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PaperclipPerfector  6mo ago (text post)   27740 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of October 23, 2023

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Following on from the defeat of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice referendum (seriously can we just include Torres Strait Islanders in the definition of "Aboriginal"? The whole phrase is too many words) Aboriginal leaders declared a week of silence to mourn the result.

Alas, all good things must come to an end, and the silence is now over. The leaders of the Yes campaign have published an open letter to the Parliament, and it is salty. So salty that reportedly some people refused to sign on to it - and perhaps that is why it appears without any names attached.

It opens by describing Australia's decision to vote no as "appalling and mean-spirited". It asserts that "It is the legitimacy of the non-Indigenous occupation in this country that requires recognition, not the other way around." It says that "the majority of Australians have committed a shameful act". So on and so forth.

In short, it is very much filled with the sort of resentment and hostility that turns people off, hard. Even on the normally far left /r/australia subreddit, posters are tearing strips off it.

This is of course a terrible time for the Yes campaigners to be acting in this way. With the failure of the Voice, indigenous policy is in a state of flux. The government is licking its wounds and weighing how to respond. These activists could not have made a better argument for why they should be sidelined in those deliberations.

We know that the No campaign was funded and resourced by conservative and international interests who have no stake or genuine interest in the lives of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. We know this funding supported multiple No campaigns that intentionally argued in varying directions to create doubt and fear in both non-Indigenous and Indigenous communities.

AFAICT 'yes' outspent 'no' by orders of magnitude. Another nail in the coffin for those who think that you can just buy any election.

There has always been racism against First Nations people in Australia. It increased with multiple daily instances during the campaign and was a powerful driver for the No campaign. But this campaign went beyond just racism. ‘If you don't know - Vote No’ gave expression to ignorance and licensed the abandonment of civic responsibility on the part of many voters who voted No. This shameful victory belongs to the Institute of Public Affairs, the Centre for Independent Studies and mainstream media.

It's funny because lots of people across the spectrum follow "if you don't know vote no" when it comes to referendums where I live. It caught me totally off guard to see that this was such a vehement point of contention in the Australian referendum.

AFAICT 'yes' outspent 'no' by orders of magnitude. Another nail in the coffin for those who think that you can just buy any election.

I believe this is true. This is from the end of August, but back then Yes23 had outspent all other groups by far, and they tracked 1009 Yes ads compared to 164 No ads. As of September the Guardian was running pieces about the No campaign spending four times as much on Facebook ads, but this is misleading - Yes spent far more on Google ads, and overall Yes spent far more - they note Yes23 spending 1.1 million, over ten times as much as the No-aligned Fair Australia. In particular as they got closer to the date, Yes spending on Facebook surged and easily outstripped No. AFR also notes Yes receiving over 26 million in donations.

It does rather bother me that in the face of the Yes campaign's considerably superior spending, institutional support, and visibility, that there is scaremongering around No. I remember spooky stories about No campaign consultants, or the terrifying fact that some people working for the No campaign are Christians. I find it rather surreal to attack the No campaign for working with a Christian marketing company, and to imply that there's something wrong working with 'a firm that specialises in fundraising for church groups', when the last I checked the Yes campaign was drowning in church support.

In the letter itself, there's the implication that 'conservative and international interests' are illegitimate. I'll concede the point around international interests (though I will argue that it is hypocritical for the Yes campaign to suggest that international voices should stay out), but surely Australian conservatives have every bit as much right to participate in the debate and to vote as anyone else?

(though I will argue that it is hypocritical for the Yes campaign to suggest that international voices should stay out),

You make an excellent point, but I cannot believe you missed the opportunity to reference Albanese getting Shaquille O'Neal to endorse the voice.

Even more ironic that Shaq was principally in town to be a gambling spokesperson for Pointsbet when he did so

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