Opinion Why Adam Goodes is booed and other anthropological discussion

[ScooterBrother]

here you go Forzaport

Why its so hard to talk to white people about race - Dr. Robin DiAngelo, associate professor of critical multicultural and social justice education at Westfield State University

"Yes, white people can have problems and face barriers, but systematic racism won't be one of them. This distinction -- between individual prejudice and a system of unequal institutionalized racial power -- is fundamental. One cannot understand how racism functions ... if one ignores group power relations."

 

[Steve Dore]

..... He questioned the date used for Australia Day because it coincided with great atrocities committed against his culture. ........

Raising the British flag in Sydney Cove on 26 January 1788 was an atrocity against the indigenous people?

Seriously though, to indigenous people it should make no matter what date is chosen to celebrate the British colonisation of an already inhabited Australia. It is still the celebration of something that eventually caused them great harm.

 

[PAFC66]

If he didnt cry racism for everytime he gets booed people wouldnt boo him.. He is essentially saying 99% of people are booing him because they are all racists. People dont like being called racist when they arnt and thats why he's getting booed. Its a vicious circle and untill he accepts some responsibility of his arrogance it will keep going. You cant tell paying customers what to do.
Ill boo the **** out of him if he's ever in Adelaide again and starts playing for frees and continues to display dirty tactics off the ball. Anything to put a good player off. He's being grossly overpaid for what he does anyway.

 

[PAFC66]

I resent the use of the term invasion day. Let's rename it civilisation day.

Yeah probably too soon..

 

[Jakko]

The irony is that lots of people developed a dislike for Adam because of perceived (or real) special treatment from umpires, MRP and the AFL.

And here we are, in the middle of a media and AFL campaign to stop people from booing one person in particular...

 

[Forzaport]

Read more. Specifically, the myth of Reverse Racism.

I'm not sure how this applies to what I've been posting.

In any case, racial prejudice is a form of racism.

http://racerelations.about.com/od/understandingrac1/a/What-Is-Racial-Prejudice.htm
According to the American Heritage College Dictionary, racism has two meanings.

Firstly, racism is, “The belief that race accounts for differences in human character or ability and that a particular race is superior to others.” Secondly, racism is, “Discrimination or prejudice based on race.”

 

[ScooterBrother]

Raising the British flag in Sydney Cove on 26 January 1788 was an atrocity against the indigenous people?

Are you for real? I can't tell if this is sarcasm or not. I hope it is.

Seriously though, to indigenous people it should make no matter what date is chosen to celebrate the British colonisation of an already inhabited Australia. It is still the celebration of something that eventually caused them great harm.

Yeah true, it doesn't matter what day they picked, something shitty would've happened to an Aboriginal person at the hands of a white settler.

Which is why I am assuming Goodes said this:

But in the last five years, I've really changed my perception of what is Australia Day, of what it is to be Australian and for me, it's about celebrating the positives, that we are still here as indigenous people, our culture is one of the longest surviving cultures in the world, over 40,000 years.

That is something we need to celebrate and all Australians need to celebrate.

There are people out there thinking that today is a great day for Australia - well, it is.

It's a day we celebrate over 225 years of European settlement and right now, that's who we are as a nation but we also need to acknowledge our fantastic Aboriginal history of over 40,000 years

 

[Forzaport]

here you go Forzaport

Why its so hard to talk to white people about race - Dr. Robin DiAngelo, associate professor of critical multicultural and social justice education at Westfield State University

"Yes, white people can have problems and face barriers, but systematic racism won't be one of them. This distinction -- between individual prejudice and a system of unequal institutionalized racial power -- is fundamental. One cannot understand how racism functions ... if one ignores group power relations."

I honestly don't know what point you're trying to make and I have addressed the issue of power dynamics.

 

[Rising Power]

That's it, if I see anyone booing Adam Goodes I'm going to boo them.

 

[ScooterBrother]

m is, “Discrimination or prejudice based on race.”

Correct!

Please provide a real life practical example of how White people are discriminated against in this country at a systematic, repeatable and structural level.

 

[ScooterBrother]

I honestly don't know what point you're trying to make and I have addressed the issue of power dynamics.

Fair enough, at least you admit it.

 

[Dylan8]

If he didnt cry racism for everytime he gets booed people wouldnt boo him.. He is essentially saying 99% of people are booing him because they are all racists.

GET THIS INTO YOUR HEAD THAT HE HAS LITERALLY NEVER EVER DONE THIS

 

[Steve Dore]

Are you for real? ....

I am for real. I know of no documented atrocities that occurred in the colony of NSW on 26 January 1788. Please enlighten me.

.... I can't tell if this is sarcasm or not. I hope it is ...

Not really sarcasm, maybe a little tongue in cheek, but you should be able to determine my tone by the rest of that post.

 

[John the Butcher]

I heard a person on Ten News saying this:
"there are (seventy something) Aboriginal players in the AFL, none which get booed like Goodes. Has he ever stopped and thought why am I getting booed?"
---
Some people who boo him are racist and join in "the fun", others are knowledgeable people who only boo him because he's a w anchor.
Do I boo Chad Wingard, Patty Ryder, Jake Neade etc? hell no
Do I boo Cyril Rioli, Steven Motlop, and the other indgeionus players? nope

tbh I'm over this and how it's blown up so big. Gill and friends, you can't ban people from the footy for booing. And if you do, good luck singling everyone out

 

[Adam Marrett23]

Yeah. I'm not reading all of that. Right to kill people? No. Right to boo someone who accepts and national award whilst pissing all over the country he got it from? Absolutely. You can veer of into the whole greater social issue at hand here, but this is a football forum, and Goodes is a ****** of the highest order.

I love Port Adelaide, I love Chad Wingard, but if he decides an indigenous war dance is a good idea, you best believe I'll boo the absolute heck out of him to.

Seriously booing Wingard if he did the same dance representing that he is proud of his heritage and supporting a fellow indigenous player/ friend? Give me a break, I'll deal with and accept any type as a Port fan but that statement in about the worst I've read all week and part of me feels ashamed it came from a fellow Port Adelaide member/supporter.

 

[ZingerB]

I hate goodes but this is seriously racist..

The trauma these people are going through has gone from generation to generation and you would have no idea how they would feel? Its not easy to get a job when half of them are scarred, on the grog and drugs ect..

I was raised an Irish / Scottish Catholic. Around the same time as the 1st Fleet, Catholics were prohibited from being educated in Ireland. Scotland and Ireland have their own problems and plenty of reasons to be pissed of at the English. At some point you just have to get over it.

 

[ploppy]

people who boo Goodes because they think he is a w***er should ask them selves why they judge him harsher than all the other w***ers that are playing who they dont boo. There are plenty worse than Goodes in the w***er stakes but the hate Goodes more...because he is black.

 

[AJJPAFC]

Seriously booing Wingard if he did the same dance representing that he is proud of his heritage and supporting a fellow indigenous player/ friend? Give me a break, I'll deal with and accept any type as a Port fan but that statement in about the worst I've read all week and part of me feels ashamed it came from a fellow Port Adelaide member/supporter.

It is a hostile action, undertaken with hostile undertones. See Jettas little outburst. If I pretended to shoot a gun at Jetta in response I would get smashed.

 

[Steve Dore]

I was raised an Irish / Scottish Catholic. Around the same time as the 1st Fleet, Catholics were prohibited from being educated in Ireland. Scotland and Ireland have their own problems and plenty of reasons to be pissed of at the English. At some point you just have to get over it.

Catholics are still excluded from being Australia's head of state, but that's OK.

 

[Liverpower]

A great deal of this discussion is at cross purposes because of different views about what constitutes racism. The basic or primary definition is relatively uncontroversial: "any action or attitude, conscious or unconscious, that subordinates an individual or group based on skin colour or race." Note that this basic definition does not require a power imbalance to exist and is focuses on behaviour at the individual level. On this definition both white and indigenous people could have racist attitudes to each other, though let's be honest, it is much harder for a white person to be subordinated in Australia because of the colour of their skin than an indigenous person.

Institutional racism is more subtle and complex. One definition is that it is "a system of procedures/patterns in education, housing, businesses, employment, professional associations, religion, media, etc., whose effect is to perpetuate and maintain the power, influence and well-being of one group over another. It originates in the operation of established and respected forces in the society; and thus receives far less public condemnation than does individual racism."

Power relations are front and center in institutional racism and I would have thought it was fairly obvious that indigenous Australian have been and continue to be victims of institutional racism, whereas white Australians have not and indeed cannot. Turning to the Israel/Palestinian question, again, individuals in both groups could have racist attitudes towards each other, but only Palestinians can be victims of institutional racism.

What does all of this mean for the Adam Goodes debacle? I have no doubt that most of the people that are booing him do not regard themselves as racists or think of it as a racist act. However, I think those that boo him regularly, or think that it is okay to do so, should ask themselves some difficult questions.

If people "just don't like him", why is that? He is certainly far from the dirtiest player to play the game, or the player that has begged for the most frees. Indeed, over the course of his career he has given away 51 more frees than he has received. So, why is the booing of Goodes more intense and regular than for any other player that I can recall in 25 years of watching football? Is it not possible that some of the negative perceptions of him as a player are tied to the political stance he has taken on indigenous issues? Was his response to being called an ape (which has a very long history of use in Australia, the US and other countries to dehumanise people with dark skins), really so unreasonable that it deserves this response?

There will always be debate about the historic rights and wrongs of the treatement of Australia's indigenous population, but there is little doubt that the subject makes a lot of people uncomfortable, particularly when it raises the prospect that the poor health and living standards of a large proportion of indigenous people today is linked to historical mistreatment and institutional racism that lingers today. Remember, racism does not have to be conscious - little differences in behaviour and attitude that people are not concsciously aware of matter too.

And even if you disagree with me on most or all of the points above, can we not agree that Goodes and many other indigenous players, past and present, including the teams that we all love and support, perceive what is going on as having a racist element? That even if it began as something non-racist, it has morphed into something more destructive? That it is hurting an important section of the football community that playera and officials have spent decades trying to ensure have equal opportunities to play and be successful at football? That some genunie racists are using this as a cover to express their own distasteful attitudes? Quite simply, the booing should stop.

 

[JAlexG]

The lines of border racism are everywhere.
A job application (no pun intended) asks whether I am Torres Strait Islander or Aboriginal? (maybe someone knows the answer, seriously?)
In all honesty, who the **** cares? I am an Australian applying for a job. If my app and persona is good enough for the job so be it, but dont borderline it with some bullshit about what my background is.
Doesn't ask if people have an Asian or European etc. background.

 

[rocket18]

Correct!

Please provide a real life practical example of how White people are discriminated against in this country at a systematic, repeatable and structural level.

I dont want to sound flippant can you please provide some examples of this occuring to aboriginal perople in the last few years. I havent encountered any and I would be curious to see where it is still happening.

 

[PA88]

Correct!

Please provide a real life practical example of how White people are discriminated against in this country at a systematic, repeatable and structural level.

Does 'white' include Europeans and Brits?

 

[Peck]

The general consensus from the more vocal posters in this thread is as PC and soft as our club has become.

People don't have jobs because there aren't jobs. When there are 100 people competing for a job are the 99 who miss out lazy? Seems like an odd way to judge people to me.

Anyway with this and other postings from yourself I think you need to refrain from commenting on racial issues. I'm not going to insult you but you clearly haven't experienced certain things and are talking like you know better than those who have experienced them.

Who knows maybe you have experienced extended unemployment, or been subject to the underprivilege that comes with being born a certain way. Regardless the comment above is most certainly racist, and to those defending the boo-ers. Opinions like these are why you should stop defending them.

 

[CharlieKelly]

The general consensus from the more vocal posters in this thread is as PC and soft as our club has become. If I stand up and say the unwillingness of indigenous Australians to contribute to the workforce on a proportionality equal basis to that achieved by white Australia is pathetic, is that racist? Or simply stating a fact.

Or is it the racists fault they don't have jobs?

yeah, pretty ****ing racist