DEAR News Of The Area,

WHEN your friend says her mother died, you say sorry.

Not because you caused it, but because you are sorry for her pain and grief.

The haters, however, couldn’t say sorry for the suffering caused to our Indigenous peoples because they didn’t do it.

But somebody did.

And it’s not right.

It’s not OK.

When your friend arrives for a visit you greet her at the door and welcome her to your home.

It’s the culturally sensitive thing to do, and universally accepted.

The haters, however, don’t feel it necessary to accept or abide by the Indigenous tradition of welcoming you to country.

When the same sex marriage case became legal, the only lives altered were some gay people who chose to marry.

This was despite what the haters led us to believe.

The country has just unified in overwhelming support for the Matildas.

I wonder how many Indigenous people might have been made the team alongside Sam and Mary if they hadn’t been held back by an imposed system which discouraged them in so many ways.

Think health, education, economic disadvantage, cost of boots and team fees.

The arguments put up by the No to the Voice campaign are either misinformed, often deliberately so, wildly exaggerated, scare-mongering, fear-provoking, nonsensical and essentially racist in nature.

The haters are appealing to the baser undercurrent that it’s safe and OK to be racist if we all vote No together.

The haters want the plethora of problems to continue, as they have for 230 years.

The Voice won’t be a quick fix, but it will allow the Indigenous peoples to have a say about issues which affect them.

The government will still decide if and what they support, as it does with the current myriad of other lobby groups, such as miners, big banks, energy, farmers, pharmacy guild etc.

After 65,000 years of culture and 230 years of the haters trying to expunge them from our nice whiteness, it really is time to say sorry haters, but I have to vote YES.

Regards,
Dianne HENDRY,
Boambee East.