BLACK life does matter, just as much as every other life.
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Anything contrary is not true.
There is a growing uneasiness around this week in Australia, particularly around the 26th of January and its status as the national day.
Some say it’s time to unite while others say it can’t be done on a day which is associated with much hurt for the first nations’ people.
Changing the date of the January public holiday, even shifting subsequently formed practices like the Hottest 100 countdown, are seemingly against Australian culture and trampling on tradition, according to the obstinate.
When it feels like something is being taken away, or a day is made to feel emptier consider how Aboriginals are made to feel less than in a number of ways every day.
There’s a day already dedicated to closing the gap in Aboriginal health outcomes, with Australian Indigenous people living 10 to 17 years less than other Australians.
Aboriginals are imprisoned at a rate 13 times greater than the non-Indigenous population.
And Indigenous students make up just 1.3 per cent of the nation’s university student-body.
A lucky country we might be, in many regards, but those are not good odds.
A scribble on a bus-stop on Tamworth may be thoughtless and maybe done with the intention of causing an ado, but it’s about more than the words written.
It’s that an act like this is deemed acceptable to some corner of the community to allow it to happen in the first place that’s the issue.
Marc Sutherland said the way forward is through working together, understanding the Aboriginal perspective and how it feels.
“It’s hard to have a meaningful conversation when people are not listening,” he said.
How’s it possible to be heard and comprehended when some think a racist action is ever appropriate.
We need to consider and celebrate our first nations’ people every day, not just on the anniversary of Arthur Phillip steering the First Fleet to Australia.
If tradition is cause for celebration, why don’t we celebrate the oldest living culture, rich in tradition, on Earth?
Don’t do it because you think you ought to or because you think you will be considered a good person.
Do it because it should be the status quo.
