An Alternative to the Northern Territory Emergency Response: a Partnership Instead of Control

The main problem I have with the Northern Territory Emergency Response (NTER) is it's failure to address that which it was implemented in response to. Namely, widespread sexual abuse of Aboriginal children and violence against Aboriginal women.

From Nicole Watson's account of the NTER, there has been a lack of research into any correlations between the NTER and improvement on safety for either children or women in Indigenous communities. This, combined with evidence of negative impacts caused by the NTER, show us that at the very least further research into its negative and positive effects should be done so that improvements can be made.

Rather than responding to problems of child abuse, child malnutrition and lack of safe water supplies, the NTER has resembled early colonial treatment of Aboriginal women including invisibility of rights and regulation of spending leading to loss of autonomy, loss of cultural authority and an increase in stigma towards those using BasicsCards as a part of the income management regime.

"In light of this history, it beggars belief that anyone would rationally argue that legislative interventions that regulate en masse are an answer to the multiple levels of disadvantage endured by Aboriginal women. Yet this is precisely what key NTER measures have delivered." (Watson, p. 158)

Perhaps the greatest thing that the NTER has achieved is recognition of the immense problem of the abuse of children and women within Indigenous communities, and the need for this to be addressed. However a different approach is needed. The NTER didn't include any prior consultation and has followed a top down approach. I agree with Watson and would like to suggest that success will be better reached through partnerships between the government and Indigenous communities, rather than through legislation for women and children's safety put in place by a society that is itself suffering from patriarchal violence.

Ban the Veil: Oppressive or Liberating?

Throughout the debate over banning the veil in France, those in support of the ban generally saw the veil as representing "the subordination of women, their humiliation, and their inequality." (Scott 2007, p. 153) However, if a veil is worn by choice, then how can we consider it to represent subordination and inequality? Further, Scott suggests that "...uncovered bodies are no more a guarantee of equality than covered ones." (2007, p. 156)

Liberty has has many different meanings in different places and at different times. It is necessary to remember that "...what is plausibly liberatory in one context is clearly repressive in another." (Asad 2009, p. 26) In the case of Saudi Arabia where according to Chesler, "...no Saudi woman dares appear open-faced in public" (2010, p. 39) then her garments may come to represent subordination and inequality. Perhaps in those specific situations, the ban would be a viable way to address oppression. However if a woman in France (or anywhere for that matter) who has autonomously chosen to wear a veil is told that legally she must take it off, then couldn't that also be viewed as a kind of oppression? After all, the choice is being taken away from her.

Compliments as Discipline

I used to be absolutely certain that no harm could ever come of complimenting somebody.

Now I am absolutely certain I was wrong.

Wilchins describes the power present in gender norms as being "bottom up". "It is not held by authorities and institutions; rather it is held by no one but exercised by practically everyone." (2004, p. 63)

When I have complimented someone about a feminine or masculine trait I have unknowingly reinforced gender norms. Although it is not as damaging as say, shaming someone for not fitting into a binary gender role, it is still adding to an individual's self surveillance and self consciousness.

In the same way that Foucalt described prisons, the gaze of society can be seen to monitor and influence the behaviour of, and then become internalized by individuals in regards to, among other things, gender norms: "The prison was designed to change inmates' consciousness of themselves. Its aim was to make them, under infinite observation and control, infinitely self-conscious and self-controlling." (Wilchins 2004, p. 66)

When I visited Sachsenhausen, a concentration camp near Berlin in Germany, it was shocking to see how the entire camp was designed in such a way that from one central watchtower the entire camp could be observed and thereby controlled. Check out a map of the camp to better understand Foucalt's description in practice.

I've realised that when I compliment someone I am often reinforcing gender norms that the individual I'm complimenting may then internalise. The same has happened when people compliment or shame me. The gaze of friends, family, teachers and strangers and eventually myself have all acted to discipline myself and others within a specific norm based society. Therefore, I have realised that in an indirect way, compliments I have given may have lead some people to feelings of shame for not conforming to gender norms.

Biases in Science

I used to be absolutely certain that science is truth. That's how it was taught through Primary School and High School.

Now I'm absolutely certain that I was wrong.

There are varying degrees of truth in science, and instead of seeing it as stable and constant, it should be seen as a fluid, changing path toward truth. Kant's (?) paradigm of a thesis, antithesis and synthesis can help us explore this idea. 

In this paradigm, the thesis is an idea, the antithesis is a negation of the idea, and the synthesis is a combination of the thesis and the antithesis made up from the logical 'truths' of both. The synthesis can then become the thesis for further arguments. This can be seen in technology. Cornelia Fine reminds us "state-of-the-art brain scanners offer us unprecedented information about the structure and working of the brain. But don't forget that, once, wrapping a tape measure around the head was considered modern and sophisticated." (2010, p. 133) This demonstrates the way science changes through processes of being the current 'truth', being criticised, and eventually changing to satisfy those criticisms so that it can once more be considered truth,

Gender studies provides an antithesis to the male-female dichotomy that is still prevalent throughout society "...at increasingly early ages, making the two-sex system more deeply a part of how we imagine human life and giving it the appearance of being both inborn and natural" (Fausto-Sterling 2000, p.31).

Haraway states that "struggles over what will count as rational accounts of the world are struggles over how to see." (1991, p. 194) Haraway demonstrates that scientific knowledge is based on power and is thereby susceptible to bias.

If we look at science as a paradigm rather than a truth, and consider that it doesn't go unaffected by bias, then we can begin to pull apart 'knowledge' about gender and the male-female dichotomy to better understand the existence of gender as a spectrum.

Reserved Seats and Representation of Minority Groups

Reserved seats in politics (where a number of job positions are allocated to individuals from minority groups) has brought up public debate as to their success and their opposition to a merit based system (one where jobs are allocated to those considered most suitable based on ability and experience).

A friend of mine suggested that instead of reserving seats in politics, seats need to be reserved in primary school, high school and university, so that people from lower classes can succeed in a merit based system  upon graduation. Assuming they would reach a position where they could succeed, I wonder if upon taking a representative position they may no longer be particularly representative of the group. Having lived different experiences and having had a more privileged life with greater access to opportunities, it is likely that they would have a different perspective and possibly also different interest and opinions to the group, thereby creating distance between themselves and the group they should be representing. This brings to front the question explored in the criticism following Diane Bell's article in which she speaks for Indigenous Australians: who can speak for who?

Such a method would also fail to take into account possible prejudices based on, for example ethnicity or gender that are present within institutions and which could create further hurdles on the path to a representative position.

Reserved seating sidesteps these problems to an extent. Perspective is important for a representative as "...members of structurally differentiated groups often have different understandings of the causes of the problems and conflicts and the possible effects of proposed solutions." (Young 2000, p. 145) Without having the perspective of the group, the representative may fail to understand the specific problems of that group. Reserved seating can also ensure representatives won't be selected with ethnic or cultural bias. However that brings us to the question "...who has the right to choose those representatives" (Young 2000, p. 50)? And furthermore, how can someone create a guideline for selecting a representative on the transient guidelines of interest, opinion and perspective?

I believe that reserving seats should be continued as a tactic of increasing representation of minority groups in politics, however I'd like to explore further the ways in which representatives are selected.

On the Social Constructionism of Gender, Race and Disability

I used to be absolutely certain that disability was biological and factual and these things needn't be questioned.

Now I am absolutely certain I was wrong.

Meekosha's article on Intercategorical Analysis explores the necessity to include disability in contemporary social, cultural and political theory. Meekosha believes it has been ignored so far because it hasn't made it into the category of the 'socially constructed'. Meekosha makes it rather obvious that just as gender and race were once considered to be biological and therefore fact, disability is still stuck in that kind of medical framework. Instead we should understand disability as a "socially generated system of discrimination" (Meekosha 2006, p. 163) that is built upon impairments (functional limitations of an individual). Similarly gender was - and distressingly still often is - understood to be biological.

I remember taking a philosophy class that touched on the topic of disability. The lecturer used an example of a community where the majority of the population was hearing impaired so everyone knew sign language. In this case would you consider a hearing impaired individual to be disabled? Another example was of an individual in a wheelchair. If ramps are always available as well as stairs can we still say that the individual is disabled?

These are quite simplistic examples however they can help us to understand the way impairment, physiognomy and sex are different to disability, race and gender. Just as impairments can be made disabling by society, sex and physiognomy also become disabling when gender and race are socially constructed into hierarchies.