Community leader challenges racism in the media
In a magazine piece, an Aboriginal community leader called out an offensive article that had discussed Aboriginal rights and spread misinformation.
... is it any wonder that we think it's time aborigines had a say in their own affairs?
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Aboriginal people’s fight for civil rights often meant combatting racist stereotypes and ideas spread by non-Aboriginal people.
In 1962, prominent non-Indigenous author Xavier Herbert wrote a contentious article in The Bulletin titled ‘A town like Elliot: There is NO solution to the Aborigines problem’. Although presumably satirical, Herbert wrote harmful statements about Aboriginal people, including about their access to government payments. He incorrectly stated that Aboriginal people ‘… for the most part, have equal rights with other citizens’. He said that they could get ‘… unemployed benefit, along with endowment for the starving children and the usual pension for the tottering alcoholic aged’.
Redfern-based Aboriginal community leader, Ken Brindle, wrote this piece as a letter in response to Herbert, saying Herbert’s words were slanderous and harmful. The Bulletin published the letter in their magazine.
He pulled apart Herbert’s claims, and wrote that the number of Aboriginal people in Queensland and the Northern Territory ‘who handle their own social services money could probably be counted on two hands’.
Brindle said any claims that Aboriginal people had full citizenship, equal pay or equal rights was ‘a joke’. He addressed assimilation policy and how Aboriginal people were ‘compelled to assimilate … [to] the white way of life’ to access these rights. He pointed out that Aboriginal activists had formed their ‘own association to battle for full rights’.
He concluded by asking his readers ‘… is it any wonder that we think it’s time aborigines had a say in their own affairs?’.
The article is an example of the way Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people have had to continually fight back against harmful stereotypes and racist ideas.
You can view Brindle’s article published in The Bulletin in full on the Trove website.
Ken Brindle was a veteran, the honorary secretary of the Redfern All Blacks Rugby League club, a member of the Aboriginal-Australian Fellowship (AAF) and FCAATSI, a community activist, and a father.
Brindle reflected on writing this response in an interview published in Faith Bandler and Len Fox’s book The time was ripe. He recalled being upset by Herbert’s article and that he received support from the AAF to write his response. Herbert later challenged Brindle to a debate on TV, however, the afternoon it was scheduled, Brindle had his football ‘team playing and quite frankly … forgot’.
Brindle’s letter was one of very few instances where Aboriginal people’s views about their own affairs were published in the mainstream press.
Brindle’s letter was published alongside another from non-Indigenous author Kylie Tennant, who also argued that Herbert’s views were harmful. Tennant was a regular contributor to The Bulletin.
The Bulletin was a long-running literary publication. Only a year earlier, in 1961, the new editor Donald Horne had removed the masthead ‘Australia for the White Man’ from the magazine.
Permissions
Permission to reproduce Ken Brindle's article was granted by his daughter Sonya Brindle.
Citation
Brindle K (14 April 1962) ‘How wrong is Xavier Herbert? The case for the Aborigines: Name one town’, pp 27–28, The Bulletin.
Tennant K (14 April 1962) ‘How wrong is Xavier Herbert? The case for the Aborigines: A place like Tranby’, pp 26–27, The Bulletin.