Her fans call her Monstar. When Monica Weightman steps up to the microphone, she and her guitar connect with everyone in the room. Her easy manner and rich, expressive voice pull people in as she talks and sings about things familiar. Through tunes and beats, sad or joyful, we’re swept up by a range of… Read more »
Posts in: indigenous struggles
Momentum builds to boycott the Melbourne Stolenwealth Games
The fiery battle for Land Rights was the big news of the 1982 Brisbane Commonwealth Games. Footage of massive protests by Aboriginal people and their supporters was beamed around the world. Aboriginal people in their hundreds occupied Musgrave Park in central Brisbane. Hundreds of demonstrators — such as Biri woman and story teller, Maureen Watson… Read more »
Indigenous land is NOT for sale
The Howard Government has already announced its plans to attack working people through the combination of its anti-union laws and attacks on welfare. But unless faced with mass resistance, it won’t stop there. On its medium-term agenda it is dismantling Aboriginal land rights legislation in order to open up communally-owned land to unfettered corporate plunder…. Read more »
A conversation with Tasmanian Stolen Generations activist, Debra Hocking
Debra Hocking is an Indigenous woman stolen from her family and the Tasmanian representative on the National Sorry Day Committee. Debra is from the Mouheneenner nation in the southeastern part of Tasmania. She is a strong feminist, dynamic organiser and proud palawa (Aboriginal Tasmanian). She spoke with Alison Thorne about her journey to be reunited… Read more »
Your Say
Law change the tip of the iceberg It was great to read the article on provocation in the Freedom Socialist Bulletin. Rob Hulls and John Thwaites have made all the right noises, but the whole of the Defence to Homicide Report needs to be adopted or the situation for women who kill after abuse will… Read more »
Reject shared responsibility agreements
Hooray for the National Indigenous Times (NIT) for blowing the whistle on the Howard Government’s appalling track record on Indigenous affairs. The paper recently published leaked Cabinet documents which revealed the real story behind the government’s unseemly haste to abolish the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission — the near certainty of an embarrassing defeat… Read more »
Expose the Redfern Cover-up!
On February 15, 2004 an Aboriginal teenager was chased by police through the streets of Sydney’s inner city suburb of Redfern. The police in their high-speed cars were in hot pursuit of their 17-year-old “suspect” on his bicycle. He died when impaled on the metal fence bordering a park used by his neighbours: residents of… Read more »
Australia must pay reparations for stolen East Timor oil
The relationship between Australia and the newly independent nation of Timor-Leste is a classic case study of imperialism. The imperialist nation claims to be motivated by “humanitarian concerns” and “generosity” for its poor neighbour while blatantly plundering its resources. The dependent nation is expected the to be grateful for Australian aid, even though the amount… Read more »
ATSIC abolition creates opportunity to fight for something better!
On the anniversary of the day Aboriginal people finally won the right to vote, the Howard Government introduced legislation into Parliament to abolish the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission (ATSIC). Established by the Hawke Government, ATSIC was an attempt to give Indigenous Australians a genuine say through an elected national body. Almost from the… Read more »
Maori resistance to the theft of the seabed and foreshore
In June 2003, New Zealand’s Court of Appeal ruled that the customary title of Maori (Aotearoa/NZ’s Indigenous people) to the seabed and foreshore had never been legally extinguished, and that cases relating to it could therefore be heard by the Maori Land Court. The social democratic Labour government of Prime Minister Helen Clarke reacted to… Read more »
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