P A R I A H - People Against Racism In Aboriginal Homelands

PARIAH (pu'riuh) A person who is rejected by society

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"Pearson is spruiking genocidal claptrap that white protectors were spruiking when they forcibly removed Aboriginal children, when they forcibly broke down Aboriginal communities and tried to extinguish all forms of Aboriginal cultural practice, ritual and ceremony. So, while Aboriginal people certainly despise John Howard, they fear Noel Pearson because he would be the greatest and most deadly threat to our continued existence as a race and as a culture." - Sam Watson

PARIAH news

• Adelaide march for Justice and Peace continues
• Brough exercises his work choices, fires 8,000 workers
• Sacred Life Walk site - Hacked | Progress report | Pt Augusta
• Forum Tau Matan Rejects World Bank Funding
• Howard visits troops in politically deadlocked East Timor
• Indigenous communities' employment scheme to be axed
• Scrapping work-for-the-dole a disaster: NT minister
• Paul Cleary in conversation
• Worlds apart
• Violence at Subi protest
• Army, US forces build NT airfield
• Maori MP unrepentant over calling Howard a racist
• Sacred Life walk - Adelaide to Uluru
• PM grabbing land, says Greer
• Details of indigenous plan
• Federal intervention questioned
• Indigenous musician mourned
• NT 'martial law'
• From the heart, for the heartland
• No justice for Kyle Horace

National Labor leader Rudd has backed the Howard initiative and "also dismissed suggestions Mr Howard's initiative was a political stunt timed for the upcoming federal election."

So no outs for Clare there...

Mr Rudd today defended his support of the radical changes, which have received a mixed response.

"Some have asked why we've provided bipartisan support in principle for this initiative, and the reason is pretty simple - and that is when it comes to the abuse of children, when it comes to the sexual abuse of children, we have a responsibility as a community and as a nation to act decisively," Mr Rudd told reporters in Brisbane.

"I also believe when it comes to the challenge of child abuse, we should be taking the party politics right out of it and just getting on with it, dealing with the problem."

Mr Rudd said he had yet to decide whether the initiative could extend beyond Aboriginal communities.

"We'll work our way through the detail of both the proposal as it relates to indigenous communities first, and any subsequent proposal which the government has for the non-Indigenous community of Australia," he said.

Anyone who has followed Question Time (Federal) - will have seen a total lack of response by Labor to any of Brough's pronouncements on Aboriginal affairs - understandably no-one wants to be seen as placing children in danger through inaction - the classic retort to any "constitutional niceties"

Prime Minister John Howard said the Federal Government had stepped in because the Territory Government had failed to act on evidence of systemic child abuse in communities."

The NT Labor response to the not-so-remote One Mile Dam Aboriginal community was also underwhelming

Mick Lambe - 30 June 07

The Federal government have made their agenda clear - a land grab based on 'racial' demonisation

Essentially the Federal government has ensured 60 plus Aboriginal communities are even more prison-like and institutionalised ...

Having been recently released from Berrimah Prison (one of our two black prisons in the NT) earlier this year, after serving a month for my part (anti-racism) in a protest that disrupted the NT Parliament while in session in 2002 - and previously being imprisoned for a protest involving East Timor's struggle in 2000

... I know a prison regime when I see it

Obviously the Federal government have vindicated the actions which led to our incarceration - as they too were inspired by the Clare Martin government's inaction over human rights abuses - and institutionalised racism

Territory has less rights than State

Nothing Howard did was going to move NT Labor on a number of contentious issues(read nukes)...

...and pastoral, military and mining interests are massively advantaged by this Federal control and racist demonisation

The opposition Country Liberal Party (CLP) was butchered in the last NT election after previously presiding over the Territory's Aboriginal people for 26 uninterrupted years

Federal intervention in Northern Territory issues is a way around this political impasse, brought to you by a Federal government with a history of caging and institutionalising children as well as demonising their parents on "racial" grounds - and a Federal Opposition with a history of concurring

Pressure to instill more control over Aboriginal communities in States which are not subject to Federal law - is continuing from the Federal government

The WSWS view on Federal intervention

Australian government imposes military-police regime on Aborigines

"Under the cynical guise of protecting indigenous children from sexual abuse, the Howard government announced on Thursday a "national emergency" plan to take control of dozens of Aboriginal communities throughout the Northern Territory and impose virtual martial law conditions. Over coming weeks, police and troops will flood into as many as 60 towns and camps to enforce a series of draconian measures.

Welfare and family payments will be halved, with the seized portions transferred to food and clothing vouchers. All payments will be cut off if children fail to attend school, or are considered "at risk". Forced labour will be imposed, via "work for the dole" programs, to "clean up" communities."

Aboriginal people are marginalised in 'Australia' - with the lowest social outcomes and highest incarceration rates

The invasion of Australia continues, although pastoral and mining interests face mounting pressure from Aboriginal and ecological activists and the growing public perception that climate change due to human activity is a reality

Northern Territory Police are still being speared by Aboriginal people on the remote black reservations - where White Australian privilege is grossly apparent

Resistance is also 'internalised' negatively in 'communities' - gang fights, domestic violence, alcohol/substance abuse, truancy - (universal reactions to racism described by Dr Martin Luthor King Jr in his essay - Where Do We Go From Here: Chaos or Community) all taking on added cultural significance when viewed as resistance to an ongoing genocide

It is important to note - that the scale of Aboriginal 'antisocial' or violent behaviour manifested as resistance to European invasion - is insignificant when compared to the history of ecological and social violence wreaked by White Australia in Aboriginal homelands and countries such as Vietnam - even in New Zealand (Aoteara)