won&#39;t you come out to play?

i'm confused. you think girls shouldn't play the digeridoo?

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i can't tell if you're joking...

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no, i'm seriously confused...

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it's a cultural taboo for women to play the didge in most indigenous cultures - within many indigenous cultures there are men's things and women's things and the didge is a man's thing. and it's not a feminist issue - indigenous women have their own music and wisdom, and men have theirs. it's how they've done it for tens of thousands of years, and for a white colonist to mess with that is not on. she's exploiting an oppressed culture to sell a movie. not cool.

(sorry if i sound patronizing, it's just that this story makes me really mad!)

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Yeah okay. She probably didn't expect it to be a big deal as it was shown in germany though. People don't know that here, I've played a digeridoo. o.O

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she's australian. she should know. and if she doesn't she not innocent, she's negligent.

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also, regardless of whether nicole kidman should play the didgeridoo (which, like

peace_bloom says, she should know better), brett rann is a racist fuckhead for calling people "abbos".

Edited Date: 2008-12-16 09:41 pm (UTC)

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who is brett rann? is that the guy who left the comment?

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"brett rann thinks the abbos should step aside and let hot redhead chicks play the didgeridoo."

that guy! i assume it was a facebook update... but i'm not on facebook, so i'm not entirely sure!

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Ooooooooh.

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yep, it was a facebook comment. and as you say, there is no excuse for using a word like that - it's as bad as calling someone a 'nigger' or a 'boong'.

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oh. my god.

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could he be more of a loser. i can't even.
i feel dirty. i have to go wash my eyes.

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i love a good dose of racism with my misogyny in the morning.

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keeps us angry.

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autumnjoy.livejournal.com

Even after reading the link, I'm a still little bit confused. It's expected that she follow the taboos and traditions of a culture she's not a native of?

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by that logic she should not appropriate them either.

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autumnjoy.livejournal.com

I still don't really get it, but I probably just shouldn't comment on things having to do with a culture I'm completely unfamiliar with.

And I truly didn't mean to come across as argumentative on your journal.

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it's ok, i don't mind an argument about ideas - it's not personal. and i think these things should be talked about! :)

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skadi.livejournal.com

So "abbos" is a bad word? I know a decent amount about how badly white people from Europe treated the indigenous people of the Americas, but I don't know a lot about your side of the world. The Boy and I were talking about this just the other day, actually. You guys still deal with some really intense problems between the white and the indigenous people, right?

(PS and totally unrelated - I LOVE your new header!)

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as i said above, 'abbo' is as bad as 'nigger' or 'boong'. it's derogatory and racist. even aboriginal isn't really a useful word - there are hundreds of indigenous nations within australia (see HERE (http://yolngu.net/Copy%20of%20Aus_map_covered_text_lined.jpg) for a map of them), and many of them have preferred names, but 'indigenous australians' is the best title when talking about them collectively.

yes, australia has a terrible record with our indigenous peoples. we've killed more aboriginals per capita than the nazis did jews. we've destroyed their land, caused hundreds of their languages to be lost, we've stolen their children in order to systematically 'breed the blackness out of them'.
it was only in the 1970s that we stopped legally classing them as fauna.
if you are aboriginal you are 5 to 50 percent more likely to die of ANY disease there is. you are more likely to be imprisoned, less likely to go finish school, and it's almost certain that you won't get to university.

in my country, we have a third world black sub-nation living alongside a first world white one and it is sickening.

i live on wurundjeri country, and i grew up in bundjalung country, and it was stolen from its rightful owners by my forefathers. i'm deeply ashamed of that, though i don't know what to do about it except call people out when they show disrespect for the people who were here long before me.

Edited Date: 2008-12-17 02:48 am (UTC)

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skadi.livejournal.com

That's really ... well, interesting isn't the right word, but I think you probably know what I mean. Thanks for posting such a long reply. I try to be really conscious of international events (well, international to me, that is), but there's always more to learn!

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baroquestar.livejournal.com

Missed the status update, but checked, and have now joined you in that removal.

Just... whether you agree or not that a variable taboo applies to NK (I personally wouldn't have played it, but I'm prepared to accept differing opinions on that), the gratuitous racism and sexism was just... Not Cool.

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i hope you said something on your way out. what a fucking prick. seriously, i just don't know how people like that can be allowed. ew.

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baroquestar.livejournal.com

Sadly, I didn't. Rage made me click the X, then I thought, "you know, I should have said... ah well, too late now."

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he'll get the message. you taked with your feet. what an effing tool.

oh my god, shiv, i have to pack up our house and the very idea of it is exhausting me. you must be so much worse! :(

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spillingvelvet.livejournal.com

the abbos? oh, that's charming. he's a real catch, that one.

pfffff.

i'm actually amazed, though. i'd never heard of that custom before.

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