Strong statement on Indigenous relations in Australia

[teonanacatl]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ulroZ4zikX8#t=134

Edited May 9, 2015 by teonanacatl

[teonanacatl]

How does one embed a video haha?

[waterboy 2.0]

 

WB

Edited May 9, 2015 by waterboy 2.0

[theuserformallyknownasd00d]

Thanks both of yas for posting that

[ghosty]

absolutely wonderful video =)

13% trust =(

Thanks for posting this.

[tangled]

Very powerful!

Excuse me I've got something in my eye...

[glimpse]

i too seem to have got something in my eye

[Swiper]

beautiful

[teonanacatl]

I had something in my eye too! Im curious what made each of you teary?

[upside]

BIG HUUUGGGGSSSSSS!!!

❤️

[glimpse]

At first when it looked like no one was going to give her a hug I was like you pricks come on forfuksake! And then they started hugging and I may or may not have melted and started bubbling like a big baby....thanks for sharing this teon.

but uhm... dont quite know exactly what made me teary......maybe i didnt get hugged enough as a kid?

i dont know if i would have made a connection to indigenous relations until the statistic that was given at the end if i hadnt read the title of the thread already.

i'm a big hugger so i guess it just upsets me a little to see someone offering some love and getting ignored.

Edited May 10, 2015 by glimpse

[glimpse]

HUUUGGGGZZZ!!!

[bogfrog]

So beautiful ...made me teary-eyed too and warm-fuzzied to the max lol, the most strongly affecting thing I have watched in a long time

[mysubtleascention]

tear -

each

.. for you

my eyes !

[Micromegas]

It's a nice video but frankly i fail to see how it makes any statement about indigenous relationships within Australia. In fact it's almost an anti-statement that obscures the issue.

It makes some kind of statement about how many people might hug a blindfolded person on a beach, which by the way is probably well below 13% of the total number of people on that beach on that day.

[mysubtleascention]

blind -

folder

.. statistic

privates !

[ghosty]

I thought it made a good statement. (edit - the blindfold is obviously symbolic, and fitting to the issue aptly on many levels), But more than that, It's catalyst to the statement it makes. Thus I feel it's brilliant.

Edited May 11, 2015 by ghosty

[Micromegas]

Ok, perhaps. So can you clarify what statement it is making because I an genuinely mystified.

Is it saying that caucasian Australians are generally blind the to history and plight of indigenous Australians since colonization, or choose to live in ignorance of the fact our beach-going middle-class world is founded on genocide, and it is therefore ironic that people should feel good about a few white folks hugging a blindfolded indigenous person on a beach in a city very remote and disconnected from the problem itself?

Is it saying that actually everything is fine because a few people gave the girl a hug and therefore we all trust one another (or will do soon enough) and we're on the way to fixing the relationship, or it's not fine because while on the surface a few people are sweet actually the majority of Australians couldn't care less and neither side trusts each other at all

I feel like it doesn't really say anything because the messages are very mixed... which paradoxically is the state of indigenous-caucasian relationships in Australia. So maybe it is really very clever but I don't think it was intentional and it wouldn't matter what ethnicity the person was getting hugs. If you're tearing up, is it because the video moves you in a positive sense, or because the impacts of colonisation in Australia have been so downright and unambiguously negative for the indigenous community?

Sorry to derail (what I think) was the feel good theme of this thread but like I said i am genuinely befuddled about what we're taking away from this video. In a broader sense i think the issue is so complex I wouldn't dare even to discuss it, because I'd be so far out of my depth.

By coincidence I was reading this evening about the role of dingoes in Australia and i stumbled across this rather stronger statement which made a greater impact on me personally, but that maybe just reflects more about me, and not the actual issue at hand.

The dingo lounge - Samuel Wagan Watson, from Smoke Encrypted Whispers, 2005.

those of the brown-skin lycanthrope

have merely become the forgotten offspring

from the dark ages of the dreamtime

the black man’s beliefs

are being swallowed up and regurgitated in foreign lands for a

dollar

the night creatures sucked into a vacuum of the techronic abyss

the shapeshifters skull around the dingo lounge

haunted by the screaming engines of the machines of

consequence

longevity just a whisper in the wind

as their numbers dwindle

and the dark hours are stolen by the monsters of new:

drug addicts, pedophiles and killers

the spirits have almost lost their foothold

the children of the rainbow serpent have no use for demons

scientific justification has rationalised their roles with prozac

and insitutionalisation

the dreamtime can be resurrected anytime

and found on the video store shelves

while in the dingo lounge

redundancy and health in death escalates

the bonemen have performed their last dance

and the shrieks of the black dingo go unheard in the night

as the ferryman has already gone down with his ship

and morpheus in his attempts to dream

has taken to anti-depressants

there comes no stormbird to deliver them to another side

as they fall into the landscape of the shadowmead

and the faded memories of the storytelling damned.

[mysubtleascention]

free foreplay -

as good as a problem

.. reality reaction

and the world solution !

[ThunderIdeal]

Didn't watch the video, just automatically felt that racial issues were piggybacking what is already a complex and emotional issue and frankly I never give or receive random hellos in the city and would sure as shit be suspicious of a hug request. If every stranger in a city wanted to make some primal human connection the city never would have gotten built. See how in a couple sentences about hugs I've given ample provocation for a big huge back and forth, and no mention of race.

[spooge]

i thought it was nice.

i did tear up.

watching it i felt very guilty and was fearful that no one was going to hug her, was flooded with relief when they started hugging her.

being outa touch with stuff and not the sharpest tool in the shed i thought more along the lines of -

its on youtube, the younger gen if able to afford it mostly lives on the net.

its on a beach, already were dealing with a relaxed atmosphere, casual, bare feet, already vulnerable.

the girl is young, attractive, much nicer hugging a young lady than a seedy old man.........

is the whole thing not aimed at the rich middle.....

the rich middles kids are going to be making the decisions in the future as their parents do now.

sure its shit, is not any shit no matter how naff good shit if it gets the masses thinking, even if its for as long as it takes to load a youtube flick, watch it and then close the page.

I'm sure if they put kind slogans like 'be nice' on coke bottle labels then the world would be a brighter place.

race is a fact, how many of us truly can walk past another of different ethnicity and not mentally reference their country of origin.

was brave of her to put it on the line i thought, after watching i then saw that there were lotsa other vids with similar hugs themes act, took the depth of it away for me after seeing that it wasn't original.

how many people on that beach would do the same thing in a indigenous community.......

[upside]

Good point Pimento.

I'd be nervous doing the same in another cultures community, but I'd be willing to do it. To put myself on the line. To show who I am.

I also think an individual's action does not represent the total spectrum. It's more of a reflection on that persons character.

That clip did make me emotional to the fact that there are nice people out there and this girl put herself on the spot. We may not agree on everything, yet we can care for another's feelings.

[teonanacatl]

I saw a girl on a beach, the title gave it context that she was an aboriginal girl, otherwise I would have thought it was just any girl on the beach. I live in an indigenous community so often I forget the actual ratio black:white ratio is not 90% black:white. So what struck me was more the metaphor of indigenous relations that I see; her being indigenous standing amongst a massive crowd of white people, on her land; with so many people oblivious to her; to the history and plight of indigenous people; oohing and arrhing taking photos- the notion of her being alone in her own country. Sure some people hugged her but almost all did with lots of show, for the camera perhaps? maybe making themselves feel better about being racist- Im not racist I hugged a black girl today?

Sure hardly scientific (I dont even know the credibility of the 13% but in my experience Id say that is about right or too much) and no control of a white girl on a beach. But then again that would be a scientific study not a statement on youtube.

An unfortunate predicament for which I do not claim to know the answer. Can-O-Worms.

[tangled]

The whole thing made me cry lol but I'm the type like that that cries at sentimental stuff.
Yeah thats exactly how I took it as a giant metaphor..
That's a good point about the hugging just being show for the camera though. Were they aware they were being flimed? If they were they could do one where no one was aware of being flimed and see if there's a difference.
Also there could have been heaps of people who hugged/didn't hug but weren't shown by the camera or edited out
So who knows what the actual ratio of hug to no hug was. Maybe it was closer to that 13%