100% It’s just a stepping stone to the next thing with the next step the “truth telling”. It’s going to be the start of a very long and painful journey that will lead nowhere.
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One area I didn’t talk politics but would have loved to been a fly in that room. So categorically you’re surrounded but no votes . Do you mind me asking what their reasons were?
Haven’t you mentioned previously in this forum you’re indigenous yourself? Perhaps you can answer your own question or am I mistaken?
Not sure how your simple metaphor is applicable to this question:
“A Proposed Law: to alter the Constitution to recognise the First Peoples of Australia by establishing an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice. Do you approve this proposed alteration?”
Anything else you may believe has nothing to do with the referendum question.
People at my work are starting to talk about it too, although the No voters all kind of hide their true feelings because they feel they can’t be seen not to support it. I work in a very left-leaning semi-government area that has publicly stated support for Yes as an organisation. It’s caused ill-feeling from employees who hold differing personal views. People feel they can’t reveal their personal objections or reservations. But believe me, there are many who I’ve had private conversations with who are definitely voting no. They are not racists, they are middle Australians who see the potential pitfalls.
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Not all recognition is good - for instance, first nations people are recognised as being over-represented in:
- committing crime
- prison populations
- chronic health conditions
- a significant shortfall in life expectancy
- literacy and numeracy levels
- unemployment
… (I could go on)
Resolving these are important and it needs to be a collaborative effort - there is already a history of poor outcomes from “white-only” led intervention. A voice to parliament will go a long way to finding solutions to these, solutions that come from within mob, for mob.
No, it should have happened many, many years ago, like it did in Canada and New Zealand and it’s beyond time for that wrong to be corrected. While other dominions of the United Kingdom had treaties with their first nations, we treated ours like some kind of circus freakshow.
And puts whatever is established at the political whim of the Government of the day, this gives the voice some certainty (like we give to things like the postal service, and weather observations) - that said, there needs to be measures put in place to stop it from becoming an unresolvable rabble under this model.
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Dont we have local schooing and policing to handle this?, or dare i say it parenting?..
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And yet these Treaties don’t seem to have actually helped to improve the lives of First Nations people in those countries. Canada in particular seems to have immense problems lifting its First Nations people out of poverty and crime. In many ways it’s as bad as Australia, if not worse. You would think with such a head start with their Treaties they would be far and away ahead - and yet they’re not… So what does a Treaty actually achieve, apart from virtue signalling?
This isn’t helping the yes case. Constant, and increasingly nasty, division amongst First Nations proponents. Stuff like this will sink it like a stone.
In my opinion the Referendum is doomed to fail if they retain “Executive Government” in the wording.
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I work in the not-for-profit sector (government funded) as well and have definitely seen this happen too.
I strongly suspect we might see a phenomena similar to what is known in the UK as the “Shy Tory factor”, where people say they are voting Yes publicly (for fear of being labelled ‘racist’) but actually vote No when they get to the ballot box.
If the Yes campaign continued using emotion as the basis of their campaign, rather than providing more clarity and detail, I fear this may become a very significant factor in the final outcome.
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Lucky then that the words “executive government” aren’t in the question we’ll get to vote upon.
Umm…yes it is. It’s point number 2 of 3.
It may not be in the question itself but it’s clearly stated and that’s what everyone is fighting over.
Do you think this should be hidden from the voters?
No, it’s not.
It’s not in the question.
Sounds like you’ll be in for a surprise when get to vote even though the question has been known for some time now.
I think you’re the one in for a surprise. Do you think they will just ask that one-line question on the ballot paper without the actual proposed wording of the constitutional change? ie. Points 1 - 3
And if they do, do you think people will vote yes to that with even that level of detail missing?
The question:
“A Proposed Law: to alter the Constitution to recognise the First Peoples of Australia by establishing an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice. Do you approve this proposed alteration?”
Yes. Have you ever seen a referendum balot paper before? It’s just the question.
You may be onto something here as to why referenda in Australia have been so unsuccessful over the decades.
Regardless, everyone knows that Executive Government is in the proposed Constitutional Amendment, it’s everywhere.
It seems they are deliberately trying to keep the detail out of the question. The question on the Republic contained specific detail about replacing the Queen with a President elected by a 2/3 majority of Parliament. By comparison, this question seems lacking.
If this Referendum doesn’t include the basic change proposed, people will vote no. It looks like they are trying to be deliberately vague, and not show an important detail that people already know about.
As you say above, lack of even the basic details in the question may in fact be a reason a lot of people vote No in Referendums. It will certainly influence my vote if those 3 basic points aren’t shown somewhere.
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Brush the facts away if you must and continue to wallow in misinformation.
Your vote has already been influenced, that is not in dispute.
And yours hasn’t of course…
Funny how some people think that peoole with different views than them must be “influenced”, yet they themselves of course aren’t. It’s very self righteous.
I still haven’t decided which way I’m voting as it’s a complex issue, whereas your mind is already set.
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Yes, my vote has certainly been influenced by some of the vocal no campaigners and their disinformation campaign.
The question is not complex . They’re just words on a piece of paper, nothing to be frightened of but would mean a lot to some marginalised people.
Wow. Just words on a piece of paper. Now I’ve really heard it all. So it could literally be saying anything and you would vote Yes. Let’s hope more people actually think a bit deeper about implications of Constitutional change. I have never been less decided about any election or referendum before but it’s not fear. Funny how a lot of Yes pushers say that those voting No or undecided are “afraid”.
Remove the constitutional amendment aspect and I would be a lot more receptive to it, despite the increase in government expenditure that it creates, but I would look for savings elsewhere to make it financially neutral, something I doubt the current political and activist heirarchy has a clue on.
There already was a voice in the 1990s and 2000s, interesting how no one seems to be calling that out, but rather painting this as some new recognition toy (righting a so-called wrong), and we know the systemic corruption with taxpayer funds and the lack of progress that killed Voice 1.0 off.
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