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Keywords: Indigenous Rights

  • AUSTRALIA

    NAIDOC Week is about shared pride

    • Andrew Hamilton
    • 08 July 2024

    A failed referendum leaves many Indigenous Australians feeling unheard, but hope remains. This year's NAIDOC Week takes on even greater significance. This celebration, born from a desire for recognition, is a time to reflect on how to build a more just Australia.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Building constitutional bridges: In conversation with Frank Brennan

    • David Halliday
    • 28 June 2024

    It's been eight months since the Voice referendum, and people are starting to grapple with what its defeat means for Australia. There are few voices in Australia as qualified to conduct a postmortem of the outcome of the Voice referendum campaign as Frank Brennan. We examine what lessons can be learned and crucually, whether there’s reason for hope for Indigenous constitutional recognition.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    When safetyism leads

    • Julie Szego
    • 07 June 2024

    In response to campus protests, universities erred on the side of free speech when every other day, the prevailing ethos is one of ‘safetyism’, namely suppressing speech or inquiry if an identity group frames it as ‘harmful’ to them. Universities should strive to be uncomfortable and ‘unsafe’ for all, with no identity immune from robust scrutiny.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Sorry Days for reconciliation

    • Andrew Hamilton
    • 30 May 2024

    This Reconciliation Week and Sorry Day, we consider the defeat of the Referendum and the substantial failure to close the gap between the living conditions of Indigenous Australians and other Australians. It means that for many Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders, this week will be less about days of celebration than of grief and of grim resolve to continue to seek justice.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Lessons from our failure to build a constitutional bridge in the 2023 Referendum

    • Frank Brennan
    • 27 May 2024

    Following the failure of the Voice referendum, many believed that the path to constitutional recognition is closed for Indigenous Australians. But they may be wrong. 

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Deakin and the parting of names

    • Andrew Hamilton
    • 14 September 2023
    4 Comments

    As the legacy of historical figures is reevaluated, Alfred Deakin, Australia's second Prime Minister, finds himself under recent scrutiny. A champion of Federation, Deakin also held views towards Indigenous Australians now regarded as abhorrent. But is erasing his name from a university the right step? 

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  • RELIGION

    In the chorus of Yes, why aren't the bishops joining in?

    • John Warhurst
    • 14 September 2023
    46 Comments

    As the Voice Referendum campaign intensifies, many Catholic groups rally behind the Voice. But Australia's church leaders remain above the fray, maintaining neutral positions. As the lines between faith, politics, and indigenous rights blur, should the bishops be more prescriptive on how to vote?

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Recognition of Aboriginal rights: A contemporary Australian perspective

    • Frank Brennan
    • 05 June 2023
    19 Comments

    The wording of the proposed change to the Australian Constitution to enshrine a First Nations Voice might not be perfect. But whatever the imperfections and the risk of future complications, it is high time that Australia’s First Peoples were recognised in the Constitution in a manner sought and approved by a broad cross-section of Indigenous leaders.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Indigenous cultural fishing should be supported, not criminalised

    • Paul Cleary
    • 21 November 2022
    2 Comments

    An intense and often ugly battle over marine resources has been unfolding between State authorities and Aboriginal people along the NSW coast. At the heart of the conflict is the NSW government’s refusal to acknowledge the right to cultural fishing by Aboriginal people, unlike other states and the federal Native Title Act (1993). 

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Racism in families belies simple reconciliation

    • Celeste Liddle
    • 22 April 2021
    9 Comments

    Due to the impacts of colonisation which have led to everything from loving intermarriage to acts of sexual violence, most Aboriginal people have non-Indigenous relations. Most of these people have, at some time or another, experienced racism within their extended family.

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  • MEDIA

    Why the media downplays Invasion Day

    • Celeste Liddle
    • 30 January 2020
    20 Comments

    At what point is the media going to realise that the Invasion Day rally, which has been going on in some form or other since 1938, is not going away and, indeed, is growing? I'm convinced the media don't want to report Invasion Day, as reminding the public to fear Indigenous people and our rights has been their practice for centuries now.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    A bad week for Aboriginal rights

    • Celeste Liddle
    • 23 August 2019
    12 Comments

    According to anecdotal evidence, Pauline Hanson arrived at Uluru, climbed up to 'chicken rock', slid back down on her backside and then, later, met with some Anangu elders to 'get permission' to climb Uluru. The disrespectful farce was but one illustration of how the week went when it comes to showing respect for Indigenous rights and views.

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