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From Common Courage Press
Recent
Stories
July
17, 2003
Ron
Jacobs
Sometimes Even the President of the
United States Has to Stand Naked
Lisa
Walsh Thomas
Bush Country: the Venom and Adulation of Ignorance
Martin
Schwarz
Bush Pre-emptive Strike Doctrine is the Bane of Non-Proliferation
Watchdogs
Heidi
Lypps
Better Justice Through Chemistry? Forced
Drugging and the Supreme Court
Norman
Madarasz
Third Ways and Third Worlds: Lula at the Progressive Governance
Conference
Pankaj
Mehta
Criminalizing the Palestinian Solidarity Movement
Marjorie
Cohn
Bush, War Lies & Impeachment: the
Boy Who Cried Wolf
Hammond
Guthrie
(Dis) Intelligence Revisited
Website
of the Day
No Force, No Fraud: the Soul of Libertarianism
July
16, 2003
Jason
Leopold
Wolfowitz Told White House to Hype
Dubious Uranium Claims
William
Cook
Defining Terrorism from the Top Down
Elaine
Cassel
Judge Brinkema v. Ashcroft: She Whom
Must Not Be Obeyed
Jason
Leopold
How Can They Justify the War If WMDs Are Never Found?
Linda Heard
Bondage or Freedom?
Raymond
Barrett
From Detroit to Basra
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Back to the Future in Guatemala:
The Return of Gen. Ríos Montt
July
15, 2003
Kathleen
and Bill Christison
Why We Resigned from VIPS
Elaine
Cassel
Ashcroft's War on Legal Whistleblowers:
the Ordeal of Jesselyn Radack
Chris
Floyd
Barge Poles: Oil Wars and New Europe's Mercenaries
Jason
Leopold
CIA Warned White House Last October that Niger Docs were Forgeries
Gaius Publius
Considering the Obvious: Fool Us Once, Fool Us Twise...Please
John
Troyer
The Niger Syndrome
Becky Gillette
No Conspiracy at Coffeen Nature Preserve: a Response to David
Orrr
Uri
Avnery
The Bi-National State: The Wolf Shall
Dwell with the Lamb
Website
of the Day
Cost of Iraq War
July
14, 2003
Lisa
Taraki
Hot Days in Ramallah
Walter
Brasch
Bush: the Pretend Captain
SOA
Watch
Training Colombia's Killers in the US
Dan Bacher
Yurok Tribe Denounces Klamath River Salmon Killers
Veteran
Intelligence Professionals for Sanity
Intelligence Unglued
Website
of the Day
Coalition for Democratic Rights and Civil Liberties
July 12 / 13, 2003
Arthur
Mitzman
The Double Wall Before the Future
Standard
Schaefer
The Coming Financial Reality: an
Interview with Michael Hudson
John Feffer
A Fearful Symmetry: Washington and Pyongyang
Ron
Jacobs
Shades of Gray in Iran
Elaine
Cassel
Judicial Terrorism Against the Bill of Rights
Tom
Stephens
Civil Liberties After 9/11
David Lindorff
New White House Slogan: "Case Closed. Just Move On"
Jason
Leopold
The Mini-War Against Iraq Prior to 9/11
Lee Sustar
What's Behind the Crisis in Liberia?
Mickey
Z.
AIDS Dissent and Africa
Sam Hamod
Semitic is a Language Group, Not a Race or Ethnic Group
Ramzy
Baroud
Awaiting Justice on an Old Blanket
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Savage Incongruities: the Photographic Life of Lee Miller
Adam
Engel
Parable of the Lobbyist
Robert
Sanders
A Review of Ralph Lopez's American Dream
Poets'
Basement
Albert, Witherup, Guthrie
July
11, 2003
Conn
Hallinan
The Coin of Empire
Tim
Wise
God Responds to Bush
Mokhiber
/ Weissman
The Two Faces of Bush in Africa
Edward
S. Herman
Whitewashing Sandra Day O'Connor
David Orr
Coffeen-gate: What's Going on at the Sierra Club Foundation?
David
Lindorff
An Iraq War & Occupation Glossary
Website
of the Day
Dead Malls
July
10, 2003
Ron
Jacobs
Dealing with the Devil: the Bloody
Profits of General Dynamics
Sean
Donahue
Bush and the Paramillitaries: Coddling Terrorists in Colombia
Yemi
Toure
Who Outted Bush in Afrika?
Robert
Jensen
Politics and Sustainability: an Interview
with Wes Jackson
Ali
Abunimah
US Leaves Injured Iraqis Untreated
Joanne
Mariner
Federal Courts, Not Military Commissions
Website
of the Day
Electronic Iraq
July
9, 2003
David
Lindorff
Is the Media Finally Turning on
Bush?
David
Krieger and Angela McCracken
10 Myths About Nuclear Weapons
Mickey
Z.
Why Speak Out?
Lee Sustar
The Great Medicare Fraud
John
Chuckman
The Worst Kind of Lie
Gary Leupp
"Pacifist" Japan and the Occupation of Iraq
Website
of the Day
Hail to the Thief:
Songs for the Bush Years
July
8, 2003
Elaine
Cassel
Bully on the Bench: the Pathological
Dissents of Scalia
Alan
Maass
Nights of Fire and Rage in Benton Harbor
Chris
Floyd
Troubled Sleep: Getting Used to the American Gulag
Linda
S. Heard
America's Kangaroo Justice
Brian
Cloughley
They Tell Lies to Nodders
Charles
Sullivan
Bush the Christian?
Saul
Landau
The Intelligence Culture in the National Security Age
Website
of the Day
Occupation Watch
July
7, 2003
William
Blum
The Anti-Empire Report
Harvey
Wasserman
The Nuke with a Hole in Its Head
Ramzy
Baroud
Peace for All the Wrong Reasons
Simon
Jones
What Progressives Should Think About
Iran
Lesley
McCulloch
Fear, Pain and Shame in Aceh
Uri
Avnery
The Draw
Steve
Perry
Bush's Wars Web Log 7/3
July
4 / 6, 2003
Patrick
Cockburn
Dead on the Fourth of July
Frederick
Douglass
What is Freedom to a Slave?
Martha
Honey
Bush and Africa: Racism, Exploitation
and Neglect
Jeffrey
St. Clair
The Rat in the Grain: Amstutz and
the Looting of Iraqi Agriculture
Standard
Schaefer
Rule by Fed: Anyone But Greenspan in 2004
Lenni Brenner
Jefferson is for Today
Elaine
Cassel
Fucking Furious on the Fourth
Ben Tripp
How Free Are We?
Wayne
Madsen
A Sad Independence Day
John Stanton
Happy Birthday, America! 227 Years of War
Jim
Lobe
Bush's Surreal AIDS Appointment
John Blair
Return to Marble Hill: Indiana's Rusting Nuke
Lisa
Walsh Thomas
Heavy Reckoning at Qaim
David Vest
Wake Up and Smell the Dynamite
Adam
Engel
Queer as Grass
Poets'
Basement
Christian, Witherup, Albert & St. Clair
Website
of the Weekend
The Lipstick Librarian
July
3, 2003
Patrick
W. Gavin
The Meaning of Gettysburg
Thomas
W. Croft
There Was a Reason They Called It the Casino Economy
David
Lindorff
Outlawing Subversives: Hong Kong
and the US
John
Chuckman
Lessons from the American Revolution
Jackson
Thoreau
New Far-Right Scheme: Impeach Supreme Court Justices
Stan
Goff
"Bring 'Em On?": a Former
Special Forces Soldier Responds to Bush's Invitation for Iraqis
to Attack US Troops
Steve
Perry
Bush's Wars Web Log 7/3
July 2, 2003
Diane
Christian
Good Killing and Bad Killing
Richard
Falk
After Iraq, Does UN War Prevention Have a Future?
Mokhiber
/ Weissman
Bush Administration: Causing Repetitive Stress
Justin
Podur
Uribe's Onslaught Across Colombia
Reuven
Kaviner
Prosecuting Ben-Artzi, the Refusenik
Steve
Perry
Bush's Wars Web Log 7/2
July
1, 2003
Sasan
Fayamanesh
Weapon of Choice: Nukes, Israel and
Iran
Elaine
Cassel
Sex and the Supreme Moralizer: Scalia
and the Sodomy Cops
Susan
Block
A Love Supreme: Our Assholes Belong
to Ourselves
Bill
Glahn
RIAA Watch: No, No Bono
David Lindorff
Weapons in Search of a Name
Gary
Leupp
Occupation, Resistance and the Plight of the GIs
Steve
Perry
Bush's Wars Web Log 7/1
June
30, 2003
Karyn
Strickler
The Do-Nothings: an Exposé
of Progressive Politics in America
Col. Dan
Smith
The Occupation of Iraq: Descending into the Quagmire
Tim
Wise
Race and Destruction in Black and White
Neve Gordon
The Roadmap and the Wall
Chris
Floyd
The Revelation of St. George: "God Told Me to Strike Saddam"
Elaine
Cassel
Kentucky Woman
Uri
Avnery
Hope in Dark Times
Steve
Perry
Bush's Wars Web Log 6/30
Website
of the Day
Bush El Hombre
June
28 / 29, 2003
M.
Shahid Alam
Bernard Lewis: Scholarship or Sophistry?
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Meet Steven Griles: Big Oil's Inside
Man
Laura
Carlsen
Democracy's Future: From the Polls or the Populace?
Alan Maass
You Call These Democrats an Alternative?
C.Y.
Gopinath
Bush and Kindergarten
Noah Leavitt
Bush, the Death Penalty and International Law
Joanne
Mariner
Rehnquist Family Values
Ignacio
Chapela
Tenure, Censorship and Biotech at Berkeley
Bob
Scowcroft
Bush's Squeeze on Organic Farmers
Jon Brown
Tom Delay: "I am the Government"
Kam
Zarrabi
Keep Your Hands Off Iran, Please!
Ron Jacobs
Big Bill Broonzy's Conversation with the Blues
Julie
Hilden
Fear Factor: Art, Terror and the First Amendment
Adrien
Rain Burke
The Anarchists' Wedding Guide
Adam
Engel
US Troops Outta Times Square
Poets'
Basement
Witherup, Guthrie, Albert, Hamod
June
27, 2003
Jason
Leopold
CIA: Seven Months Prior to 9/11 Iraq
Posed No Threat to US
David
Vest
Supreme Silence: Bush's Bunker-Hunker
David
Lindorff
The Catch and Release of "Comical
Ali"
Ray McGovern
Cheney, Forgery and the CIA
Steve
Perry
Bush's Wars Web Log 6/26
Website
of the Day
John Kerry, Teresa Heinz & Ken Lay: The Politics of Hypocrisy
June
26, 2003
Sen.
Robert Byrd
The Road of Cover-Up is a Road to Ruin
Jason
Leopold
Wolfowitz Instructed the CIA to Investigate
Hans Blix
Paul
de Rooij
Ambient Death in Palestine
Chris Floyd
Mass Graves and Burned Meat in Bush's New Iraq
Elaine
Cassel
Wolfowitz as Lord High Executioner
CounterPunch
Wire
Musicians Unite Against Sweatshops
Sheldon
Hull
Squatting in Mansions
Ben Tripp
A Guide to Hating Almost Anyone
Uri
Avnery
The Best Show in Town
Steve
Perry
Bush's Wars Web Log 6/25
Website
of the Day
Ordinary Vistas:
The Photographs of Kurt Nimmo
June
25, 2003
Bruce
Jackson
Buffalo Cops Wage War on Pedal Pushers
Mickey
Z.
The New Dark Ages
David Lindorff
Indonesia's War on Journalists
Dan
Bacher
Butterflies and Farmworkers Confront USDA and Riot Cops
Adam Federman
"Success is Not the Issue Here"
Elaine
Cassel
"Ain't No Justice": Fed Judge Quits, Assails Sentencing
Guidelines
Bill Kauffman
My America vs. the Empire
Steve
Perry
Bush's Wars Web Log 6/25
Website
of the Day
You Are Being Watched:
Elevator Moods
June
24, 2003
Elaine
Cassel
Supreme Indemnity
Holocaust Denial at the High Court
Roya
Monajem
A Message from Tehran: Is It Worth
It to Risk One's Life?
John
Chuckman
The Real Clash of Civilizations
David Lindorff
WMD Damage Control at the Times
Steve
Perry
Bush's Wars Web Log 6/24
June
23, 2003
Marc
Pritzke
Washington Lied: an Interview with
Ray McGovern
Conn
Hallinan
The Consistency of Sharon
Wayne Madsen
Commercials, Disney & Amistad
Edward
Said
The Meaning of Rachel Corrie
Steve Perry
Bush's Wars Web Log 6/23
June
21 / 22, 2003
Alexander
Cockburn
My Life as a Rabbi
William
A. Cook
The Scourge of Hopelessness
Standard
Schaefer
The Wages of Terror: an Interview with R.T. Naylor
Ron Jacobs
US Prisons as Strategic Hamlets
Harry
Browne
The Pitstop Ploughshares
Lawrence
Magnuson
WMD: The Most Dangerous Game
Harold
Gould
Saddam and the WMD Mystery
David Krieger
10 Reasons to Abolish Nuclear Weapons
Avia
Pasternak
The Unholy Alliance in the Occupied Territories
CounterPunch
Summer Reading:
Our Favorite Novels
Todd Chretien
Return to Sender: Todd Gitlin, the Duke of Condescension
Maria
Tomchick
Danny Goldberg's Imaginary Kids
Adam Engel
The Fat Man in Little Boy
Poets'
Basement
Guthrie, Albert & Hamod
June 20, 2003
Walter
Brasch
Down on Our Knees
Robert
Meeropol
The Son of the Rosenbergs on His Parents Death and Bush's America
Russell
Mokhiber and Robert Weissman
Grannies and Baby Bells
Norman
Madarasz
Pierre Bourgault: the Life of a
Quebec Radical
Gary
Leupp
Bush on "Revisionist Historians"
Steve
Perry
Bush's Lies
Marathon: the Finale
Hot Stories
Wendell
Berry
Small Destructions Add Up
CounterPunch
Wire
WMD: Who Said What When
Cindy
Corrie
A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter
I Can't Hear From
Elaine
Cassel
Civil Liberties
Watch
Michel
Guerrin
Embedded Photographer Says: "I
Saw Marines Kill Civilians"
Uzma
Aslam Khan
The Unbearably Grim Aftermath of War:
What America Says Does Not Go
Paul de Rooij
Arrogant
Propaganda
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
Bush: A Draft Resolution
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for More Stories.
|
July
19, 2003
Max Dupain, Olive
Cotton and the Aboriginal Tent Embassy
A
Three Dog Night
By VANESSA JONES
I'd emailled an old high school friend. We used
to share final year art classes. I told him of a photography
exhibition. One of his favorite old Australian photographers--Max
Dupain. He used to like him a lot. I told him how I liked Olive
Cotton's photo of the photographer himself (her husband at the
time) "Max
After Surfing",1939.
One of the few images, when I first saw
it, I'd call drop-dead-gorgeous. Probably because it was a woman's
eye view of desire, which I hadn't often seen in visual history,
or in society. Aretha Franklin and Bessie Smith express much
of this in their music, but where else was it? I hadn't known
of this seductive view of Olive Cotton's at school. Cotton wasn't
part of the school's or wider community's art knowledge like
Dupain was. Wonder why! Let's not encourage all those girls to
create ideas of their own desires (sexual, financial, political
or cultural). Let's not teach them that 50 odd years ago, a woman
called Olive Cotton was doing it.
I'd only heard of her and her work when
doing an art school essay. Cotton's photo "Teacup
Ballet" 1935, had been an option in a choice of
essay topics. I chose a comparative essay assignment. Cotton's
Teacup Ballet with Margaret Preston's oil painting "Implement
Blue", of 1927, included by lecturers Jennifer Turpin and
Bruce Adams. Comparative art theory essays were never my interest,
as I didn't believe that artists made their work for people to
sit down and write complicated essays about. But I appreciated
the introduction to Olive Cotton, and her inclusion in the selection.
It was the late 1980s, when Cotton was over 70 years old, before
Cotton's photography enjoyed wider exposure in Australia.
The old school friend wrote of being
overseas, and being far away from the sea. And in the middle
of summer, missing the beach. He told me how he'd hung up Max
Dupain's iconic beach photo "Sunbaker",
1937. The image summed up so much of what was missed, about the
sea and Australia. The friend had educated himself as far as
he could in Australia, in our open access, low fees uni system,
which is under attack now, by the current government. He was
in a far way land, but the photo exhibition of Dupain's was nearby.
It motivated me to go, the remembering
of him, leafing through a Dupain photo book, in late adolescence.
Life lived through reproductions. Rarely seeing the real thing.
So, I went. With my son. Put some apples and a plastic knife
and a box of crackers in the car and set off for the National
Portrait Gallery at the Old Parliament House. We parked. I thought
ahead, and asked my son "Would you like some apple now?"
He saw the lawn. The lake. I saw the
Aboriginal Tent embassy. The newly burnt out shell of the Tent
Embassy's Information Office. "Arsonists" had attacked
it under a month ago. The Tent Embassy was started in 1972, and
since then it has symbolized and expressed Aboriginal people's
fight for sovereignty. Aboriginal Australians are now approximately
1.1% of the population and received the vote and access to social
benefits as late as 1967. The Greens politician for the Canberra
area, "The Australian Capital Territory", Kerrie Tucker,
had been in the news lately, for conflicting with the Federal
Minister for Territories Wilson Tuckey. The sequence of events
after the arson attack on the Aboriginal Tent Embassy became
confusing, so I called her office, and was emailed the following
description by her office staffer Roland Manderson, of what had
happened. Their names Tuckey and Tucker are so similar it might
sound confusing, but stick with it!:
"Thank you for your email in support
of the Aboriginal Tent Embassy and our actions in challenging
the Commonwealth Minister for Territories Wilson Tuckey on the
matter. You won't be surprised to learn that not everyone is
pleased by what we have done on this issue, and so your support
is particularly gratifying.
"Not everyone who has written to
us knows the details of these recent incidents, so I have summarised
the situation so far. At present the site shed, which was the
Embassy's information centre and subject to a recent arson attack,
is a burnt out shell. Minister Tuckey argued that as the shed
had been burned out, it was unsafe and should be removed. It
is however still on site, directly in front of the Old Parliament
House, and would be reparable.
"When, on the suggestion of friends
of the Tent Embassy, we offered to cover the cost of a safety
fence erected around the shed, to ensure it was safe and so obviate
the need for Minister Tuckey to have it removed, his reaction
was extraordinarily hostile. While legal action was threatened,
none appears to be forthcoming. However, the contractor removed
the fence, the next day under threat of legal action from the
National Capital Authority (which has responsibility for Canberra's
Parliamentary Triangle, in which the Tent Embassy is located)
presumably acting under directions of the Minister.
"The Tent Embassy itself is listed
on the register of the national estate as a protest site of heritage
value. If a Commonwealth agency were to make any changes to the
site, it would have an obligation to refer the matter to the
Australian Heritage Commission.
"As I understand it, the National
Capital Authority did refer the matter to the Heritage Commission.
In explaining the position that the Commission then arrived at
in regard to the removal of the building, Executive director
Bruce Leaver concluded a letter to The Canberra Times with the
following paragraph: 'The Commission believed that the very nature
of the debate about the arson incident and proposed removal of
the structure clearly demonstrated that the national-estate values
were not affected, indeed the removal of the structure might
well heighten awareness of the site's national-estate values
rather than diminish them.'
"I have since written to The Canberra
Times suggesting that, on the same basis, we spill oil on the
Great Barrier Reef in order to raise awareness of its ecological
sensitivity.
"It is a serious concern however
that the Minister for Territories appears to dismiss an arson
attack on the Tent Embassy (and its residents) as a mere reflection
of its unpopularity, but threatens legal action against people
who offer to pay for the erection of a security fence around
the damaged building; and that the Heritage Commission will accede
to the removal of the building simply because people DO appreciate
its political significance.
"Thank you again for your letters
to us, please feel free to share your thoughts with any of the
above on this matter.
"PS . Previous to its life at the
Tent Embassy , the site-shed was a permanent protest installation
outside the South African Embassy when that country was run under
the apartheid regime, so clearly there are quite a few heritage
values at stake."
I hadn't crossed that green lawn before.
It seemed a no-go zone. I'd met a camera film guy at a refugee
rally a year or so ago, who'd been slowly making a doco of the
Aboriginal Tent embassy. It seemed an unwritten Anglo code that
non-Aboriginals didn't venture down there, or shouldn't go there,
to those tents on the lawn with a fire smoking, with cars around,
and washing hanging. You should believe in God, Queen and country,
and not much else. Like how you grow up with any sort of cultural
or social conditioning.
We walked over the road, to the grass
and steps. My son, keenly carrying the lunch box, tripped on
the steps. An Aboriginal guy came over. Helped him up. "Do
you mind if we eat here?" I started slicing my apple on
the lunch box lid and chatted about what was happening. My son
observed the burnt out nature of the site-shed, which was the
Information Center. A few Canadian journalists were sitting further
away, with some Aboriginal people.
"Cold down here, isn't it?"
I say, as the wind seems to run up from the War Memorial, over
the lake. He says "It was a 3 dog night last night".
I laugh. I hadn't heard that in a while. Aboriginal people sleep
at the tent embassy. A 3 dog night means he needed 3 dogs to
keep him warm at night. 3 equals a cold night. Fur cover. An
old outback drover saying, when men sleep under the stars. I
knew how they felt. I'd slept near the full blowing gas heater.
3 hours away were the Snowy Mountains ski fields, in full winter
flight, at top prices. I asked if they do interviews. "Come
back tomorrow. We've got some Canadians now, and we've just had
some Norwegians."
The fire was burning. The old bush humpy,
or "gunya", a traditional Aboriginal dome shaped sleeping
shelter, of tree branches woven with leaves, was standing with
the War Memorial in view behind it. There were painted signs
on and around the burnt out Information Center "Tent Embassy
Information Center--Open to Public" "Sacred Sites.
WorldHeritage." "Aboriginal Tent Embassy". Someone
had put up sculpted metal razor wire around the burnt out building,
to show unity with Amnesty International. It also tied in with
the locking up of refugees behind razor wire in our desert. Another
sign read "Native wisdom, Respect Culture, Sovereignty".
There was one sign there, decoratively
painted and signed "Bunja 03" which read, from top
to bottom, in 13 lines: "Infiltrate, Annihilate, Incarcerate,
Indoctrinate, I DID NOT GO AWAY. Assimilate, Educate. Graduate.
Self Determinate. I WILL NOT GO AWAY. Pluralism. Multiculturalism.
HOW ABOUT SOVEREIGNTY". That last sign seemed to sum up
so much Australia's 215 year Aboriginal-Anglo history.
I'd learnt some things about Aboriginal
culture from my father, who'd taught in a remote area of the
Northern Territory, in northern Australia, for 3 years. At Beswick
Creek, south of Katherine. Ten miles off the highway. He
has a collection of Aboriginal paintings from that time, traded
for dressmaking cloth and tobacco with the painter Charlie Lamjarrett.
Lamjarrett was the Tribal Elder/ the Head Man, of the Djoun tribe.
It was better for artists to trade their art for goods, more
useful than cash. I'd watched those images all my childhood.
Turtles. Kangaroos. Snakes. On tree bark. Pigments. Blues. Reds.
Yellow Ochres. As kids, he'd tell us stories of going hunting
with the kids, shooting kangaroos, bush turkeys, goannas, lizards.
He once shot a pelican and then they'd go and cook it up and
eat it. The kids loved the pelican taste.
The government sent up supplies of tinned
food- tinned fruit, flour, tea, sugar. These Western types of
food were later blamed for the prevalence of diabetes within
Aboriginal communities. These foods were foreign, before, to
these communities. The kids would go and fish at the waterhole.
There would be fresh water crocodiles. The aim of the settlement,
the government policy, was to assimilate the children into white
ways. To teach them to work within white society. Many Aboriginals
have been critical of government assimilation policy. See the
above link to Beswick Creek regarding the return of this land
to the Aboriginal people by Prime Minister Bob Hawke in June
1988, and the Barunga Statement, which was created on bark. Dad
said that the biggest problem was for the kids to actually get
a job after school. This is still an issue in Australia, and
he pointed out that the town of Moree, in north-western N.S.W.
is a contemporary example of the way in which communities are
trying to deal with these issues. The documentary "Message
From Moree" recently discussed these issues.
At Beswick Creek in the early 60s, there
was no alcohol, and thus no alcohol related problems. Beswick
Creek employed half a dozen white people, including the Superintendent
and his wife. Aboriginal men worked the cattle and learnt horse
riding, for the white cattle station. There'd be a bullock slaughtered
once a week for the Aboriginal people. The kids ate in the canteen
to "have a decent lunch". They had a power generator
lighting plant, and showed films. There was a garden to produce
settlement fresh vegies. A church minister would come once a
month--Brother Hamish. It was close to Arnhem Land. The Aboriginals
would settle at Beswick, and then go off to Arnhem Land. Apparently
they were free to move as they wished, to go hunting when they
wanted. He'd taught the actor David
Gulpilil who has acted in the films Walkabout, Storm Boy,
The Last Wave, Tracker, to name a few. When I saw Storm Boy as
a kid, I was proud of the connection my Dad had had to this actor.
Dad used to take the bark paintings into
his history classes at an urban high school, to show the boys.
He'd also regularly taken us out to La Perouse in Sydney, in
an old purple Valiant station wagon, to walk around and see the
snake man. Station wagon Valiant cars in the late 1970s were
nicknamed "wog chariots"--a type of racist slang, racist
when used by Anglos to people of Mediterranean origin, based
on the old "worthy oriental gentleman" acronym. The
comedy "Kingswood Country" was an Aussie suburban comedy,
which used the phrase "wog chariot" in the late 70s,
in reference to the comedy's Italian son-in-law "Bruno"'s
car, and to many migrant families, in general, who drove a Valiant.
Now Valiants of 1967 vintage are quite
chic, with their wind down back windows, but back then they were
more pragmatic. Dad had told me later that migrants were proud
of these adequate cars. They were good for families with more
than 2 kids, although Volvos were more middle-class-Anglo desirable.
My family drove their Valiant all the way out to La Perouse,
often. A purple one at that.
The film"Vacant
Posession", written and directed by Margo Nash, shows
this La Perouse region, the film being set at Botany Bay. Botany
Bay being the site where Captain James Cook arrived with the
first English Boat people. One of the interesting themes of that
film is its exploration of the taboo of Anglo women falling in
love with Aboriginal guys. Of crossing that unwritten line. The
story told of pregnancy, a fight with the young woman's father,
the Aboriginal lover's subsequent detention, and death. A forbidden
desire. A broken culture in whole.
I think many towns in regional areas
of Australia had their own story of these deaths, as well as
urban areas. Often suicides, of quiet young Aboriginal guys.
Perhaps in love with white girls. Perhaps for other reasons.
Not always in detention. Sometimes just the relationship. All
too complex and painful. Once the line had been crossed. It was
quiet, and rarely mentioned, but the sadness stayed, for many
years, in the silent faces of the mothers and the girls who had
been loved. And, others girls learnt, by watching, to avoid that
pain. The names of the boy, the girl, and the boy's mother never
vanishes. Remembering seeing them in the town, cuddling. Somehow
stays in the memory. You knew that if your eye could see this,
that it was better to transfer that site of desire to non-Aboriginal
men. It wasn't safe, socially. (The government's aim was for
the Aboriginal population to decrease, not to increase). But
you couldn't repress this desire. It'd perhaps be like being
gay- something you couldn't and didn't want to run away from,
but it had the same taboo. So, you learnt to keep that desire,
for your own survival, but seek its expression/connection elsewhere.
Yet, transferring that desire to a non-Australian
man means risking putting a lot of racial clutter on him, when
you try and live within Australian society, and the man can end
up feeling boxed in and revolted by the culture. Your own involuntary,
internalized values of that culture can sit uneasily here too.
Looking at the bush humpy, or "gunya",
at the Tent Embassy, which seemed to sit out of place with the
permanence of the over constructed War Memorial and the symmetry
of Canberra behind it, I wanted a camera. The burnt out site-shed
(which had been used also at the South African embassy as an
anti-apartheid information embassy) painted with images and texts.
The Aboriginal flag near it. A vacant plastic chair. Old Parliament
House behind it. Well painted, white. It seemed strange, to go
to a photography exhibition, when outside, there were photos
to be taken. History to be recorded while apple slices were eaten.
Inside Old Parliament House were exquisite
black and white portraits by Max Dupain, of distinguished artists
and unknown Australians. Their framed front glass, in the deep
grey areas of the photos, reflecting the viewer's own portrait.
I remembered reading of Max Dupain saying
that the skills of a photographer were in being able to take
photos in your own environment i.e. of a magnolia or such. It
was somehow as important, or more important, than travelling
to far off, exotic locations in search of the alluring. Like
Naguib Mahfouz living in Cairo and writing Cairo stories. Or
Olive Cotton living out at Cowra and doing photography around
there. Dupain had taken photos of Australian artists such as
Lloyd Rees and Russell Drysdale in their studios. As a child
at school, while lining up, I used to lean against a worn out
Drysdale poster of his painting "Moody's
Pub"1941. Drysdale had been a painter who went to outback/
regional Australia and recorded his European perspective of non-urban,
human oriented landscapes, which included varying depictions
of Aboriginal Australia. Seeing Dupain's photo portrait of the
artist and former Art Gallery of NSW Director, Hal Missingham,
reminded me of Missingham's photographic books "Close Focus"
or "Design Focus", photographic studies of detail.
The idea of detail has always interested me. It's intimacy. It's
domesticity. It's power. How detail can be overlooked, yet any
whole experience is usually made up of many details and fragments.
Think of Paul Cox's film "Innocence".
All those details of memory, time, smell, music, place, touch
and emotional experience. There were also many portraits of dancers,
a couple of the writer Patrick White, one of the soprano opera
singer Dame Joan Sutherland, architects. Musicians including
Yehudi Menuhin. Conductors. Also, there were anonymous photos,
amongst which was the portrait of a young boy "Smiling Boy at Glebe"
1939, . The eyes, or the smile struck me. Something about his
young face.
Aboriginal Australia is one of the hardest
realities to face and write about, without being a patronizing
white twit. Maybe it's not so hard, with some effort, but it
is a difficult, complex, living, breathing complexity, which
is hard to face and easier to avoid. Where does one try to start
from? Where to commence? I think it's better to leave the white
critics aside. Better to read or hear Aboriginal people's own
stories. Talk to Aboriginal people on your own. (Just as Olive
Cotton had done, by placing her eye behind the camera at Max.)
Visit the Tent Embassy, sit down by the campfire. Listen, hear
the stories, and have your winter jacket come home smoke saturated.
And when your kids ask you where you've been, as they smell that
smoke within the canvas, just say "Oh, just sitting by a
campfire, listening to some Aboriginal people talk about their
life", and already at 6 years, one says "But there
aren't many Aboriginal people anywhere".
A few days after seeing the photo show,
I drove back to the Tent Embassy. This time, knowing why I was
going there. I wanted to ask the name of the guy I'd been speaking
with on that first unplanned visit, but no-one could remember.
"Probably it was Uncle Neil. What did he look like?"
Medium build I said. Perhaps a moustache or beard. "How
old was he? How dark was he? Really dark or not?" At my
hesitation to answer, we all laughed shyly a little. There was
a chance now to sit down by the campfire, and listen. I didn't
own a mobile tape recorder so I'd just brought pen and paper.
2 other Aboriginal men turned up, strangers. Were offered a seat.
I sat down. Listened to some talk about the embassy. The arson
attack. It turned out that 3 of the men around the fire were
adopted into white families at a young age. The men were in their
30s. It amazed me how they just slipped into each other's company-
strangers, but somehow not strangers. Asking if one knew the
other's relatives in the region where they'd come from. They'd
establish shared connections, links to family and friends, and
then keep talking. Opening up about the pain of adoption early
in the chat. The different men spoke of being well cared for
in their adoptive homes. The visiting men spoke of experiences
in juvenile detention centers, of theft, of doing the Harry Holt
(bolting off). The least pained of the adopted men seemed to
be those who'd always known they were Aboriginal. Not so hidden.
2 of the men were caring for relative's children. I thought the
kids were their own. But they both said "Oh, no they're
my sister's kids- giving the Mum and Dad a break to sort things
out/ have some time together" Or they were a brother's kids.
As a parent I could understand that. Their strength in the extended
family reminded me of the social fabric of Egyptian society,
which I'd experienced in Cairo. Something adoption would (and
did) threaten in Aboriginal communities. Some of the men spoke
of the affect of alcohol on family breakdowns in general, and
their decisions to delete it from their lives.
Ivan Sen's film "Beneath
Clouds" dealt with issues of Aboriginal youth in detention
centres and the anger these young men carried within them. The
music group "Tiddas" sing about deaths in custody in
their song "Malcolm Smith", 1993. A song about a boy
who steals a bike, gets locked up, and dies in custody. The magistrate
Pat O'Shane, herself Aboriginal, is aware of the frequent times
Aboriginal youths are brought before court for offensive language.
The artist Lin Onus did the sculpture "Fruit
Bats", 1991 --one hundred bats hanging upside down on
an archetypal Australian Hills Hoist clothes line. Wonder what
that's all about? Many young guys end up inside, having done
little to warrant it. Perhaps they stole a packet of textas and
something else. After doing something else minor.
Later, another man came over. He sat
down, and some Timorese women came over, who'd been in Australia
for less than 2 years. One Timorese lady came over, came up close,
and didn't stand back. She crouched down by the fire, and held
out her hands to the campfire grate "We cook like that,
back home, on the fire, like that", she motioned to the
black kettle and saucepan on the grate. The Aboriginal man who'd
come over, Damien Eade, welcomed them, and started talking, explaining
to the women the buildings "One building, the one over there,
was an East Timor embassy. The one with the snake on it. That
one, the one that got burnt out, was used before outside the
South African embassy, and was used as an information center,
in the anti-apartheid struggle, to share information. In our
country, we have to have an embassy. A tent embassy. In our own
country. We still have problems in this country, we have people
here living in third world conditions. We sleep here like white
people did when the boats came 215 years ago. We'd like to govern
our own country, like you East Timorese want to govern your own
country- without the fighting. You have the UN telling you how
to run your government and your lives. When people come here,
they should have respect for our way of doing things, like how
in East Timor, they should respect your sovereignty. We have
the West Papua flag here, and other flags from around the world,
from other indigenous nations, in solidarity with them .....They
try and come and make us put out our campfire and we want to
keep our campfire burning- it's the oldest form of energy. If
they let us manage our land, as we did before 1788, there wouldn't
be these problems like the firestorm (in Canberra in January
2003)....We want the chance to rule our country, so our kids
can have a proper country" Then, Damien sang a welcome song
for the Timorese ladies, and said to them to bring their flag,
that they'll fly it, near the West Papua flag. He gets paid nothing
for this singing, and story, but people who drop by are welcome
to leave a gold coin near the <steps.Then>, Damien sang
a welcome song for the Timorese ladies, and said to them to bring
their flag, that they'll fly it, near the West Papua flag. He
gets paid nothing for this singing, and story, but people who
drop by are welcome to leave a gold coin near the steps.
Damien explains to me "As sovereign
people we have always acknowledged, recognized, welcomed other
sovereign people in this sacred land since time immemorial, (from
the beginning). Always was, always will be yolngu, ngar, nungah,
murrie, koori koories (Aboriginal) land. We are refugees in our
own country. And we didn't lock up other boat people who came
into this country" i.e. the British, referring to the mandatory
detention of asylum seekers in Australia, especially over the
past 2 years.
Damien and I spoke of refugees coming
here as boat people, taking that huge risk in unpredictable boats,
escaping oppressive regimes. How when they came here, Damien
wondered why they didn't see this government as equally oppressive
as the ones they'd left behind. I said I'd heard people in the
migrant community express that frustration, but once you get
here and start struggling to provide for yourself, learn English,
and study to improve your work prospects, it's hard to give all
that up and return home. Yet other immigrants I'd met were simply
happy with the money they could make, and a perceived political
freedom."
Damien also questioned the loyalty inspired
by the fact that migrants to Australia, including British migrants,
could often hold dual citizenship. Where exactly was the loyalty?
They could leave and run at any unsuitable time. Especially when
Aboriginal people usually had just one citizenship, and had only
in recent history recently got the vote. And he questioned the
ease in which foreign nationals could buy Australian land.
Tent Embassy resident Darren Bloomfield
warmed up stew in a saucepan on the fire, another man later grilled
a chop on the open grill. One man warms up toast, scraping off
the burnt bits. Washing was hung up between 2 trees, on a line.
Pots of dishwashing liquid were around basins for washing up.
Kids were running around and jumping around inside cars or under
trees, with all the formality of Old Parliament House behind
them. Some men spoke of pinstriped blacks in well paid jobs,
too cozy to remember the real struggles. How money compromised
the bravest of men. They told me that the new Parliament House
land site is a traditional sacred birth site for Aboriginal women,
and how important sacred land is for them. I said that where
my children were born seemed like a sacred site, and that the
NSW Carr government had sold the Royal Hospital for Women's old
Paddington land site in Sydney, and the land was redeveloped.
The birth of a child had meaning for these Aboriginal people,
and me, but that significance was overridden by government bureaucrats
and developers.
I'd never really understood why Aboriginal
people slept at the tent embassy. Were they guarding the makeshift
buildings, my Anglo property-centric mind asked, like a security
guard is paid to protect property. Most Australians work their
entire lives to pay off their own home. People make sure mortgage
payments are met, or all else is lost, including social inclusion,
stability and respect. It is a national obsession. There are
many lifestyle programs on TV about renovating houses to make
money, house auctioning programs, backyard improvement programs
galore. People learn to identify greatly with the house they
live in, or aspire to live in, the area they live in, and the
worth of their home. Increasing house prices are making this
even more of an issue, with there being talk of banks permanently
owning part of the property, so people can get a foot into the
expensive urban real estate market, and the banks would keep
a good part of the profit on sale. All this will tie up people's
time more, and people will have less time to think about issues
important to their lives or their nation, or their world. Less
time to spend with their immediate or extended families. Or do
what they want in their lives.
A shortage in urban housing should inspire
the increased building of well designed public housing, to make
sure people have stability, dignity and a decent shelter, not
just motivate banks to come up with profitable schemes which
capitalize on people's desperation for shelter. But adequate
supply of public housing would take the plug out of the real
estate market, and this would not help those who make a profit
out of the boom, which includes businesses which do well out
of housing and building booms, and governments who collect large
amounts of stamp duty. The most threatening thing to governments
and big business about adequate supply of decent public housing,
is that it would empower people, and allow them time to do what
they want with their lives. It would also lower the price of
housing in general, taking out the desperation factor, and make
housing more affordable for all people.
As seductive as a big profit is, coming
after you sell a renovated house, which allows people to accumulate
wealth quickly, instead of slaving away at a job for years, the
boom which has accompanied it will make housing largely unattainable
for current and future generations. It might help your family
now, but how will your kids and others of their generation catch
the market? As the old saying goes, shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves
in three generations. It is important to have decent public housing,
and an affordable housing market, for all Australians. It is
important that this public housing is spread throughout a city,
not just in immigrant or struggling areas. To cover all who might
need it in the future, as well as those who desperately need
it tonight.
I knew that the Aboriginal people at
the Tent Embassy were there to make a point, to protest, and
did not want to be removed. That it was an act of defiance. Did
the Aboriginal people at the Tent Embassy like being together
and hanging out together, despite the cold and, to me, the simple
provisions? One man agreed that it was better to be there, than
in a lonely flat watching TV. But, as a culture, we weren't supposed
to talk about loneliness and suicide. (The film "Ken Park",
which has been banned in Australia for adults to see, deals with
suicide and self-asphyxiation issues. The film critic Margaret
Pomeranz was one of a group calling themselves "Free Cinema",
who attempted to start a public screening of the film on July
3rd 2003, but police stopped the screening.)
In an article in The Canberra Times by
Kirsten Lawson on July 5 2003, Lawson quoted Neil Simpson discussing
why he has spent 31 years of his life, on and off, at the Tent
Embassy "We went from being classed as vermin, but here
now we have a political voice. We will maintain this site as
it is, simply because a lot of our uncles, sisters and mothers
and aunts and children have to live on the fringes of our society.
A lot of us have nice places to go but we choose to live here
and suffer as our people has."
The men were not there to guard the buildings.
This idea seemed odd to them. They were there to bring attention
to their political cause, to keep their ideals alive, of sovereignty,
and they were there to share information about their concerns
and hoped to be there for a lot longer. The now burnt out Information
Office was a means of storing information, which was the value.
The building itself in its original condition was not exactly
the value, but its political-resistance significance, artwork,
national heritage value and its capacity to contribute to helping
share the information on their ideals were. Just like if your
own home was destroyed in a fire, and you get an insurance cheque,
but a lot more was lost than just materials. Family photos, family
heritage, personal treasure. The men didn't speak of wanting
a nice government building, in a nice quiet isolated location,
to have an embassy from. And this probably would not further
their cause. Especially in a country like Australia, where there
is such limited media freedom, such tight concentration of media
ownership, which looks like getting tighter. A quiet location
for an embassy would make them hidden, as the government wants
it all. These Aboriginal men want their own embassy, on their
own terms, and they seemed to deeply want to have it accessible
and open to people. Communication, sharing and access were the
main priorities. Modern comforts were compromised, and were put
as last priorities. Perhaps 3 dogs are better than a full-blown,
bill arriving, gas heater. It seemed these "discomforts"
and "compromises" were the price they paid for their
struggle. Like Mandela in prison all those years.
Perhaps the significance of the Tent
Embassy and its now burnt out Information Centre was like Aboriginal
bark paintings- the bark being temporal, yet the spoken and visual
history of storytelling ensured the story was passed onto the
next generations, and not forgotten. The painted surface not
expected to last forever, in traditional outdoor environments.
Although rock and cave images have lasted, tree bark rarely does,
except perhaps in galleries. The stories and political struggle
are significant, and of great importance, and it is their content
which is meant to be passed on. Access and sharing of the bark
paintings, to the told story, and to the Tent Embassy, are of
high importance.
After doing some of this writing, and
having a siesta, I got up. And on the white wardrobe door, I
saw a printed page stuck up. My husband had been cleaning up
his papers, and had found an exhibition print out, from 1995.
An Olive Cotton photography show I'd been to at the Josef Lebovic
Gallery in Paddington. There it was: her photo "Max After
Surfing". Alongside "Teacup Ballet". Placed there,
in my own bedroom.
Vanessa Jones
lives in Australia and can be contacted at: post4@bigpond.com.au.
NOTE: On SBS TV news, on July 17, 2003, it was reported
that the Aboriginal Tent Embassy's burnt out Information Centre
was trucked away in the early morning, by police and contractors,
and that one person was arrested in this process. This was put
as the 2nd last item of news, during a 13 (thirteen) second (not
minute) news reportage space given to the Tent Embassy. ABC Online
told of police dressed in riot gear, numbering more than 40,
to "guard" the site-shed while it was put on a truck
by contractors. I called Damien Eade on his mobile, at the Tent
Embassy, and asked his version of events in the early morning.
Damien said that it came as a shock. I asked how he felt about
it. He said that he felt "disgraced", and that the
removal of the Information Office on July 17 shows that discrimination
still goes on in this country.
Thanks to the Aboriginal people at the
Aboriginal Tent Embassy in Canberra for welcoming me to their
campfire and sharing their ideas and lives. The Tent Embassy
is located on the lawn at Parkes Place, King George Terrace,
Parkes, opposite the Old Parliament House, in Canberra. These
are the English names for this location, but will get you there.
The Tent Embassy is open to all visitors, all day, all week.
A visitors' book can be signed there, and gold coins can be left
as donations.
Weekend Edition Features for July 12/13, 2003
Arthur
Mitzman
The Double Wall Before the Future
Standard
Schaefer
The Coming Financial Reality: an
Interview with Michael Hudson
John Feffer
A Fearful Symmetry: Washington and Pyongyang
Ron
Jacobs
Shades of Gray in Iran
Elaine
Cassel
Judicial Terrorism Against the Bill of Rights
Tom
Stephens
Civil Liberties After 9/11
David Lindorff
New White House Slogan: "Case Closed. Just Move On"
Jason
Leopold
The Mini-War Against Iraq Prior to 9/11
Lee Sustar
What's Behind the Crisis in Liberia?
Mickey
Z.
AIDS Dissent and Africa
Sam Hamod
Semitic is a Language Group, Not a Race or Ethnic Group
Ramzy
Baroud
Awaiting Justice on an Old Blanket
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Savage Incongruities: the Photographic Life of Lee Miller
Adam
Engel
Parable of the Lobbyist
Robert
Sanders
A Review of Ralph Lopez's American Dream
Poets'
Basement
Albert, Witherup, Guthrie
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