this post was submitted on 14 Oct 2023
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Fuck. I’m sad. I’m sorry to be Australian right now.
Yeah - the voice didn't really mean much to my day to day at all, but this loss is indicative of our deepening conservative bent.
With any luck it would have meant something to mine. I'm devastated.
Genuinely sorry for your loss.
Thanks, sadly I've learned a lot about my country and my local areas in how they've polled
Deepening? How new are you? Homosexuals were criminals until recently.
It has nothing to do with anyone becoming “conservative”. Another advisory board would change nothing when the ones we already have are ignored and aren’t working.
60% of the country voted for gay marriage, a far more “liberal”/“progressive” thing than the voice, so saying we’re getting more “conservative” makes no sense. The fact is that the actual progressive people recognize that this was all grandstand virtue signalling, and we want more than that. “It’s better than nothing” is not a valid reason to change our constitution. How about actually doing something meaningful as a starting point instead?
I think you've misunderstood this. Sure it's 'virtue signalling' and not gonna do anything. But that's all it was meant to be, recognising the original owners of the land in our constitution was really all it was meant to do. And so what if that's literally all it did? How is there any reason to vote against that? What has anyone achieved by voting no? We could have had a more respectful constitution today but instead we've got nothing. Well done, we've denied Aboriginals the smallest bit of acknowledgement and respect. Good job Australia. Fuck I wish Sky News would start telling people to jump off a cliff.
Without any detail about how these processes would actually work, this seemingly common sense statement is fraught with danger. This has been rightly recognised by those most likely to encounter legislative change around land management and compulsory engagement with indigenous groups. As you move outwards from inner city suburbs, the percentage of no voters increased and this should not surprise anyone at all...that doesn't mean country folks are racist or that they don't care about first nations issues. It means they are far more likely to have been caught up in the absolutely disgusting mess of previous government attempts to put a framework around cultural heritage issues or challenges to private land ownership.
The guarantee of 'an indigenous voice to parliament' completely failed to elucidate how this could possibly hope to deal with the fractious state of existing first nations groups who can not and will not work together or settle disputes over borders. Obviously this is a problem originally caused by colonisation and forced encampment, but it's not easily put to bed. Right now where I live there are heated battles raging over native title claims; over boundaries and which family groups are the rightful representatives of each tribal group. 4 or 5 districts that cannot decide on who is the rightful native title claimant, all with various corporate backing fighting tooth and nail with a view to securing the imagined wealth of being ratified as the original inhabitants of one patch of dirt or another.
This is where it ends up:
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12304769/Perth-tree-planting-event-axed-Aboriginal-corp-demands-2-5M-approval.html
This wasn't some mining company looking to explore for gas or resources...it was a group of people trying to carry out a waterway restoration project. To help undo damage to the land. They were asked to pay 2.5 million dollars to the Whadjuk Aboriginal Corporation for the privilege.
That CEO has since been rightly removed, but you get the picture. There are so many corporate groups out there just rubbing their hands together and hoping to turn this ugly mess into a gravy train. I have first hand experience dealing with these situations and it has been absolutely heartbreaking. White solutions to black problems seems to just lead to more exploitation and fresh wounds.
About 6 months ago we had some cultural heritage training delivered at work just as public discourse around 'The Voice' was starting to ramp up heavily. There were about 100 people present across a few sessions and I think they were extremely powerful for some people. Some minds were changed on a few issues and the facilitator was absolutely fantastic. Towards the end of the session I was absolutely shocked when that facilitator who obviously cares deeply about first nations representation told our group that she and her family would be voting against the referendum. Her statement was concise and to the point: "How can a single indigenous voice to parliament represent hundreds of groups who do not agree with one another?"
Obviously she is caught up in the aforementioned ongoing disputes, but I dare say after the heartbreaking presentation about generational trauma inflicted by white settlers trying to solve indigenous issues, she made almost 100 no voters right there.
To be perfectly honest I am completely disgusted by the way this proposal was handled from start to finish. IMO the Labor party has taken the olive branch offered by the Uluru Statement from the Heart and stomped it into the ground for attempted political gain.
They grabbed a divisive wedge issue and took it to a referendum with no real plan for how it was going to work. They failed to illustrate a workable framework or demonstrate what was going to be put in place to compensate private landholders for restrictions placed on development of the land they have purchased.
It feels as though we just set reconciliation back about 40 years, picked the scab from every wound imaginable...and for what? My heart breaks for indigenous Australians right now. They've just been told by the entire country that we don't care about them. That hurts, because there's simply no way that is the case. Again, our first Australians have been let down by a tone deaf white government that believes so hard that 'they know best' that they were prepared to put indigenous people on the gallows with a smile and forced the Australian people to pull the lever by keeping them in the dark and not presenting the full legal framework that would draw from that constitutional change.
It's fucking gross.
Yeah there's nothing in there anywhere about land rights, it was purely about recognition. I have no idea how the issue got conflated by that nonsense, all I know is it's being peddled by a bunch of racists. You do seem to genuinely care but imo it just makes this all sadder. I do agree Labour did a horrible job with all this but I still see no good reason for anyone to vote no. It's all written in the information, and no you don't need to answer every question before hand, it says in the information that parliament gets to decide the functions, composition and procedures. It had absolutely nothing to do with land rights, there was so much disinformation spread about this and I hate everyone who couldn't just read it and instead trusted whatever some moron on sky news or facebook said.
It got conflated because there are multiple global examples to where the constitutional change that passed was equally broad and has created a situation where you cannot sneeze in your back garden without first asking a first nations corporation for permission and paying the tithe. I'm not saying that some form of financial reparations should be ruled out, but landing it on the heads of people who purely through accident of birth grow up in a former colony is not going to fly. It ends up in a circular argument every single time. Perhaps the British crown should own their crimes and shoulder the financial burden of making things right? Certainly no questioning the lineage of those responsible there.
No, it's not broad. Please for the love of christ read: In recognition of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as the First Peoples of Australia:
there shall be a body, to be called the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice;
the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice may make representations to the Parliament and the Executive Government of the Commonwealth on matters relating to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples;
the Parliament shall, subject to this Constitution, have power to make laws with respect to matters relating to the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice, including its composition, functions, powers and procedures.
Nothing anywhere that would have any say in land rights, it's a completely separate issue.
It certainly isn't specific.
Who will this person be, claiming to represent the interest of 200 distinct language groups? What laws will be made?
It's little wonder it failed. You and I can't even agree and it seems like we're ostensibly on the same side of the issue.
It literally says that parliament will decide, not some random individual, the people we elect to make laws. You seem to have some weird idea of how government works. You're right it doesn't mention specific term limits but again, these are decided by parliament. I pasted you the constitutional changes and none of it is unreasonable, I'm not sure how any of it got confused with land rights, or how any of it is worth saying no to.
The person you're talking to thinks those details are irrelevant and we should have voted yes in order to find out. For crying out loud, it's not even in the constitutional amendment that there needs to be an indigenous person on the Voice lol.
If a community feels their needs will be best represented by a non indigenous person why not let them be elected? It's probably unlikely but seems like an odd restriction.
They also didn't tell us how the people would be selected btw. They weren't necessarily elected, which is yet another problem people had with it. It would no doubt have just been more "jobs for the boys".
That’s reason to vote against it because it’s pointless. It achieves nothing positive, and likely leads to decades more of inaction because “but we put you guys in the constitution and gave you a voice, what more can we do?!”.
I’m not voting to change our constitution for something this pathetic. It’s not a shopping list.
If you're not willing to vote for the bare minimum you're not going to vote for anything. The status quo got us into this mess and you're expecting it to get us out, pathetic.
100% incorrect.
I would have voted yes if we were guaranteeing something to indigenous people that would actually be guaranteed to help, like 10 senate seats or something. A new indigenous government agency that gives indigenous people money and say over all indigenous things.
You know what would also really help? Details about the thing I’m voting on, not a vague “just leave the details to us, the government, who have shown we’re not to be trusted over and over again”.
Voting for the voice as it was was essentially maintaining the status quo while being able to pat ourselves on the back and tell ourselves we saved the indigenous people.
Could it not have been a start? Now it looks like you’ve all said no to the bare minimum, so there’s no point in continuing with anything at all. And have you seen the reaction from the indigenous community? That doesn’t seem like they felt it was useless. They’ve just been ignored again.
I’m on the outside looking in, btw. From Ireland it looks like you’ve all been played by the No campaign.
No, that couldn’t have been the start because it likely would have been the end too. What was proposed wasn’t the bare minimum, it was a complete embarrassment. It was a giant “trust us guys, we’re the government and we’ll definitely do the right thing”.
No one got played. Maybe, just maybe, the majority of people saw this ridiculous waste of time and money as just that. A virtue signalling waste of time and money so the rich inner city lefties can feel good about themselves for ending racism by doing the absolutely smallest thing possible.
Yeah, and if it went all the way, guaranteed senate seats, minimum employee numbers in all companies and universities, that would be going too far, wouldn’t it.
Fucks sake. It might have had the chance to be the start of something, but you’ve all definitely made sure it’s the end of it now, haven’t ye.
It wasn’t going to be the start of anything other than another waste of time. How many indigenous advisory boards have the government already had?
This was the equivalent of putting a black square as your social media profile picture.
Indigenous advisory boards that were legislated for, and were killed by legislation. That’s why it was a referendum this time, so the next politician can’t just kill it.
Oh, and this seems appropriate
Yet they wouldn't legislate any real power for it, nor even the size or makeup of the advisory board. Note the proposal didn't even say that the advisory board had to be made up of or even include an indigenous person.
No one is asking for the "perfect" solution, just not a shitty virtue signalling one that will change nothing.
Well you’ve all made sure nothing will change for 20 years, because no politician is going to want to touch it because “the people said no the last time”, so well done there.
Said no to enshrining an advisory group in the constitution, nothing more. There’s nothing even stopping them from making the voice via legislation.
What’s with the new narrative of “it was the voice or nothing for decades! You’ve killed us all!” coming from the virtue signallers?
…which the next shower will legislate out of existence again.
Look, maybe they’ll go the Irish route like with the Treaty of Nice, where there was a referendum that was ill defined, it was voted down, so in true Mrs Doyle style they made small amendments and said “you will, you will, you will” and it got through.
I certainly hope so, because regardless of why you voted against it, it’s not a good look internationally.
The same exact thing would essentially happen with a constitutionally protected voice though, that’s the thing. Under the LNP they’d just strip it right back till the point where it may as well have been legislated out of existence. The referendum protected a name only basically.
Upvote for father Ted ❤️
All the details were on the sheet you wrote No on. Looking forward to all the helpful progressive policies getting passed now that you've voted no, what a champ.
All the details? Really? How many people would this government put on the board? How would they be selected?
Point me to those details please.
We're not going to be able to answer those questions because you voted no, were those really your hangups, though? How many people would be on the advisory board? If you're actually curious to learn more, go have a read https://ulurustatement.org/the-voice/what-is-the-voice/ It's a bit late, though.
Those were some of my hangups, yes.
That site doesn’t tell me what the Albanese government were going to do if it passed.
Recognise aboriginals in the constitution and add an advisory board that can't simply be removed by the next government. It says it right there. The advisory board wouldn't change how our government is run in any way, it would just be there to help decision making on things specifically relating to aboriginal affairs. I'm not sure if you're actually being sincere here, it's not a nefarious plot or anything. Advisory boards are a very common normal thing and you can read about them here: https://www.directory.gov.au/boards-and-other-entities/what-board There's also a list of all the advisory boards we currently have. But seriously, there's a ton of information on how it would have worked. https://voice.gov.au/resources/information-booklet This mentions it would have members from each of the states, territories and Torres Strait islands. So now you know, had you done some basic research you would have gotten your answer.
That's not the details people are asking for. How many people would be on the advisory board? How would they be selected? How long would their terms be?
They. Would. Not. Give. Us. Any. Details. This is a huge part of the reason why they lost. People don't trust the government, and this was a huge "trust us, we'll definitely do the right thing this time" move. It's no surprise it backfired so badly.
Maybe try not being so smug when you're incorrectly answering questions next time.
literally everything you just asked is answered in the links, maybe try learning how to read lol
Literally none of it is.
What was this Albanese governments makeup of the voice going to look like? How were they going to be selected? What were the term limits?
They list the constitutional amendment process on the page, a lot of the finer details are decided on afterwards, this has been the case for almost all referendums. It mentions specifically that consultation with aboriginal leaders, parliament and the broader public would help design the voice. It also mentions that it would work alongside existing organisations and structures, again, advisory boards are very common.
They also explicitly state that the voice would be chosen by aboriginal and torres strait islander people based on the wishes of the community. It also says members would be chosen from each of the states, territories and the torres straight islands.
If it's the structure of a referendum that you have a problem with then cool, but it wasn't a good reason to vote no.
Also please read, it talks about all of your questions. It's honestly frustrating to hear you say it doesn't talk about any of it when all of these things are covered in the official literature.
This isn’t one of the things that should be out in the constitution and “have the finer details decided on afterwards”. An advisory board with no power doesn’t belong in the constitution.
There is no “official literature” with what it would look like if it won. There are lots of ideas, but nothing concrete. It can’t be both “we’ll work out the details later” and “here are the details”.
They give you the details in the literature but parliament is still the one to decide what it ultimately looks like if it passed so what's the point in making it all "concrete" if it all changes? I really feel like you have no idea of how any of this works. And they tell you exactly what would have went into the constitution, if they changed the law so that the board had no power it would be unconstitutional.
I'm not going to respond anymore because honestly you just seem willfully ignorant.
You yes voters just can’t help but keep trying to make everyone think that you’re so much smarter than us no voters can you? 😂
I know how it works, which is why I think attempting to make a Constitutionally protected advisory group is stupid.
Labor didn’t even put out a “if this succeeds this is what we will do and this is what the voice will look like”. Something as simple as that would have made a world of difference.
I’m happy you won’t respond anymore, I’ve had enough smug virtue signalling.
Do you really believe that most "actually progressive" people voted no?
Do you think this is the springboard from which meaningful change will flow?
Lol all the woke voters in -checks notes- Maranoa and North QLD. Melbourne is actually super conservative then I guess.
Clearly a lot did, yes. 60% of people voted for gay marriage. That’s a far more “progressive” and divisive issue and it won.
Also seems the results are showing that a lot of massive indigenous population areas voted overwhelmingly no.
to say it plainly, you're clearly not very bright. that you actually believe attack advertisements and social media spin, while still maintaining a stream of 'considered' opinions really lays out the massive problem Australia faces with wilful, proud, ignorance. that you're actually daft enough to claim that this will be somehow revisited? jfc...
One of the most stagnant democracies in the west.
We'd rather spend time talking about franking credits than lend an ear to the suffering.
Some of the people receiving the franking credits believe they’re suffering… somehow.