By Helen Reynolds
On the opening day of the 48th Parliament, a striking gesture by Pauline Hanson and her One Nation senators – turning their backs during the Acknowledgement of Country – has reignited debates about respect, unity, and the acknowledgment of Australia’s First Australians. This act, performed alongside colleagues Malcolm Roberts, Warwick Stacey, and Tyron Whitten, was a deliberate protest against a tradition that honours the Indigenous custodians of the land.
Pauline Hanson has long been a polarising figure, with a history of statements and actions that critics have labeled as racist. From her 1996 maiden speech warning of being “swamped by Asians” to her recent opposition to multiculturalism and Islamic immigration, her rhetoric has often drawn accusations of divisiveness. Yet, the Acknowledgement of Country is not a political manifesto – it is a brief, symbolic gesture recognising the Ngunnawal and Ngambri peoples as traditional custodians and paying respect to elders past and present. Standing respectfully for a few minutes is a small act of acknowledgment; turning one’s back, however, leaves a lasting impression of rejection.
This incident raises a broader question: why can’t Australia, as a nation, embrace respect for all cultures and all people? The Acknowledgement of Country is not about exclusion but about inclusion, inviting all Australians to reflect on a shared history that spans 65,000 years. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has celebrated this tradition as a positive starting point for parliamentary proceedings, while Opposition Leader Sussan Ley emphasised its role in committing to improve lives for Indigenous Australians. In contrast, Hanson’s claim that it tells non-Indigenous Australians they don’t belong overlooks the intent to unite rather than divide.
Respect does not diminish one group’s identity to elevate another; it enriches the fabric of a multicultural society. Turning away from this acknowledgment sends a message that some histories and cultures are less worthy of recognition. As a nation, we must ask whether such actions foster the unity we claim to value or deepen the cultural divides we seek to bridge. The choice to stand together, even for a moment, could be a step toward a more inclusive future – while turning away risks etching division into our collective memory forever.
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When Western governments disrespect the human rights of the indigenous Palestinians while those Western governments trash international laws and conventions is it any wonder that disrespect for Australia’s indigenous people plays out in parliament. The world has turned its back on civilised norms. The West shows its double standards and hypocrisy when it calls out its go to enemy,Russia, while it enables its friend and ally to commit evil genocide and vile and racist apartheid rule.
I can only hope that all those who vote for this white trash can see this action as one of total disregard for the original custodians of this country and that next time they will vote accordingly.
We didn’t expect any other type of behaviour from this quartet of racist slime creatures from the planet Anus did we?
Disrespectful scum. They should have been ejected from the Senate. No doubt those who voted for these racist pigs will applaud their actions but I would hope that the vast majority of Australians would condemn the actions as straight-out racism as well as a failure to understand the simple meaning of the welcome to country ceremony.
Mehreen Faruqi is censured for holding up a sign, yet this tetrad of twonks gets away with blatant disrespect of this nature.
It’s all theatre with One Nation but Bob Katter stood alongside his fellow crossbenchers as House of Representatives clerk Claressa Surtees asked the MPs to swear their allegiance to King Charles, his heirs and successors.
“No, I swear allegiance to the Australian people,” Katter said, before repeating it a second time.
I happen to agree with Katter (he’s my local Member) and I find it hard to see why we should be pledging allegiance to the British Monarch. In the same position as Bob, I would do exactly the same.
I find it strange that a party which calls itself “One Nation” thrives on division.
Me thinks a name change to “One Divided Nation” should be contemplated. It has more sincerity about it.
I hardly expected anything else from this small repulsive Party which is so pitifully ignorant about history that they are unable to recognise sixty five thousand years history of the people who inhabited and cared for Australia.
Pauline’s ancestors 60 to 65 thousand years ago were Neanderthals.
Some might argue that not much has changed for her and her followers.
To turn their backs on a Parliamentary process is not acceptable. Who votes for these racist brainless people?
White one-nation Australians were assured that there are no throwbacks and Aboriginal people would die out and disappear, leaving one nation.
The Aboriginal people betrayed the one nation and, not only didn’t disappear, but multiplied and used the constitution to destroy one nation.
Even when the constitution requires parliament to make laws specifically for Aboriginal people 60% of one nation voted no to allowing Aboriginal people any input into the laws.
After such a knock back, Aboriginal people still are acknowledged before the one nation moves.
WTF can one nation do but turn their backs?
Reading the comments here proves multiculturalism will never work and never has. You are either an Australian, or your not. Society building is about assimilation not cultural division.
Hanson cannot claim that she is not a racist when she does this! Her view of one nation is one that is founded in 1900s racial arrogance and 1950s ignorance. She has clearly demonstrated, along with Malfunction Knob Head and the other two arseholes that she is racist.
I’ve never forgiven her for claiming that Aborigines practiced cannibalism.
jonangel:
Please define “multiculturalism” and explain why the comments here show it does not and can not work.
Multiculturalism implies the living together of different cultures in the same environment.
The comments here prior to my contribution, suggest animosity between varying groups.
I repeat, I know of nowhere multiculturalism is successful.
jonangel:
It’s not multiculturalism that’s the problem. It’s the intolerant, the racists and xenophobes. The OneNotioners. To work, those already there need to accept the newcomers. There are many facets of it that do work in this country and it’s mostly just a loud minority that create issues with it.
Lets cut to the chase, name me one country where multiculturalism works?
jonangel, multiculturalism will never work in a country where people share your attitude.
Well, jonangel, I will never forget Hanson’s idiotic suggestion that Bosnia was a failure of multiculturalism. While it may be true, the simplicity of that argument is also the absurdity of it. Bosnia, Serbia, Croatia, Macedonia, Slovenia and Montenegro were forcibly united into one country. After collapse of communism, the former Yugoslavia disintegrated. One of the causes of Bosnia being like that is that it had Bosnians, Bosnian-Serbs and Bosnian-Croats living in the one country. Now, I have known Serbians and Croatians and Bosnians who would have faced each other down the barrels of guns between 1991 and 1995, but who have met and lived in Australia as friends. Some have even intermarried. I even know people from Bosnia who have said, “One parent is Muslim, and one is Catholic, and I have the best of both worlds.”
I support multiculturalism with integration rather than assimilation for this reason and in this way. Many Australians like Chinese food, for example. We should not have a dominant culture.
If this s your answer to a simple question? What a mess our world is in.
Once assimilation takes place there is no “dominant culture”, that is the whole point.
jonangel:
Once assimilation takes place …
So the convicts and their guards and free settlers should have adopted the local Aboriginal peoples’ way of life when they invaded? If only …
You ask about where multiculturalism has worked, and that can’t really be answered until you explain exactly how you define that success. You can’t be so hypocritical as to suggest it means no internal comflict, because you only have to get two humans together to get conflict of some sort, so by that metric there has never been a successful human society ever, anywhere.
So, I’m going to ask a different question: where has multiculturalism failed (by your standards and, btw, what are those standards) due mainly to the actions of the newcomers rather than the intolerance of their new neighbours?
I also wonder how far the assimilation you propose must go – no more late night kebabs after a bender, because that’s incomer cuisine? No national costumes in public beccause “that’s not how we dress? No language other than English to be used in public because “that’s not how we speak”? Does that necessity to fit in with the dominant culture extend to minority identity groups within mainstream society, such as LGBTQIA+ people?
The oldest ploy in the world is to answer a question by asking one, so I’ll ignore yours.
Regarding your comment on multiculturalism there can be no “success”, assimilation is the only way forward.
In answer to the last part of your post; I see assimilation as being when groups adopt and absorb the practices, beliefs and ideas of each other.
As I said, I don’t know what your parameters for “success” are, so I can’t answer that question. But, given you then say there can be no “success” … well, that’s not exactly an indication of an unbiased perspective.
… adopt and absorb the practices, beliefs and ideas of each other.
So the old become more like the new and the new become more like the old? Not what most people mean when they start slagging off multiculturalism and insist upon assimilation into the mainstream, and what tends to happen to some extent within a few generations anyway. And while it happens, people need to have space to learn about each other, which is part of what multiculturalism does.
When the old attacks the new (or the other) for being harmlessly different, it isn’t the new (or the other) that’s the problem.
Leefe, If you really don’t know “what the parameters for success are”, I feel sorry for you!
As for your “old” and “new”, just what has age got to do social compatibility?
I am beginning to think you have no concept of assimilation, which can be described as an amalgamation of cultures.
Tedious jonangel.
You have given little insight into your rationale. The performative ducking and weaving of your exchanges here makes for poor reading. It leaves the reader to conclude your foundational assimilation is wrought from illogical bias.
jonangel
Your reading comprehension is somewhat faulty. I quite clearly wrote YOUR parameters for success.
If there’s one thing I’m fairly confident about when immersed in a debate, it’s that when people distort your words and deflect, they know their arguments are weak and/or that telling the simple unvarnished truth will expose certain facets of themselves they aren’t prepared to make public.
Have the day you deserve.
jonangel, if you’re so convinced that multiculturalism is a failure, then let’s fix that. How about then, we all adopt the culture of the original inhabitants of this country?
Clakka, Leefe and Roswell, multiculturalism is an obvious failure, none of you are able to provide an example of where it is working. It worries me that you insist on continuing down a path of failure.
Multiculturalism is a pleasant fantasy to consider but it will never take root because there will always be people who consider themselves superior to those around them. So of course it will fail and continue to fail until the human race fades into, can’t say memory, because if we’re gone who is going to be around to remember us.