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Re: Adam Goodes
- Thread starter iLoVeNeWmAn
- Start date
Anything that causes security to be involved cannot be good. Do it pre game at the Carlton team, not at the Carlton supporters during a game.
spook said:
That's all convenient but not necessarily true. Certainly not in my case. I don't think Goodes is inferior and I certainly don't think he's inferior because of his Aboriginality. I wonder if Waleed thinks Adam's inferior considering the thought even entered his head. My opinion on Goodes is based on his own actions and words that he's chosen being on the footy field to express.
Big difference is the haka is done to the opposition TEAM. It's a far cry from inciting the crowd. No player should do that in such a confronting manner. Adam said of course he was angry it was a war cry. He's not at war with the opposition fans. Of course it could be considered "offensive" Adam.
IanG said:
Not sure how that's relevant to my comment you quoted. I don't think I said they did. In fact I'd be surprised if it wasn't a very small minority that disliked him because of racial reasons. I think it's more the person and his actions than the colour of his skin.
This is what Adam Goodes does. Provokes you. He confronts you. He is an indigenous man proud of his ancestry. That’s why he danced towards the Carlton fans on Friday night. He was celebrating his Aboriginality.LeeToRainesToRoach said:
And that is why he has been booed like no other AFL footballer before him. The venom, the loudness and the duration. It is too nasty to be merely borne of his style of play: the staging, the feet-first tackles.
The talk all week — when it was not about Mick Malthouse — was about the booing Goodes receives and why it happens. Goodes was asked and said he was unsure, the AFL chief executive Gillon McLachlan was drawn but he, too, could not finger the reason.
We argued last week that the fierceness of the booing was racially fuelled because the outspoken Goodes made people uncomfortable and uneasy.
Because that’s what he did when he turned around to find a face to the voice that called him “an ape” in 2013 during that season’s indigenous round.
It is what Goodes did when he was named Australian of the Year in 2014.
He made speeches and wrote columns, deeply saddened and angered by the way early Australians had mistreated his people.
News Corp columnist Andrew Bolt predictably attacked the column. His response was, in part, this: “If that were so (racially generated booing), why was the much-loved Cyril Rioli, also on the ground, not booed, too? Why not Lewis Jetta? Buddy Franklin? Why no boos over in Adelaide for the great Eddie Betts?” Bolt wrote on his Herald Sun blog.
“If we were all the racists that Smith, himself so pure, imagines us to be, why no boos for those players? (Well, OK, Franklin got a bit from Hawks fans for quitting Hawthorn.)”
The explanation is simple yet it remained out of reach for Bolt. Conveniently, you suspect. Rioli has not called out a girl for racial vilification. Betts has not been named Australian of the Year. Jetta has not made speeches, written columns where he has considered the “brutal history of dispossession”.
They have not demanded we pay attention to indigenous issues. It is inconceivable that Bolt was not aware of that. He chose to ignore these facts because to consider them would destroy his argument.
He says the booing of Goodes was not a racial issue but a comment on his behaviour. But really the matter of Goodes’ tribunal record and staging for free kicks is of little consequence in a career that has spanned more than 350 games, brought two Brownlow Medals, two premierships and All-Australian selection.
Goodes danced towards Carlton supporters on Friday night for three reasons. One to celebrate his culture because it was the AFL’s annual indigenous round. The second to highlight the racist element to the booing. The third to emphasise that he was not going to back off.
It was an act that was always going to be attacked by Bolt. It so suited the narrative he has shaped in his polemic columns and blogs. He described the action of Goodes on Friday night as a “dance of hate”. Certainly, hated by Bolt who also called on the AFL to ban a repeat performance.
It went unsaid that Bolt also called for the banning of the Irish jig, the polka and clogging.
The league bosses liked the war cry, did not think it offensive and have been puzzled by the shrill and consistently racist response in social and mainstream media. McLachlan contacted Goodes on the weekend to reassure him he had the complete backing of the AFL. “Adam Goodes is a leader in our game, and for indigenous Australians,” McLachlan said yesterday.
“I spoke today to Adam and Adam Goodes knows he has my support and the support of the AFL.
“What happened on Friday night was a celebration, and not offensive. It came from the under 16s indigenous team (the Boomerangs) — and I think we are a big enough game to accept and celebrate these forms of expression.
“Indigenous Round is a time to celebrate reconciliation and to reflect on changes that still need to happen, and I am proud that the AFL is part of this journey.”
It has been reported that the slapping of the arms during the dance is a sign to opponents that the defences of indigenous players will not be breached while raising the right arm when running towards your opponents is the raising of a boomerang and not a spear as some media commentators suggested on the weekend.
Goodes’ explanation was simple. “It’s something a lot of Aboriginal people are proud about. You ask a New Zealander about the Haka, do you think the Wallabies get their backs up and get offended? It’s supposed to be a war cry” he said.
“It was something for them to stand up and go, yeah, cool, say we see you, we acknowledge you, bring it on,” Goodes said.
“I want people to embrace it for what it was, and everybody else take a chill pill, understand what I was doing and if there were Carlton supporters offended by it I’m sorry but it’s a war cry, it’s a battle.”
Goodes is not that naive that he thinks all that will take place. It is not as easy as that.
Not when a major opinion shaper thinks it was so inflammatory that he calls it a dance of hate. There’s a man who is desperate to be offended.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/sport/opinion/goodes-move-an-act-of-pride-not-a-dance-of-hate/story-e6frg7uo-1227377247156
The indisputable facts are
1. He did it to the Carlton supporters not his direct opponents the Carlton players
2. He said it wasn't retaliation to anything they did
3. Security got involved
4. He has said for people to chill
5. It has caused varied opinions some for him some against him
Everything else is interpretation. In my opinion any act that causes security to become involved because of crowd behaviour is not good! And I am not going to accept being called a racist or uneducated to have that opinion.
1. He did it to the Carlton supporters not his direct opponents the Carlton players
2. He said it wasn't retaliation to anything they did
3. Security got involved
4. He has said for people to chill
5. It has caused varied opinions some for him some against him
Everything else is interpretation. In my opinion any act that causes security to become involved because of crowd behaviour is not good! And I am not going to accept being called a racist or uneducated to have that opinion.
tigertim said:
And another that confuses me.
“I’m not going to go up to (Carlton’s) Chris Yarran and do it because he’d actually be part of the war cry.”
Does that mean he was only aiming it at non-Indigenous opposition rather than the opposition in general? Sad if Adam believes in such segregation in a time when so many are working in a positive direction for reconciliation and equality across the board.
joegarra said:
plenty of players have incited opposition fans. clapping at them, waving, blowing kisses etc. i cant remember specific instances though because they have not generated pages and pages of discussion.
i think therefor it is not reasonable to claim the opposition to his actions are because they incited opposition fans.
Brodders17 said:
clapping, waving, kissing is not the same as brandishing a weapon. What would the reaction be if a player pointed a pretend gun at spectators??
