Warren Mundine with Vickie Grieves Williams:

Outrage has become a common feature in modern politics. If someone screams when you press their skin, it’s a sign of injury lurking underneath. Likewise, if a person reacts with outrage in political debate, it often masks great vulnerability in their position.

A few months ago, the National Indigenous Australians Agency released records of the 14 regional Dialogues on constitutional recognition that preceded the Uluru Statement of the Heart.

The document is 112 pages long.

Confusingly, it begins at the end with “Document 14”, labelled this way because it’s a record of the 14th and final Dialogue held at a resort in Yulara, near Uluru, during which the document known as the “Uluru Statement from the Heart” was released.

Documents one to 13 follow, being records of the 13 Dialogues that preceded it.

These records provide considerable material for commentary and critique of the proposed Voice, only one of the “requests” in the Statement from the Heart.

Advocates for the Voice reacted to this scrutiny with so much outrage it was like someone had poured disinfectant into a gaping wound. No wonder. Document 14 is a dossier declaring a metaphorical war on modern Australia.

This outrage has focused on how long the Uluru Statement is. Whether it’s just the 439 words reproduced on canvas surrounded by attendee signatures and artwork for display in museums. Or the longer and now infamous “Document 14”.

This has distracted us from the most important point. The howls of outrage are a warning. We need to examine Document 14 in detail and we need to talk about it.

Document 14 is a 26-page document headed “Uluru Statement from the Heart”. Page one contains the 439 words Prime Minister Albanese describes as an “eloquent request”. The remaining pages are grouped under four sub-headings:

• “Our Story”, an Indigenous history of Australia;

• “Guiding Principles”, governing the 14th Dialogue’s assessment of reform proposals;

• “Reform Priorities” assessing proposals considered in the previous 13 Dialogues and detailing the three favoured by the 14th Dialogue being a Voice to Parliament, Treaty and Truth-telling and their rationale; and

• “Roadmap” outlining the plan for implementing the Voice, Treaty, Truth reforms.

It’s now heresy to suggest the Uluru Statement is anything other than the 439 words reproduced on the canvas.

This edict has been issued by the NIAA, ticked off by RMIT Fact Check and endorsed by Yes campaigners everywhere.

Albanese described the suggestion the Uluru Statement includes these sections as “absolute nonsense”, “a conspiracy theory” and like believing the moon landing was fake.

But, until recently, the whole document was pushed by the chief architect of the Voice, Professor Megan Davis, who’s said repeatedly in speeches, interviews and print, that many people don’t know the Uluru Statement isn’t just one page but indeed a longer document of circa 18 pages.

In her 2018 Human Rights Oration, for example, she said the Uluru Statement “includes the very important statement that we issued to the Australian people at Uluru but it also includes a very important story that we called ‘Our Story’ that maps Aboriginal history through Aboriginal eyes starting with the invasion and traversing many phases of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander history”.

This, in itself, is an astounding assertion that begs closer examination.

In her 2018 Henry Parkes Oration, she said the Uluru Statement is “not just the one page invitation to the Australian people, it also includes what we call ‘Our Story’ … and also a few pages … on the reform. Why do we want a Voice? What will a Voice do? So, I urge everybody [to] … read that whole document, which we call the Uluru Statement from the Heart.”

And in a recent contribution to a book, “Our Voices from the Heart”, she and co-author Pat Anderson said the Uluru Statement “includes three elements: the one-page pitch to the Australian people; ‘Our Story’ of the First Nations history of Australia; and the explanation of the legal reform’’.

Davis believes Document 14 is essential to understanding what the Uluru Statement is about, what it is intended to achieve, and what the 439 words are actually asking for. And until it became politically unwise to say so, she wanted Makarrata everyone to read it.

She’s right. Everybody should read that whole document, whatever you want to call it.

Document 14 is steeped in grievance; with Indigenous Australians trapped in victimhood and oppression, not currently free or able to make their own decisions; where self-determination is an aspiration, not something within reach today.

That’s a lie; as is the inference self-determination can only be granted by government (and bizarrely by a government that the ‘Our Story’ narrative frames as illegitimate).

Nothing could be further from the idea of reconciliation than Document 14.

It contemplates a future of separation, with First Nations sovereignty standing apart from, and opposite to, Australian sovereignty.

But not only that.

Document 14 also stands against traditional owner autonomy over their own lands and seas; rooted in the idea of one homogenous pan-Indigenous people with one capital “L” law.

That’s the very clear objective of the Makarrata Commission, which is the second body requested in the Uluru Statement (and right there in the words on the canvas).

The final paragraphs of Document 14 should be chilling for all Australians, but especially for traditional owners, where it states: “The Bill establishing the Makarrata Commission should confer all necessary powers and functions to facilitate the settlement of a National Makarrata Framework Agreement between Australian Governments and First Peoples, as well as subsequent First People Agreements at the local level. The role of the National Native Title Tribunal should be subsumed by the Makarrata Commission, which should have as one of its functions the role of a Truth and Reconciliation Commission to enable all Australians to face the truth of the past and to embrace a common hope for the future.”

The Uluru Statement from the Heart is a political ploy to grab power, not just from the Australian nation but also from traditional owners themselves.

It’s apt that Davis and Anderson’s recent writings describe the 439 words as a “pitch”.

It’s a glossy marketing document for the misappropriation of culture, a misrepresentation of history, and for a radical and divisive vision of Australia.

All done in the name of Aboriginal people but subsuming our interests and very much working against us.

There will be other essays from these 2 in the Daily Telegraph over the next few Fridays in the lead up to the referendum date. If this one is any indication, they are required reading.

Again, I think the Christians have a better insight into human nature

Of course.

For starters we have an ontology grounded in reality rather than post-modern liquidity.

Archbishop Kay Goldsworthy of the Anglican Church Diocese of Perth featured prominently on The Drum last night. There was a lot of talk about the church failing to move with the times and not keeping up with changes going on in the modern world.

Someone should remind the “archbishop” of the old saying, “Whoever marries the spirit of this age will find herself a widow in the next.”

Anyone who threatens suicide if they don’t get their own way is a narcissistic abuser.

Local ABC radio interviewed a big wig in an aboriginal health service who claimed the “outbreak of racism” associated with the referendum was leading to increased referrals for mental health issues.

Let me say off the bat, anyone who engages in actual racist trolling on the back of this issue is a dickhead.

That being said, what did the lady mean by “racism” and how many referrals above average were they getting? Neither question was asked by the interviewer, of course.

For starters we have an ontology grounded in reality rather than post-modern liquidity.

Whoever down ticked that observation, explain your reasoning…I dares ya!

(The down tick doesn’t worry me; I’m interested in your counter argument.)

Cassie of Sydney
Sep 16, 2023 7:49 AM

How about you don’t purchase it in the first place to put children at risk.

Believe me, I’ve tried it for a week to no avail.

Oh…you mean they don’t have a counter argument?

I guess we’ll find out soon enough, calli.

😀

You and I may disagree about whether some statements are true, but we certainly agree that truth exists…

Indubitably.

Ideas always have consequences, and we’re seeing the consequences of a lot of bad ideas in the current absurd confusion over biology and sex in particular, with much damage being done to lives as a result.

Cassie of Sydney
Sep 16, 2023 8:09 AM
“Go on and do a rant about a MSM article. It seems it consumes your soul.”

Secondly, your own soul is permanently entangled, obsessed and consumed by vaccines, earthquakes, and now EVs.

Yes you do, and you are brilliant at it. Don’t comment on the jabs or earthquakes because you are out if your league.

STFU!

You need help.

of your league….

James Campbell asks the question:

It should have been the week the starting gun fired on the sprint to victory at next month’s Voice referendum.

But with a month until polling day and polls showing the vote likely to fail, minds in the government are turning to how the divisions from the campaign can be healed.

The first official week of the campaign, which began on Monday with Governor-General David Hurley issuing the writs for the October 14 vote, quickly turned into a horror show for the Yes campaign after comments emerged of Professor Marcia Langton telling an audience in Western Australia that the No campaign’s arguments came down to “base racism” or “just sheer stupidity”.

Langton was later at pains to make clear she was talking only about the arguments and was not calling No voters racist or stupid.

But in private, senior government figures and Yes23 staff were not hiding the fact they thought the comments played into the hands of the No camp and were a disaster for the campaign.

Privately some ministers expressed frustration at the reluctance to publicly rebuke her.

“We should have distanced ourselves from Langton,” one minister said.

The Yes23 campaign wasn’t sure how to respond either.

“In an election campaign you can disendorse candidates, but it’s a referendum. You can’t sack Marcia Langton because you don’t like what she’s said,” a senior Yes23 campaign strategist said on Thursday.

Bizarrely, with only four weeks to go until the vote — and with the polling all showing the referendum is likely to fail — a surprising number of senior Labor figures say minds have yet to turn to what the government plans to do on the morning after the night the vote goes down.

In the aftermath of the 2016 Brexit referendum, which saw the UK vote to leave the EU, then UK prime minister David Cameron, who had led the case to remain, resigned.

Could the same thing happen here?

“How does he stay if the Yes vote starts with a 3 when he’s put the country through this?” a senior Coalition frontbencher said.

A former Morrison government minister said it was right that people considered what he called “the David Cameron option”.

“(Anthony Albanese) is the one who insisted on this in this form to the existence of other forms, he’s got to take responsibility for that,” he said.

“There are a lot of similarities. He chose to do it. He chose for it to be in that form to the exclusion of all others, and was adamant about it. It was all or nothing. That was his choice.

“Now when you make an all-or-nothing play, you’ve got to accept the all-or-nothing outcome.”

But Labor MPs who spoke to News Corp all rejected the prospect of the PM quitting in the wake of defeat, with one saying the caucus was “100 per cent behind him” and no Australian prime minister had ever quit who had lost a referendum.

But a minister conceded it was strange how little work had gone into preparing for this outcome.

The reason for that, he said, was simple: “Because it’s a thought crime.”

Another said the prospect preying foremost on his mind was how it would be received by Indigenous Australia.

“It is going to be a really bad day for Aboriginal people if the polls should be proved correct,” he said.

There would also be angry recriminations from the inner-city Left — “a pity party for the ages”, as one Labor activist described it — which the government would need to avoid indulging.

“I think there needs to be a balance of humility, reflection and optimism,” the minister said.

“There’s got to be a hope proposition, but turning that into something that can be operationalised is really f..king hard.”

A Labor MP, who made no bones about the fact he thinks the referendum is going to fail, said “it will take some time” for the country to get over the vote.

“There will be a lot of bitterness and rancour about this,” he said.

He said Mr Albanese would need to “redouble his effort on closing the gap” after the campaign was over.

“Housing, health, education, homelessness — that’s what he’s got to do for the country,” the MP said.

Just how bleak the aftermath of defeat might be was summed up by Yes23 spokesman Thomas Mayo, a favourite target of the No campaign, who said the damage would take generations to heal.

“You won’t be able to undo the hurt or the damage it does, particularly, and most importantly, to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, because the truth is this is a modest proposal despite fear mongering, it’s just an advisory committee, that’s all it is, what most of the respected constitutional experts and former High Court justices say,” Mr Mayo said.

“It will take more than a lifetime to heal the damage of a No vote, it will take many lifetimes I think.”

Mr Mayo is in no doubt that the blame for the decline in the Yes vote’s fortunes can be attributed to the Federal Opposition’s decision in April to oppose the Voice.

“It’s only been since the No campaign has ramped up its misinformation and fear campaign that we have seen those numbers plummet,” Mr Mayo said.

“It should never have been something that a political party decided to make an issue that is about being re-elected. It’s just wrong.”

Another minister, who admitted he had “no idea” how the government planned to move on if No won out, drew attention to the Prime Minister’s rhetoric last week in parliament in which he said Australians are “fundamentally decent” and “regardless of what way they vote in a democratic referendum, I respect Australians — each and every one of them.”

“I think that’s the tone he’s going to be striking,” the minister said.

“The challenge,” his colleague said, will be “to find a message and a tone that cuts through what will be wild noise, that doesn’t look like it’s picking a fight with the vote — whilst not letting Dutton off the hook — and which provides as much comfort as possible to First Nations people who’ll be doing it tough and who know there isn’t an easy answer to that pain.”

But a senior Labor official, who is deeply involved in the campaign, was blunt about how little thought so far has gone into this.

“It’s a good question how we handle it and I’m not sure comrades have properly turned their minds to it,” the official said.

Bit in there comrades! (Chortle)
Mayo suggests that more intergenerational trauma will follow a No decision. It won’t.
Labor person says it will cause “rancour and bitterness” if it goes down. It will amongst the inner city elites. Old mate in rural areas, not so much.
Labor insiders suggesting they can’t distance themselves from Langton. They should have long ago.
Yes no Australian PM has resigned because of referenda being dismissed. But the knives will certainly be out.

People that think DEW’s don’t exist probably watch MAFS and the MSM news at 6… add breaky TV to the equation.

Add Sky News to the mix.

Have they really focused on the Bio-Tech jabs?

Mythbusters did an episode on this.

Wow.

GreyRanga
Sep 16, 2023 8:38 AM
We haven’t had steel columns being vaporised so far today. I feel lost.

If you think the imagery was fake just say so.

Dot
Sep 16, 2023 8:55 AM

MSM gobbler.

Mark Dice:

The Wheels Fell Off! – They Can’t Even Pretend Things Are Okay Anymore!

Albanese described the suggestion the Uluru Statement includes these sections as “absolute nonsense”, “a conspiracy theory” and like believing the moon landing was fake.

It is astounding how badly and childishly Albo and his mob argue. Scepticism of the Voice is like doubting the moon landing?

You would never hear such far fetched nonsense from the Libs – because they never stick to their guns. They flee a position before the outer layers wear down enough to expose principle.

Labor, on the other hand are different. Albo will stick to his gun firing away, even though it is pointed at the deck and each shot makes him sink even faster.

That said, Dutton has shown surprising feistiness. The first pollie of the major parties to openly talk about introducing nukyulah, and his decision to oppose the Voice. Can you imagine Trumble or Morro to put up with being called racist? He’s given Jacinta free rein against the Voice and has not abandoned her when she has been courageous.

Even his idea of a second referendum, while I think it unnecessary, shows strategic initiative: people thinking they must vote ‘Yes’ because, inter alia, it delivers an indigenous recognition that is what they care for (not a small cohort I suspect given the Yessers tend to have vague and woolly justifications for their choice).

And all the while Marcia, Albo, and Burney are peppering the decks amidst a shower of splinters, “BANG! BANG! BANG!”

Jack Poso
@JackPosobiec

Now get out of our way. We have a country to save