RebLaw opens with Teela Reid introducing Riverbank Frank on Wiradjuri country, who Welcomes delegates and offers tribute to the late Hal Wooten #RebLawAus
Riverbank Frank tells the effect of “your law” on Aboriginal people and talks about [white] assumptions of inherent criminality.
the birds in the background sound so pretty😍
wraps with love. “Be kind” - Riverbank Frank, poet and philosopher, speaking from Dubbo. #RebLawAu
organisers introduced. All lawyers, set to tackle systemic injustice. See the law as a site of political struggle - Sarah Schwartz #RebLawAu
systemic change, says Zoe Bush. Sites include First Nations self-determination, climate justice, workers rights. #RebLawAu
over 650 delegates! We are now saying who we are. Lots of lawyers. None too many academics: lowest proportion at 5%. Boo. #RebLawAu
Suzie Wnukowska-Mtonga is up. She is introducing speakers. The program opens with absolute legends Profs Megan Davis and Larissa Behrendt🤩 #RebLawAu
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these wonder women. Wailwan and Wiradjuri lawyer Teela Reid is wrapping up #RebLawAu with a reminder to lawyers of our responsibilities to First Nations justice and rights.
what stood out to delegates at the #RebLawAu conference?
abolition is an everyday practice. It opens up so much possibility. Prisons are not sites of accountability. What about the murderers and rapists? Welp, the current system does not stop murder and rape. #RebLawAu
abolition stands counter to reformism, says Alison Whittaker. Reformist changes try to change conditions in prisons rather than challenging the legitimacy of prisons and carceral logics. Tinkering at the edges. #RebLawAu
Marrawah Johnson: we can not rely on litigation to save us but the significance of Mabo No 2 (1992) - the High Court rejected legal fiction of terra nullius and Wik Peoples bringing the principles of Mabo to the mainland and survival of native title on pastoral leases #RebLawAu
there has been a conscious and intentional uncoupling of Indigenous rights from human rights - Marrawah Johnson #RebLawAu
human rights are not new to Aboriginal law. It is colonial law that stripped First Nations people of their human rights. It has been convenient for settler colonial law to violate the rights that are enshrined in First Nations law - Marrawah Johnson, abridged #RebLawAu
“folks who are closest to the problem are also closest to the solution” 💥💥 - Marbre Stahly-Butts #RebLawAu
so much of how we exercise power goes unseen and that’s not an accident. Power is invisibilised because it is very violent - Stahly-Butts #RebLawAu
accountability is about who you go home to, who you explain your actions to, who you apologise to… Stahley-Butts is electrifying. On relationality and de-centering the law and lawyers as gatekeepers in movements for change #RebLawAu
hearing acting prime minister Barnaby Joyce campaigning on the Holden in every garage and chicken in every pot slogan plagiarised by Menzies in the 1950s from a US Republican slogan of the 1920s. Sounds about right.
our particular brand of 233 year old white supremacist squattocracy never gets old I guess. Go hard, acting prime minister Joyce. Judging by the many previous race elections, it is a winning formula mate.
“economic anxiety” white males being all violently plague spready on the streets while nurses do what they do, teachers do what they do, MOTHERS do what we do, cleaners do what they do. Righto champ.
Rodney Croome is such a veteran legend activist. He finds it easier to work with lawyers who can see whats possible instead of whats impossible🔥#RebLawAus
example is the case he took to the UN Human Rights Committee (Toonen v Australia 1991). I’ve been writing up some HR content for first years around this case, which is still so incredibly unusual, for an Aust case to get up. #RebLawAus
the marriage equality campaign strategy via states and territories, to test the Commonwealth Marriage Act 1961, was a success in the sense that ACT Civil Unions made formal same sex partnerships visible and “the sky didn’t fall in”. #RebLawAus