- cross-posted to:
- news@beehaw.org
- cross-posted to:
- news@beehaw.org
Australians have resoundingly rejected a proposal to recognise Aboriginal people in its constitution and establish a body to advise parliament on Indigenous issues.
Saturday’s voice to parliament referendum failed, with the defeat clear shortly after polls closed.
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As an American, it’s nice to know we’re not the only pieces of shit out there.
Oh it’s not just us.
UK, and Canada have sordid pasts as well.
UK
Where do you think the US learned it from?
Where do you think Australian colonialism comes from?
I LEARNED IT FROM YOU, MOM AND DAD! 😭😭
You can throw the French, Spanish, Dutch, and Portuguese in there too
You mean… the UK. Given that the USA, Canada and Australia were all British colonies, ergo the same past.
Yeah but no because we are talking about today and not the 1700s.
“sordid pasts”
“bUT WE’re tAlkiNg aBouT TodAy!”
🤦 goddamn you’re an idiot.
eLOquEnT
So, are we talking about the past or today? Make up your mind. 🤦 seriously, how do you remember to breathe in the morning?
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Yeah but this is the present.
Canada is actively shitty to their indigenous people.
I’m from the UK so I can vouch that the government are actively shitty to it’s not rich people.
If I want to explain the class system to someone from a former colony, I start with colonialism, but practised at home.
As is the US. Let’s have a threesome!
Down 😊
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It could be ignorance, but as a Canadian of European descent, I’d have claimed we were passively shitty more than actively shitty.
Sorry to yell you, but Canada has been, and still is, actively shitty to the indigenous peoples. Just more polite about it in public.
And that is why I am soo embarrassed, and shocked, and dissappointed, and
Pretty much any white person who doesn’t live in Europe is guilty of these atrocities.
That’s not how generations or guilt works.
Quite honestly it was a very confusing referendum. The question seemed simple on the surface but as soon as you ask questions very quickly it was hard to find answers. I think this confusion is the reason the majority voted no, they were scared to choose yes for something they didn’t understand. I tried to understand and still couldn’t find a straight answer of what this referendum was actually about.
The confusion definitely wasn’t helped by the large amounts of deliberate misinformation being put out there about the intention of the Voice, and requests for specificity.
And then the apparently contradictory arguments (often by the very same person, within the same argument) that it was too much, and therefore privileged indigenous Australians over other Australians, and yet also not enough, and would therefore achieve nothing at all. Or that more information needed to be provided, or more often, that specifics needed to be pre-decided and included within the wording (overlooking that those specifics would then be enshrined in the constitution and largely unchangeable ever again)
An argument to paralyse everyone along the decision spectrum who wasn’t already in the yes camp or no camps.
To answer your question, the voice was essentially a yes or no to creating a constitutionally recognised body of indigenous Australians, that could lobby Government and Parliament of behalf of indigenous Australians on issues concerning indigenous Australians.
To use an extended analogy:
It would be similar to a board meeting of a large company asking their shareholders to agree to a proposal to create a position within the company of “Disabilities, Diversity, and Equity Officer”, and have that position enshrined within the company’s charter, to enable a dedicated representative to make representions on behalf of those that fall under those categories, as they all tend to be in minority groups whose needs or ideas don’t tend to be (on average) reflected or engaged with by existing company processes or mainstream society. And that the position be held by someone within one of those minority groups.
Sure, an individual employee could take an issue to their supervisor (i.e. the Government/parliament), but that supervisor rightly has a need to observe the needs of the company (its voters) and the majority of employees (the average Australian), and the thought that a policy might not actually be effective for person Y would likely not even occur to the supervisor, as it seems to work for the majority of employees anyway, and they’re not raising any issues. The supervisor is unlikely to go proactivelly asking employee Y’s opinion on implementing X policy when they feel they already understand what employee a, b, c and d etc. want out of the policy.
Even if employee Y brings up an issue directly with the supervisor, the supervisor is structurally unlikely to take it on board or give it much weight, as it’s a single employee vs the multitude of other employees who are fine with the policy as is. And listening involves extra work, let alone actually changing anything as a result.
Having a specific Disability/Diversity/Equity officer not only allows employee Y an alternative chain of communication to feel like they’re being seen, and their concerns heard (which has important implications for their sense of self worth, participation, and mutual respect in the company), but the fact that it’s a specified company position within the company’s charter means the supervisor is much more likely to give that communication from that position much more weight, and consider it more carefully, than if that random, singular enployee Y had just tried to tell the supervisor directly.
The Disability/Diversity/Equity officer doesn’t have the power to change rules, or implement anything by fiat. He can only make representations to the company and give suggestions for how things could be better. The supervisor and company still retain complete control of decision making and implementation, but the representations from the DDE officer could help the company and supervisor create or tweak policy and practices that work for an extra 10-15% of employees, and therefore a total of 85% of the company’s employees, instead of the previous 70%.
Now, would you expect that the company provide the shareholders with exact details of: what hours the DDE officer will have, how much they’ll be paid, what room of what building they’ll operate on, how they’ll be allowed or expected to communicate with others in the organisation, etc? With the expectation that all this additional information will be entered into the company charter on acceptance, unchangeable except at very rare full General Meetings of all shareholders held every 2 or 3 decades?
No. They just ask the shareholders if they’re on board with creating a specific position of Disability/Diversity/Equity officer, and that its existence be noted and enshrined in the company charter so the position can’t be cut during an economic downturn, or easily made redundant and dismissed if an ideologically driven CEO just didn’t like the idea of having a specific Disability/Equity officer position in the company.
Agreed, there were too many “then what?” when you start to ask questions. On the surface, yep, sounds good to me! But “how does that help?” or “what would they do?” or “who picks them?” lead to some pretty piss poor answers.
I think the biggest red flag for people was that a large portion (possibly not the majority) of the Aboriginals that had a platform of some kind were against it themselves. Why?
that a large portion (possibly not the majority)
Not the majority. Not close. Less than 20%.
In retrospect Albanese made a big mistake breaking his own rule in being a small target and “taking Australia with you” on big changes. I suspect this will be a bit of a “told you so” moment for the section of the Labor party agitating for bigger social and economic initiatives.
We’re both born from Western colonialism and converted into capitalism
Western colonialism was capitalism, have a wee read about the East India Company for starters
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Finland also has quite a bad history with Sami people. Not quite as savage as US and Indians but still.
English and thr Irish… it’s savage all the way down.
We really need to move on from this divisive attitude that people who don’t vote the way we do, especially with such a clear democratic majority, are necessarily ‘pieces of shit’. Life and politics are more complicated than that and more politically informed left-leaning voters should know better.
Except it is often the case they are pieces of shit.
Sane people don’t vote for Clive or Pauline, for example.
Perfectly sane people do. I wouldn’t, but I don’t denigrate others’ sanity based on their political views. This is how you inflame and stifle debate, which only fuels ignorance.
No, they don’t. No-one sane does.
It was a vote on whether one specific group of people based on race should have a say in parliament that no other race would have.
A lot of people in Australia seen that as racist and a way to divide the population.
Australians voted to remain in a system where everyone has an equal vote and voice in parliament.
The headline is very obviously misleading and not what people who voted no actually thought.
It’s important to note a lot of Aboriginals voted no and we’re campaigning for no. As such the left/internet whoever have jumped on the bandwagon about something they don’t understand.
You moron everyone else has a voice: it’s called the house of representatives. This was a body specifically to advise on indigenous issues, primarily because they live in remote communities and are therefore under-represented. A lot of money goes their way each year from the federal budget for purposes decided by old white men who live in cities, so why not have an indigenous body advise on where that money gets spent? Seems a lot less wasteful to me.
Your home is now mine and I just had a vote if you should have any say at all in anything. It failed. So you have no say. Move out tomorrow. Equal rights to everyone!
American cultural hegemony tends to influence the world. If we go farther to the right, the world tends to follow. If American exported cultural propaganda didn’t work, the world would have condemned us years ago.
If I never heard again about an American being grateful/surprised/emotion that other humans are just like the humans from the US, I would begin to suspect that simulation theory is real and that there’s a huge glitch in the matrix. So, thanks for confirming this is all very real again, I guess.
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Yeah, nah. It was an oppurtunity for aboriginal and Torres straight islanders to be heard.
There has been years of inner dialogue, and discussion with both parties. That led to the Uluṟu statement from the heart, which called for voice, treaty, truth.
The first step was voice. It was not designed by white people but came from within the discussions between mobs.
It was not divisive or destroying equality. As it stands, the constitution was changed to allow Lars specifically targeting ATSI people. This was a way to ensure they had a voice of reply. On all measures, they are faring worse than all other Australians.
Many people voted no with good intent, or because they were unsure, but make no mistake, this was a step backwards for our country, a step backwards in race relations and a victory for racists.
I’m not saying all those who voted no are racist. However, all the racists voted no. Sometimes you need to look at who’s on your side and why.
There’s a lot to break down about your post with half truths but it’s a perfect microcosm of the Yes campaign and why it failed.
What are “mobs?”
An Aboriginal community.
Huh, in the US we use it as a term for a violent group of people. Does it not mean that in Australia?
In the US a “mob” isn’t necessarily violent. You have peaceful mobs, and even just generic “mobs of people everywhere”. A mob is just a group of people.
In the US a mob is also a type of crime organisation.
In Australia it means the exact same thing. However, in addition to that, it can also mean something else, thanks to the actual meaning (a group of people) and context.
AI controlled monsters that you kill for exp and loot.
Copy paste is working over time, iddnt it
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:’(
Sadly unsurprising.
I personally didn’t pay close attention to the campaigns, and think it pretty obvious Australia has a fair way to go on indigenous issues, but my impression is also that the Yes campaign was poorly executed and thought through, failing, in part, to recognise how much of an uphill climb it was going to be and how easy the No campaign was going to be. For instance, while reading the ballot, I was taken aback by how vague and confusing the proposal was, despite having read it before.
Otherwise, I’m hoping there’s a silver lining in the result where it will prompt an ongoing conversation about what actually happened and get the country closer to getting better at this.
There was a massive, heavily funded FUD campaign by the “no” proponents. Sadly, it was very effective.
Yeah as soon as I heard the “if you don’t know vote no” slogan I knew it was already over… this one line just forgives people for being racist.
I’m not saying every No vote was racist just that many would have been and this made it so fucking easy for them to feel no guilt.
Yea that’s kinda what I meant. The No campaign here was pretty easy to cook up I think. And for the Liberal party it was a very attractive chance to kick the Labor govt down no matter the cause.
Which means, IMO, if you were going to do this, you had to be ready for all of that and not rely on calls to be “be on the right side of history”. Australia isn’t there and needs convincing, unfortunately.
The mining lobby seems to be behind it too - they stand to lose a lot if Aboriginal rights are given more credence.
The mining lobby in Australia is behind everything.
Don’t forget agriculture too!
Clive Palmer dropped (at least) $2 mill on the No campaign. That says a lot about what it’s worth.
Not to mention that the bar for a referendum to pass is very high. For the non-Australians, you need not only a majority of voters nationally to vote yes, but also a majority of states to vote yes (the so-called “double majority”). Only 8 of the last 44 referendums before now have passed and partisan referendums have never passed, so this one was doomed the minute Dutton decided to play politics with it.
I wish somebody had said that about Brexit.
The yes campaign did it to itself with its vague and questionable impact.
The mining lobby funded some of the yes campaign and then proceeded to put out those vague and questionable messages. They really played both sides very effectively.
I have no doubt they had vested interests because the cultural sites get in their way (that’s reparations of its own!).
The yes vague campaign started day 1, that was on them entirely. They were proposing changing the constitution with very little detail out of the gate. Conducting and listening to a pole would have helped immensely.
The weight of the media was against them from day 1. It doesn’t really matter what your messaging is if it doesn’t get reported. What did get reported was whatever Murdoch’s news media wanted to be reported, and if they reported the “yes” side only in terms of weak points then that’s what people think the “yes” side had to say.
ABC ran non stop opinion pieces and articles on the yes vote. None stop from before the referendum was announced. The guardian same game. Early on the no campaign had no idea where or how they were going to oppose the vote. They just knew they were.
So no I kindly disagree the yes campaign can’t cry fowl here the no campaign didn’t find its feet until the last maybe week or two.
I agree that Labor very badly misread the room. I’m a bit grumpy about it TBH.
I don’t think Australia is really ready for a meaningful conversation about issues relating to first Australians - hell, I’m not if I’m really honest.
They will be ready when there are no indigenous people left.
Tasmania taking point on this.
That’s perpetuating the racist myth that Tasmanian Aboriginal people were exterminated entirely. The Black War in Tassie arguably was a genocide but there are some Indigenous descendants today.
But with Tasmania’s functional literacy below fifty percent (never mind two-thirds of the island’s population being welfare dependent), it’s never going to be the centre of intellectual discourse of any kind in this country.
So… you agree then? That Tasmania has done more / come closer to achieving that horrific goal than other states?
I didn’t say “exterminated entirely”. I said “taking point”. As in leading the nation (state-wise).
I can understand the misunderstanding from an implication - but remembering the Black War is a good way to help fight against it happening again.
I mean, to be perfectly fair it happened in the Van Diemen’s Land colony, around seventy years before statehood, it was far from the only atrocity committed against Aboriginal people, and Indigenous Tasmanians were in a much worse state (no pun intended) at the time than those on the mainland. But if you want to add it to the list of Tasmania’s achievements alongside those othet two nation-leading measures I mentioned, I won’t stand in your way!
Iirc it was a very popular idea when it was first proposed, but a bunch of right-wingers spent a shitton of money spreading misinformation which swung it towards being unpopular.
Once again, the right-wing is responsible for being garbage people.
60% of the country voted against it. Your attribution of this to the media alone is juvenile.
Bruh, over the past 6-7 years we’ve been shown time and time again how incredibly powerful media manipulation is, both when it comes to traditional media and social media. Seriously?
Even 10 years ago the topic of this referendum would have been political suicide. Remember Rudd got crucified for apologising. It’s actually pretty positive that this referendum, as poorly executed as it was, actually happened.
I’m sorry, I’m stupid and not up-to-date with this.
Taken at face value, Constitutional Recognition for the indigenous population sounds correct.
So what was wrong with it?
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Thank you. But I’m still not sure I get it. Could you maybe give an example of what kind of lie or fear mongering would make people want to say:
“No, I don’t want the constitution to recognise that there were an indigenous people here before us.”
That seems like an unarguable fact, isn’t it?
I’m sorry, I don’t mean to put you on the spot but since you were kind enough to take the time to give an overview, it makes me hungry for more detail!
The referendum was (if I understand it correctly) about adding an advisory body of indigenous people to parliament. This wouldn’t have given them any power to make decisions, only to advise parliament on things.
The No Campaign just straight up lied to people saying it would let them write laws, take away your land, etc…
I see, thank you (and to everyone else who responded).
First off to be precise, this was a ”proposal to recognise Aboriginal people in its constitution and establish a body to advise parliament on Indigenous issues".
Some examples of what I think were sadly effective for the no campaign:
“This will allow indigenous peoples to reclaim your land”
“It will only further divide our nation”
“We don’t know how this might be misused”
These all play on peoples fear. On the other hand some indigenous peoples also were campaigning for a no vote, primarily because they thought it wasn’t strong enough.
This gave voters a lot of reasons to hide behind while voting no.
And all this was not helped by a rather poor yes campaign that barely did anything to address misconceptions.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-07-19/fact-check-yes-no-campaign-pamphlets-aec/102614710
There’s the bare bones of the thing. The yes side had the exact same grasp of messaging that the Democrats in the US do. Which is to say none.
Amazing this was posted 4 days after the in person voting… how is an Aussie meant to make an informed choice when the data comes after the voting day?
The referendum was yesterday. We have early access polling, access to which has increased since the pandemic, but most people still typically vote on the election day, as I did, which was yesterday - so an article from 19 July is plenty of notice for most people.
Not sure what you mean, the linked article was from months ago and the in person vote was yesterday. People had plenty of time to decide to make an informed choice and many decided not to.
by reading literally anything or listening to one of the dozens of speeches on the topic.
Arguments included:
“If you don’t know, say no” Incredibly reductionist, could be used to justify any position, but a very effective soundbite. It’s only when you extrapolate it, that you realise the issues. Imagine if someone told you “If you don’t know whether a girl/boy will say yes to you, never ask them out on a date”. Uncertainty is an inherent part of most of human nature. A lot less humans would be born if no one had the presence of mind to find out more about whether a person liked them, or just took a gamble and asked for a date.
“This will allow aboriginals to claim and take your land” Because Australia was declared “terra nullus” on ‘discovery’, and therefore regarded as uninhabited under English law, colonisers basically took and claimed all the land and dispossesed the Native Australians. And ever since, there’s been a resistance to recognising prior ownership and use by native Australians, because that might threaten current ownership of land. No one wants land and property they own to be arbitrarily taken away from them with no recompense (ironic, yes?), so it’s very easy to create fear in current landowning/propertyowning Australians by saying increased recognition of indigenous Australians in any form could have their land taken from them and given back to indigenous Australians.
“This will be a 3rd chamber of parliament” There are currently two houses of Parliament of government, in which candidates are voted and elected by a majority of their constituents. The houses form the core mechanics of how laws are created, debated and enacted. By portraying the proposed advisory body as a 3rd legislative body on par with the 2 existing houses, and pointing out the body was to be formed from indigenous Australians, the no campaign capitalised on fears of changing our entire political system, and the false impression of giving indigenous Australians incredibly disproportionste and unfair weighting within the political system.
“Enshrining a specific ‘political’ body made up of only indigenous Australians in the constitution makes us unequal, because they don’t do that for other Australians”. This one tries to capitalise on feelings of equality, and therefore fairness. Because I don’t get X, they shouldn’t have X. And neatly creates the assumption that the status quo is equal, so why change it. Ignoring that indigenous Australians are a very small percent of population, and therefore less than 5% or so of the voting population, so unlikely to ever form an effective voting bloc or have their needs and desires reflected in mainstream politics like the average Australian might. Also, the statistics for quality of life are extremely poor when compared to the average Australian, in terms of social and financial mobility, education, health, prison incarceration rates, birth complication rates etc. The average life expectancy of an indigenous Australian is at least 8 years lower than the average Australian. These have been persistent gaps in societal outcomes that haven’t closed despite decades of government focus and money, hence trying something new, like the Voice.
“It won’t do anything, so there’s no point creating it” The argument was that this body has no executive powers, and can only talk ‘at’ the government, and there’s no obligation in the current wording in the referendum, that the government even needs to listen. So it won’t achieve anything at all, it will be useless and ineffective.
“It does too much” The argument was that it was too powerful, and would put too much unequal power in the hands of indigenous Australians, and that it would therefore be unfair and unequal. That it would allow indigenous Australians to create laws, change them, create treaties between them and Australia, recognise indigenous land rights etc.
Lots more out there, but that’s it for now from me
This makes sense, thank you for taking the time to explain.
The problem is you’re trying to rationalise racism, which isn’t rational.
The democratic result was clear. Assuming it was all about racism is so reductive that you’re stultifying your own outlook by simplifying a more complex issue.
Then go look it up, lazy. That other person has no obligation to teach you a customized course on the Australian referendum to recognize indigenous peoples. Use the internet that you’re reading their post with to look it up yourself if you’re so hungry for detail. I’d be willing to bet you can find scanned copies of each pamphlet if you tried. I’d Google it to find out for sure, but then you’d want me to read them to you.
How would someone unfamiliar with Australia, unfamiliar with our laws, unfamiliar with our methods of referenda get the information better from the pamphlets over asking Australians?
The pamphlets have falsehoods. They are released by the election commission. People not from Australia would assume it is verified information if it’s in an election commission pamphlet, for instance.
Rather than being helpful, your comment in unnecessarily combative, while being confidently incorrect.
I dont understand people who complaining about other people asking simple questions. What a waste of time to make such a pointless and angry reply.
Your point is a valid one, so I’ll answer it. Initially I did use Google. I was overloaded with a mash-up of sites from which it would have been difficult to resolve right from wrong. As this doesn’t relate to my country I’d have simply moved on.
Instead, I feel much more informed from all the considered, well-written responses which people were kind enough to write here.
I’d say an excuse for politics to ignore indigenous issues for another decade by placating the white masses for the next few election cycles would be a lil worse.
Also generations of non-ATSI Australian children being taught total dehumanising racist bullshit, and never being corrected largely because the genocide was very successful.
A society can’t just start trying to correct some of the history taught to children over the last few years, and then be surprised by the outcome of a referendum when success relies on the judgement of people who grew up on the old lies. Correcting the record for the next generation is necessary, but it doesn’t fix the existing damage the lies have done and continue to do.
I don’t know what Labor was thinking when they took this path. From the outside it looks like a huge unforced strategic failure.
Shit’s fucked and there are no simple solutions and I hate it.
Our history is shameful but also our efforts to redress past wrongs recurrent and inspiring. Negativity about a well-intentioned referendum helps nobody. I’ll note that this was driven by the Labor Party, not by Indigenous Australians, who don’t trust the good intentions of politicians who carried out policies like the Stolen Generations on behalf of the poor unfortunate blacks of the time. The road to hell is paved with good intentions.
Leaving the moral arguments aside, there were also massive campaign failures on the Yes side. No had two clear cheerleaders with an absurdly simple catchphrase: “If you don’t know, vote No”. Meanwhile Yes didn’t have a star for the campaign and had made the amendment way too simple/general so there weren’t any included details of the practicalities. So they ended up with 100 people having to re-explain their plans every campaign stop and occasionally tripping over each other’s messages. As a result, the complicated sell from Yes played right into No‘s hands.
So the No side’s campaign was one of deliberately not educating people? To me that just says that people educated on the subject are voting Yes.
While that may be an absurdly simple slogan, it is also absurdly stupid.
The only Territory to vote yes, out of all our States and Territories, was the Australian Capital Territory which is the most educated and most involved with governance.
uni educated people overwhelmingly voted yes. so yep pretty much
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Also, the Yes slogan eventually became “if you don’t know - find out” and “just Google it”.
Just Google it, the advice you always hear when the other person is shutting down any more conversation. What an unfortunate result
“Google it” vs “no”. The point of the slogan was to highlight a) how the other side was shutting down the conversation and b) that their premise of ignorance was stupid, in a short pithy way.
It wasn’t saying “go find out”, so much as “you CAN find out if you care, there is no reason to not know”
That said, without question, the Yes campaign’s official messages were pretty poor. Supporters have been far more eloquent.
On the “just google it” topic, this short video was brilliantly well done: https://youtube.com/watch?v=SAqIypjk-5A
Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
https://piped.video/watch?v=SAqIypjk-5A
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I’m open-source; check me out at GitHub.
Which isn’t in any way how it works. You’re making the claim, you sell it. I’m not going digging to make someone’s claim on their behalf.
It is how “it” works, where “it” is “mock reductionist ignorance worshipping”.
You are correct on all counts.
The ‘No’ campaign was largely nonexistent. The ‘Yes’ campaign was enough reason to vote ‘No’. And the ‘No’ voters are just as educated as ‘Yes’ voters. It’s just that some people can’t understand why other people would disagree with them.
Didn’t get a single flyer from the yes campaign, the no campaign, however. Just depends on where you live
Some are educated, some are racist - no reason they can’t be both.
It’s easy to understand ignorance and racism.
(There’s a third option, and that’s for the mining magnates like Clive who want less complaining about digging up sacred sites)
It’s clear that most of the people responding to you are being deceptive and crying ‘racism’ to make themselves feel superior.
This was not a referendum to recognise indigenous people. Whomever titled this article is a liar. It was a referendum to create an advisory body that makes representations to parliament to support a specific race. Contrary to the holier-than-thou crowd around here, many people voted ‘No’ because they do not agree with permanently enshrining this in the Constitution.
It had nothing to do with race, how someone could be against something as simple and inoffensive as an advisory body is beyond me
I never saw any arguments against the Voice that weren’t either simplistic ideology (“it’s racist to have an advisory body for indigenous people!”) or outright lies and conspiracy theories. Claiming that it wouldn’t have gone far enough isn’t a good argument to do nothing instead. Does anyone really think that a treaty is more likely now than if we had voted yes?
Well technically a treaty doesn’t need a referendum but given the strong no result it could be political suicide, a risk I hope the Albanese government is willing to take
race‘cultural group’Still not race, infact it didn’t even require that the members were first nations peoole
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The referendum isn’t about recognition of the indigenous population. That was 1967, which overwhelmingly passed.
This referendum was to add into the constitution that a body (a group of people) that represents the voice of indigenous and Torres strait Islander people must exist.
That’s it.
The obfuscation occurred when people expected more from it, which a constitution does not do. That’s a legislative power, which the current government of the time will then determine how the body is made up, how people will be chosen for the Voice etc. Additionally, there was a huge misinformation campaign and we have a media monopoly with an agenda here, so many, many people voted No as a result of the confusion.
The No vote was very, very largely done in good conscience. I firmly believe that these voters want what’s best for Australia and I’m glad for that. I wish it was a Yes, but hopefully this will spur more conversation on what we can do to bridge the gap.
A decade ago our PM said sorry. Twenty years ago we were told the gap in life expectancy would be closed. One of our most famous moments in history is a PM giving old Lingari a handfull of dirt.
The majority of indigenous people I’ve spoken to have said they’re voting no or don’t care. Another empty gesture to placate the white population for another election cycle isn’t what we need. An official voice that can make recommendations to the same governing body that has oppressed them for a century and to this day continue to ignore or obfuscate the most basic voices of reason from academics, human rights experts and elders?.. Yeah nah fuck that for a solution.
I didn’t vote because I think each country should decide how and if they want to be incorporated into the Western system. The polarisation in the media compared to the results on the day make me think I made the right choice. Australians famous laconic apathy is ripe for spin masters to manipulate by only giving extreme minority groups the mic and as usual the actual victims are doubly fucked.
It was never “a solution”, it was “part of solution”. The world isn’t so simple.
Theoretically… Yes.
So what, precisely, do the actual victims want?
More autonomy and self determination is a big one. More so than land rights or any sort of reparations in my experience, but different regions face very different issues. Unless we’re just looking for a token gesture, it’s a bit daft to lump a hundred diverse aboriginal countries together and expect them to all agree.
The only case against it was that at best it would be symbolic, as if there isn’t dozens of symbolic bodies around the world providing suggestions to governments that are nothing more than just that, being another opinion on a matter.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-07-19/fact-check-yes-no-campaign-pamphlets-aec/102614710
Absolutely nothing. Just racists being racist.
Not racist, merely conservative. I voted yes but it’s important to separate political observations instead of lumping them all together as “just racists being racist”. It’s dumb.
That attitude cost the Yes vote. Idiots couldn’t organise a root in a brothel.
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The amendment if full,
i. there shall be a body, to be called the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice;
ii. the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice may make representations to the Parliament and the Executive Government of the Commonwealth on matters relating to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples;
iii. the Parliament shall, subject to this Constitution, have power to make laws with respect to matters relating to the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice, including its composition, functions, powers and procedures
So… No. Your friend is full of shit. It provides no powers whatsoever.
The same parliament ignoring indigenous voices for a century will be the only one free to listen to “the” indigenous voice.
Your friend was wrong. All it required was that a designated group of people be consulted with to discuss an issue - if they wanted to discuss it. There was no veto power attached or any other additional rights or privileges conveyed.
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https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-07-19/fact-check-yes-no-campaign-pamphlets-aec/102614710
Try again. Your friend was lied to.
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Now that two people have shattered the circlejerk you live in are you going to reassess anything? Maybe let your Australian friend know that he was duped too.
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The majority of Australians are decendant from the colonists, an they’re against it. They’re never going to leave
Majority of people here descended from people who arrived well after the colonists. About a third of us were born overseas. Around half have a parent born overseas.
Would the Aboriginals think differently about the colonists who arrived first, second, last?
You’re really righteous for an ignorant bastard.
It’s always so funny when Americans on here, including me, are openly willing to discuss how shitty, racist, and full of bigots the United States is. Around 40% of the population is complete filth and we’re happy to openly acknowledge that.
Meanwhile, Canada, the UK, and Australian users, even if they’re on the left, try to find excuses to not acknowledge that their general public is also significantly racist and bigoted. And always have been.
Lefty Canuck here - Very willing to admit my country is full of racist pieces of shit. And so is every other country. 30% of the world is made up of trash humans who would fuck over their mother for a dollar, or to get to their destination 10 seconds faster.
You’re being very generous there.
Afraid I have to agree on the UK front. It shocks me how so many people refer to the UK as a multicultural, tolerant nation.
London, Bristol, Leeds, Liverpool, and Birmingham, perhaps? Outside of maybe 5-8 major cities, the amount of sexism, racism, and general hate for anyone poor or not of Anglo origin is unreal.
I remain weirded out that the racist response during Brexit was a bunch of harassment of Polish immigrants.
Why Polish? I assume it has to be some internal thing that the rest of the world doesn’t have information about.
The Polish people are like the Mexicans (previously Irish) are to the US. They’re foreigners who move to another country to do manual work cheaper than locals are willing to.
In the words of one of my favourite comedians “They’re going to come over here and take all of the jobs we didn’t want to do!”
I’m Australian and I acknowledge the levels of racism. I think it’s the racists who think it’s not racist here. One guy told me he wasn’t racist, his hatred and disdain for ALL aboriginal people was valid because he had had traumatic experiences, first hand. (makes me so freaking angry even typing this) his traumatic experiences were absolute bullshit. Racists justify thier racism as “a valid explanation” so they don’t call themselves racists. So if people are saying it’s not racist here you’re probably talking to the racists. And Facebook. I also blame Facebook for this.
The Canadian government loves to advertise how open and inclusive they are, while at the same time oppressing indigenous people. For example (although it was a while ago, I don’t think a lot has changed), the Oka crisis started over a Golf Course wanting to expand into indigenous territory, which the Canadian Government eventually deployed the military (largest deployment since WWII) to support… the Golf Course.
Even elected representatives have to deal with racist bullshit while serving their country (like Mumilaaq Qaqqaq of Nunavut). It’s so intertwined in Canadian society it often isn’t recognized, likely because for the most part it isn’t overt. A lot of the racism is subtle, reinforced by inequitable laws & policies and almost always acted on if there’s plausible deniability (that is, unless they screw up). It’s almost like a lot of Canadians are politely racist.
The origin of the horsy police was to control indigenous peoples and take their children away to residential schools. Not much has changed in the meantime. They just pretend to police in the off hours when they aren’t ignoring forced sterilizations and disappearances of native women, giving starlight tours, and pointing AR-15s at unarmed protestors in their own homes on behalf of the oil pipeline companies.
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I think the term you’re looking for is covert racism.
I think it’s a cultural difference honestly.
I’ve only travelled the US, haven’t spent a significant amount of time there, about 6 weeks.
I’m Australian and growing up, I was quite shocked to learn at different points of my life that a few fair people were actually racist, sexist, very right or even religious.
These things just aren’t overly openly discussed. Maybe in small groups etc but a lot of the population are quite apathetic (a whole other issue) and I think there apathetic tendencies both mask their own racism or whateverism but also make them not really speak out against others.
On the other hand, America embraces individuality, fame, speaking out and standing up for your rights etc. As a whole, I feel a racist American is far more in your face than a racist Australian.
I’m curious to know if this vote really is a racist result or if a large percentage of the population got caught up with the ‘no campaign’ which was pushing things like ‘separating us in the constitution is going to create a divide, we are ALL Australians’ etc.
Interesting none the less and a shit result.
The 1967 amendment already did that. But yes, the campaigns were about the voice, not recognition of first nations people
The difference is our electoral system doesn’t let the 30% of racist pieces of shit run the entire country.
Fair enough. I think every democracy needs to have the compulsory voting system that Australia does.
The perceptual downside to the system though is that it definitively and accurately tells you out of the entire population the amount that are bigoted POS’.
There were many ATSI people who voted no because they want treaty, not an advisory committee with no veto powers.
Not everyone who voted no is racist and proclaiming they are is far more reminiscent of US divisive politics than how Australian politics works.
So, the problem is it didn’t change the political process enough?
For progressive no voters, that is correct.
There is of course an element of society who want to ignore or bury any discourse on issues impacting ATSI Australians but they’re not the full picture either.
First person who’s bothered to try and understand the result rather than denouncing the country. The No campaign was deliberately divisive, like Abbott’s 2013 election or Howard’s manipulation of the republic referendum in 1999. Not only that, lack of political engagement and awareness - most embarrassingly from our most prominent left party, the Greens, who get so embroiled in internecine disputes that they seem not to really get what a political party does. The LNP may not be doing well at the moment but they’re a true coalition and trusted voting bloc.
In short, people just don’t want to run headlong into progressive politics without thinking it through. We’re tired of government interference following years of lockdowns, don’t trust our state and federal governments because of repeated betrayal by the Morrison government and broken promises there and elsewhere, and Indigenous people were divided and made the perfect the enemy of the good.
This is the inherent flaw in democracy in general. If most people are shit, the government will also be shit
That’s why access to quality education is tantamount to functioning democracy.
Maybe not but we just saw that it’s a fuckin’ lot more than just 30 for you guys!
You actually think 55% of Australians are racist?
You understand that the vast majority of No voters voted that way because they didn’t understand what it was, and the No campaign very deliberately did everything they could to make it unclear and confusing.
yeah nah cus. we’re racist as and generally the progressives are willing to admit it.
Our cities don’t have shit like the stark divide I saw over in Atlanta Georga usa where there’s like the black side and the white side (was 20 years ago, better now?) but like even in sydney we have the red rooster line. Beyond that the wealthy east likes to assume everyone on the other more non white migrant side is an ignorant moron.
But especially to blackfellas we’re horrible. I remember being told not to walk down streets because an “abbo” lived there as a kid. Like what the flying faaaark?
I’m Canadian and yeah… Even IRL a lot of people refuse to admit it.
I’ve been forced to educate people about the Chinese Head Tax and the 2 very distinct Chinese Exclusion Acts and how that on top of Yellow Peril still affects Chinese disapora today in government regulations including immigration and social programs, which is super traumatic as a Hong Kong diaspora who is also trans, queer, female-bodied, and neurodivergent.
Let’s just stop trying out new referenda, OK?
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If the Yes campaign are serious about the Voice to the nation being important to the Indigenous people, then no-one is standing in the way of making it happen. The vote to enshrine it in the Constitution failed, but the body can still be created and can still function primarily the same.
yeah until the Liberals dismantle it. again.
No until it turns corrupt like what most of these bodies inevitably do. But I guess it’s racist to ask if there will be a framework to oversee and manage corruption.
Yeah mate, the lnp is concerned about corruption. That’s what leads them to tear down every proposal. It’s corruption.
I mean, yeah - didn’t you read the proposed legislation released back in March?
The whole topic is now radioactive. No politician will touch it for at least the next 10 years.
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New to the subject here: why is it a desirable thing to recognise Aboriginal people in the Constitution?
As I read through the article in the Aboriginal camp not everyone wants this. So I’m puzzled.
A sad day for Australia. It was cool to see a lot if Australian celebrities come out in support of a yes vote.
Yeah this fucking sucks. I have to admit I was expecting Yes to win by a landslide, but I guess I give people too much credit.
Australia does not like referendums.
It was a constitutional change. Yes campaign was nothing more than virtual signalling with vague impact. End result a visibly risky change (see WA recent change that went really bad) that will do bugger all maybe maybe not and it’s easy to see where it would end.
Yes vote had been polling poorly from the launch. Can I ask why you thought it would win?
I know a large amount of Yes23 campaigners were shocked, but I chalked that up to them existing in an echochamber and lacking the awareness to factor that in.
I guess I must live in an echo chamber. I’ve been staying away from larger socmed and news for my own mental health, and my area was a pretty solid yes so that’s kinda all I saw.
American here, what does it mean to recognize a class of indigenous people in Australia?
Because we have a very different understanding of the word lol
It was to put them in the constitution as the original inhabitants of Australia and give them the right to a mostly powerless advisory body to the Commonwealth government called “the Voice”.
It was a pretty conservative idea but unfortunately the conservative opposition leader is the arch-racist piece of shit who will never win a real election, but in his desperation to make a name for himself he campaigned against the referendum, and referendums traditionally only succeed with bipartisan support. So now all that’s really been accomplished is to disenfranchise our indigenous population even more.
I know it’s a lot more nuanced than this but the idea of history being like “yes these people were unarguably here first” and government going “nah we created this place” is so fucking ridiculous.
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That’s not far from how it is here - but I’d say it’s more dishonest politicians tokenistically acknowledging Country (such a performative exercise) and capitalising common nouns in that way. Nobody’s really saying “we created this place”, more that we have this culture of falling over ourselves to recognise Traditional Owners while not actually doing much to address Indigenous disadvantage. Referenda are seen as a big deal and usually fail, especially where they’re not led by those who care about the movement, AND are completely transparent about what the result will mean. This referendum was led by the governing party of Australia as an election commitment, and what would result was neither well thought out nor explained adequately. Australia voted not to support the vague word of hand-wringing do-gooders we don’t trust.
That’s a lot of hate you assume was caused by the opposition. Australia voted them out big time a few months ago so that’s a lot of reach.
It was the yes campaign that did it to themselves. They needed to have CLEAR impact statements about what it will do before they put it to the public. Their campaign created its own vague outcome and stink of virtue signalling. Not good enough. Especially considering what happened in WA weeks before announcement.
There’s a good breakdown on the whole thing here: https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/oct/13/what-is-the-indigenous-voice-to-parliament-australia-when-referendum-2023-explained-yes-no-campaign-wording
The recognition aspect was basically the creation of an advisory body to the government with members selected from indigenous groups. The idea being that the govt has historically poorly managed indigenous issues so by having them directly advising govt there should be better policy outcomes
In retrospect they really should have set it up first and let it run for a bit before they tried to put it in the constitution.
Yeah, but they didn’t have time for that in this election cycle. Fuck I hate it when progressives play the conservative handbook, follow fuck ups become fuck ups.
Went for a slam dunk but didn’t tie their laces.
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The context is important here - Australia had a continuous indigenous population for over 60,000 years before white settlement. White Australia never had an agreement with indigenous peoples at large, and through relentless expansion of colonies, spreading diseases like smallpox, introducing alcohol and drugs, forcibly abducting and schooling children, heavy incarceration and a slew of other typical British colonial shit ended up leaving them disenfranchised, alienated, and excluded. Indigenous Australians prior to colonisation had a deep affinity with the land and tended it like custodians, but because they didn’t build towns or farm like Europeans, they were just swept aside without ever really being acknowledged or addressed.
The Voice was asked for as a product of the Uluru Statement of the Heart - not long, worth a read- https://ulurustatement.org/the-statement/view-the-statement/
It was really first and foremost about having an acknowledgement that maybe, just maybe, the settlers cocked things up and that it’d better to fix things together. It’s not asking for anything “more” or extra, it’s about correctly telling history and reframing our national dialogue to be coming from a place of partnership, instead of colonialism, so we could fix some of the very real issues modern Australians face as a result of hundreds of years of callous racism. It was a chance for white Australia and government to really listen and maybe find better ways of doing things.
But now instead we get to try to explain to our kids why 60% of the country don’t think representation or inclusion matters while indigenous Australians will continue to struggle without a government that can listen to them.
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You are correct except for calling the white colonizers “settlers”.
Settlers in this context typically means immigrants who came over after Australia became a British colony. Usually non-white but there are plenty of Scottish and Irish families who are settlers because of the whole British enslaving them part.
Yeah I don’t get it either. I know a lot of Natives hate the Bureau of Indian Affairs, but is that what Aus is trying to get too (within the Constitution)?
There are essentially two parts to what was proposed, the first is that having mention of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island (ATSI) peoples in the constitution is recognition.
The second part, which is actually the exact mechanism which was proposed, was a permanent advisory body made up of ATSI representatives with constitutional power to give advice to the Government on issues related to or impacting ATSI people.
The exact details of the advisory body were up to legislation which we will probably never see.
Why would anyone have a problem with that?
A few of the arguments or concerns voiced by Australian’s included:
-A Voice with no power is pointless
-Lack of detail in the proposal
-Separating Australian’s by race is divisive (note there’s already constitutional race powers, which I disagree with and hope will be scrapped)
-ATSI people would have more representation than others (they actually have proportionally higher representation in Parliament today than their percentage of population)
-Leaving the exact details of the Voice to legislation means any future government could gut it without violating the constitutional amendment
-concerns this is the first push on a path to treaty and reparations as a percentage of GDP (which WAS discussed as a possibility by the people who worked on the Uluru statement)
I’ve left out the outright lies, though I guarantee someone will take issue with me simply mentioning the talking points to give you context.
Just as long as we’re all aware that while those are all reasons put forward, they are all false / lies / misleading.
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The exact details of the legislation were released on the 23 of March. As in, 6-7 months ago.
The exact wording of the Constitutional amendment was released 6-7 months ago.
The Legislation has not been, and likely won’t be seen.
If you have seen the legislation somewhere please share a link.
Design principles are not legislation, it seems you are unfamiliar with Parliamentary process.
Additionally he (Anthony Albanese) stated that if the referendum is successful, another process would be established to work on the final design, with a subsequent government produced information pamphlet stating that this process would involve Indigenous Australian communities, the Parliament and the broader community, with any legislation going through normal parliamentary scrutiny procedures.
The final design being the legislation.
I hope that clears things up for you.
🤦 well done champ. You successfully don’t understand process.
That’s basically why the Voice to Parliament failed. It wasn’t clear what that would mean, and our utter garbage media fanned all the flames they could - raising the fear in people’s minds that we’d be ‘giving away’ some part of our democratic process. It’s not what would have happened, but it’s a not unfounded fear that in this age of doublespeak and militantly progressive movements, ‘recognition’ of Indigenous Australians could be manipulated into something we didn’t agree to. The result - keep the status quo.
The result - keep the status quo.
I feel like the result was different from my perspective.
The result - stop planless virtue signalling and prevent the government sweeping the real issue under the rug with a token gesture.
I probably didn’t articulate it well but “planless virtue signalling” is exactly what I meant - I suppose when it’s clearly planless (if well-intentioned) it’s easy for reactionaries to reframe what it’s really about, since the populace is ignorant but generally tired of being told how to think and why things ‘must’ change.
The fact you’re tired of “being told what to think” by “garbage media” and “militant progressives” is why you need to be told how to think
No
And if you look at the demographics that voted with the yes campaign, you’ll find it’s all the rich suburbs. Odd that they seem to know what’s right for the most disenfranchised people.
ATSI live in rich suburbs now? That’s nice progress!
Except for all the plans they released months and years ago
The vague ones subject to significant changes?
You mean “how the world works”? 🤦
Like the whore to your dad, “fuck you’re thick”
Username checks out.
How grim.
This is a victory for racists, and bad-faith actors, some some of which have received lots of money from China and Russia to help destabilise another Western country.
Honestly don’t know if that latter bit is true. We manage to be absolutely atrocious to the indigenous population without third parties meddling. I don’t think there’s a single native population that hasn’t been mistreated; had their culture and names taken away, sent for reeducation, eugenics, and so on, so forth.
That’s what I as an outside person have read for like a decade. Australia is usually looking good because it’s not 'murica, kind of like Canada, but bloody hell don’t look too close.
Not just them. The Sami people of Scandinavia were subjects of eugenic experimentation during the early-mid 1900s. The Ainu people of Russia/Japan had their names and culture stripped, and were forced to marry Japanese, and live as Japanese citizens. Many branches of that culture is dead.
There’s the Icelandic people who fairly recently were subjected to forced sterilisation.
Can I believe that third parties fuel this kind of thing to wreak havoc? Absolutely. But I can also believe that we’re fully capable of doing this ourselves. Mankind is hateful.
Third party meddling is most effective when peddled to a receptive audience.
I agree but at the same time in this modern age of ‘social media’ I am certain that the people who said openly that they wanted to take down The West, are doing so.
SudanEthiopia and Thailand, IIRC. There’s one African nation, and one SEA nation that never got colonized.Edit: I didn’t remember correctly
Ethiopia and Thailand, and they were arguably colonised at least in part by Italy and France respectively.
Yea I wouldn’t go around underestimating Australia’s ability to fuck up its indigenous people without any conspiratorial help like that.
Lol there’s no China and Russia. Baby boomers mostly britishers and racist as fuck in australia so by default their kids carry the same sentiment… Germans and Britishers are the worst people.
This is shameful. I’m sorry.
Disappointing, to say the least.
Thanks to the media shovelling fear, misinformation and lies into our minds. I blame Facebook, Twitter and Murdoch for this one.
The conspiracy theories around this issue were fucking wild. Ranging from the UN taking control of our government, to abolishing all land ownership and giving them the right to have your home demolished, to some bizarre thing about the pope or some shit.
The preview image looks like the lady on the right just let loose the most foul stench imaginable and the other two are being forced to deal with it.
