Stan Grant and Australian racism

Hopeful for what we may yet do together

Hey folks, 

2 from 2! 

I’ve had a pretty rough mental health week, and have had to take a few days off work to get my head right. But I’m very keen to make this newsletter a thing, so here I am. “Nevertheless, he persisted.”

A few big news stories this week. 

The investigation into the Hawthorn racism allegations remains an absolute mess. 8 months in, the alleged perpetrators (Alastair Clarkson, Chris Fagan and Jason Burt) are yet to be interviewed by the AFL’s panel of independent investigators. Clarkson has taken stress leave from North Melbourne, and the AFL seems to be conditioning us to the reality that their conclusion will be “well, who knows really?”

Most footy fans have already made up their own mind. Talkback on SEN and 3AW has been full of ocker blokes declaring that the allegations are fabricated, and that Clarkson, Fagan and Burt have been slandered. I even heard one guy linking this saga to the Voice, saying that this is the kind of woke, anti-white society we’ll get if Australians vote Yes. 

Personally, I’m not sure what to make of it all. My initial reaction when the ABC story broke last September was pretty hardline; I thought the 3 men accused (including Fagan, the coach of my own team) should be banished from the game. 

Since then, I’ve softened a little. The accused have continued to maintain their innocence, and after 8 months the accusers haven’t produced a smoking gun. I think this is probably a case where there is genuine uncertainty, where we all need to reserve judgement (possibly indefinitely). To say simply, we don’t know, we don’t have enough information to form a view. 

This is something we’re typically reluctant to say, because uncertainty is an uneasy feeling. One of our most basic cognitive needs is simplicity, the ability to sort things into simple, neat categories. The world is big and chaotic, and our brains can’t hold in all of that chaos and bigness at once.

That’s why we love to think in terms of stories, because they allow us to break things down into little bite-size pieces. Stories have these beautifully straightforward chains of cause and effect, that lead inexorably to a single, definitive ending: this happened, then this, then finally this. 

But every now and then, an event comes along that we can’t turn into a story, because we simply don’t know enough about what happened, or the motivations of the people involved. We are confronted with genuine ambiguity and opaqueness, and rather than tolerating the dissonance, we clutch onto increasingly wild and extreme theories that, however implausible or uncharitable, offer an easy out. The Hawthorn players are just making this up. This is a woke, racist conspiracy. It goes all the way to the top.

Exhibit A: radio talkback callers this week.

What a sad and sorry state of affairs. It’s a cliche, but I really do feel for everyone involved. 

As I do for Stan Grant, who has decided to step back from his role in the media because of the relentless racist abuse he has copped:

On social media my family and I are regularly racially mocked or abused. This is not new. Barely a week goes by when I am not racially targeted. My wife is targeted with abuse for being married to a Wiradjuri man.

The inciting incident this week was Grant’s appearance on the ABC’s coverage of King Charles’ coronation, where he challenged viewers to reckon with “the darkness of colonisation and empire.” Grant was abused both on social media and in the Murdoch press, and no one at the ABC bothered to support him publicly. 

As Grant writes: 

This is the last column I will write for the ABC for a while.

On Monday night I will present my Q+A program, then walk away. For how long? I don't know.

I don't take time out because of racism — I won't give racists the satisfaction. I don't take time out because I believe the ABC was wrong to discuss the legacy of colonisation and empire on the day of the coronation. We did that, I believe, with maturity and respect.

I take time out because we have shown again that our history — our hard truth — is too big, too fragile, too precious for the media. The media sees only battle lines, not bridges. It sees only politics.

Grant is a tremendous loss for the Australian media, particularly on the eve of the Voice campaign. His writing is often challenging and confrontational, but always deeply humane, with unwavering optimism. He despairs for the things we’ve done to each other, but is hopeful for what we may yet do together.

This week, that hope has been crushed. 

_____

You should check out… 

Stan Grant’s speech about Adam Goodes and the Australian Dream…