy was on his own back.
This in itself should tell you everything you need to know about sacrificing your soul in politics. As soon as people know you’ll bend over for a pack of cigarettes everyone becomes a smoker.
And so now yet another prime minister is about to be rolled for no reason other than pure and brutish self-interest. This is what happens when our rulers rip up the rule book as they did in 2010 and have done in every single term of government since.
Our parliament has been reduced to the animalistic law of the prison yard. We have paved the way for government by vendetta.
The pretence of policy is, as we have seen, bullshit — although to describe it as such does discredit to bullshit itself. No cowpat has ever so cruelled democracy.
Nor is the current opposition exempt from the stench. Bill Shorten has knifed more leaders than anyone in the parliament and then tried to squib on being opposition leader because he assumed he himself would be knifed before he got a shot at the Lodge. Tragically, he was wrong.
The Greens are equally culpable. Had they supported Mr Rudd’s original emissions trading scheme in 2010 he would never have been rolled and Australia would have an ETS today. Instead they would rather protest endlessly into the void and send the planet they pretend to love into oblivion because nothing is ever perfect enough for their brain dead socialist utopia.
And of course One Nation are just brain dead full stop.

‘Everything is falling into place nicely. I’ll have knighthoods back in no time.’ Picture Kym Smith

There used to be a broad consensus about national interest in the parliament. Some things used to be bigger than party politics and personal ambition: The great economic reforms of the 1980s, the gun laws that made Port Arthur the last mass shooting on Australian soil, matters of foreign affairs, trade and national security. All of these were underpinned by wise men and women who understood that political fights belonged on the playing field, not in the stands.
Now that sensibility has been lost. Once respected institutions and conventions have been trashed by self-interested tribalists who behave like drunken teenagers at a house party. And for what?
Tragically, and amazingly, no one seems to ever think that far ahead. If Mr Dutton does indeed roll Mr Turnbull on his second strike what happens then?
The Libs hurtle into an election that they will still almost certainly lose, Mr Dutton will have to spend half his time trying to save his own seat, Mr Turnbull will quit altogether leaving another seat to be won and another leader torched, Ms Bishop will probably go as well costing massive political capital, Mr Morrison will sit in the wings waiting to roll Mr Dutton when his time comes around, Mr Abbott will be back in the ministry but soon back in opposition and of course he’s bound to be quiet as a mouse. So who’s going to be the next Liberal PM when all the smoke clears? Alan Tudge?
This would be dumb enough if it had never been done before and yet it has, time and time again, and the results are always disastrous. Oscar Wilde’s Lady Bracknell famously observed that to lose one parent was a misfortune and to lose two looked like carelessness. What would she say about four prime ministers?
The power players in politics these days are like dogs chasing a car. They love the excitement but not one of them has any idea what to do if they actually catch it. But when it comes to the fragile fabric of democracy itself they are more like a gorilla playing with a matchstick man. No wonder ever more voters are fleeing to the volatile extremes that will only fuel the firestorm.
Meanwhile all these honourable members who pretend to love our country so much have turned Australia into an international laughing stock. The only people not laughing are us.
As a closer, here is a fun fact: If Malcolm Turnbull survives for just one more month he will become the longest serving prime minister Australia has had in more than a decade. Just think about that.
And now think about the fact that he may not survive a week, let alone a month. This means that in not one of the last four elections has the elected prime minister served a full term. And in not one of the last four elections has a party kept the promises it made when it went to the people.
Or of course the Turnbull camp could call a snap poll and bring the whole thing crashing down just to spite their enemies.
Either way, that is not democracy. Democracy is dead. And its killers are running the country.

Stan Grant - Indigenous history 13 Feb 2018

Here is a little truth we haven't heard much about this week: We know how to close the gap.

Hundreds of thousands of Indigenous people are living successful, healthy, stimulating lives. I am one of them.
A 2016 Centre for Independent Studies report that found that of 550,000 Indigenous people identified in the 2011 census, "approximately 65 per cent (350,000) are in employment and living lives not noticeably different from the rest of Australia".
In fact, I am more privileged than most other Australians.

I wasn't always a success story

It wasn't always that way: much of my childhood was one of bare-bones poverty: transient; itinerant; no permanent home or consistent schooling.
To add to our poverty — if not in fact the cause of it — my family was Aboriginal, enduring a legacy of state-sanctioned discrimination and a history often marked by brutality.

Yet, neither history, nor race, nor class need be destiny: if they were, I wouldn't be here.

Here's another truth: All of the Indigenous leaders and political figures we have seen and heard from this week have closed the gap too.
They are remarkable examples of resilience and determination. If ever there were people who speak to the power of the "Australian dream", it is these people, because they have paid the highest price.

There is more to Indigenous Australia

We are not good at telling this story: far more predictable and enticing is the tale of deficit and disadvantage.

'Years later, what's changed?'

The national apology was supposed to be life-changing. So why is it now a bittersweet memory for the survivors?

Statistically it is true: Indigenous people, as a group, have the lowest life expectancy; the highest infant mortality; the highest levels of imprisonment; and the worst health, housing, education and employment outcomes.
This year's closing the gap report reveals a failure to meet four out of seven targets and it is a measure of our low expectations that Malcolm Turnbull calls that a good result.

Clearly, there are two stories: entrenched misery and remarkable success.

The numbers tell an apparently contradictory tale. According to the Bureau of Statistics there are 11,000 Indigenous people in prison; there are around 30,000 Indigenous university graduates and about 15,000 currently enrolled.
Three times as many Aboriginal people and Torres Strait islanders have university degrees as are behind bars, yet the story of suffering appears to resonate more powerfully in the media and in the Australian imagination.

Politics is driven by narrative, and the narrative of suffering connects to a history of injustice and oppression. It is compelling because there is an undeniable historical link to contemporary misery.

There is an intergenerational transmission of trauma that can be debilitating. But it doesn't tell the full story.

A new narrative of hope

There is an alternative narrative that is more nuanced, more hopeful and more convincing. It speaks to Indigenous people who have loosened the chains of the painful past, transformed ideas of culture, broadened and deepened questions of identity, and found a secure place in Australia.
I have written about this in a 2016 Quarterly Essay, probing the idea of Indigenous economic migration: it was the story of my family and thousands of others who made a trek from segregated missions and reserves to towns and cities in search of work.
Their journeys began on the Australian frontier of the 19th century, but accelerated in the post World War II economic boom powered by an influx of migrants from Europe and later Asia as the old White Australia policy was dismantled.
As I wrote in my essay:

"They looked at the post-war migration and hitched a ride, becoming economic migrants themselves. The meagre pay and menial work didn't dissuade them as they … fought to provide for their families."

They took responsibility. It is a sad sign of our times that today, to talk of the need for responsibility is too readily contorted with blaming the victim: but these Indigenous economic pioneers did not see themselves as victims.
The late Indigenous scholar Maria Lane, a decade ago, tracked the economic migration and the divergence of Aboriginal communities into what she called "open society" — opportunity, effort and outcome-oriented and an "embedded society" — risk averse, welfare and security-oriented.
Lane called the journey to the "open society" the "slow grind" founded on "universal human rights, the rights to a rigorous, standard education and equal rights to a place in the Australian economy and society".
Lane's study was premised on ideas of classical liberalism: freedom, progress and the rights of individuals.

Liberalism is too often missing from analysis of Indigenous affairs: the historical suffering narrative too easily drowns out the story of economic uplift.

The self-made man

African-American scholars have a richer tradition. A century ago the anti-slavery campaigner and writer, Frederick Douglass, spelled out his recipe for success underlined in capitals: "one word and that word is WORK! WORK! WORK!"
Douglass wrote a famous essay, The Self-made Man. He wrote:

"Whether professors or plowmen; whether Caucasian or Indian; whether Anglo-Saxon or Anglo-African … self-made men are entitled to a certain measure of respect for their success and for proving to the world the grandest possibilities of human nature, of whatever variety of race or colour."

To Douglass — a man born into slavery — race was no impediment; America should be held to its promise of equality.
African-American sociologist William Julius Wilson in his book More Than Just Race: Being Black and Poor in Urban America argues for the need to look at cultural and structural underpinnings of poverty.
Structural often relates to historic underpinnings of poverty, while cultural goes to attitudes and societal norms.
Wilson believes that structural issues carry more weight, but it is crucial too, he says, to consider cultural factors that erode personal responsibility and distort behaviour.
His work mirrors that of Maria Lane's "open society" and "embedded society".
As Wilson writes:

"There is little basis for ignoring or downplaying neighbourhood effects in favour of emphasising personal attributes. Indeed, living in a ghetto neighbourhood has both structural and cultural effects that compromise life chances above and beyond personal attributes."

Maria Lane found an explosion in high school graduation and university enrolment in the grandchildren and great-grandchildren of those original indigenous economic migrants.
I am a product of it; every Indigenous leader we have heard from this week is a product of it.
The "Open Society", is the bedrock of the growing Indigenous middle class.

Between 1996-2006 the number of educated, well-paid, Indigenous professionals grew by 75 per cent.

Academic Julie Lahn from the Australian National University mapped this in her paper Aboriginal Professionals: Work, Class and Culture.
She said: "Aboriginal professionals in urban centres remain largely overlooked"; a process of transformation, she wrote, "increasingly evident to Aboriginal people themselves".

Balancing healing with progress

Debating closing the gap this week, Treasurer Scott Morrison had an answer: a job.
It is true even if deceptively simple: nothing in Indigenous affairs is simple.

Captain Cook 'myth'

Indigenous people have become a postscript to history thanks to a belief in the superiority of white Christendom, writes Stan Grant.

Trying to analyse it is like looking at a shattered mirror: each shard telling its own part of the story.
There are those who remain locked out of the Australian dream: it is not as easy as telling people to move or get a job — there are concerns about preservation of culture and deep connection to place and kin.
But, as we have seen, countless Indigenous people have made that journey and maintained or strengthened their identities and cultural connections.
Clearly there is a need to create meaningful links between Indigenous communities and individuals and the mainstream Australian economy.

There is another lesson: empowering Indigenous people, allowing them to determine their lives and grasp responsibility, works.

There is a pathway: indigenous leaders need look only to the lessons of their lives.
Healing the wounds of history is crucial, and as we mark a decade from the national apology, as we never lose sight of those for whom the Australian dream remains out of reach, there are hundreds of thousands of Indigenous people who can say, we have closed the gap.
Matter of Fact is on the ABC News Channel at 9pm, Monday to Thursday.

A wicked problem - Stan Grant on Barnaby Joyce

What to do about Barnaby Joyce is a "wicked problem"; that's what philosophers call a dilemma that is incomplete, contradictory and changing, almost impossible to resolve.

Immanuel Kant is not the first name that springs to mind when thinking of the Deputy Prime Minister, but the enlightenment philosopher may be a better guide to trying to make sense of all of this than the often hyperventilating media.
It revolves around the questions of morality: Who decides and who has the right to impose that on another person.
Kant believed fundamentally that the right came before the good: a moral autonomy.

It is his foundation of justice: Individuals should be free to chart their life course without the imposition of the values of others.

There are some immediate causes for concern: Does my right to do you harm supersede your right to be protected?
Kant had thought of that: To choose my life's course, I must respect the rights and choices of others.
The 20th century philosopher, John Rawls, updated Kant's arguments. To establish the principles that govern our lives, Rawls argued that we should set aside our particular interests, beliefs, ethnicities. In this way we would agree from a position of neutrality.

Will they burn Barnaby at the stake?

Rawls famously called this the "veil of ignorance". He claimed it would create a social contract that would be the most equal.

Who under a veil of ignorance — removing all self-interest — would not agree that private life is exactly that, private.
Kant and Rawls adopt a classically liberal position: that I am the author of my own life.
Harvard University philosopher Michael Sandel in his book Justice: What's The Right Thing To Do? writes: "It is precisely because we are free and independent selves that we need a framework of rights that is neutral among ends, that refuses to take sides in moral or religious controversies."
Sandel poses the question: If the state seeks to impose its morality, doesn't that lead to intolerance and coercion? As he says, it raises concerns about "religious fundamentalism past and present — stonings for adultery, mandatory burkas, Salem witch trials and so on".
Well, Barnaby Joyce may feel as if he is about to be burned at the political stake, and it raises questions about the imposition of morality.

Malcolm Turnbull's public vilification of his Deputy Prime Minister and the ministerial ban on sex with staff (so quickly and inelegantly dubbed the "bonking ban") hardly fits with ideas of moral autonomy.

But Mr Turnbull is not thinking about morality, he is thinking about politics.
The polls are already showing that the government is haemorrhaging over this scandal.
This is the problem with philosophy — it imagines a perfect world and that's not the one we live in.

Human nature 'moralistic and judgmental'

There is no veil of ignorance. As a society we make other peoples business our own.
As ethicist and psychologist, Jonathan Haidt, says in his book The Righteous Mind: Why Good People are Divided by Politics and Religion, "human nature is not just intrinsically moral, it is also intrinsically moralistic, critical and judgmental".
Haidt says this morality "binds and blinds". At our worst, he says, "We are indeed selfish hypocrites, so skilled at putting on a show of virtue that we fool even ourselves."

Joyce lost his moral authority

The scandal surrounding Barnaby Joyce's personal life has shattered his mystique and any authority, writes Andrew Probyn.

There are many people — journalists, politicians, the public — writing and speaking critically about Barnaby Joyce whose own lives may not withstand public scrutiny.

But the Deputy Prime Minister's attempts to reclaim his privacy ignores the words of writer Kennan Malik in his book The Quest For A Moral Compass: "Moral thought does not inhabit a sealed-off universe."
Michael Sandel's Harvard course on ethics is hailed as the most popular course in the university's history.
He also believes that separating moral scrutiny from community is impossible, writing: "Deciding important public questions while pretending to a neutrality that cannot be achieved is a recipe for resentment and backlash. A politics emptied of substantive moral engagement makes for an impoverished civic life."
Barnaby Joyce cannot even take refuge in Immanuel Kant. As Michael Sandel points out, the philosopher who spoke of moral autonomy himself opposed all sex except that in marriage.
Even when casual sex involved mutual satisfaction and consent, Kant wrote it "dishonours the human nature of each other. They make of humanity an instrument for the satisfaction of their lusts and inclinations".
A wicked problem indeed.

1975 - 37 years ago today .... and the liberal polititians are still just as disdainful of democracy

The dismissal of the Whitlam government on November 11, 1975, is singularly important to Australian history.

Even now, this severe test of our democratic institutions is poorly grasped. Our haziness around the facts has led to many rationalising the dismissal. These rationalisations focus on Whitlam's personality, his alleged lack of strategy or claims that the government was "disintegrating anyway".
None of this is adequate — these rationalisations show a troublingly casual disregard for democratic process.
But facing the facts of our past can teach us how to better face the present. Without a clear grasp of the facts, our interpretations of political events are bound to go astray.
In a time of "fake news", it is crucial that we remain committed to the facts — whether they tell us what we want to hear or not.
Here are five facts you need to know to understand why Whitlam's dismissal matters.

1. The 'supply crisis' was actually over

In the weeks before Whitlam's dismissal, the Senate was frozen. The Liberal opposition were starving the government of funds by repeatedly deferring the vote on its money bills, creating a "supply crisis".
In response, Whitlam called a half-Senate election. Governor-general John Kerr agreed and was exchanging draft documentation with Whitlam — it was already being announced on ABC radio's PM program.
The Liberal Coalition had used the same strategy to block the government in 1974. In response, Whitlam had consulted with then governor-general Paul Hasluck and called an election. The money bills were passed as soon as the election was called.
This sequence was about to be repeated in 1975. Instead, Kerr "ambushed" Whitlam, dismissing him just hours after he announced the Senate election.

2. Kerr's second dismissal

After Kerr sacked Whitlam, the House of Representatives met in the afternoon. Kerr's newly-appointed prime minister Malcolm Fraser was defeated in a "no confidence" motion.
By the afternoon, the Senate passed supply, resolving the supply crisis.

Next, the Speaker of the House went to advise the governor-general that the House had no confidence in the Fraser government.
Kerr simply refused to see the Speaker or receive the motion of no confidence.
In short, he rejected the democratic role of the House of Representatives in the making and unmaking of governments.
This, argues historian Jenny Hocking, was "Kerr's second dismissal: the dismissal of the Parliament".

3. Kerr believed he had a green light from Buckingham Palace

Kerr's recently released papers show he was seeking advice on using the "reserve powers" to dismiss Whitlam long before was previously revealed.
This included consultations with Prince Charles, the Queen, and the Queen's private secretary, Martin Charteris.
The Palace offered to delay Kerr's recall to help the governor-general sack Whitlam before Whitlam could sack him.
The Palace didn't counsel Kerr to consult with Whitlam, nor did it contact Whitlam. Kerr took this as a green light.

4. Fraser and Kerr were in secret phone contact

Former Liberal Senate leader Reg Withers recently revealed that Kerr had already decided to act against Whitlam in the week before November 11 and Fraser was aware.
In utter disregard for our constitution and political conventions, the pair were in secret phone contact the week before the dismissal.
Their deception around this was sustained for decades.

5. Two High Court justices secretly advised Kerr

In an egregious breach of the separation of powers, Chief Justices Garfield Barwick and Anthony Mason advised how to dismiss a government.

Kerr's papers show Mason secretly advised him for months leading up to the dismissal, and both during and after it.
Mason even drafted a letter of dismissal for Kerr.
Mason's central role was unknown before the release of Kerr's papers.
Kerr and Barwick — a former Liberal minister — colluded to deceive the public.
By focusing attention on Barwick, they shielded Mason from public view.
Christopher Pollard teaches philosophy and sociology at Deakin University.

Ageism

Euthanasia: How ageism warps the debate

By Jane Caro

The elderly are often called vulnerable, but they do not necessarily lose their common sense or their desire for autonomy as they age. (AAP/Glenn Hunt)

An elderly friend of mine (she is in her late 80s) has put together a very thorough suicide plan.

When she feels she has had enough or if she receives a diagnosis that offers nothing but decline, misery and suffering, she will take her own life.

She also plans to warn friends and family via a note on the door telling them not to enter but to call the police to save them from finding her body.

She talks about her plan very cheerfully. She is not a fool and knows that at her age death is not far away.

She simply wants to control her demise in the same way as she has controlled her life.

To her, it is about her dignity and her rights as an individual. She has repeated on many occasions that she particularly wants to avoid what she calls scornfully "lovely palliative care".

The very idea of that, she says, sends shivers down her spine.

The next major life event

Unsurprisingly, my friend is a passionate supporter of voluntary euthanasia. Among her peers, this is common.

Indeed, if you ever attend an event where the issue is debated you will see that the audience is full of grey heads. For them, death is not theoretical.

Younger people often regard death and dying as things that lie a long way in the future.

For the elderly, however, death is the next major event in a long life.

It is interesting to watch their reaction when a well-meaning medico or religious figure begins to give their reasons for not supporting the right to die.

Sometimes the angry mutterings are audible. My friend is given to asking forthright and blunt questions at such forums, designed to make her opponents squirm.

It is my observation that people do not get more biddable as they get older. On the contrary, many of their inhibitions seem to disappear and they can become quite confrontational.

They need to.

Vulnerable isn't a synonym for older

Recently, I helped launch a research report by The Benevolent Society (not, I hasten to add, an official supporter of euthanasia) about the attitudes that drive ageism.

As I read the report, it struck me how much ageism plays its part in the way elderly people are talked about in the euthanasia debate.

They are often called the "vulnerable" elderly and much attention is given to their fears about being a burden on either their children or society. There is a concern that frail older people could be coerced into ending their lives.

Some of these concerns are important but good, comprehensive legislation with sensible and strict guidelines should be able to protect people from such unscrupulous and rare pressure.

However, old people do not necessarily lose their common sense or their desire for autonomy as they age and nor should they lose their rights to make their own decisions.

They do not become wrinkly, grey-haired children with the passing of the years.

Patronising begins at 60

I have noticed since I turned 60 and my hair has gone quite grey, a tendency for some younger men (taxi drivers are particularly guilty) to call me "dear".

I sense it is the beginning of the belittling that inevitably accompanies ageing.

Even the exaggerated awe that greets older people who still run marathons or swing dance carries is a form of talking down to the old. Just because I am getting older and greyer does not mean I am losing my marbles or am any less deserving of being taken seriously.

Perhaps that is why the elderly mutter so furiously as they watch those younger than themselves discuss their rights to decide their own fate. They feel that they are not being taken seriously. They — quite rightly — feel patronised and condescended and they resent it. We will too, if we are lucky enough to live as long as they have.

Worse, the way their independence and autonomy is so easily dismissed, the way they are stereotyped as somehow no longer capable of making their own decisions, only confirms their fears about being at the mercy of such people when they are at their most vulnerable.

A sense of control

Older people are among the fiercest supporters of the voluntary euthanasia legislation currently before both the NSW and Victorian parliaments.

In 2013, men aged 85 and over had the highest rate of suicide by any age group in Australia. If my friend is any guide elderly women may soon not be far behind them.

But suicide means people leaving this world before they need to, and necessarily leaving it when they are alone.

Worse, it may mean some people killing themselves unnecessarily.

Many years ago now, when she was much younger, my friend had a serious operation.

She was given a morphine drip which allowed her to administer a dose of the painkiller whenever she felt the need. She found she hardly ever used it because the mere fact of knowing she was in control was enough.

Perhaps that is all most of us seek when we face the end of our lives. A sense that we — not the doctors, not the clergy, not the Government, not our children or even our partner — get to decide how we go.