'Who gives a fuck about white society anymore': a response to the Redfern riot

ON 17 FEBRUARY this year the Herald Sun informed readers that the ‘bitter ghetto’ of Sydney’s innercity Redfern ‘had gone to war’ in a battle against both the NSW police and the nation. In the days after the riot, headlines and editorials condemned Redfern to the singular status of a drug-infested slum, absent of any social function beyond performing the role of the Other within the shadow of the corporately sanctified ‘globally informed and vibrant metropolis’ that is Sydney in 2004. The suburb of Redfern is located within Gadigal country, which is part of the Eora nation. Many in white Australia have little knowledge or interest in the cultural and historical specificity of this geographical information. Redfern is also located close to where the British first landed in Australia in 1788. It was the Eora people who first encountered this imperial nation that not only ‘danced with strangers’ but killed them as well. In Redfern today a small patch of land known as Pemulwuy Park commemorates the life and death of an Eora man, Pemulwuy— ‘the Rainbow Warrior’, who led a concerted guerrilla resistance against the British in the 1790s until he was captured, murdered and had his head cut off, which was then secretly sent to Britain as the trophy that accompanied the violence of dispossession. The history of the relationship between Indigenous people and the state from this moment forward has been dominated by systematic attempts to decapitate Indigenous communities. This recent incident, the Redfern ‘riot’, was an outcome of a confrontation between the NSW police, members of the Redfern community and a few ‘outsiders’. The clash followed the death of an Indigenous youth, Thomas (T.J.) Hickey, who died in hospital after being found impaled on a steel picket fence after crashing his pushbike. During the riot, which occurred during the late hours of Sunday night into early Monday morning, the police, suited in appropriately labelled ‘riot gear’ were pelted with rocks, bottles and a sundry arsenal of missiles that had been earlier stored in ‘wheelie’ rubbish bins. As a result of the clash, police claimed that forty to fifty of their members had been injured, although it has since been reported that very few police suffered any serious injury. Thomas Hickey was 17 when he died. The cause of the accident that led to his death is contested and will be the subject of a NSW judicial inquiry. The police claim that they were alerted to the scene of an accident in Redfern, where they found Thomas Hickey impaled on the fence after falling from his bicycle while riding through a public housing estate. The police then attempted to revive Thomas at the scene. Although police state that they were not looking for Thomas, witnesses to the incident have provided statements that a police vehicle was clearly in pursuit of him. The police deny this. While criminal charges have been laid against some of those involved in the riot, no members of the NSW police force have been cited for provocation or violence despite witnesses stating that police had not only incited the initial confrontation but had themselves acted violently toward members of the Redfern community. Subsequent press headlines and electronic images focused attention on the actions of Indigenous youths who were involved in the incident. This was