Will today be the day that you read the #statementfromtheheart

https://ulurustatement.org/the-statement/view-the-statement/

Listicle of Six Things Because People Read Listicles

1. It'll take about 3-4 minutes to read.

2. It's the reason Australia is having the referendum.

3. 85% of voters have still not read it or heard it

4. Voting is compulsory for Australians over 18 (as is registering to vote, which you must do in the next couple of weeks if you haven't already)

5. If you don't know, find out. If you're too lazy to spend a few minutes understanding what is being asked, then voting 'no' isn't the 'safer' option. The status quo is decidedly unsafe. Ignorance harms.

6. The Voice is one of three requests in the Statement. The other two are arguably even more important (#Treaty and #Truth), but the #Voice is what the government has decided to respond to first and is the only question on the referendum.

7. No one likes a list with six items in it

#UluruStatement #Auspol #VoiceToParliament #VoiceReferendum

A good one minute explainer video about the Voice to Parliament referendum happening soon in Australia.

https://vimeo.com/726630771

#VoiceToParliament #VoiceReferendum #Auspol #Voice

Yes campaign releases new ad in Australia's referendum on an Indigenous Voice to Parliament.

And it's actually worth watching.

I normally can't stand political advertising, because of the perceived need to simplify messages to lowest-common-denominator, but there are some clever moves made in this one.

The references come thick and fast. But the overall framing seems to be:
- Australia has previously come together to make positive changes. Change is not something to fear.
- Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people have demonstrated courageous leadership over many, many decades
- This referendum is grounded in a request from the largest gathering of Indigenous representatives on the continent in recorded history (the Statement from the Heart I mentioned in an earlier toot).
- Will Australian's listen to that request and speak up in support of it?

#Auspol #VoiceToParliament #VoiceReferendum

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=br8dB_0z3Fk&lc=UgzQmoCskApTELRtQiB4AaABAg

The image is of the Uluru Statement from the Heart, a petition arising from a May 2017 gathering of hundreds of First Nations delegates at Uluru, the internationally-recognised #Pitjantjatjara sacred site at the heart of the continent.

It was this Statement that was the impetus for the current referendum.

(More information about the statement if you click on the image).

Yet just weeks out from actually voting, surveys indicate that only 15% of voters have ever read or heard the text of the Uluru Statement from the Heart.

The full statement can be read here, it is not long: https://ulurustatement.org/the-statement/view-the-statement/

#Auspol #Voice #VoiceReferendum #VoiceTo Parliament #UluruStatement #StatementFromTheHeart #Uluru

EDIT: typo

In just over a month, Australian voters are to go to the polls to vote on a referendum to change the (colonial) constitution in a small but symbolic way.

Here is the text Australians will be voting on in mid-October:
___________
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?
___________
The Voice would be a consultative group only, created and controlled by legislation, without any power over legislation.

But of course, given the centuries-long entrenchment of white supremacy in a settler-colonial society (the only Commonwealth nation to have not signed any kind of treaty with the original inhabitants of the land being stolen through sustained colonial violence), the reactionary forces in Australian society treat this referendum as an opportunity to maximise confusion, fear, disinformation and all the usual racist tropes.

It's working. Support for the proposal has dropped from about 70% when first announced, to the mid-40s.

#Auspol #UluruStatement #VoiceReferendum #VoiceToParliament #voice

Mains power’s gone out in the entire town. I’m scouring the local Facebook groups, waiting for some idiot to blame it on the #VoiceReferendum. #auspol #QldLife

Albo has announced the Indigenous Voice to Parliament referendum will be held on Saturday the 14th of October.

I think it's shameful that until now, there's been no positive recognition for Indigenous people in our constitution, and they've had no official place in our Parliamentary process. The Indigenous Voice to Parliament will be an independent advisory body for First Nations people. It's a step in the right direction after 235 years of this Australian colony.

More info at Yes23: https://www.yes23.com.au/

Confirm your voting enrolment details with the Australian Electoral Commission: https://www.aec.gov.au/

#AusPol #Voice #VoiceReferendum #VoteYES #Yes23

Independent fact check of the #VoiceReferendum booklet.

Guess what? Claims made by the ‘yes’ case are accurate. Those by the ‘no’ case are unsupported, inaccurate or misleading.

Details here

https://theconversation.com/how-do-the-yes-and-no-cases-stack-up-constitutional-law-experts-take-a-look-212364

#Australia #VoiceReferendum #auspol

My take.

How could you NOT vote YES ❓

A few weeks to the #VoiceReferendum and we are consumed by an argument about the number of pages in the Uluru Statement from the Heart.

This is an indictment of the entire political class - the No side for relentless dishonesty and negativity and the Yes side for the absence of anything clear to vote for.

A #reactionary #crypto #techbro (but I repeat myself) has self-funded his own unofficial #NoCampaign for the upcoming Australian referendum on the #Indigenous #VoiceToParliament. To that end, he made various online video ads fearing an algorithmically-generated person of colour expressing their concerns about listening to #Aboriginal people when they say they want to be listened to.

Faced with the predictable backlash (and #FreePublicity, who would have thought it?), his response (only slightly translated): "how could you possibly think this my ads against listening to Indigenous people would depict an Aboriginal person? Don't you realise that I'm targeting people who *don't* want to hear from Aboriginal voices? Why would I pick a fake Aboriginal person to make a #fearmongering claim about people falsely claiming to be Aboriginal? And anyway, I can always tell at a glance with 100% accuracy whether someone is Aboriginal or not, can't everyone?"

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/aug/07/indigenous-voice-to-parliament-no-campaign-ai-facebook-ads
#auspol #racism #VoiceReferendum #voice #SockPuppet #AI

Jackie Lambie is right that we need a Plan B for the (likely) event that the #VoiceReferendum fails. With a narrow loss (say a majority of votes, but only 3 states), Parliament could pass legislation.
But if the vote goes badly, which seems more probable, we need some quite different response, which would help to wipe away the shame of failure, without overriding the voters verdict.
We can't really discuss this before the vote happens, but it can't hurt to think

I wish supporters of the #VoiceReferendum would stop sharing the discovery that the organizers of the No campaign are right wing Christians, soft on racism etc. Anyone likely to be impressed by this fact is already in the bag for Yes. Anyone who is undecided is likely to feel attacked.

Hard to describe how depressed I am feeling about #auspol right now.

The #VoiceReferendum was always going to be a longshot because referendums usually fail. But #Albo's refusal to put forward a model, and the promotion of someone as abrasive as Noel Pearson as a leading advocate have ensured a defeat so bad that the fallback of option of a legislated Voice is unlikely.

In economic terms, Australians will be worse off by the next election than when Labor was elected - lower real wages, higher unemployment, higher interest rates, a more regressive tax system.

The fact things would have been even worse under the #LNP doesn't cheer me up

And just to make the picture complete, the #Greens are overplaying their hand on housing. Should let #HAFF through now, and pocket a win with the $2 billion.

With the exception of a relatively brief period in April, I've been convinced that the #VoiceReferendum was being mishandled, and likely to fail. Now I'm back on maximum pessimism.

Maybe still a chance, if #Albo
* Pushes out the voting date to December
* Puts forward at least an outline of the model the government plans to propose to Parliament.
* Persuades Noel Pearson his (considerable) talent could be better deployed elsewhere.

The two biggest items in a very small Albanese #Labor government agenda were the #HousingFund and the #VoiceReferendum. Both are now in danger of failure. That's largely because the government has interpreted a narrow majority in the House of Reps, won with barely 30 per cent of the vote, as a #mandate to ignore and belittle anyone who questions them. #auspol

The Voice to parliament process is ramping up and I note there is a refreshed website (https://voice.gov.au). It provides links to details on what the Voice will do and how it will be set up

An explanatory booklet that provides the information in a bite sized chunk has also been prepared (https://voice.gov.au/sites/default/files/resource/download/information-booklet_0.pdf)

#VoiceToParliament #TheVoice #Referendum2023 #VoiceReferendum

This video of Lidia Thorpe’s behaviour at a strip club in the early hours has caused me to rethink on how I will vote in the #voicereferendum https://youtu.be/kLV-W-LSU4o

Its a big yes from me #voicereferendum #australia

For a moment, I thought that Dutton was about to switch position and support the #VoiceReferendum, which would have been great news. Sadly, it's just the changes to the machinery of running a referendum. But maybe we can find a way after all.