Oh.. This Ain’t Racist Huh?

I don’t know how you draw an African American person by not making them look like an African American person.

Mark Knight -Australian cartoonist for Australia’s Herald Sun

Mark, are you telling us how you really feel or are you lying just because you got caught with the hood off. There were two people of African decent playing in the US Open. How come one of the characters in your cartoon has a blonde ponytail and European features. Here in America, African American’s pretty much have to deal with your kind everyday and can easily spot you. Your country’s history reads like a companion manual to the 19th and 20th century Jim Crow era in the United States.

Indigenous peoples of Australia who had lived in Australia for at least 65,000+ years before the arrival of British settlers in 1788, were dispossessed from their land in 1788 by Britain, which claimed Eastern Australia as its own on the basis of the now discredited doctrine of terra nullius. Terra nullius stems from the Roman law term res nullius, meaning nobody’s thing. According to the Roman law ferae bestiae, things without an owner, such as wild animals, lost slaves and abandoned buildings, were res nullius and could be taken as property by anyone by seizure. Initially, indigenous Australians were in most states deprived of the rights of full citizenship of the new nation on grounds of their race and restrictive immigration laws were introduced to preference white European immigrants to Australia.

Remember the the 2004 Palm Island community riot? Cameron Doomadgee, an Indigenous Australian was aged 36 when he died. The time of death was about 11:20am on Palm Island, one hour after being picked up for allegedly causing a public nuisance.  This was the 147th death of an Aboriginal  person in police custody since 1990, a mere 14 years.  An autopsy report by Coroner Michael Barnes was produced for the family one week after the death. It stated that Mulrunji had suffered four broken ribs, which had ruptured his liver and spleen, it also found that the body’s blood alcohol content was 0.29 from a cocktail of alcohol including methylated spirits mixed with sweet cordial. The family of the deceased were informed by the Coroner that the death was the result of “an intra-abdominal  hemorrhage caused by a ruptured liver and portal vein. In other words he was beaten to death. Subsequent to the autopsy report reading a succession of angry young Aboriginal men spoke to the crowd and encouraged immediate action be taken against the police. Mulrunji’s death was repeatedly branded “cold-blooded murder”. A riot erupted involving an estimated 400 people, half of them school children. Numerous police officers were flown into Palm Island following the riot. Police officers in riot gear wearing balaclavas with no identification, carrying large guns marched into the community conducting early-morning raids. Residents report officers pointing guns at children’s heads and being tasered. A resident and his partner were later awarded $235,000 compensation for assault, battery and false imprisonment. The raids, found to be racist, resulted in a record $30 million class action settlement and a formal apology to be made by the State Government.

I would need another blog to list all the anti discrimination laws Australia has passed to keep you from systematically  eliminating your “colored” problem, but to give my readers an idea, here is a partial list:

• 1958 revision of the Migration Act, introduced a simpler system for entry and abolished the “dictation test”.
• 1962 Commonwealth Electoral Act, provided that all Indigenous Australians should have the right to enrol and vote at federal elections (previously this right had been restricted in some states other than for Aboriginal ex-servicemen, who secured the right to vote in all states under 1949 legislation).
• Migration Act 1966, effectively dismantled the White Australia Policy and increased access to non-European migrants.
• Aboriginal Land Rights (Northern Territory) Act 1976, was a significant step in legal recognition of Aboriginal land ownership.
• Commonwealth Racial Discrimination Act 1975
• Commonwealth Racial Hatred Act (1995)
• Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission Act (1986)
• New South Wales: Anti-Discrimination Act (1977)
• South Australia: Equal Opportunity Act (1984) and Racial Vilification Act (1996)   (The Racial Vilification Act… really?)
• Western Australia: Equal Opportunity Act (1984) and Criminal Code
• Australian Capital Territory: Discrimination Act (1991)
• Queensland: Anti-Discrimination Act (1991)
• Northern Territory: Anti-Discrimination Act (1992)
• Victoria: Equal Opportunity Act (1995) and Racial and Religious Tolerance Act 2001
• Tasmania: Anti-Discrimination Act (1998)

So don’t you dare try to tell us that cartoon doesn’t have a racist component. I’m calling this at best, condescension of the most vicious variety and at worst, outright racist demagoguery.