We need to close the gap. But how? Some things need to happen first
The dream situation is where Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians can chat openly and freely about all the policy options. That's not generally feasible now. Things are sensitive and you'd pick your company before starting a conversation.
We've always been a bit shy of these discussions. Evelyn Waugh's son Auberon fell in love with Australia. He said he loved the openness, the commitment to "let the other bloke have his say". He added that there was one exception to this openness, namely having open discussion about Aboriginal Australians. He said we just look uncomfortable and change the subject. Some people got mad with him because he pointed out the wheel hadn't been invented. He was right to sense that this is taken as an insult. In any event, that was in the 80s and we're a lot more sensitive now.
The vast majority of Australians want Indigenous Australians to be given the respect they deserve. They also want policies that will close the gap. How, you might ask, do we achieve these two goals?
Indigenous leader Pat Anderson recently called for younger leaders to be brought forward. It's insightful and frankly courageous to point out that your own generation needs to move on. It's a good thing. It's not just that intergenerational change is both important and long overdue. The current crop just hasn't delivered. They've been too aggressive and accusatorial. Going on the attack should always be a last resort. Publicity, self-aggrandisement or stupidity have led many to that path. It's been worse than ineffective. It has turned people of good heart and faith away. Anderson might have called, not just for younger leaders, but for more effective and conciliatory ones.
In any encounter, you can choose to be the angry antagonist and maybe play the victim to boot. It won't go well. Nobody chooses at any event to sit next to the angry grump. Nobody wants to deal with them unless they have to. If you toss onto "angry victim" an aggressive, accusatory tone, then nastiness ensues. You can't effectively argue for reconciliation if you don't have more than a few grams of conciliatory in your personality. People who aren't racist do not warm to being labelled that way.
Aboriginal people need solutions-focused leaders. Take a look at Denise Bowden at the Yothu Yindi Foundation for some inspiration. While you're up that way, look at what the Gumatj clan are doing in mining and forestry. There'd be others - people getting the job done. We need more of them.
As well as some fresh leadership, the varied debate around welcome to and acknowledgment of country needs to be sorted out. We just can't keep walking around with this annoying pebble in our shoe. There's no disagreement that welcome to country was never universal and, in fact, as a ceremonial event Australia-wide, it's only decades old.
The extreme variation in performance of the welcome leads to uncertainty. Will the welcomer be gracious and welcoming or will the welcomed get a healthy reminder of how badly Indigenous Australians have been treated and walk away feeling chastised more than welcomed?
There are two other issues with the welcome. Where it was practised, it was to welcome other clans passing through. Non-Indigenous Australians don't see themselves as passing through the land on which they live, and, for many, on which their forebears have lived for well over 100 years or more.
The other is the fee charged for the welcome. Somehow, saying, "I'm welcoming you" as you sharpen your pencil and whip out an invoice pad from your back pocket seems the sort of stuff John Cleese or Ricky Gervais might have some fun with.
The money, incidentally, doesn't go to some broad fund to help Indigenous Australia. Discard that notion. Think a select few on the gravy train. Personally, I'd just stop it. For all of the above reasons, it is simply causing too much negativity towards Indigenous Australia and for no gain. It's a no-brainer.
Acknowledgment of country is different. It's not a bad thing to acknowledge traditional lands. The problem is at meetings and conferences, at which every person who opens their mouth starts with the breathless revelation that says, "I too acknowledge ...". It's ridiculous, and aggravates everyone else in the room. It sounds platitudinous and hollow, because it is. Largely because it's more about each person wanting to identify as a "good person". Conspicuous compassion is always popular. People get sick of it and feel annoyed. Oh, that we could have a decent acknowledgment at the beginning, and everyone just accept it's been done. The end.
A test might be if, at the same time, we acknowledged two more things. First, the system of government that lets us live in arguably the most stable and peaceful country in the world. That's no small thing. Second, thank all those people from around the world who've helped make Australia what it is today. I think the three acknowledgments would sit together very well.
There's more material for Cleese and Gervais in the meetings where an acknowledgment is rightly done but then looks comedic because the speaker chooses to read one out in whatever the local language was when no one in the room speaks that language. Ridiculous.
MORE AMANDA VANSTONE:
Lastly, we will have to bite the bullet on how to qualify as Indigenous. The current test is too loose. It's allowing big companies and bureaucracies to tick the Indigenous box by employing or giving assistance or whatever to those whose indigeneity is some way back in their heritage.
The consequence of that is that those Indigenous Australians and their offspring who either haven't started a family with non-Indigenous Australians or have only done so recently miss out. Bureaucracies will almost always go for low-hanging fruit. People in regional and remote communities are harder to engage and therefore miss out to someone who had an Indigenous great-grandparent and lives in a big city. It's just easier.
If we can sort these things out, we've got a better chance of moving forward together in a very positive way. Keeping on doing stuff that makes Indigenous Australia the butt of jokes is the unkindest thing we could do. To do it because you want to look good is reprehensible.
There's an uncomfortable unease surrounding Indigenous affairs in Australia. You can tell that by watching people chatting. They're likely to pick their company before they say what they really think. It shouldn't be like that.
The dream situation is where Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians can chat openly and freely about all the policy options. That's not generally feasible now. Things are sensitive and you'd pick your company before starting a conversation.
We've always been a bit shy of these discussions. Evelyn Waugh's son Auberon fell in love with Australia. He said he loved the openness, the commitment to "let the other bloke have his say". He added that there was one exception to this openness, namely having open discussion about Aboriginal Australians. He said we just look uncomfortable and change the subject. Some people got mad with him because he pointed out the wheel hadn't been invented. He was right to sense that this is taken as an insult. In any event, that was in the 80s and we're a lot more sensitive now.
The vast majority of Australians want Indigenous Australians to be given the respect they deserve. They also want policies that will close the gap. How, you might ask, do we achieve these two goals?
Indigenous leader Pat Anderson recently called for younger leaders to be brought forward. It's insightful and frankly courageous to point out that your own generation needs to move on. It's a good thing. It's not just that intergenerational change is both important and long overdue. The current crop just hasn't delivered. They've been too aggressive and accusatorial. Going on the attack should always be a last resort. Publicity, self-aggrandisement or stupidity have led many to that path. It's been worse than ineffective. It has turned people of good heart and faith away. Anderson might have called, not just for younger leaders, but for more effective and conciliatory ones.
In any encounter, you can choose to be the angry antagonist and maybe play the victim to boot. It won't go well. Nobody chooses at any event to sit next to the angry grump. Nobody wants to deal with them unless they have to. If you toss onto "angry victim" an aggressive, accusatory tone, then nastiness ensues. You can't effectively argue for reconciliation if you don't have more than a few grams of conciliatory in your personality. People who aren't racist do not warm to being labelled that way.
Aboriginal people need solutions-focused leaders. Take a look at Denise Bowden at the Yothu Yindi Foundation for some inspiration. While you're up that way, look at what the Gumatj clan are doing in mining and forestry. There'd be others - people getting the job done. We need more of them.
As well as some fresh leadership, the varied debate around welcome to and acknowledgment of country needs to be sorted out. We just can't keep walking around with this annoying pebble in our shoe. There's no disagreement that welcome to country was never universal and, in fact, as a ceremonial event Australia-wide, it's only decades old.
The extreme variation in performance of the welcome leads to uncertainty. Will the welcomer be gracious and welcoming or will the welcomed get a healthy reminder of how badly Indigenous Australians have been treated and walk away feeling chastised more than welcomed?
There are two other issues with the welcome. Where it was practised, it was to welcome other clans passing through. Non-Indigenous Australians don't see themselves as passing through the land on which they live, and, for many, on which their forebears have lived for well over 100 years or more.
The other is the fee charged for the welcome. Somehow, saying, "I'm welcoming you" as you sharpen your pencil and whip out an invoice pad from your back pocket seems the sort of stuff John Cleese or Ricky Gervais might have some fun with.
The money, incidentally, doesn't go to some broad fund to help Indigenous Australia. Discard that notion. Think a select few on the gravy train. Personally, I'd just stop it. For all of the above reasons, it is simply causing too much negativity towards Indigenous Australia and for no gain. It's a no-brainer.
Acknowledgment of country is different. It's not a bad thing to acknowledge traditional lands. The problem is at meetings and conferences, at which every person who opens their mouth starts with the breathless revelation that says, "I too acknowledge ...". It's ridiculous, and aggravates everyone else in the room. It sounds platitudinous and hollow, because it is. Largely because it's more about each person wanting to identify as a "good person". Conspicuous compassion is always popular. People get sick of it and feel annoyed. Oh, that we could have a decent acknowledgment at the beginning, and everyone just accept it's been done. The end.
A test might be if, at the same time, we acknowledged two more things. First, the system of government that lets us live in arguably the most stable and peaceful country in the world. That's no small thing. Second, thank all those people from around the world who've helped make Australia what it is today. I think the three acknowledgments would sit together very well.
There's more material for Cleese and Gervais in the meetings where an acknowledgment is rightly done but then looks comedic because the speaker chooses to read one out in whatever the local language was when no one in the room speaks that language. Ridiculous.
MORE AMANDA VANSTONE:
Lastly, we will have to bite the bullet on how to qualify as Indigenous. The current test is too loose. It's allowing big companies and bureaucracies to tick the Indigenous box by employing or giving assistance or whatever to those whose indigeneity is some way back in their heritage.
The consequence of that is that those Indigenous Australians and their offspring who either haven't started a family with non-Indigenous Australians or have only done so recently miss out. Bureaucracies will almost always go for low-hanging fruit. People in regional and remote communities are harder to engage and therefore miss out to someone who had an Indigenous great-grandparent and lives in a big city. It's just easier.
If we can sort these things out, we've got a better chance of moving forward together in a very positive way. Keeping on doing stuff that makes Indigenous Australia the butt of jokes is the unkindest thing we could do. To do it because you want to look good is reprehensible.
There's an uncomfortable unease surrounding Indigenous affairs in Australia. You can tell that by watching people chatting. They're likely to pick their company before they say what they really think. It shouldn't be like that.
The dream situation is where Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians can chat openly and freely about all the policy options. That's not generally feasible now. Things are sensitive and you'd pick your company before starting a conversation.
We've always been a bit shy of these discussions. Evelyn Waugh's son Auberon fell in love with Australia. He said he loved the openness, the commitment to "let the other bloke have his say". He added that there was one exception to this openness, namely having open discussion about Aboriginal Australians. He said we just look uncomfortable and change the subject. Some people got mad with him because he pointed out the wheel hadn't been invented. He was right to sense that this is taken as an insult. In any event, that was in the 80s and we're a lot more sensitive now.
The vast majority of Australians want Indigenous Australians to be given the respect they deserve. They also want policies that will close the gap. How, you might ask, do we achieve these two goals?
Indigenous leader Pat Anderson recently called for younger leaders to be brought forward. It's insightful and frankly courageous to point out that your own generation needs to move on. It's a good thing. It's not just that intergenerational change is both important and long overdue. The current crop just hasn't delivered. They've been too aggressive and accusatorial. Going on the attack should always be a last resort. Publicity, self-aggrandisement or stupidity have led many to that path. It's been worse than ineffective. It has turned people of good heart and faith away. Anderson might have called, not just for younger leaders, but for more effective and conciliatory ones.
In any encounter, you can choose to be the angry antagonist and maybe play the victim to boot. It won't go well. Nobody chooses at any event to sit next to the angry grump. Nobody wants to deal with them unless they have to. If you toss onto "angry victim" an aggressive, accusatory tone, then nastiness ensues. You can't effectively argue for reconciliation if you don't have more than a few grams of conciliatory in your personality. People who aren't racist do not warm to being labelled that way.
Aboriginal people need solutions-focused leaders. Take a look at Denise Bowden at the Yothu Yindi Foundation for some inspiration. While you're up that way, look at what the Gumatj clan are doing in mining and forestry. There'd be others - people getting the job done. We need more of them.
As well as some fresh leadership, the varied debate around welcome to and acknowledgment of country needs to be sorted out. We just can't keep walking around with this annoying pebble in our shoe. There's no disagreement that welcome to country was never universal and, in fact, as a ceremonial event Australia-wide, it's only decades old.
The extreme variation in performance of the welcome leads to uncertainty. Will the welcomer be gracious and welcoming or will the welcomed get a healthy reminder of how badly Indigenous Australians have been treated and walk away feeling chastised more than welcomed?
There are two other issues with the welcome. Where it was practised, it was to welcome other clans passing through. Non-Indigenous Australians don't see themselves as passing through the land on which they live, and, for many, on which their forebears have lived for well over 100 years or more.
The other is the fee charged for the welcome. Somehow, saying, "I'm welcoming you" as you sharpen your pencil and whip out an invoice pad from your back pocket seems the sort of stuff John Cleese or Ricky Gervais might have some fun with.
The money, incidentally, doesn't go to some broad fund to help Indigenous Australia. Discard that notion. Think a select few on the gravy train. Personally, I'd just stop it. For all of the above reasons, it is simply causing too much negativity towards Indigenous Australia and for no gain. It's a no-brainer.
Acknowledgment of country is different. It's not a bad thing to acknowledge traditional lands. The problem is at meetings and conferences, at which every person who opens their mouth starts with the breathless revelation that says, "I too acknowledge ...". It's ridiculous, and aggravates everyone else in the room. It sounds platitudinous and hollow, because it is. Largely because it's more about each person wanting to identify as a "good person". Conspicuous compassion is always popular. People get sick of it and feel annoyed. Oh, that we could have a decent acknowledgment at the beginning, and everyone just accept it's been done. The end.
A test might be if, at the same time, we acknowledged two more things. First, the system of government that lets us live in arguably the most stable and peaceful country in the world. That's no small thing. Second, thank all those people from around the world who've helped make Australia what it is today. I think the three acknowledgments would sit together very well.
There's more material for Cleese and Gervais in the meetings where an acknowledgment is rightly done but then looks comedic because the speaker chooses to read one out in whatever the local language was when no one in the room speaks that language. Ridiculous.
MORE AMANDA VANSTONE:
Lastly, we will have to bite the bullet on how to qualify as Indigenous. The current test is too loose. It's allowing big companies and bureaucracies to tick the Indigenous box by employing or giving assistance or whatever to those whose indigeneity is some way back in their heritage.
The consequence of that is that those Indigenous Australians and their offspring who either haven't started a family with non-Indigenous Australians or have only done so recently miss out. Bureaucracies will almost always go for low-hanging fruit. People in regional and remote communities are harder to engage and therefore miss out to someone who had an Indigenous great-grandparent and lives in a big city. It's just easier.
If we can sort these things out, we've got a better chance of moving forward together in a very positive way. Keeping on doing stuff that makes Indigenous Australia the butt of jokes is the unkindest thing we could do. To do it because you want to look good is reprehensible.
There's an uncomfortable unease surrounding Indigenous affairs in Australia. You can tell that by watching people chatting. They're likely to pick their company before they say what they really think. It shouldn't be like that.
The dream situation is where Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians can chat openly and freely about all the policy options. That's not generally feasible now. Things are sensitive and you'd pick your company before starting a conversation.
We've always been a bit shy of these discussions. Evelyn Waugh's son Auberon fell in love with Australia. He said he loved the openness, the commitment to "let the other bloke have his say". He added that there was one exception to this openness, namely having open discussion about Aboriginal Australians. He said we just look uncomfortable and change the subject. Some people got mad with him because he pointed out the wheel hadn't been invented. He was right to sense that this is taken as an insult. In any event, that was in the 80s and we're a lot more sensitive now.
The vast majority of Australians want Indigenous Australians to be given the respect they deserve. They also want policies that will close the gap. How, you might ask, do we achieve these two goals?
Indigenous leader Pat Anderson recently called for younger leaders to be brought forward. It's insightful and frankly courageous to point out that your own generation needs to move on. It's a good thing. It's not just that intergenerational change is both important and long overdue. The current crop just hasn't delivered. They've been too aggressive and accusatorial. Going on the attack should always be a last resort. Publicity, self-aggrandisement or stupidity have led many to that path. It's been worse than ineffective. It has turned people of good heart and faith away. Anderson might have called, not just for younger leaders, but for more effective and conciliatory ones.
In any encounter, you can choose to be the angry antagonist and maybe play the victim to boot. It won't go well. Nobody chooses at any event to sit next to the angry grump. Nobody wants to deal with them unless they have to. If you toss onto "angry victim" an aggressive, accusatory tone, then nastiness ensues. You can't effectively argue for reconciliation if you don't have more than a few grams of conciliatory in your personality. People who aren't racist do not warm to being labelled that way.
Aboriginal people need solutions-focused leaders. Take a look at Denise Bowden at the Yothu Yindi Foundation for some inspiration. While you're up that way, look at what the Gumatj clan are doing in mining and forestry. There'd be others - people getting the job done. We need more of them.
As well as some fresh leadership, the varied debate around welcome to and acknowledgment of country needs to be sorted out. We just can't keep walking around with this annoying pebble in our shoe. There's no disagreement that welcome to country was never universal and, in fact, as a ceremonial event Australia-wide, it's only decades old.
The extreme variation in performance of the welcome leads to uncertainty. Will the welcomer be gracious and welcoming or will the welcomed get a healthy reminder of how badly Indigenous Australians have been treated and walk away feeling chastised more than welcomed?
There are two other issues with the welcome. Where it was practised, it was to welcome other clans passing through. Non-Indigenous Australians don't see themselves as passing through the land on which they live, and, for many, on which their forebears have lived for well over 100 years or more.
The other is the fee charged for the welcome. Somehow, saying, "I'm welcoming you" as you sharpen your pencil and whip out an invoice pad from your back pocket seems the sort of stuff John Cleese or Ricky Gervais might have some fun with.
The money, incidentally, doesn't go to some broad fund to help Indigenous Australia. Discard that notion. Think a select few on the gravy train. Personally, I'd just stop it. For all of the above reasons, it is simply causing too much negativity towards Indigenous Australia and for no gain. It's a no-brainer.
Acknowledgment of country is different. It's not a bad thing to acknowledge traditional lands. The problem is at meetings and conferences, at which every person who opens their mouth starts with the breathless revelation that says, "I too acknowledge ...". It's ridiculous, and aggravates everyone else in the room. It sounds platitudinous and hollow, because it is. Largely because it's more about each person wanting to identify as a "good person". Conspicuous compassion is always popular. People get sick of it and feel annoyed. Oh, that we could have a decent acknowledgment at the beginning, and everyone just accept it's been done. The end.
A test might be if, at the same time, we acknowledged two more things. First, the system of government that lets us live in arguably the most stable and peaceful country in the world. That's no small thing. Second, thank all those people from around the world who've helped make Australia what it is today. I think the three acknowledgments would sit together very well.
There's more material for Cleese and Gervais in the meetings where an acknowledgment is rightly done but then looks comedic because the speaker chooses to read one out in whatever the local language was when no one in the room speaks that language. Ridiculous.
MORE AMANDA VANSTONE:
Lastly, we will have to bite the bullet on how to qualify as Indigenous. The current test is too loose. It's allowing big companies and bureaucracies to tick the Indigenous box by employing or giving assistance or whatever to those whose indigeneity is some way back in their heritage.
The consequence of that is that those Indigenous Australians and their offspring who either haven't started a family with non-Indigenous Australians or have only done so recently miss out. Bureaucracies will almost always go for low-hanging fruit. People in regional and remote communities are harder to engage and therefore miss out to someone who had an Indigenous great-grandparent and lives in a big city. It's just easier.
If we can sort these things out, we've got a better chance of moving forward together in a very positive way. Keeping on doing stuff that makes Indigenous Australia the butt of jokes is the unkindest thing we could do. To do it because you want to look good is reprehensible.
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I have marital advice for our anti-Semitism envoy
Turns out that the federal government's anti-Semitism envoy Jillian Segal and I have a lot in common. We are both oldish. We are both Jewish. And we are both so very married. I reckon Segal must have been married to John Roth for close to 40 years. Same! Same! My spouse and I got married in 1983. Now I'd like to think I know my spouse better than I know the back of my hand (and he is far more interesting than my wrinkled, be-veined specimen). Shocking news this week that not all couples married for decades have a clue about their partners. The Australian Electoral Commission donation records show that Henroth Investments gave $50,000 to Advance Australia in 2023-24. Segal's husband, John Roth, is a director of Henroth. And Segal claims she didn't know about the donation. I asked one of my kids about this. She said: Maybe rich people don't know where $50k goes. Maybe. But I think I'd know if my husband was supporting a divisive disgusting political organisation and if he was, I'd then file for divorce. Even if she didn't know before the weekend, she knows now. For those who don't know, Advance Australia campaigns against immigration (Mr Roth, pretty sure you are from a family of migrants), it campaigns against Welcome to Country. It was part of the ugly campaign against the Voice to Parliament. Which is weird. Is it just opposed to an Indigenous Voice to Parliament? Or all voices to parliament? And if so, why is it not campaigning against special envoys on anti-Semitism and Islamophobia? Let me be straight with you. These special envoys are just voices to parliament with direct access to government. They act as advocates and advisors for their specific cause. I would dearly love to wipe out both anti-Semitism and Islamophobia and am thrilled that the government decided these two forms of bigotry and hatred needed to be addressed in this particular way. So let's also address one elephant in the room. While Israel continues to commit mass murder in Gaza, anti-Semitism will continue to rise. There's a link between military operations (also known as war) conducted against Palestinians by Israel and the resultant rise in anti-Semitic behaviours. Three studies all found a clear correlation - including one paper by Deakin University academic Matteo Vergani and others that examined 673 incidents between October 2013 and September 2017, well before this current razing of Gaza. The other elephant? Why not a special envoy to address the hatred of Aboriginal people in this country? Yes, Australians voted against the Voice to Parliament. Why did this government give Australians the chance to be racist bigots, the chance to play to their lowest natures? Anthony Albanese could have had an entire phalanx of Indigenous envoys to write reports and make recommendations on how to fix the problem, so devastatingly expressed in the coroner's report into the death of Kumanjayi Walker. Racism coming out of our bleeding ears. So, if 50 grand is unimportant, how about the sentiment of the man who gives this money to a bunch of racists? Can't you tell the measure of a man by the company his money keeps? Or is it only racism against Jews which concerns you? Because if so, you are part of a much bigger problem. Which brings me to your report. One of the key recommendations in your report is that all levels of government should adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance's (IHRA) working definition of anti-Semitism. As Josh Bornstein writes: "In part, this definition states that it is anti-Semitic to target the state of Israel and/or claim the existence of a state of Israel is a racist endeavour." I'm a Jew. I want to be able to criticise Israel freely. I especially want to do that now as Benjamin Netanyahu bombs Gaza relentlessly, continues its mass slaughter of starving civilians. The IHRA definition also says it is anti-Semitic to draw comparisons of contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis. I'm assuming that means you can't mention the G-word. But in an extraordinary essay, leading genocide scholar Omer Bartov writes: "Discrediting genocide scholars who call out Israel's genocide in Gaza as anti-Semitic threatens to erode the foundation of genocide studies: the ongoing need to define, prevent, punish and reconstruct the history of genocide. Suggesting that this endeavour is motivated instead by malign interests and sentiments - that it is driven by the very hatred and prejudice that was at the root of the Holocaust - is not only morally scandalous, it provides an opening for a politics of denialism and impunity as well." Australia could adopt the Jerusalem definition, one which doesn't spend two-thirds of its focus on Israel. Dear Jillian, in your wafty deer-in-headlights performance, utterly lacking in facts, on the ABC's 7.30, you thought it was OK to suggest that you would monitor the outputs of the ABC and SBS. I mean, Lawyers for Israel already did that. It campaigned hard against Antoinette Lattouf's brief appearance on ABC Sydney. It led to Lattouf losing her gig. It led to the ABC losing $2 million in fighting a futile court case. And I'll tell you what else it led to. It led, in my view, to people using the phrase "Jewish lobby", one of the most ill-conceived and racist phrases ever. I would not for one minute complain about social media posts sharing Human Rights Watch information. And there are many Jews here and elsewhere who rightly criticise the use by Israel of starvation as a weapon of war. The prospect of you trying to censor what the ABC broadcasts is so horrific. We don't need more censors in this country. We don't need lobby groups like Lawyers for Israel trying to silence those with valid opinions LIA doesn't like. Or you don't like. Which brings me to the federal government. How is it even possible that it did not do a check on those adjacent to Segal? My mind is boggled by this. And how did it think it was appropriate to nominate a person to this role who so clearly supports Israel's current behaviour? Jews experience anti-Semitism every single day in this country and that's what needs to be urgently addressed. If you conflate anti-Zionism with anti-Semitism you make it worse for all of us, you make anti-Semitism far more likely. Turns out that the federal government's anti-Semitism envoy Jillian Segal and I have a lot in common. We are both oldish. We are both Jewish. And we are both so very married. I reckon Segal must have been married to John Roth for close to 40 years. Same! Same! My spouse and I got married in 1983. Now I'd like to think I know my spouse better than I know the back of my hand (and he is far more interesting than my wrinkled, be-veined specimen). Shocking news this week that not all couples married for decades have a clue about their partners. The Australian Electoral Commission donation records show that Henroth Investments gave $50,000 to Advance Australia in 2023-24. Segal's husband, John Roth, is a director of Henroth. And Segal claims she didn't know about the donation. I asked one of my kids about this. She said: Maybe rich people don't know where $50k goes. Maybe. But I think I'd know if my husband was supporting a divisive disgusting political organisation and if he was, I'd then file for divorce. Even if she didn't know before the weekend, she knows now. For those who don't know, Advance Australia campaigns against immigration (Mr Roth, pretty sure you are from a family of migrants), it campaigns against Welcome to Country. It was part of the ugly campaign against the Voice to Parliament. Which is weird. Is it just opposed to an Indigenous Voice to Parliament? Or all voices to parliament? And if so, why is it not campaigning against special envoys on anti-Semitism and Islamophobia? Let me be straight with you. These special envoys are just voices to parliament with direct access to government. They act as advocates and advisors for their specific cause. I would dearly love to wipe out both anti-Semitism and Islamophobia and am thrilled that the government decided these two forms of bigotry and hatred needed to be addressed in this particular way. So let's also address one elephant in the room. While Israel continues to commit mass murder in Gaza, anti-Semitism will continue to rise. There's a link between military operations (also known as war) conducted against Palestinians by Israel and the resultant rise in anti-Semitic behaviours. Three studies all found a clear correlation - including one paper by Deakin University academic Matteo Vergani and others that examined 673 incidents between October 2013 and September 2017, well before this current razing of Gaza. The other elephant? Why not a special envoy to address the hatred of Aboriginal people in this country? Yes, Australians voted against the Voice to Parliament. Why did this government give Australians the chance to be racist bigots, the chance to play to their lowest natures? Anthony Albanese could have had an entire phalanx of Indigenous envoys to write reports and make recommendations on how to fix the problem, so devastatingly expressed in the coroner's report into the death of Kumanjayi Walker. Racism coming out of our bleeding ears. So, if 50 grand is unimportant, how about the sentiment of the man who gives this money to a bunch of racists? Can't you tell the measure of a man by the company his money keeps? Or is it only racism against Jews which concerns you? Because if so, you are part of a much bigger problem. Which brings me to your report. One of the key recommendations in your report is that all levels of government should adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance's (IHRA) working definition of anti-Semitism. As Josh Bornstein writes: "In part, this definition states that it is anti-Semitic to target the state of Israel and/or claim the existence of a state of Israel is a racist endeavour." I'm a Jew. I want to be able to criticise Israel freely. I especially want to do that now as Benjamin Netanyahu bombs Gaza relentlessly, continues its mass slaughter of starving civilians. The IHRA definition also says it is anti-Semitic to draw comparisons of contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis. I'm assuming that means you can't mention the G-word. But in an extraordinary essay, leading genocide scholar Omer Bartov writes: "Discrediting genocide scholars who call out Israel's genocide in Gaza as anti-Semitic threatens to erode the foundation of genocide studies: the ongoing need to define, prevent, punish and reconstruct the history of genocide. Suggesting that this endeavour is motivated instead by malign interests and sentiments - that it is driven by the very hatred and prejudice that was at the root of the Holocaust - is not only morally scandalous, it provides an opening for a politics of denialism and impunity as well." Australia could adopt the Jerusalem definition, one which doesn't spend two-thirds of its focus on Israel. Dear Jillian, in your wafty deer-in-headlights performance, utterly lacking in facts, on the ABC's 7.30, you thought it was OK to suggest that you would monitor the outputs of the ABC and SBS. I mean, Lawyers for Israel already did that. It campaigned hard against Antoinette Lattouf's brief appearance on ABC Sydney. It led to Lattouf losing her gig. It led to the ABC losing $2 million in fighting a futile court case. And I'll tell you what else it led to. It led, in my view, to people using the phrase "Jewish lobby", one of the most ill-conceived and racist phrases ever. I would not for one minute complain about social media posts sharing Human Rights Watch information. And there are many Jews here and elsewhere who rightly criticise the use by Israel of starvation as a weapon of war. The prospect of you trying to censor what the ABC broadcasts is so horrific. We don't need more censors in this country. We don't need lobby groups like Lawyers for Israel trying to silence those with valid opinions LIA doesn't like. Or you don't like. Which brings me to the federal government. How is it even possible that it did not do a check on those adjacent to Segal? My mind is boggled by this. And how did it think it was appropriate to nominate a person to this role who so clearly supports Israel's current behaviour? Jews experience anti-Semitism every single day in this country and that's what needs to be urgently addressed. If you conflate anti-Zionism with anti-Semitism you make it worse for all of us, you make anti-Semitism far more likely. Turns out that the federal government's anti-Semitism envoy Jillian Segal and I have a lot in common. We are both oldish. We are both Jewish. And we are both so very married. I reckon Segal must have been married to John Roth for close to 40 years. Same! Same! My spouse and I got married in 1983. Now I'd like to think I know my spouse better than I know the back of my hand (and he is far more interesting than my wrinkled, be-veined specimen). Shocking news this week that not all couples married for decades have a clue about their partners. The Australian Electoral Commission donation records show that Henroth Investments gave $50,000 to Advance Australia in 2023-24. Segal's husband, John Roth, is a director of Henroth. And Segal claims she didn't know about the donation. I asked one of my kids about this. She said: Maybe rich people don't know where $50k goes. Maybe. But I think I'd know if my husband was supporting a divisive disgusting political organisation and if he was, I'd then file for divorce. Even if she didn't know before the weekend, she knows now. For those who don't know, Advance Australia campaigns against immigration (Mr Roth, pretty sure you are from a family of migrants), it campaigns against Welcome to Country. It was part of the ugly campaign against the Voice to Parliament. Which is weird. Is it just opposed to an Indigenous Voice to Parliament? Or all voices to parliament? And if so, why is it not campaigning against special envoys on anti-Semitism and Islamophobia? Let me be straight with you. These special envoys are just voices to parliament with direct access to government. They act as advocates and advisors for their specific cause. I would dearly love to wipe out both anti-Semitism and Islamophobia and am thrilled that the government decided these two forms of bigotry and hatred needed to be addressed in this particular way. So let's also address one elephant in the room. While Israel continues to commit mass murder in Gaza, anti-Semitism will continue to rise. There's a link between military operations (also known as war) conducted against Palestinians by Israel and the resultant rise in anti-Semitic behaviours. Three studies all found a clear correlation - including one paper by Deakin University academic Matteo Vergani and others that examined 673 incidents between October 2013 and September 2017, well before this current razing of Gaza. The other elephant? Why not a special envoy to address the hatred of Aboriginal people in this country? Yes, Australians voted against the Voice to Parliament. Why did this government give Australians the chance to be racist bigots, the chance to play to their lowest natures? Anthony Albanese could have had an entire phalanx of Indigenous envoys to write reports and make recommendations on how to fix the problem, so devastatingly expressed in the coroner's report into the death of Kumanjayi Walker. Racism coming out of our bleeding ears. So, if 50 grand is unimportant, how about the sentiment of the man who gives this money to a bunch of racists? Can't you tell the measure of a man by the company his money keeps? Or is it only racism against Jews which concerns you? Because if so, you are part of a much bigger problem. Which brings me to your report. One of the key recommendations in your report is that all levels of government should adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance's (IHRA) working definition of anti-Semitism. As Josh Bornstein writes: "In part, this definition states that it is anti-Semitic to target the state of Israel and/or claim the existence of a state of Israel is a racist endeavour." I'm a Jew. I want to be able to criticise Israel freely. I especially want to do that now as Benjamin Netanyahu bombs Gaza relentlessly, continues its mass slaughter of starving civilians. The IHRA definition also says it is anti-Semitic to draw comparisons of contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis. I'm assuming that means you can't mention the G-word. But in an extraordinary essay, leading genocide scholar Omer Bartov writes: "Discrediting genocide scholars who call out Israel's genocide in Gaza as anti-Semitic threatens to erode the foundation of genocide studies: the ongoing need to define, prevent, punish and reconstruct the history of genocide. Suggesting that this endeavour is motivated instead by malign interests and sentiments - that it is driven by the very hatred and prejudice that was at the root of the Holocaust - is not only morally scandalous, it provides an opening for a politics of denialism and impunity as well." Australia could adopt the Jerusalem definition, one which doesn't spend two-thirds of its focus on Israel. Dear Jillian, in your wafty deer-in-headlights performance, utterly lacking in facts, on the ABC's 7.30, you thought it was OK to suggest that you would monitor the outputs of the ABC and SBS. I mean, Lawyers for Israel already did that. It campaigned hard against Antoinette Lattouf's brief appearance on ABC Sydney. It led to Lattouf losing her gig. It led to the ABC losing $2 million in fighting a futile court case. And I'll tell you what else it led to. It led, in my view, to people using the phrase "Jewish lobby", one of the most ill-conceived and racist phrases ever. I would not for one minute complain about social media posts sharing Human Rights Watch information. And there are many Jews here and elsewhere who rightly criticise the use by Israel of starvation as a weapon of war. The prospect of you trying to censor what the ABC broadcasts is so horrific. We don't need more censors in this country. We don't need lobby groups like Lawyers for Israel trying to silence those with valid opinions LIA doesn't like. Or you don't like. Which brings me to the federal government. How is it even possible that it did not do a check on those adjacent to Segal? My mind is boggled by this. And how did it think it was appropriate to nominate a person to this role who so clearly supports Israel's current behaviour? Jews experience anti-Semitism every single day in this country and that's what needs to be urgently addressed. If you conflate anti-Zionism with anti-Semitism you make it worse for all of us, you make anti-Semitism far more likely. Turns out that the federal government's anti-Semitism envoy Jillian Segal and I have a lot in common. We are both oldish. We are both Jewish. And we are both so very married. I reckon Segal must have been married to John Roth for close to 40 years. Same! Same! My spouse and I got married in 1983. Now I'd like to think I know my spouse better than I know the back of my hand (and he is far more interesting than my wrinkled, be-veined specimen). Shocking news this week that not all couples married for decades have a clue about their partners. The Australian Electoral Commission donation records show that Henroth Investments gave $50,000 to Advance Australia in 2023-24. Segal's husband, John Roth, is a director of Henroth. And Segal claims she didn't know about the donation. I asked one of my kids about this. She said: Maybe rich people don't know where $50k goes. Maybe. But I think I'd know if my husband was supporting a divisive disgusting political organisation and if he was, I'd then file for divorce. Even if she didn't know before the weekend, she knows now. For those who don't know, Advance Australia campaigns against immigration (Mr Roth, pretty sure you are from a family of migrants), it campaigns against Welcome to Country. It was part of the ugly campaign against the Voice to Parliament. Which is weird. Is it just opposed to an Indigenous Voice to Parliament? Or all voices to parliament? And if so, why is it not campaigning against special envoys on anti-Semitism and Islamophobia? Let me be straight with you. These special envoys are just voices to parliament with direct access to government. They act as advocates and advisors for their specific cause. I would dearly love to wipe out both anti-Semitism and Islamophobia and am thrilled that the government decided these two forms of bigotry and hatred needed to be addressed in this particular way. So let's also address one elephant in the room. While Israel continues to commit mass murder in Gaza, anti-Semitism will continue to rise. There's a link between military operations (also known as war) conducted against Palestinians by Israel and the resultant rise in anti-Semitic behaviours. Three studies all found a clear correlation - including one paper by Deakin University academic Matteo Vergani and others that examined 673 incidents between October 2013 and September 2017, well before this current razing of Gaza. The other elephant? Why not a special envoy to address the hatred of Aboriginal people in this country? Yes, Australians voted against the Voice to Parliament. Why did this government give Australians the chance to be racist bigots, the chance to play to their lowest natures? Anthony Albanese could have had an entire phalanx of Indigenous envoys to write reports and make recommendations on how to fix the problem, so devastatingly expressed in the coroner's report into the death of Kumanjayi Walker. Racism coming out of our bleeding ears. So, if 50 grand is unimportant, how about the sentiment of the man who gives this money to a bunch of racists? Can't you tell the measure of a man by the company his money keeps? Or is it only racism against Jews which concerns you? Because if so, you are part of a much bigger problem. Which brings me to your report. One of the key recommendations in your report is that all levels of government should adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance's (IHRA) working definition of anti-Semitism. As Josh Bornstein writes: "In part, this definition states that it is anti-Semitic to target the state of Israel and/or claim the existence of a state of Israel is a racist endeavour." I'm a Jew. I want to be able to criticise Israel freely. I especially want to do that now as Benjamin Netanyahu bombs Gaza relentlessly, continues its mass slaughter of starving civilians. The IHRA definition also says it is anti-Semitic to draw comparisons of contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis. I'm assuming that means you can't mention the G-word. But in an extraordinary essay, leading genocide scholar Omer Bartov writes: "Discrediting genocide scholars who call out Israel's genocide in Gaza as anti-Semitic threatens to erode the foundation of genocide studies: the ongoing need to define, prevent, punish and reconstruct the history of genocide. Suggesting that this endeavour is motivated instead by malign interests and sentiments - that it is driven by the very hatred and prejudice that was at the root of the Holocaust - is not only morally scandalous, it provides an opening for a politics of denialism and impunity as well." Australia could adopt the Jerusalem definition, one which doesn't spend two-thirds of its focus on Israel. Dear Jillian, in your wafty deer-in-headlights performance, utterly lacking in facts, on the ABC's 7.30, you thought it was OK to suggest that you would monitor the outputs of the ABC and SBS. I mean, Lawyers for Israel already did that. It campaigned hard against Antoinette Lattouf's brief appearance on ABC Sydney. It led to Lattouf losing her gig. It led to the ABC losing $2 million in fighting a futile court case. And I'll tell you what else it led to. It led, in my view, to people using the phrase "Jewish lobby", one of the most ill-conceived and racist phrases ever. I would not for one minute complain about social media posts sharing Human Rights Watch information. And there are many Jews here and elsewhere who rightly criticise the use by Israel of starvation as a weapon of war. The prospect of you trying to censor what the ABC broadcasts is so horrific. We don't need more censors in this country. We don't need lobby groups like Lawyers for Israel trying to silence those with valid opinions LIA doesn't like. Or you don't like. Which brings me to the federal government. How is it even possible that it did not do a check on those adjacent to Segal? My mind is boggled by this. And how did it think it was appropriate to nominate a person to this role who so clearly supports Israel's current behaviour? Jews experience anti-Semitism every single day in this country and that's what needs to be urgently addressed. If you conflate anti-Zionism with anti-Semitism you make it worse for all of us, you make anti-Semitism far more likely.
Sydney Morning Herald
2 hours ago
- Sydney Morning Herald
Some tourists are avoiding Trump's America, but we aren't
When Traveller columnist Ben Groundwater wrote a piece earlier this year, saying that the Trump administration would not stop him from visiting the US, he received an overwhelming response. Of the record 525 comments on Groundwater's column, the vast majority took the opposite view. Not only were many of the readers critical of the idea of visiting the US under president Trump, many were critical of Groundwater for even suggesting it. At a time when visitor numbers to the US from various other countries are reportedly plummeting, then, it might come as a surprise to see that Australians are not only continuing to visit, are actually going there in greater numbers than before Trump's election. The latest figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics show that, in May, the number of Australian residents returning from short trips to the US was a little over 69,000 – an increase of more than 5000, or about 8 per cent, on the same time last year. What's more, the numbers were up in every key category – those travelling a holiday (up 12 per cent compared with last year); visiting friends or relatives (up 15 per cent) or for business (up 8 per cent). It's true that the numbers for April showed a decline in Australian visitors, year-on-year, for the first time since borders reopened after the pandemic, but so far that amounts to a blip, not a trend. Overall this year the number of Australians visiting the US is up about 3 per cent and in May the US was our fourth most-visited country, behind only Indonesia, New Zealand and Japan. The number of Australians heading to the US still remains below pre-COVID levels, one of only two countries in our top 10 to have not surpassed 2019's numbers (New Zealand is the other one), but this might indicate that the strength of the US dollar has been a bigger factor in deterring visitors than any political issues. Australians have long been a sought-after market for US tourist destinations. We are among the top 10 sources of visitors and tend to stay longer and spend more money than tourists from other countries. And it seems we are continuing to go there in droves. This comes even as a series of horror stories are reported about Australians and others being denied entry to the US for seemingly arbitrary reasons.
Sydney Morning Herald
2 hours ago
- Sydney Morning Herald
Albanese is being pressured to choose Trump or Xi. Why not both?
Change can be hard to accept. Nowhere is that more evident than in what passes for much of the debate, discussion, analysis – call it what you like – relating to Australia's national security stance since Donald Trump won the US presidency eight months ago. It wasn't just America that changed when 49.8 per cent of the Americans who voted gave Trump a second turn in the White House – it was the world. A lot changed, because he promised it would, and he is in charge of the richest, most powerful country on the planet, so he can make it happen. His governing style is to treat everything like his plaything. One day he thinks this, a few days later he thinks that. Like most of his followers, he is guided by his emotions and suspicions. That is his unbreakable point of connection with them. On Tuesday, in a one-on-one phone call, the BBC's Gary O'Donoghue asked Trump if he trusted Vladimir Putin. Trump took a long pause and replied: 'I trust almost nobody, to be honest with you.' What is going on in America is not some entertaining distraction or minor diversion after which past verities will be naturally reinstated. The international order is being remade. Nowhere is this more obvious to Australians than with Anthony Albanese's visit to China, which crystallises in the Australian mind our new reality. On the one hand, we have China, an authoritarian state with whom we have few shared values, that is in our region and is our most important economic partner. We have a trade-exposed economy and one-third of our export income comes from China. On the other hand, there's America, our friend and ally for more than 80 years, which is moving quickly away from what we previously believed were a comprehensive set of shared values. Increasingly, its new administration reveals an intention to render Australia a form of vassal state via the AUKUS agreement. AUKUS has not yet reached its fourth birthday but the original signatories to the pact, Joe Biden, Boris Johnson and Scott Morrison, are all gone from their posts, exiting either in disgrace or embarrassment. AUKUS was an exercise in Anglosphere hubris. Biden believed he had figuratively speared Trump and the MAGA movement through the heart at the 2020 election and that America was back on its previous post-war multilateralist path. Johnson was riding high after his Brexit victory and his smashing of British Labour's so-called Red Wall in 2019. Morrison was polling well and believed he was on a winner with his China-bashing stance. He was not concerned in the slightest that he was walking out of a deal with France to build our next fleet of submarines. Loading Crucially, he saw political advantage with AUKUS, expecting that Labor might baulk at its inclusion of nuclear subs. That would have given him the opportunity to portray Labor under Albanese as disloyal to our greatest friend, America, and in the thrall of Beijing on the way to the 2022 election. But Albanese and his senior colleagues, nervous about their election prospects, saw that coming and immediately gave AUKUS the nod. As it turned out, Morrison accused Labor of being China's puppet anyway, to little avail. More importantly, however, Labor had, by embracing AUKUS, saddled itself in office with an unworkable, decades-long security pact. If AUKUS was ever fit for purpose, it isn't now, because our relationship with America, while remaining strong, cannot go back to what it was. Much of the Australian defence establishment cannot see it that way. Many analysts, former bureaucrats, academics and the Coalition parties won't readjust their view of the Australia-US relationship as one in which our interests and America's blur into a whole. They're obsessed with the fact that Albanese has met with China's president before he's met with Trump. Somehow, the lack of a face-to-face with Trump is all Albanese's fault. What does it say about Trump that he hasn't made it happen? The large number of holdouts in the defence and security establishment who insist that the America of 2025 is the friendly and predictable America of past decades with just a few Trumpian characteristics refuse to accept the obvious. America is no longer what it used to be, via a democratic decision of its own people. It's shocking to consider that as awful as the Chinese government is, at least we know what we are dealing with. Can we really say the same about America? It is now reviewing AUKUS, although the signs are that it actually wants to renegotiate it. Last week, the Trump administration briefed out its demands on Australia to the media, chiefly that it wants reassurances that the submarines it delivers to Australia under AUKUS would be deployed to assist the US in the event of a conflict with China. This was a bit of interference with Albanese's imminent meeting with President Xi.
