The booing of Adam Goodes is not unquestionable proof of racism, but it is evidence of a societal indifference to racism – which might be even worse.
The most disturbing thing about the people who boo Goodes isn’t that they started in the first place. It’s that after the booing was associated with racism, they became louder.
I don’t think for a second that everyone booing Goodes hates black people. But the fact that they don’t care that they might be perceived as racist, and the idea that this perception is emboldening and not deterring them, is as depressing as it is frightening.
It would be so much simpler if Goodes was being derided because he was black. We could write off his antagonists as anywhere along the spectrum from uneducated to evil. But Goodes is not being booed because he’s black – he’s being booed because he wants to talk about black people.
The fact that he’s being booed for that reason, and not the simpler one, is much worse. It speaks to something more deep-rooted and insidious in the culture – the idea that if you have pain, not only do we not want to know about it, but we will take pleasure in laughing at you for it.
There seems to be an odd distaste in casual Australian culture for real issues. There is an obsession with not taking oneself seriously. In contrast to America, we pride ourselves on self-deprecation. To burst the airy, inflated bubble of non-seriousness with words about real things is somehow to be un-Australian.
Sometimes there is nothing as loud as the misguided, spiteful desire for silence. It speaks volumes that Australia’s token racist slogan is ‘If you don’t like it, leave’ – a zombie Hallmark card promoting intentional, dismissive deafness.
An unearned, demented entitlement seems to be at work. People generally watch the football to, well, watch the football. When Adam Goodes distracts us from the game with an Indigenous dance or by pointing at someone in the crowd, this makes us feel aggrieved, as though he’s taken something away from us – as though he is selfishly making abnormal what we held to be normal.
Of course, this is ludicrous. When someone speaks an important truth, regardless of the context, you listen to them. Discomfort is a far lesser evil than neglect.
There is a misguided feeling floating around Australia that Goodes has brought this upon himself. He allegedly manufactures drama for the sake of it, as evidenced by his impromptu war dance against Carlton. But discussion of race, rights and their history need no motivating act because racism is not a stop-start phenomenon – its heartbeat is constant, sometimes we just choose not to hear it.
My dad is white and my mum is not. I didn’t cop much racist abuse playing junior footy, probably because I was six feet tall when I was 15 and generally bigger than everyone else on the field. Being mixed race, my ethnicity is not easily discernible (although that didn’t stop one bloke I tackled high from wrongfully labelling me a ‘Filipino c*nt’. I started to tell him that my mum was actually from Malaysia but eventually decided that the Southeast Asian geography lesson would probably be in vain) and I never dealt with anything more than a handful of passing insults that I immediately dismissed because of the character of those issuing them.
Although the taunts were passing, they still stayed with me, and even as the captain of my footy club at 18 and someone who had spent his entire life in Australia, I always had the gnawing feeling that I was a tourist to a white man’s game.
Compared to Adam Goodes, the adversity I dealt with was nothing. Imagine having a source of pain that you have the courage to bring to the surface, and then have it met not with understanding or sympathy, or even indifference, but rather by gleeful, sadistic mocking on a national stage.
Through his bloodlines Goodes represents over 200 years of a history of exploitation and dehumanisation, and I can’t begin to imagine or comprehend exactly what goes through his head, his heart or his soul.
Evidently neither can the people who choose to boo him.
DaveM
Guest
I loved Jetta's dance in the game this weekend against Adelaide ...and also Pearce and Walters in the Freo game. I hope we see more celebrations of that nature. I cannot say the same about Goodes. The difference is that Goodes dance IMO had one purpose , to incite the crowd. It was aimed directly at one section of the crow , with one purpose.
Beny Iniesta
Guest
Agree - some fools even booed Stephen Milne because of a rape issue. Fancy booing someone accused of rape! How bloody rude is that.
Pumping Dougie
Roar Guru
13 year olds are old enough to know better and shouldn't hide behind their age. In fact 13 year olds have pretty well developed brains in my experience. Goodes actions on that occasion were totally reasonable and sent a good lesson to a lot of 13 year old poorly behaved kids that it's not acceptable to behave that way.
Pumping Dougie
Roar Guru
Are you sure? Were you there? I've never heard that said before. We're just hearing this week that Goodes get's booed all the time, yet I haven't heard specific examples except for the Hawthorn match (the week after he did the war dance) and now West Coast. And yet the media all seem to be taking it as gospel that he gests booed every week.
Pumping Dougie
Roar Guru
Yeah, let's all agree: West Coast Eagles fans are just a bunch of ferrals.
Pumping Dougie
Roar Guru
Great article Jay. Only line I disagree with is, "he’s being booed because he wants to talk about black people". As you've alluded to in the rest of your article, I don't think the motives are that clear-cut. I think his war dance wasn't just an indigenous celebration in indigenous round - it appeared to be much more than that. It appeared to be antagonistic (perhaps this was misinterpreted?), divisive and confronting. It appeared to be challenging Australia to accept indigenous culture, which by extension, is criticising Australia for not accepting indigenous culture previously. Or it could have been metaphorically saying "up yours". Which is all fair enough if he feels that way - although I think he could have found a more suitable time and place than the middle of a sporting contest - but when you criticise people, or criticise a nation, it's not overly surprising (to me) that a large percentage will be offended and affronted. (Although I think people who boo anyone for anything are behaving like morons!) I wasn't offended and I admire intelligent people like Goodes challenging other people to think; but I'm not surprised that so many people were offended. The irony is that Goodes' strategy (deliberate or otherwise) has probably achieved what he set out to achieve - to bring this debate into mainstream Australian media and the Australian consciousness. As Bob Murphy says so eloquently and simply, "the man's got chin".
Nick
Guest
Opinionated articles on an opinion site? New to the Internet?
Sleiman Azizi
Roar Guru
'Love it or leave it' is a cop out slogan for those unable to differentiate between their left and right hands.
Sleiman Azizi
Roar Guru
Who's reality?
Xiedazhou
Guest
Oh come on AussieBokkie. How is Australia not inclusive when it has many affirmative action programs in place to support Aboriginals. Furthermore, these programs are supported by both sides of politics. Yet people like you somehow twist that into a scenario wherein there is institutionalised discrimination against Aboriginals in this country. How does that work for you? And save me the lectures on the gap between Aboriginals and the rest of the population. We all know that exists, and thats why the sytems are in place to close that gap. Now its the turn of the Aboriginals themselves, time for them to shake off the victims tag, and to get on with it. Yes, bad things happened in the past. But do you advocate that this generation is the one that must accept responsibility for that, to feel shame for that, and to make recompense? How would that work? Would, for example, a first generation Australian, of Vietnamese parentage be expected to bear responsibility for the wrongs commited to Aboriginals 200 years ago, or even 30 years ago? Or would the burden of guilt and shame and the need to pay compensation only be levied upon those that had relatives who were actively involved in the dispossession and cruel treatment of Aboriginals? Is there even any moral or ethical basis for making this generation of Australians responsible for what has happened in the past, regardless of their ancestry? And where would Goodes fit into this argument, given he has "white" ancestors who were certainly around at the time "his people" were being "killed, raped and stolen from." Does he personally, via his "white" ancestry, feel the burden of guilt and shame he levies on those he says "benefited most from those rapes, those kiilings, that theft"? As a rich part Aboriginal man, has he benefitted unfairly from the "white" side of his ancestry? Or does his distant Aboriginal ancestry somehow enable him to disavow, the other side of his genetic make-up, and is it truly only those of entirely Caucasian genetics that must bear the burden of the past? When you look at everything through the prism of race and victimhood, reality tends to get distorted, and emotion gets in the way. You profess to want a genuinely equal society, and laud Goodes for his vision thereof. Yet he is a man who clearly does not treat both sides of his ancestry equally. And with the affirmative action policies in place, its difficult to argue for equality, as that "equality" would then mean that there would be no special programs for anyone, regardless of race or gender. Surely more, or better targetted affirmative action programs are needed, rather than an "equal society", if the gap between Indigenous Australians and the rest is to be bridged. However provocative finger pointing and apportioning of blame is unlikely to get the best outcomes for anyone. Goodes politicised himself, and said some things that could be construed as being genuinely offensive to many Australians. He now attempts to play the race card in an attempt to characterise his unpopularity as a racial issue. Well meaning scribes such as yourself will only create further divivsion when you champion someone whose agenda is divisive rather than inclusive, rooted in the past, and focussed on the problem, rather than the solution.
AlanKC
Guest
and Bravo AussieBokkie, well said.
Joe
Guest
Jason K The West Eagles have had their fair share of indigenous players within their squads over many years. I struggle to accept that the booing towards Adam Goodes is racist because he is of aboriginal descent than against Adam Goodes as an individual. Slane I think you are 100% correct.
Abg
Guest
It's taken its toll, run it's course but not before the disease set in club to club, state to state. Ask yourself who your favourite fairest and best is at the club you follow? Take that name, then read and hear dribble about how dirty they are, how they deserve what they get, brought it on themselves, etc., etc., and subject yourself and your family in the stands to what has occurred to this player since when I first witnessed it at GF14 and you'd be calling for a cease-fire too. The motivation and justification of the jeering masses is no longer the point, now it's about saving the game.
MichaelJ
Guest
Adam Goodes made a decision on the spur of the moment. He may reflect one day and admit that he went a bit too far, given it was a mere child. No-one is condemnably at fault here. We all never cease to grow and learn.
Pope Paul vii
Guest
Syd had to make an economic decision. If they ejected people who made racist comments in his day, the VFL would have gone broke.
MichaelJ
Guest
PS: All your link does is confirm what I claimed: 1. The girl was singled out in front of the world 2. She was upset and is still struggling with it, and 3. her mother is also upset about her being singled out. Why do people like you have trouble with comprehension?
Paul
Guest
So how does this relate to a one-club, one-code player like Adam Goodes?
Mark
Guest
I hate it when people say he shouldn't complain or make a stand because others have had it worse. It is exactly like two domestic assault victims arguing over whose was worse. It shouldn't matter, it shouldn't happen. Period.
MichaelJ
Guest
I don't buy that at all. Goodes most definitely over-reacted. Syd Jackson copped that his whole career and, at the time, he was the only indigenous player in the (VFL) game.
Momentbymoment
Guest
Axle - I will defend Alan Jones' right to push this barrow for as long as he wishes. He can't afford a golden mic as yet - must eat him up inside.