Goodooga, northwest NSW, 8 January 2010 -- An Aboriginal activist, who was once engaged by the Australian government as a consultant on special race relations matters, says Australians are so racist that they cannot recognise it anymore because racism is so pronounced and active here.
“Australians no longer have to be covert about racism, they show it publicly,” Michael Anderson, leader of the 3,000 Euahlayi of northwest NSW, writes in response to the recent murder of an Indian student in Melbourne.
“Have a listen to Australian talk back radio programs, they appear to have an unlimited right to racially condemn people,” he writes.
The first Aboriginal public prosecutor in the district court of NSW in the field of criminal law, Mr Anderson says for the Victorian police to say that this is just another crime by ordinary criminals, shows their naivety in such matters as race relations.
“It is absolute cowardice on the part of the Rudd Labor government and their Liberal coalition Opposition to deny that the recent killing of an Indian student in Melbourne was racially motivated.
“The audacity of the government and police to say that the student should not have carried a lap top computer while walking to work after dark is absurd and pathetic.”
Mr Anderson, who lectured Aboriginal studies and politics at several Australian Universities, charges that Australians have always encouraged race supremacists to settle in Australia.
“Just look at the ‘chicken run’ from South Africa when the white race supremacists chose not to live under black rule. They were encouraged to come and live in Australia. It is not surprising that where they settled Aboriginal people have suffered increased racial abuse and physical attacks; just take Townsville as an example.”
He cites as another example of racism the Moree Plains Shire voting down Prime Minister Kevin Rudd’s apology, saying in a resolution that they did not support it and that there was no need to support it.
Nearby in the general area, Mr Anderson now runs a sheep and cattle property on his traditional ancestral land in the lower Ballone river system on both sides of the New South Wales and Queensland borders.
The last survivor of the four young Black Power activists who set up the Aboriginal embassy in Canberra in 1972 cites other examples of racism:
• “You only have to listen to white Australians who after getting out of a taxi racially condemn the black and/or Asian drivers.”
• “How many white police or correctional institutional staff have been prosecuted for killing Aborigines in custody? How many more Aboriginal deaths in custody have occurred in prisons around the country since the Royal Commission Report?”
• “Governments can get away with passing discriminatory laws because the Australian public chooses not to want to know about it. This is what makes this country a dangerous place when it comes to racism.”
Mr Anderson implores the Indian government to demand that the Australian government take a more pro-active initiative on racism and to pass much stronger anti-racism laws.
“In particular this is a case where the media must be reined in and boundaries must be set. If Germany can set in place strong anti-racist laws which include how the media deal with such things, then so too can Australia.”
Mr Anderson’s release in full:
It is absolute cowardice on the part of the Rudd Labor government and their Liberal coalition Opposition to deny that the recent killing of an Indian student in Melbourne was racially motivated.
The audacity of the government and police to say that the student should not have carried a lap top computer while walking to work after dark is absurd and pathetic.
For the Victorian police to say that this is just another crime by ordinary criminals is to show their naivety in such matters as race relations.
Australia is so racist that they cannot recognise it anymore because racism is so pronounced and active here. Australians no longer have to be covert about racism, they show it publicly. Take the Moree Plains shire, who two years ago voted down Prime Minister Kevin Rudd’s apology; in a resolution the shire said they do not support it and that there was no need to support it.
Have a listen to the Australian talk back radio programs in this country, they appear to have an unlimited right to racially condemn people. Listening to these programs will give you a very good insight into the Australian mentality towards people of colour and racial origins.
Let us tell it as it is. Australians have always encouraged race supremacists to come and live in Australia. Just look at the ‘chicken run’ from South Africa when the white race supremacists chose not to live under black rule. They were encouraged to come and live in Australia. It is not surprising that where they settled Aboriginal people have suffered increased racial abuse and physical attacks; just take Townsville as an example.
In NSW and Western Australia police have waged a war on our youth, stopping them every time they walk in the streets in small groups, in some cases confiscating their personal property if they cannot show receipts.
You only have to listen to white Australians who after getting out of a taxi racially condemn the black and/or Asian drivers.
How many white police or correctional institutional staff have been prosecuted for killing Aborigines in custody? Consequently how many more Aboriginal deaths in custody have occurred in prisons around the country since the Royal Commission Report?
This is the only country in the world that has a Human Rights Commission but has the constitutional power to suspend it when they seek to pass special laws against any race it deems necessary. Thereby permitting themselves to pass discriminatory laws. And they can get away with it because the Australian public chooses not to want to know about it. This is what makes this country a dangerous place when it comes to racism.
Wake up Australia, you are a racist country and you don’t have to go far to find this out, listen to those you call friends when they talk of other races who come to live in Australia.
Australians demand that the new comers should give up their cultural identity, including their languages, to ASSIMILATE. We Aborigines can tell you a lot about this. This is RACISM, this is not patriotic Australianism.
I implore the Indian government to demand that the Australian government take more pro-active initiative on racism and to pass much stronger anti-racism laws. In particular this is a case where the media must be reined in and boundaries must be set. If Germany can set in place strong anti-racist laws which includes how the media deals with such things, then so too can Australia.
Comments
Racism is at the heart of attacks on Indians
http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/politics/racism-is-at-the-heart-of-atta...
It is easy to compare murder rates in India and Australia and, after finding that the official rate in India is double that in Australia for a given year, to ask why Indian TV channels do not devote the same attention to murders in either country.
It is also rather simplistic to do so, without taking into account the background and circumstances of a particular incident that has caused Indian TV channels to go off on a tangent.
To me, the way in which Indian media have treated the murder of young Nitin Garg is no different from the way in which the Australian media reacted when Schapelle Corby was caught with drugs in Bali or when Annice Smoel was arrested for stealing a barmat in Thailand.
And remember, neither of them were murdered. Both were found guilty too.
In both the cases of Corby and Smoel, the media made out that their colour had been a factor. There was no clear evidence to say so. In the case of Garg, however, there seems to be a better case to argue that his ethnicity has been a factor in his murder.
And that makes all the difference. Indian TV channels do not go into overdrive when any Indian is murdered overseas — and Lord knows there are more than enough Indians overseas. India has nearly 55 times the population of Australia.
Indians die regularly in suspicious circumstances in the Middle East and their deaths barely rate a mention. The same happens in Britain and Canada — where there are large Indian migrant populations — and things go unreported for the most part.
I do not speak from perusing government statistics or from anecdotal evidence — I have family all over the globe who have lived in various countries for decades and been part of migrant Indian communities. That's the best source of information, not government statistics.
Garg's death comes after a steady stream of violent incidents against Indians in Melbourne in the past 18 months. These incidents have caused enough concern in both countries for their respective prime ministers to take note.
A large number of minor incidents, of which the Indian community is aware, have not been reported because students are fed up with the lack of response from the police. They are also scared that reporting such incidents may lead to a backlash from their would-be attackers.
I don't know if Tim Colebatch has even been threatened with physical violence by people in any country, but as someone who faced such a situation a few months ago — in broad daylight, in a well-populated area in East Doncaster — let me tell you that when three well-built 20-somethings try to intimidate you, it is a frightening experience.
Especially, when one asks, "you know why Indians are getting beaten up?"
In my case, as I have been out of India most of my life and can stand up for myself more than adequately, I did not suffer physical injury.
I don't think any Indian expects every part of Australia to be safe round the clock. India is not a nation of fools.
But it doesn't make anyone feel safe when the Victorian authorities refuse to even countenance the notion that an underbelly of racist sentiment may be driving these incidents.
Why does one need to do so? Simple. Until the police acknowledge the cause, they cannot curb the effects.
And spin, which is calculated to paint the murder of a 21-year-old as just another grim statistic that we should all accept, is only going to help further that attitude of denial.
Sam Varghese is a sub-editor with The Age Online.
Fire 'attack' on Indian deepens race tensions
Fire 'attack' on Indian deepens race tensions
STEPHEN CAUCHI AND JOSH GORDON
January 10, 2010
RELATIONS between Australia and India were under greater strain last night after the second Indian man in a week was allegedly attacked in Melbourne.
Just days after 21-year-old student Nitin Garg was murdered in West Footscray, 29-year-old Essendon man Jaspreet Singh was allegedly set alight in the street by four attackers about 2am yesterday.
Mr Singh, believed to be the father of a young child, is living in Melbourne on a spouse visa while his wife studies. He remained in a stable condition in The Alfred hospital last night with burns to 15 per cent of his body, including his face, arms and hands.
But there were indications last night that the story may be more complicated than it first appeared. Victoria Police said the incident did not appear to be race related and a police source said that ''there are things that don't add up'' in the initial reports.
A police spokeswoman said that all possibilities would be investigated. It is believed the arson squad has been called in.
The story quickly made headlines in India. News of the alleged attack was the lead item on Indian Google News and made the front page of India's top news websites, including The Times of India, The Hindu, and the Press Trust of India.
The Press Trust of India - the major news agency on the subcontinent - reported that India was pursuing the incident with Australian authorities and asked the media to exercise restraint as it could affect bilateral ties.
''The Indian high commissioner in Canberra and consul-general in Melbourne are following up this matter vigorously with the Australian authorities,'' External Affairs Ministry spokesman Vishnu Prakash said.
The Times of India reported that the assault on Mr Singh came ''a week after a student from the country was stabbed to death amid a slew of assaults on the community in Australia''.
The negative publicity will no doubt hamper the Federal Government's latest push to improve the tense relationship between Australia and India.
In an interview late last week with The Sunday Age, Trade Minister Simon Crean said the stabbing death of Nitin Garg last weekend while walking to work in Footscray had ''thrown into sharp focus the relationship between our two countries''.
He said media on both sides had been viewing Australia's relationship with India through the ''tragic prism'' of Mr Garg's death.
Mr Crean detailed a plan to boost the bilateral relationship by ramping up international lobbying efforts to get India included in the Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation forum (APEC).
''India, with a population of 1.1 billion and a dynamic growing economy is the missing link in the APEC forum,'' Mr Crean told The Sunday Age.
He said that with a moratorium on new APEC members ending this year, he believed India's involvement in the group would benefit both Australia and the region.
Mr Crean's comments came before news of the latest alleged assault became known.
While details are sketchy, it is alleged that Mr Singh dropped his wife at home about 2am after the pair attended a dinner party.
He then parked his car around the corner, in Grice Crescent, where he claims he was attacked by four men. He says they pushed him against his car as he stepped out, doused him in fluid and set him alight before fleeing.
Mr Singh allegedly ran from the car while peeling off his clothes. However, Detective acting Senior Sergeant Neil Smyth said that police had not located any burnt clothing in the area.
Mr Singh's housemate, Sushil Kumar, said Mr Singh had not suffered any racism in the two years he had been in Australia.
He said Mr Singh's wife was devastated.
The incident sparked fear and fury among the city's Indian population, with Gautum Gupta, a spokesman for the Federation of Indian Students in Australia, describing the alleged attack as ''most abhorrent … someone was burnt alive''.
Mr Gupta, speaking after a small group of Indian students gathered on the steps of Parliament House, said it was unclear if race had played a part in the incident, but urged ''all Victorians to [condemn] the minority of people who are racist and criminals … let them not win''.
''All we know is that there's been another night of senseless violence on our streets … there were three attacks, one of them was [on an] Indian,'' he said.
State Energy and Resources Minister Peter Batchelor said ''whether it is racially motivated or whether is is for some other reason such as theft or some other crime-related factor, it diminishes our community''.
Acting Prime Minister Julia Gillard declined to comment, saying only that the ''Government condemns all acts of violence''.
with JOHN MANGAN, JANAE HOUGHTON
http://www.theage.com.au/national/fire-attack-on-indian-deepens-race-ten...
Just to set the record straight
Who's the racist now Flower Power?
Jaspreet Singh, Grice Crescent, Essendon, in the city's north, faced an out-of-sessions hearing today before a bail justice at St Kilda Road police complex charged with making a false report to police and criminal damage with a view to gaining a financial advantage, the Sky News TV said.
Melbourne, May 3 (ANI): A magistrate’s court here has delivered a suspended jail sentence to an Indian national who sought to commit insurance fraud by declaring that he had been attacked by thugs. He also claimed that they doused his car with petrol and burned it.
Jaspreet Singh, however, had actually destroyed the car himself to claim the insurance money.
The Herald Sun quoted magistrate Felicity Broughton as describing Singh’s botched insurance scam as a stupid “premeditated enterprise’ that brought great shame to himself, his family and his community.
http://www.thaindian.com/newsportal/world-news/indian-man-claiming-insur...
I think of cockroaches when I see these gutless people
A lot of Australians are very very racist. They spit, they shriek out of cars, they show their backsides, they throw fruits at you from cars, they fake coughs, when they see you are different. The worst thing is they are never brave enough to confront you as a man, probably because they know these are not dignified behaviours. I think of cockroaches when I see these gutless people. Unfortunately, they are everywhere, certainly more than the cockroaches. I hope they can be educated.
Michael Anderson no longer needs to hide his racism!
"You only have to listen to white Australians who after getting out of a taxi racially condemn the black and/or Asian drivers."Now there's a racist comment it is not just white Australians, that have a problem with Taxi drivers that don't know their way around and can't do their job properly.
An Indian-origin taxi driver who bashed an 81-year-old woman passenger has avoided prison after a local Australian court sentenced him to nine months jail, wholly suspended, for false imprisonment.Singh picked up Sarwari in Noble Park and was directed to drive her to a Dandenong medical centre, but he took her to Dandenong Hospital instead.
http://www.indianexpress.com/news/indianorigin-cabbie-avoids-jail-over-b...
Taxi driver jailed for six years over rape.
http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/newshome/13176589/taxi-driver-jaile...
An Adelaide taxi driver has admitted running over a boy after he refused to pay a $20 fare.
Dung Tran, 16, was left with severe injuries and required a leg amputation.
http://makingmulticulturalaustralia.blogspot.com.au/2010/08/indian-taxi-...
Indian taxi driver charged over bashing passenger in Australia
http://www.thaindian.com/newsportal/world-news/indian-taxi-driver-charge...
TAXI drivers turned on each other last night outside a Tullamarine cafe, in what appears to have been a racially charged brawl.t was initially suggested the fight was between Sudanese and Indian drivers.
However, other witnesses claim the fight began between a Somalian driver and an Indian driver, before mushrooming into a brawl between Indians and drivers from various African nations.
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/more-news/taxi-drivers-riot-at-airport/...
A 25-year-old Indian has been charged with two counts of dangerous driving after he slammed his taxi into a tree which killed two passengers he was carrying on the Christmas Day.Police opposed bail, citing previous cases where Indian nationals have fled from Australia while facing driving charges.Police alleged that Kang was over the legal blood-alcohol limit and lost control of his taxi before slamming into a tree.
http://www.indianexpress.com/news/indian-taxi-driver-charged-after-doubl...
Looks like Australians are not the only country that have a problem with Indian Taxi drivers.Read Hizaaz comment here
http://www.virtualtourist.com/travel/Asia/Malaysia/Wilayah_Persekutuan/K...
Michael Anderson you are just stereotyping again. “Australians no longer need to hide their racism”May be you should set the example Michael!
I will leave you with this one just for a laugh.
A drunk woman, stark naked, jumped into a taxi at a Durban Cab Rank.
The Indian driver opened his eyes wide and stared at the woman. He made no attempt to start the Cab.
“What’s wrong with you Luv, haven’t you ever seen a naked woman before?”
“I’ll not be staring at you lady, I am telling you, that would not be proper, where I am coming from”.
“Well if you’re not bloody staring at me Luvie, what are you doing then?”
“Well, I am looking and looking, and I am thinking to myself, where is this lady keeping the money to be paying me with.”
Michael you are jumping to racist conclusions again!
"Have a listen to the Australian talk back radio programs in this country, they appear to have an unlimited right to racially condemn people. Listening to these programs will give you a very good insight into the Australian mentality towards people of colour and racial origins."
Michael can you tell what colour people are over the radio? I know lots of people in Australia that are not of the white race that speak with Australian accents!Lots of Chinese Greeks Italians even change their names to Anglo names and speak with Australian accents.Michael you are jumping to racist conclusions again!