James Khalid, Maffra
LETTER TO THE EDITOR
SPARKED by the death of George Floyd, protest organisers have had no trouble amassing people for huge protests around America and Australia.
There is no doubt that there is a policing issue regarding unnecessary use of force and racism in America.
However, in Australia it is not as clear-cut.
Protesters are claiming that Australia too, has a policing problem.
There is no doubt there are cases of police being racist or using unnecessary force, but “people find what they look for, and they look for what they believe” – Goethe, touching on an important idea of psychology, confirmation bias, which seems to be evident in the argument claiming that Australia is a racist nation, when it is more likely that Australia houses racist individuals, as Dillon alludes to.
According to Dr Anthony Dillon, an Indigenous Australian, “there are no winners with the race riots and protests”, essentially claiming that the protests are counterproductive (news.com.au, ‘Rent-a-Crowd’ have no idea about the ‘real issues’ facing Indigenous Australians, Anthony Dillon, 8 June 2020).
Evidently, more needs to be done, however, as Dr Dillon mentions, in other areas of Indigenous life and Australian culture.
I am simply commenting on an article, free of my own opinion.
