There is an essay by some guy called Death by Murder where he identifies one of the best ways to avoid being murdered – don’t be in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Fair enough. I like a common sense approach. But he doesn’t break his lists of places down to local regions. If he did North Queensland or the Northern Territory may be on the map.
The good news is that after a couple of years of attention by community organisations, the press and regional government officials things are changing. Slowly. For example, in 1999 there was this report on crime and violence against women in the Torres Straight.
The bad news is that if you are an aboriginal or Torres Straight islander you are 7.5 times more likely to b murdered than whitey, and if you are an indigenous woman; pack your things now and book the hearse. You are 11.7 times more likely to die at the violent hands of others.
Hmm – there I was thinking it would be easy to find something on the topic on the prime ministers website. I should have known better. I couldn’t find anything recent when I searched using the work ‘aboriginal.’ When I search for ‘violence’ I did find a commitment by John that he would put up $20 Million as a down payment to address domestic violence in indigenous communities.
No update, no mention of extra funding in subsequent years. John – what are you doing?
So, anyway, some guy, it appears to me that even better than not being in the wrong place at the wrong time, you are safer from murder if you lose that blackness and get a pair.
(This partly explains Michael Jackson, but only partly.)
In it Neena Bhandari comments on how an amazing twenty-three percent of all Australian aboriginal women have been attacked by a partner or family member. There is a case study of one particular women who… well, you can read the summary at Amazon.
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