If you enjoy laughing and have ever watched the British (knowing laugh) nihilistic comedian Frankie Boyle I very much doubt that you have never laughed at his jokes.
The joke about the Queen's vagina being haunted? If you heard it I would bet that something akin to laughter ensued.
Yet that and other comedic transgressions has resulted in transgressive Frankie being banished by the evil English establishment.
Except it hasn't.
Oh no. We have the BBC commissioning a show headed by Boyle after the Scottish referendum and then another commission for online after the UK General Election. Some banishment. The Boyle election show was on the BBC iplayer homepage for weeks.
In his election show Boyle had two female comedians to bounce off and a 'Grime' commentator - aka a black British bloke. All of whom polished his mantle.
Now I can think of a number of bitchy conservatives who could have been a perfect foil to Boyle. Were they even considered? It would have made for great TV.
But why I am even asking this? Multi millionaire Boyle needs his 'safe space', bless. He has no history of stepping outside of his comfort zone but let's try. Here we go Frankie. Here's me puncturing your safe space.
The treatment of Australia and Australians by Boyle and his 'Grime' commentator Akala was colonialist and racist.
Boyle cherry picked a brief extract from Australian morning TV to showcase how Australians are all stupid fucking colonials and so so racist. This was as bad as the treatment of the 'colonials' by the Brits going way back has ever been. Barry Humphries, Private Eye and Humphries' Barry McKenzie character were satirising this Brit attitude in the 1970s (the 70s FFS).
We recently had the Gallipoli hundredth anniversary. Gallipoli in the Australian imagination is all about how the Brits have traditionally treated Aussies as subaltern. This stuff has form.
After his cherrypick, Boyle, backed by Akala, then underlined by calling Australia, quote, "the most racist country in the world".
Worse than Mali? Worse than Russia? Worse than India? Worse than Brazil?
Akala cited the utter revelation, to much of the audience I would assume, that Australian Aborigines 'used to be ruled by the Flora and Fauna Act'. This is actually a myth (the Act is) but the bigger point is that nearly fifty years ago Australians voted to end that mythical status, change the Constitution and grant Aborigines citizenship by 91% in favour. Right now Australians are 85% in favour of proposals to change the Constitution to recognise Aboriginal people.
Why does Akala mention the (non existent) Flora and Fauna Act? To back Boyle's claim that Australia remains "the most racist country in the world".
Boyle's claim, with Akala's backing, does two things: it denies that white Australia has moved one centimeter on from the 1960s; it denies that Aboriginal and progressive activism has had any impact.
Obviously both are wrong. Clearly they are wrong. But both Akala and Boyle have an investment in denying the reality in Australia: their British audience will love to hear Australia called "the most racist country in the world" - and Akala and Boyle know it.
In order to make that claim both have to behave exactly like colonialists. Racist, British colonialists. And they have to fail to listen to Aboriginal people.
I wrote about this a few years back. Listening involves understanding that Aboriginal people have different opinions on how to advance the interests of their communities. (Of course they effing do.) There are some who want sovereignty to be central. (If Akala knew anything he would mention the absence of treaties.) Then there are others working with capitalism to create Aboriginal owned business and create jobs. And then there's the mass in between, trying to get on.
Outside of this we have white people like leftie icon John Pilger and environmentalists like newly minted BBC star Professor Tim Flannery who also have opinions. And don't they ever have opinions - and the whites always know better than the bad blackfellas.
Who is going to get the attention of the likes of Boyle/Akala (and countless other Brits)? Short answer: the white people. They'll know and trust someone like Pilger (Akala's comment is a 'tell' here) and have never heard of the likes of Professor Marcia Langton.
Langton has slammed Flannery and the "racist assumption in the green movement about Aboriginal people being the enemies of the wilderness." She is a leading light in the national debate around Aboriginal advancement and particularly the role of mining and is one of the most well known Aboriginal people in Australia. Yet when Pilger covered the area of Australia she has focused on in a film he flat out ignored her because she was an inconvenient black woman. What would you call that?
It is not going to even vaguely occur to Boyle/Akala what they're doing, namely that Aboriginal people in their world view may as well be regarded as 'flora and fauna' - invisible, lacking any agency. They're just going to be led by presumptions and ignorance and what white leftie icons say, for that is what it is.
Invisible: Two examples
