The Australian slammed for ‘racist’ Bill Leak cartoon, as Press Council reveals it has received complaints
News Corp’s national broadsheet The Australian is under fire over a Bill Leak cartoon published today which appears to suggest indigenous fathers do not know the names of their own children.
The Australian Press Council told Mumbrella it had already received complaints about the cartoon which shows a policeman bringing back an indigenous juvenile to his father and telling him: “you’ll have to sit down and talk to your son about personal responsibility”.
The Leak cartoon published by The Australian.
The father responds: “Yeah righto, what’s his name then?”
Hi guys, why is ‘racist’ couched with quotation marks? It’s pretty objectively racist, I would have thought.
If the characters were white and from a trailer park, would it still be racist?
There are correlations between low socioeconomic white ‘trailer trash’ communities and crime and juvenile offenders. Is it only ok to talk about and depict these issues when the victims are white?
And yes, there have been cartoons of white trash before.
If it was an Aboriginal News Paper and the cartoonist was Aboriginal this would not be racist, if a little tasteless. For News Corp, a bastion of white male supremacy, that has a history of giving racists a platform and attacking non christian whites, this is not acceptable. If they did run this as white trailer park trash cartoon then it wouldn’t be racist, just equally unfunny and insensitive to the difficulties facing many working class communities.
Stay calm. Bill Leak’s cartoon is not racist. It’s pointing to a problem that has been discussed by many in the Aboriginal community who have first hand experience, namely the parental dysfunction that deprives children of parental guidance and an education. It’s a powerful cartoon, doing what cartoonists (like the ‘fools’ in royal courts of old) should be doing. Telling it like it is.
stay calm? good luck, the regressives live for moments like this.
Telling it like it is? Please. You’re sounding like a Trump supporter.
An educated and caring person might interpret it as “pointing to a problem of parental dysfunction” (albeit without regard for the hurt it might inflict on others).
But, an uneducated or angry person might interpret it as carte blanche to publicly ridicule Aboriginals.
So, as far as I can tell, it’s not honest, brave nor insightful. It’s harmful, and pointless.
Does the Australian get a lot of uneducated readers you think? As for the angry ones… well they were angry to start with.
I’m not really sure debates should be dumbed down to lowest level of intellect, nor should they made so bland in thought theyt won’t wake the angry ones.
Look at the rôle that the black copper is playing.Is that racism or reality.Bill Leak is a national treasure(and a living one at that!)
Stay calm,, yep have heard that from many non colored people throughout my 50 odd years as an indigenous person of the country, the stupid part is that what is portrayed is a minority of the majority of aboriginals but there is no media play to actually acknowledge that, if they really looked at numbers of these scenarios then the truth would show that the amount of broken non-indigenous far outweighs the indigenous…But hey being an aboriginal these days we consider ourselves the white mans business objects as that is what the government does with all of the funds they say they spend on us but in reality it’s to pay and support new non-indigenous businesses to provide a service to us which historically never eventuates to anything….it is all a sham……
What’s ”racist” about the cartoon. It’s just stating a fact that many indigenous fathers don’t know who their kids are.
“Just stating a fact.” Nice one. And in the context of the current issue around abuse of kids in custody, the application of capsicum spray and spit-hoods and restraining chairs and the physical abuse of 10-year-olds, it was the fault of the aboriginal people and not the system or the politicians with responsibility for it or the individual guards. Yep. Thank God Bill Leak has a national newspaper as a platform to really drill down to the root cause of it all.
The problems with these kids starts way before they get into detention. Eventually the communities will have to step up and take responsibility .The money is there but not getting to where it is needed.
Way to double down on the racism.
and neither do many non-idigenous fathers.
This comment section is called ‘Have your say’ – my ‘say’ has been submitted, but it’s disappeared. If it’s not accepted for publication, I’d like to know where it contravenes the guidelines.
a cartoon about a serious issue in a community is taboo? GTFO you nazis
Pretty sure it’s the Nazis who were the racists. Criticising racism is about the furthest thing from Nazism there is.
Maybe go and learn some history before trying (unsuccessfully) to be a free-speech advocate.
I’m not sure where to begin…
Nazis were both racist and anti free speech. Limiting free speech was Goebbels’s speciality. look it up before its called history.
If you think this image is racist you must think discussing aboriginal issues is racist, which makes you racist.
If you think this image should be taken down and the man who drew it fired, you do not stand for free speech.
Hence nazi
That’s pretty much the dumbest thing I’ve ever read.
Yeah, the serious issue is definitely not fully grown men bashing 10yo kids, spraying teenagers who are trapped in cells with capsicum spray, putting hoods on them and shackling them to chairs. That’s just a distraction. Thx for bringing us back to reality, Winston and Bill.
I’m sorry, it seems I forgot that for some there is only one problem in the world at any given time.
Do you lack the cerebral or emotional power to accept reality?
Okay. So please confirm: the point of this cartoon is that aboriginal dads don’t care about their kids?
Pathetic,ignorant, racist cartoon from a pathetic, ignorant, racist LITTLE man.
Put Murdoch racism, terrorism, phone hacking, fear mongering, lies out of business. Stop reading or listening to him.
My initial reaction was a sharp intake of breath and a mental “yeah, that’s racist”. But on second look, I was forced to examine my own reaction. All the characters in the cartoon are aboriginal and the policeman is carrying a truncheon. Maybe the point of the cartoon is that it is about the child stuck in the middle between a judicial system that doesn’t know how to cope and a family life that is broken.
It was interesting to me that I did not see racism in the depiction of the policeman armed with a truncheon, but leapt straight onto the bad aboriginal dad stereotype automatically. Given that all the characters in the cartoon are aboriginal, is it clearly racist? I could argue either point of view quite well.
I would like to think that Bill Leak could have made that point just as forcefully without the racism and political correctness card exploding, but then again I am no cartoonist.
Great art should confront us. I don’t know that we should insist it also never offends us. Not saying Bill’s is great art, but you shouldn’t need to be considered great to have the right to offend.
In the end I am not comfortable with Bill’s cartoon, but I am even less comfortable that so many appear ready to vilify him for something that he said. I believe we should be more focussed on whether his point has any validity and how we should respond to the situation if it does.
Really great comment and view on this issue?? I too thought damn that’s harsh but also noticed that all of the characters are depicted as the same colour which as you have pointed out makes some ppl think deeper about the issues not just a solitary still image drawn .
Thanks it’s always refreshing to see a thoughtful well presented comment in a sea of quick reaction hate filled dribble
I stopped reading The Oz after they published a Bill Mitchell cartoon in February 1985 during the AIDS scare showing gays cringing in a dark alley with rats and garbage and someone at the start of the alley saying “Things aren’t so bloody gay now, are they?”
The reaction from bleeding heart White Australians who live in places like Melbourne and Sydney always makes me laugh. The outrage that comes from these people who’ve probably never visited the territory and only real interaction with an Aboriginal person is via Tv is comical. Whilst not all Aboriginal people are like the cartoon depicts the majority are and if you visited the territory or similar places you’d be able to see what actually happens.
Right. The majority of aboriginal people don’t care about their kids. Right. Nice one, Jimmy.
Probably poorly worded on my behalf but if you visit somewhere like Alice Springs and walk around at night you’ll see there isn’t a lot of parental care.
Uh-huh
I for one am a rural Aussie more than familiar with issues on community – lived most of my life on lands where traditional language is spoken etc. And I know plenty about what ‘actually happens’ too.
But you do realize the majority of Aboriginal Australians live in NSW, right? So does your precious racist Bill Leak too for that matter.
Lots of Aboriginal people are in Sydney. Pretty bloody ignorant to suggest that people from cities can’t have any idea. And you haven’t spent much time actually engaging with community if you think that men have no idea who their family are. Plenty of issues out in many communities but that’s not generally one of them.
You aren’t actually going to learn shit if you see people in the distance but cross the road to avoid them and never have conversations. I doubt you have any real idea of the experience of Aboriginal people in the NT beyond complaining about them from a distance and looking down your nose at them. I doubt you’ve ever had an Aboriginal friend or found yourself with Aboriginal family members.
Nic: What have we come to, when you’d even contemplate putting quote marks around the word racist in this headline? One Nation returns, and the national conversation drops 50 IQ points. The cartoon is clearly derogatory and race-based. Fits the definition. I am stunned that this got published. Bill Leak is becoming Pickering. Not pretty.
The Australian and News Corps other newspapers always punch down. Never up.
There were many ways this issue could have been addressed in a cartoon but Bill Leak lacks the ability to do so and his editors are jsut as bad for allowing this to publication.
The sooner Rupert or his sons pull the plug on this loss making endeavour the better for public discourse in this country.
I would have cancelled my firm’s subscription to the Oz over this but we had already cancelled it last year when they published a front page of rampant homophobia.
Jimmy, your comment doesn’t warrant response mate. I work with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. You find me one parent that doesn’t want a better life for their kids? Who introduced alcohol and drugs to Australia’s Indigenous people? Who then stopped the sale of alcohol and drugs to Australia’s Indigenous people? Why do those who have no real commitment to fixing fragmented communities feel they have the right to SH*T all over them. Instead of pointing the finger at our First Australians, why not pull it out, roll up your sleeves and pitch in to make Australia great again. We used to be the country that was known for standing by our mates. We can be that nation again!
When you say “who introduced alcool and drugs to Australia’s indigenous people” you make it sound like they were things that non-indigenous people didn’t use and that their introduction was specifically aimed at crippling indigenous people. You also make it sound like indigenous people are childlike innocents with no power of choice in this matter.
@Bill I think you will find that Bob is simply stating facts. Often The Australian and the Telegraph and the rest of the Murdoch stable tend to skew the facts in order to present their slanted view on how they want the population to consider others. Next!
Bob,
You make an interesting point; the Australia of 15 years ago has disappeared. Where ‘mateship’ and ‘a fair go ruled’, we have ‘leaners and lifters’. The politics of divide and conquer have overtaken a narrative that was helping out for the better of all. Who gets beaten down? The minorities and the marginalised.
While many will feel repulsed by the rawness of the cartoon, sadly it is a mirror of Australian society: a police state that locks up kids, persecutes minorities and allows asylum seekers to rot in gulags.
There is a barbarity here that only a cartoon like this seems to reveal.
You should have read the arresting officers name tag……
Noel Pearson.
Now its not racist just repeating his (Noel Pearson’s) own words and view.
Cant fix what we cant address!
Just thinking “out loud”, would it have been racist if all of the people in the cartoon were white?
WTF? This is actually bad, in no way is it acceptable.
What a shame the cartoonist could not have used his talent to shine light on the real problem,namely medieval barbaric treatment of children and the Government that allows it to happen.If the children were mostly white kids would the cartoonist’s subjects have had more sympathy and less disrespect…I think the answer is yes. I do believe in free speech but how does being cruel,hateful and disrespectful to anyone’s race or culture make life better,isn’t art supposed to make society better,inspirational and uplifting to the spirit?His art (cartoons)
just made me feel ashamed to be a white Australian.
Bill leake for president
Caroonists are meant to challenge us. And push the boundaries. I get that. What I don’t understand Bill Leak, is why is the police man indigenous? This is not the stereo type image of cops in NT. I have been there, and indigenous police are there in very small numbers. The jailers in the child detention centre, were white guys. This is the racism of the cartoon, that is entirely a black on black problem.
The other problem for me is the position taken by the editor, Paul Whitaker, defending Leak. Really poor judgment and attempting to drag in Noel Pearson. Anyone who knows and has heard Pearson (and I have) would know that he would never support this kind of cartoon.
What is there left to do? Today, I cancelled my personal subscription to the Oz. And I will insure that my organisation ceases advertising in this newspaper. I am redirecting my $50,000 annual advertising budget to be spent with socially responsible media.