Welcome back Karen
I've been watching the 'Karen' issue for a few weeks now, but have remained
quiet. It is clear to me that your ideas and I guess your sense of self
emerge from what we have come to know as the 'average Australian' through
the words of John Howard or Pauline Hanson. I assume you have heartfelt
dilemmas around what it means to be Australian, the idea of equality etc. as
do many of us. To name you as ignorant or racist is simply to perpetuate
another divide - a divide that allows another history of hate and oppression
to exist. But how do we reconcile these differences?
These differences are based upon particular assumptions, for example your
most recent letter assumes that equality means treating all human beings the
same. I think this is what a lot of 'average Australians' want, to not feel
as if others are getting 'special treatment' or that they are being
disadvantaged. The trouble begins however, with the fact that as different
groups of people we have, and continue to get and dole out, special
treatment. In other words we can't just be treated as equal just because we
are human beings. Women, like yourself, have for so long received lower
wages, until the 70's weren't allowed in front bars of pubs, were expected
to sacrifice their employment opportunities for men and today, it remains,
much harder for some groups of women to achieve in the same ways as men.
This is special treatment, this is not equality based upon you being a human
being. Your humanness is ordered in a hierarchy and attached to it is a
status. The response by people working to change this special treatment is
to create policies and laws that reverse this special treatment - that
gives those who have been disadvantaged some greater chance at the average
Australian's opportunities. In short some human beings are more equal than
others.
I think that your ideas are important, if frustrating, merely because
Reconciliation is also very much about White Australians coming to terms
with the differences of their ideas. In this sense we all have to let go of
our claim to being 'right' but there comes a point where we are forced to
hold onto what we think is right. To say that there is no wrong or right in
this debate, as you do in your letter, neglects the point that there are
'real' effects to how right and wrong is played out in our culture. This may
be a debate in which you have no investment in being right or wrong, but the
nature of 'truth' in this case can and has had very bad effects for
Indigenous Australians. The idea that we are all equal human beings
regardless of colour, race, gender etc, has meant for many Indigenous
Australians equality through extremely poor health, unacceptably
disproportionate rates of incarceration and clear ongoing discrimination -
see mandatory sentencing.
My question is Karen: why is it so hard for many White Australians to see
critically how difference and equality work? Does White equal blind?
For me, liberal equality is a myth and you would do yourself a huge justice
as a human being and as a woman to try and see this. The idea of equality is
'man-made', made by some who have greater access to the resources that their
equality provides than others. Equality simply, does not mean sameness.
Good luck
BW
-----Original Message-----
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of Karen Crook
Sent: Sunday, March 12, 2000 12:22 PM
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: RE: [recoznet2] Karen, Karen, Karen!
TO EVERYONE!!!!!!
For everyone's information the reason I disappeared for 2 weeks was because
my computer had a faulty CD-Rom and we've had to have it replaced and
rebuilt.
How quick everyone is to judge me, that you all seem to think I am ignoring
you or don't want to play or that you managed to prove I was wrong and that
I am a sore loser and left.
None of that at all. Simply a computer fault which left me without a
computer. I am never one to stand down from something i believe in - just
the same as all of you.
I think some people out there should be looking at themselves and
questioning their own personalities. People are so quick to judge me,
implying all sorts of things and that I am a racist yet none of you even
know me from a bar of soap. Do you know how many Aboriginal friends I have?
Do you know how many friends I have and have had over years from various
cultural backgrounds?
But that's right - none of you care anyway all because I am young with my
own opinion which contradicts the thought processes of your own.
I will never apologise for being ME.
I have not personally attcked anybody the way some of you have attacked me.
I'm simply trying to get some answers and put my thoughts across but instead
I have been attacked.
I believe in equality of people because you are a human being, not because
of the colour of your skin. People are people through and through - the only
thing we have different are our minds.
I am me with my own opinions and am happy to put my thoughts across just as
you are. there is no wrong or right in this debate so
-----Original Message-----
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of Don Clark
Sent: Thursday, 9 March 2000 10:09 PM
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: [recoznet2] Karen, Karen, Karen!
Of course she is not listening, but she is talking and that is one part of
an exchange of dialogue. The other may come, it may not. It depends on her
sense of fair play.
However, many of us are not listening to her either and are more intent on
trying to get our stuff through.
Ignorance is the enemy here and I still believe in "know thy enemy" There
are chinks in any armour, especially the armour of self-righteousness. The
more one listens the more one can find the chinks.
Don
Don Clark
President
Indigenous Social Justice Association
PO Box K555
Haymarket NSW 1240
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
There can be no real reconciliation without social justice
----- Original Message -----
From: .... <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Sunday, 5 March 2000 3:05 A.M.
Subject: Re: [recoznet2] Karen, Karen, Karen!
> I have been reading the Karen saga, for the past few weeks, is really
weeks,
> that we have been reading the Karen saga?????
>
> My goodness?
>
> Why?
>
> We may try and tell this person, our history, our, knowing, our what we
have
> been through!!!! She is not going to listen...
>
>
>
>
>
> She doesn't want to know what and how we feel, she wants to tell us...her
> s...t...u...f...f...
>
> It doesn't matter...
> because no matter how folk try to justify what has, and is still happening
> in AUSTRALIA (and I am shouting Karen) there is know way that any fair
> minded AUSTRALIAN, would not stand up and say enough is enough.
> Karen we are losing our young, we are losing our people, we are losing our
> nation. ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!!!! Black and white children are being lost.
>
> The laws in this country are horrible.....The law that the majority
> (non-indigenous) put in place. Think about it Karen........
>
>
>
> Marinomoana Ward.
> "They drew a circle that shut me out heretics, rebels and things to flout,
> but love and I had wit to win, we drew a cirlce and drew them in".
(Author
> unknown)
>
> "Zen Hugs"
>
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