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Stan Grant's racial villification

By Michael Keane - posted Thursday, 23 March 2017


Part (b) specifically says "because of the race...." Not because of "a race...". Grant clearly then defines non-Aboriginal Australians on the basis of race. According to the Human Rights commission, "Courts have generally taken the view that 'race' as described in anti-discrimination legislation is a broad term".

Specifically an Aboriginal Corporation was found to have unlawfully discriminated against an employee by dismissing her because of her "non-Aboriginality". It has been well established that not all persons within a particular race need to be offended. Section 18C precedent has included very narrow sub-groupings within a race based on hazy ill-defined constructs such as "youth, inexperience or psychological vulnerability" and the changeable and consensual notion "self-identification".

As written, part (b) could reasonably be interpreted as encompassing an exclusive definition (ie anyone not of a particular race) as well as an inclusive definition (anyone of a particular race). Indeed a bouncer at a nightclub was found in breach of 18(c) by yelling at MrH "that he should go back to his own country, that Australia is a white peoples' country, and that he is not white." (ie an exclusive definition).

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Furthermore, would anyone for an instant not believe that 18C was breached if a white nationalist said that "non-white people are …." fill in the derogatory stereotype?

Interestingly, despite the bouncer being found to have breached 18C for his comments to a punter who was abusing him in return, in another case, Federal Magistrate Brown, using gymnastic-esquelogical contortions, found that 18C had not been breached when an agitated white woman screamed to an Aboriginal corrections officer: "'You f****** black piece of s***' and 'f*** you blacks, you're all fucking s***'."  Actually it was the other way around and it was an Aboriginal woman who yelled to a white corrections officer and Brown seemingly "made stuff up" to find the woman not in breach of 18C.

Whether this case is truly seen as legal precedent or an embarrassing lack of quality assurance within the judiciary is irrelevant to Grant's divisive rhetoric. This is not about Aboriginal versus white. It's about all non-Aboriginal Australians who have an Australian dream. When I consider my Vietnamese, Chinese, Sri Lankan, Indian, Greek, Polish, Iranian, Filipino, Somalian, and Zimbabwean friends and colleagues (many of whom have come to Australia with nothing, fleeing persecution) and how we all aspire to help individuals and society, I find Grant's vulgar remarks far from being visionary. Indeed, I believe they are the epitome of racially-divisive "hate speech".

Specifically,Grant de-legitimizes the dreams and the achievements of Australians from all ethnic backgrounds.

Jurisprudence regarding 18C is all over the shop; everything or nothing could be found in breach. Anyone with any understanding of law, evidence-based medicine, political polling, fact-checking, psychological, biological and other basic science research understands that around the contested margin, there is no objective truth; there is solely the ideology of the decision maker. That's why it's pure intimidation that speech can be adjudicated through the ideological fantasies of any particular Judge.

However since this absurd law is with us Dilan Thampapillai, a legal academic argues that the focus "should be on the outcome of racist speech." Section 18C "should be aimed at preventing the exclusion and sense of division fostered by racist speech." The immense racial division that Stan Grant fosters should be at the front of the queue for reprimand under 18C. We should instead foster tolerance and understanding and judge people on the content of their character and their individual circumstance, not whether they are "my people" (as Grant says) or not.

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About the Author

Dr. Michael Keane is Adjunct Associate Professor with interests in ethics, human factors engineering, health economics and substance abuse; adjunct lecturer in public health; specialist anaesthetist.

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