Two months ago I was in Arnhemland desperately trying to help save my
sister-in-law who'd been accused of the murder of her husband and was in
danger of being killed herself. She was in seclusion, seated in a tiny
room for weeks on end. The day she was questioned by police I sat with
her while a dozen men waved shovel-nosed spears outside and women
screaming abuse smashed clubs against the wall a metre away.
Two weeks ago my relatives and I attended my sister-in-law's dead
husband's funeral in Arnhemland where my relatives fully expected there
to be more trouble. The potential was there - 2-3 hundred Aboriginal
people, among them men with spears and guns. Luckily the dead man's
mother was a strong woman. She had a double flag erected signalling that
there was to be no fighting, that the area was a place of peace. And the
one man who did start screaming abuse - well, not one person answered him.
Yesterday I was with grief-stricken relatives as they viewed the body of
another man, dead before his time. Yet again we were lucky. At least he
died of natural causes and so my relatives aren't terrified that they're
going to be accused of killing him with magic, and I don't have to
intervene between people wanting to spear each other.
Not surprisingly I find the criticisms voiced on Birding Aus rather
petty. Sure Night Parrot's comments aren't agreeable to everyone but
what the heck, he/she offers another spin on things as others have
pointed out.
I'm not suggesting that people on Birding Aus. should have to wear the
sorts of experience my family and I go through at times; I know that many
of you haven't had an easy time of it anyway, and you have my heartfelt
sympathy and best wishes. But to those few who respond to people like
Night Parrot with such profound negativity, I suggest you need to broaden
your horizons.
Denise Goodfellow (Lawungkurr Maralngurra)
Birding-Aus is on the Web at
www.shc.melb.catholic.edu.au/home/birding/index.html
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