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Welcome to the Graham F Smith Peace Trust E-newsletter. In this Issue In Other News Don't forget to book for the Peace Trust dinner by the 19th of June! Pass it on Know anyone who might be interested in our newsletter? Click here to forward this email to up to 5 friends at once. |
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Welcome to the winter edition of the Peace Trust’s e-newsletter. I write this during National Reconciliation Week 2009. I have just returned from speaking briefly about the creation of the Kaurna Reconciliation Sculptures and Walking Trail prior to the beginning of the Kaurna historical walk based on the booklet “Kaurna meyunna, Kaurna yerta tampendi” which has been developed and published by the Peace Trust. I understand the Kaurna Walking Trail will become an important part of National Reconciliation Week activities in future years. The Peace Trust is looking for volunteers to conduct this walk. If you would like to give generously of your time please contact us. The e-newsletter covers information about our twin aims, namely human rights and a sustainable environment, the profile of one of our member artists and an article which takes us back to the Civil Rights struggle in the USA. Thank you to members who have renewed their membership and welcome to our new members. Your support is appreciated. Léonie M Ebert
Come Celebrate Our 20th Anniversary 
Fundraising Dinner and Art Auction Italian Function Centre Speaker: Dr Lester-Irabinna Rigney MACE Professor of Education & Director, Yunggorendi First Nations Centre for Higher Education and Research, Flinders University Topic: What is the role of peace and reconciliation in Australia’s Education Revolution?
National Human Rights Consultation – Have Your Say! Deadline For Submissions 15 June 2009 The Australian federal government launched a national public consultation about the legal recognition and protection of human rights and responsibilities on 10 December 2008, the 60th anniversary of the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Did you know that ‘Australia is the only democratic country that does not have a national bill or charter of rights?’ (Source WFUW-SA Inc)
I attended one of the Adelaide Community Roundtables held in April. There were over 250 participants present. The event was very well planned and carried out, so that everyone had the chance to have their ideas heard. Although we were told that it was not the intention of the Government to develop a Human Rights Act, it was overwhelmingly clear that the majority, if not most, of the participants were calling for a Human Rights Act or at least a Charter for Australia. Each time a speaker mentioned the need for a Human Rights Act or Charter there was strong applause. It is not too late to have your say. May I encourage you to make a submission to protect and promote human rights. Make a difference. The deadline for making submissions to the National Human Rights Consultation is the 15 June 2009. See www.humanrightsconsultation.gov.au for more details. The National Human Rights Consultation is also holding an online forum. Contributions to this forum will be considered in the Consultation Committee's final report. You can find the forum at: http://www.openforum.com.au/NHROC
Leonie Ebert United Nations Declaration On The Rights Of Indigenous People At Parliament House on April 2009, the Hon Jenny Macklin MP, Minister for Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs announced that Australia would take the important step of supporting the United Nations Declaration on Indigenous Rights. The work of drafting the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples began in 1985. On 17 September 2007, 143 nations voted in support of the Declaration. Australia was one of four countries that voted against the Declaration at that time. The Peace Trust is very happy that the federal Government has at long last supported the Declaration. See following websites for additional information:
Leonie Ebert On June 4 we will remember, sadly, the Tiananmen Square massacre of 1989. During this awful event an anonymous man carrying only a pair of shopping bags faced a line of Chinese tanks and endeavoured to prevent the tanks' advance on the students. This man referred to as the Tank man or the Unknown Rebel is remembered for his tremendous courage.
Barb Smith is a Canberra-based writer and photographic artist. Although photography and writing have always been major passions, her original career training was in zoology. After gaining an M.Sc from the University of Melbourne, she worked for several years as an academic tutor in Australia, a data base consultant in England, and a policy adviser in the Commonwealth Public Service in Canberra. The opportunity for a complete career switch only emerged after an intractable attack of RSI left her unable to write or use a computer for many months. Taking photos was one of the few activities she could still manage. She used the time off work to complete a diploma in the Photomedia Department of ANU Institute of the Arts, and has since had nine solo shows, and contributed work to more than 100 group exhibitions. Her images usually explore political, social or environmental issues, using in-camera techniques or added text to jolt viewers into questioning what they are seeing. Barbara Smith is a member to the Peace Trust. Music and Civil Rights Stories In Nashville, USA 
By Julia Sumner Ever since I heard Parton and Cash coming from my mother’s record player, I have been wanting to visit Nashville, where you can listen to live country music, 14 hours a day. It was for this reason that on a recent tour of America, I encouraged my partner to make a trip to America’s Music City. Nashville is about the same size as Adelaide but that is where the similarities end. As we drove into East Nashville, where street side BBQ’s are common place as well as the occasional street side church run out of the back of a truck, and past Winfrey’s Barber Shop (we were told Oprah’s dad still runs it), I knew we were somewhere special. The country music was amazing but it was our traditional Southern Sunday lunch that made sure this trip would be unforgettable. Sitting around a communal table over a delicious meal of iced tea, fried chicken, mac and cheese and corn casserole we met Mr Ernest 'Rip' Patton, a freedom rider from the 60’s who offered to give us a tour of the Civil Rights Museum. As promised, Rip met us in the Museum and as we walked in to the main hall, a quote from Dr Martin Luther King on the wall reads: “I came to Nashville not to bring inspiration but to gain inspiration from the great movement that has taken place in this community.” Rip was a major part of this great movement. I was truly blown away with the stories this man had to tell. Stories of a time less than 50 years ago when black and white people were not allowed to eat at the same diner, shop at the same supermarket, or catch the same bus together. The story of their struggle is one of courage and a fight for equality but it is also one of supreme organisation, determination and a lesson in peaceful protest. Rip spoke of the intense training that took place before the protests began. He told us how night after night for weeks before the campaign began he and his fellow students would go to church halls and practice the art of peaceful protest. They trained at being beaten and teased so that they could manage their own instinct to fight back. The protesters were predominantly students - thousands of people joined the movement– they needed the numbers to flood the jails Rip told us. The movement was organised and determined, boycotting businesses, peaceful silent protests and then of course the famous sit-ins and Freedom Rides. The sit-in protests began in 1960 in Nashville and across the South. The rules were simple and very clear and were developed by one of the movement leaders who had spent 6 months working with Gandhi. You had to be dressed in your Sunday best then you had to go to the white coffee shops in groups of 5 or so, order a coffee, put the money on the counter and wait to be served; they never would be. The police would then be called and they would sit there peacefully until they were finally arrested. As the first set of protesters were taken to prison, the next set of protesters would arrive and do exactly the same thing as the last. Rip went to jail 5 times during his time on the campaign – the final time was in Jackson, Mississippi at the end of one of the famous Freedom Rides. Another well organised campaign, the Freedom Rides were perhaps the most dangerous of all the protests. Although the sit-ins were not pleasant – the protesters often had ketchup and coffee poured all over them and cigarette burns in their clothes - Rip never feared for his life, but it was on the Freedom Rides that the violence got worse. The movement kept in close contact with the Kennedy Administration. As such the Federal Police were always warned of the rides. The Federal Police in turn informed the local police many of whom were part of the Ku Klux Klan and as such, they were waiting for the protesters at every stop. This time the violence was life-threatening – on the first ride, the protesters were violently beaten, arrested and sent back to Nashville by the local authorities. However, as soon as they got home, they got on the very next bus to do it all again. Every time a bus left Nashville, there would be a group of freedom riders on it. They were relentless. In Alabama, someone threw a Molotov cocktail into one of the buses and the Ku Klux Klan barricaded the bus door – the people inside were choking to death. Finally a policeman shot his gun in the air and the people dispersed so that the freedom riders could get off the bus. He then told us of a little white girl who was working in her parents store across the road – she saw these people getting off the bus and ran across with a big bucket of water and a ladle and fed them water. Years later Rip told us A Current Affair was doing a story on the Freedom Rides and one of his friends asked a journalist if they could try and find this girl. A Current Affair did find the woman and at a reunion of the freedom riders her story was told and she got a 15-minute standing ovation – she then told the audience that her family had disowned her after that one simple act. After this string of acts of serious violence, the Kennedy administration put the National Guard on the buses to stem the violence. However, every time the protesters got off a bus, they were arrested again. The stories from the jails are the stories you only believe happen in the movies. But Rip said that there were so many of them in the jails together that they survived by singing – all day, everyday. After he returned to Nashville, he and his 13 classmates from Tennessee State University were all expelled. He continued with the protests for a while but one day after leaving a campaign meeting he heard a car backfire and thought he was being shot at and it was at that time he knew he could no longer participate successfully in the protests – his nerves had had enough. He moved to New York and worked for the Congress of Racial Equality. Rip and his classmates, were finally awarded honorary degrees a few years ago after a long time battle with the University administration. It was at this time that Rip moved back to his home in Nashville and is now fighting for the city to recognise their amazing place in the Civil Rights Campaign. Many people are trying to hide this history, perhaps they are embarrassed or perhaps the prejudices of the past are not completely eradicated. When you drive through the South and you see the Confederate flags still flying in some of the small country towns, you think the latter is more likely. Of course we had to ask him how he felt about the Obama victory – but he didn’t need to say much, his face said it all. Initially, I had really wanted to see a woman as President. However, at that moment, I realised that this victory to Obama was even more important to America than having a woman at the helm. As we walked out of the museum, another quote caught my eye – It was a quote from John Lewis – a leader in the Nashville movement and now a Congressman who was on the stage when Obama was inaugurated, it read: “If not us then who; if not now then when.” I have asked myself regularly since leaving Nashville, would I have the courage to do what they did? Next year will be the 50th anniversary of the sit-ins and in 2011 it will be 50 years since the Freedom Rides. Rip is looking forward to the reunions and I think he is secretly hoping the Obama Administration doesn’t forget the importance of this event. I did wonder why Rip was so generous with his time and spent hours talking to a bunch of strange Australians, but then I realised, it is all too quickly that these stories and struggles are forgotten and it is important to keep telling these stories not just for history’s sake but also because there is a lesson in there for all of us. Julia Sumner is on the Peace Trust Board of Trustees.
Water Summit Commits To Action By Chris Field Over 250 people attended the Community Water Summit held in Adelaide on 14th March, 2009. The diversity of community interests represented at the Summit was reflected by the excellent range of speakers. All speakers, whether passionate about the pitfalls of desalination plants in our Gulfs or the destruction of the Murray Darling river systems, agreed on one message to the SA Government. It needs to seek the facts from thorough investigation of ALL options/combinations of water allocation, storage and organisation. Summit participants agreed to develop a ‘People’s Water Charter’ and the formation of a single Water Action Co-ordinating Group in South Australia. A recurring concern throughout the Summit was the growing trend towards the privatisation of water in Australia. This concern was reinforced shortly after the Summit in an article in the Weekly Times which stated that a Californian based company, Summit Global Management, has purchased $20million of Australia’s irrigators’ water. Should there be restrictions by governments in Australia on the ownership of our scarcest resource? Or should we wait for the time to come when our elected governments find themselves in court to try and retrieve our scarcest resource from globalised corporate interests? Chris Field is a Member of the Peace Trust Management Committee
At a seminar in Denmark on May 27 U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said “The impact of climate change is accelerating at an "alarming" pace and urgent action must be taken. What is frightening is that the scientists are now reviewing their predictions, recognising that climate change impact is accelerating at a much faster pace. This is very serious and alarming. That is why I have been urging that if we take any action, we must take action now regardless of where you are coming from. Rich and poor countries, we must address this issue together." In making this statement Ban referred to the ongoing fifth assessment report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Source: Reuters http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/LR711702.htm Deadline for Spring issue (September 2009) is August 15th, 2009. |
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