Melbourne Anti-Racism - Friday : Melbourne Indymedia

Thousands of people packed Bourke Street mall near the GPO on Friday afternoon to demonstrate against racism and to listen to handfuls of people speak about its sources in corporate media and parliament as well the atrocities in Cronulla, war zones and torture facilities in particular Guantanamo Bay.

Speakers who drew attention to John Howard's speech during the Tampa incident where he proclaimed "We decide who comes into this country and the circumstances in which they come" and the similarity between the events in Cronulla where people took arbitrary control of beaches in Sydney and forcefully decided who enters them and allegedly wore t-shirts that read "ETHNIC CLEANSING UNIT".

The lively crowd then migrated to Liberal HQ to target the Liberal Party as a main source of inciting racism in society via government propaganda.

Speakers asked people to continue their public opposition to such issues and urged people to a lunchtime picnic/protest at the State Library on Sunday. The event on Friday was part of many events being planned to highlight the effects of racism and war in society.

Theatrics portray David Hicks, prisoner in US "Camp Delta" Guantanamo Bay over this Christmas period. Orange suits represent the clothing prisoners wear at Guantanamo Bay.

Banner by 'Civil Liberties Defence' leads the migration up Russel Street.

As the crowd headed towards Liberal Party HQ, inspired people joined the protest including people on delayed trams.

People targeted the government and liberals as the source of inciting racism and fear, earmarks of facism.

Home-made signs displayed common messages including this one. "Racial prejudice is a mere pigment of the imagination!"

Activist groups plastered the area with graphic posters, a reminder fresh in the minds of everyone there.

The swarm was vibrant with catchy anti-racist chants.

A large peace banner, the train continues down russel street.

Scores of people wore a multitude of shirts with anti-racist phrases painted on them.

Police harass people, singling out these banner holders..

sorry, I'm calling bullshit on the comment given with his photo. police harassment? crap, i was there and they didn't single out people with banners and they didn't harass anyone. what a pointlessly whiny thing to say.

quote:
========
crap, i was there and they didn't single out people with banners
========

in fact, the police were quite decent.

I was there too.

...but certainly par for the course. There are many people who do not equate John Howard with the racism these people are quite rightly gnashing their teeth over, therefore they alienate many people who agree with them over the central issue by involving an issue that (I hope) they genuinely believe is related (otherwise they are using 'racist-ism' as their own little bugbear to push their un-related political cause, which would be sad, and genuinely put them, as far as I am concerned, in the same ball park as the Cronulla thugs of any race)

I find it really upsetting that someone who was clearly experiencing some serious personal distress ended up in the back of a divvy van as a result of participating in this demo. Without laying any blame, maybe we could be better at looking out for people who are behaving strangely at demos and keeping them safe.

I noticed a few people who weren't in a good headspace. Right at the start of the demo there was one guy who'd been drinking all day was freaking out at the display of the Eureka flag and got even more agitated when two police tried to get him to walk away.

Me and another guy talked to him to try and find out what was agitating him so much. The police had him by the arms and were ready to drag him off. I was really suprised when they actually listened to me gave me a chance to calm him down. They left me with him, we had a bizarre and slightly scary conversation about lots of things, and eventually he took off.

It clearly wasn't in the interests of the individual police to arrest this guy - unwanted paperwork, risk of injury to themselves etc - and they responded well to an alternative way of dealing with the situation.

I saw the girl with the dog sitting at a tram stop in Collins Street watching the rally go past. She was quite agitated and yelling stuff that didn't make a heap of sense. Did anyone speak to her or try to help her out before the situation escalated? If so, did it help at all?

"I find it really upsetting that someone who was clearly experiencing some serious personal distress ended up in the back of a divvy van as a result of participating in this demo."

Yes, you are right and the prisons are full of mentally-ill people because society generally doesn't create more appropriate ways to deal with people.

However I just want to point out that there were many people making sure that the demo stayed peacefull. I think everyone wanted to prove that we are better than the violent mob at Cronulla beach.

The incident with the dog was right at the end of the rally when everyone was leaving and probably not paying that much attention to what was happening. The girl got angry at the police and kicked one of them because they wouldn't help her find the dog. After negotiating with rally participants, the police did try to let the girl go without charge several times. However, every time they let her go she proceeded to attack them instead of leaving.

I think the whole thing was very unfortunate and she shouldn't have been charged (as she was clearly too upset to be thinking straight), but generally the rally and the way people conducted themselves and dealt with each other was great.

It was by far the best rally I've been to in years and it was such a relief from the general sense of fear that I've had since the racist lynch-mob in Cronulla. It was beautifull.

quote:
===========
There are many people who do not equate John Howard with the racism these people are quite rightly gnashing their teeth over,
===========

JOHN HOWARD was the only minister in the Fraser government to oppose Viewtnamese immigration.

JOHN HOWARD, when in ooposition, made some fairly FAMOUS statements about how Asian immigration was undermining our beautiful Aussie kulcha, mayyyyte!!!

It's amazing that *some* people don't equate John Howard with racism.

Some people don't equate the Pope with Catholicism.

I THINK JOHN HOWARD SHOULD BE EXTERMINATED, along with ALEXANDER DOWNER, ROBERT HILL and PHILIP RUDDOCK.

I WOULD BE VERY HAPPY TO SEE IT HAPPEN.

Philip Ruddocks daughter escaped Australia due to intense shame.

I wish I could afford to do the same.

How do feel about exterminating Iraqis, Jay?

It's easy to see who is full of crazy hatred on this thread.

The outragous violence in Cronnulla is just a aberation of a society that is bassed on land theft, murder, genocide and reacism.
The Indigenous Soverign Nations know this all to well, and we have lived in successive generations of ever incrreasing racism. Each new wave if imigration is met with fear and intimidation.
When the Chinese arived they where villafied, then the Italians, Greeks, Croations, Middle Eastern, African etc. But always the Indigenous Peoples have been villafied by all groups.
What we are sieng now is the natural progression of the propaganda we are all bieng fed through the media na governments of the world. The war on terror and the assumption that middle Eastern people are to blame gives rise to this sort of violence... and the Government arre to blame for this.
We have to be ever vigilant, as the rise of Facism is sneaky and underhanded. It can creep up on you without you knowing!!!
We need to be healing our past now in the pressent inorder to walk together towards the future. And that healing needs to start with the Soverign peoples of this Land.... the over 500 soverign nations of indigenous peoples.
For peace and soverignty, and friendship for all people.

MY HEART BLEEDS.BUT WHERE ARE ALL THESE PEOPLE OUT IN FORCE TO STAND UP FOR THE FIRST NATIONS PEOPLES OF THIS COUNTRY.WERE PEOPLE TURNING UP IN FORCE LIKE THIS WHEN TJ HICKEY WAS MURDERED BY POLICE.ARE PEOPLE TURNING UP IN FORCE WHEN A LITTLE 4 YEAR OLD BABY BOY WAS MURDERED IN 2003.BY DRUNKEN ADULTS WACKED OF THEIR FACES,PLAYING CHICKEN WITH HIS LITTLE BODY WITH CARS.AND THE POLICE WONT CHARGE THE PERPETRATORS,AS THEY ARE POLICE INFORMANTS.WHAT ARE ALL THESE PEOPLE OF GOOD WILL AND CONSCIENCE DOING FOR MY PEOPLE.THIS IS THE SILENCE THAT OUR PEOPLE ARE DYING I..PEOPLE WANT TO STAND UP IN FORCE FOR EVERY OTHER ETHNIC GROUP OF PEOPLE ITS TIME THEY START TO STAND UP INN FORCE ALONG OUR PEOPLE OR ELSE YOU ARE BEING HYPOCRITES.
IT IS OUR HOMELANDS THAT IS CONTINUING TO BE INVADED BY EACH AND EVERY ONE OF THESE PEOPLE UNTIL THEY SEKK OUT WRITTEN FORMAL DOCUMENTS OF CONSENT TO THE OCCUPATION OF OUR LANDSD TERRITORYS AND WATERS.

I would be happy to see John Howard exterminated (in the metaphorical political sense, as I'm sure you were offering the statement - otherwise, may your relevent supreme entity help you...) and will continue to contribute to that end (for his domestic policies on health and education particularly) at the relevent moment. It's not a perfect system, but the dalek system I find somewhat more offensive - something I think the former ruler of Iraq had down pat.

So perhaps more importantly, how are YOU on the extermination of Iraqis? I'd imagine it would be fine as long as you perceived them to have contrary political viewpoints to your own?

I'm not in favour of exterminating anyone: and as I've said before, the only justification for war is when the 'peace' becomes more intolerable than what the war may be. The hard part is making the call, and I sure as hell would never want to be the one to do that.

We know who the real racists are in all of this are.

====================

In Bay Street, Brighton-le-Sands, a young woman was sitting in a car when men approached and opened the door to her vehicle and put a hand up her dress, saying: "We are going to rape you, you Aussie sluts."
A witness, Linda El-Hassan, 19, said a shot was fired at the woman's car but she was unhurt.

http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2005/12/12/1134236005902.html
=============

Yes, it's kind of hard to argue with the unpalatable facts, isn't it?

Until we acknowledge that there is tremendous racism both towards and FROM Lebanese-Australians, all the self-congratulatory gatherings in the world aren't going to make a jot of difference (except make us feel good about ourselves for a while).

Let's not forget that Lebanese-Australians started things, and were much, much more violent towards innocent bystanders in their 'retaliation riot'. I didn't see any white neo-nazis stabbing old Lebanese men in the back. But as a mixed race woman, I have experienced grotesquely disproportionate sexual harassment and and one stage sexual assault by young men of Middle Eastern appearance. And though there are some feminists prepared to talk about how Islamo-fascism is *directly* responsible for this, it really shits me how many other 'leftists' are so intent on denying the over-representation of some cultural groups with crimes against women. By all means misrepresent Cronulla if you must, and gather in feel group counter-demos, but you won't change the fact that selective immigration policy is on its way. And from someone with scars on her thighs ...and other places... I can't say I will be sorry.
Nor will I abandon other traditional 'leftist' principles of human rights, animal rights, land rights, ecology etc.
It's just that, for me, the coffee smell is so strong now it can't be denied.

They're dreaming of a white Australia.
Just like the Natzis used to do.
Where the coloured ones are mangled,
While right whites wangle,
As Howard guides us to the doom.

Why is it koher for Anglo motorcycle gangs to patrol the coast, intimidate beachgoers, and do so from behind masks designed to hide their criminal identities, and why don't the Australian police do anything to protect ORDINARY Austalians from these amphetanine fueled biker nazis?

quote:
=========
Motorcycle Gangs or
Motorcycle Mafia?
by Sergeant Steve Tretheway
Arizona Department of Public Safety
and Lieutenant Terry Katz
Criminal Intelligence Division, Maryland State Police

Once considered nothing more than rowdy toughs on two-wheelers, motorcycle gangs have evolved into crime units that are sufficiently well-oiled and well-organized to rival the Mafia. It's not just police officers who lump these groups together. Documented evidence in state, provincial and federal courts throughout the United States, Canada, Europe and Australia suggests that motorcycle gangs have become organized crime entities equal to the Mafia on many fronts. Biker gangs are organized internationally, with chapters in Europe, Australia, South America and Africa. As retired Illinois State Police Sergeant Joe Satercier noted in 1993 at a Chicago-area Outlaw Motorcycle Gang training seminar, "Biker gangs are the only sophisticated organized crime groups that we export from the United States."

http://www.nagia.org/Motorcycle_Gangs.htm
=============

Transcript
08/10/1999
Bikie war feared after shootings

MAXINE McKEW: Fears that a war between rival biker gangs is underway have been fuelled by a shooting outside the Rebels' Motorcycle Club in Adelaide this morning.

Two men were killed and three others were injured in the shooting.

Meanwhile, police in Victoria are investigating yesterday's discovery of an undetonated bomb at the Ballarat headquarters of the Bandidos.

The two incidents follow a stream of bombings, shootings and killings involving biker gangs across Australia in the past two years.

At a national meeting of police ministers and senior police personnel scheduled for next month, the South Australian Premier, John Olsen, is expected to suggest that Australia's escalating biker warfare should assume top priority.

Jill Singer reports.
http://www.biker.co.nz/Reviews.asp?id=111
====================

Seems that if you're white in Australia, you represent yourself.

If you're not white, you represent your entire "race".

"BUT WHERE ARE ALL THESE PEOPLE OUT IN FORCE TO STAND UP FOR THE FIRST NATIONS PEOPLES OF THIS COUNTRY.WERE PEOPLE TURNING UP IN FORCE LIKE THIS WHEN TJ HICKEY WAS MURDERED BY POLICE.ARE PEOPLE TURNING UP IN FORCE WHEN A LITTLE 4 YEAR OLD BABY BOY WAS MURDERED IN 2003."

Susan, do you honestly think that those thugs at Cronulla can tell the difference between an Arab and an Aboriginal? Do you think they even care?

Had you been to the rally (or paying attention) you would have noticed that the thing was full of Aboriginal flags, people in black-GST shirts and that the MC was an Aboriginal herself.

I along with many others DID come out in force when TJ Hicky was murdered and for a host of other land-rights campaigns etc. Infact Fridays rally was built out of Human Rights Day which had as one of it's main demands "Justice for Douglass Scott".

Personally, as a migrant to Australia I felt personally scared and insulted by what happened at Cronulla. I am really glad and gratefull that for once Australians of all races and nationalities came out to stand up against it.

Cronulla ist kein Einzelfall. Rassistische Ausschreitungen in Australien

Nach Wochen antiarabischer und antimuslimischer Hetze, die u.a. dazu diente, neue Terrorismus- Gesetze rechtzufertigen, kam es zu einer Eskalation der rassistischen Ausschreitungen in Australien. Tausende Whiteys beteiligten sich an massiven Übergriffen, es kam zu Straßenschlachten, vielen Verletzten und zahlreichen Protesten sowohl gegen die Übergriffe als auch gegen die rassistische und repressive Politik der Regierung.-

Inhalt:
- Zur Einleitung
- Staatlicher Rassismus in Australien
- Rassistische Traditionen
- Rassistische Ausschreitungen und Terrorismus
- Proteste
- Zahlreiche weiterführende Links

weiter: http://no-racism.net/article/1494

does anyone know why 5pm at the bourke st mall was choosen for this rally?

- did the person/s who started this text message know another different rally was already booked for the mall at the exact same time?

if this was done on purpose, i think that was a very bad move, i went to the mall to show i did not like the race roits in sydney not to protest about the governements new sedition laws or the unfair locking up of david hicks

just so this reads as positive as well....overall i thought it was great to go out and protest about these things

but i thought it unfair to hold two event at the same time and location - who choose to make the event clash/overlap - was it the group that orginised the first rally keen to see numbers increase?

this left a sour taste in my mouth i felt tricked as i doubt this was just a coincidence?

Oh yeah sure you did Naziboy/spinifx/lilly and fred.

I think caffiene queen has a good point. If those organising this demo had not done so in such a knee-jerk reaction, the whole thing may have been more meaningful.

What has been accomplished? As far as I can see NSW beaches have been turned into a police state with everyone now a suspected criminal.

"I think caffiene queen has a good point. If those organising this demo had not done so in such a knee-jerk reaction, the whole thing may have been more meaningful."

If you don't agree with our rally then go make your own one. The fact is that the several thousand strong crowd of all races agreed with the rally including the anti-terror-law and anti-war themes. We have a right to defend ourselves and our communities as we see fit.

"What has been accomplished?"

I feel a lot safer in the knowledge that people in my community (my bus from Footscray was packed with people going to the rally) will fight back (peacefully) if attacked.

As far as I can see NSW beaches have been turned into a police state with everyone now a suspected criminal."

That certainly has nothing to do with peacefull anti-racism rallies in Melbourne.

"If you don't agree with our rally then go make your own one"

Ar... that's not really the point of the exercise is it?

I diddn't hear any of these criticisms from people at the rally or anyone else. I have been to many rallies and this was one of the most enthusiastic crowds I have seen; particularly over the anti-war stuff. These criticisms appear to be just the usual ideologically-based complaints from the usual suspects on MIM.

Um, yeah... sorry for raining on everyone's parade. I just had no idea that these rallies were actually trademarked.

Now I realise I don't actually own any shares in this venture so therefore I shouldn't have a voice.... But then again who gives a fuck about your corporate mentality anyway.

Apart from from the hedonism, the feelgood factor, and 5 stars David for the best rally I've ever seen. I just wondered what these rallies had ACTUALLY accomplished. And what they had ACTUALLY failed to ignore.

Now you can all get back together and talk about how great it all was.

If you were actually an activist (as opposed to a loud-mouthed wanker) you would know that it usually takes more than one week and one rally to win anything.

But as you're such a fucking genius go on then... tell us your brilliant plans of what we should do to stop racism in Australia?

I read the wrong post (I thought caffein queen was saying something else). Now that I realise just what I am talking too...

FUCK OFF! WE HAVE NO INTEREST IN TAKING ADVICE FROM NAZIS ABOUT HOW TO FIGHT NAZIS!

Jesus Christ! The nerve of some people....

Crikey rp. If you had a brain you may actually get up to Nazi level yerself.

Two Austwalians innocently dwiving along a beachfront woad this week were menaced by men, possibly of Middle Eastern appeawance, who pursued the pair before wamming their car and dwiving away.

This happened in Kuwait, by the way. I blame the fascist Austwalian wacist violence at Cornulla for this.