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A stillness that I did not normally associate with the hallways of my school marked the occasion deeply enough that, if I draw my attention back to that point in time, I can feel every sensation as if it were occurring in the present. A sensation for which my vocabulary is far too limited to describe, yet is all too familiar. That was the 13th of February 2008, or otherwise known as the ‘apology’. It was a time where I was confronted with my Blackness. A time where I was so very separate from the school community, even more so than I felt at that point. Kevin Rudd’s voice wafted out through the those halls as students and teachers listened on and I wandered, for I had no place among those crowded into the school quadrangle. Later that day, I sat and listened to other students talk about the event, often debating its merits. Even more remained distantly silent, having little capacity to understand the extent and the significance these issues have on the lives of Aboriginal people. I feel as if I didn’t have that capacity either. Talk-back radio filled with white people annoyed that their neatly ordered vision of ‘society’ and how it came to be followed me on the way back home that day.

Another memory follows, where I am sitting in front of a person charged with the administration of an institution that provided a roof over my head. A space where I went about life trying to study, and figure out what my life actually meant to me. My entry into that space had come after a time where I had previously been rejected from a community for not falling in line and for my mental health. It followed a time where I had since experienced the recurring immediacy of a horrifying accident, where I had assisted with first aid and in which both victims had died. I had been engaging in extensive (and costly) therapy in order improve my health, which I knew had been slipped to a very low point, and it certainly did not help that I was ashamed of the way I had to quit my job at the time. The list of heart-ache goes on, and the question that was thrown at me and which pierced into me amounted to a ‘what is wrong with you?’ All I could tell this person was about the deep sense of shame and guilt that blanketed my existence then, and still haunts me now. I had worked so hard to pull myself through the low expectations and the indifference I had often been exposed to due to disability and my Aboriginality all throughout life. I can say I have experienced that point that too many face where, despite your best efforts to lift yourself up, you end up forced out of the only space in which you can rest and sleep with some comfort.

As I have discussed previously, the recent discussion around ‘Black Guilt’ has revealed so much, and yet so little. I feel that I cannot meaningfully translate the experience into a book, much less a piece of commentary for a blog, but I do feel compelled to share just a little bit of this experience, not for my sake but for others. Black Guilt has been an experience which has had me constantly questioning my right to enter spaces, especially spaces reserved for people who seemingly have their entire future spelled out for them. Spaces where privileged and/or lucky people are held up as examples for others to aspire to. Spaces for which the expectations of a new generation of ‘Indigenous leaders’ are placed around your head like a crown of thorns, and where if you dare to take roads less explored in the hope of building something, you feel the burn of angry white people and other Black people too. If you are Black, they are spaces that are unforgiving of mistakes. It is an experience where you even question your right to exist.

We live in a culture of celebrity, making it incredibly difficult to celebrate the act of sharing among ourselves as we search for healing. The stories of our remarkable youth who have no choice but to navigate incredible obstacles in the absence of generosity and empathy from their environment are not being heard, unless they are the prescribed visions of success demanded in a culture of relentless consumer-individualism. It is an experience made all the more harder when we are constantly being told that we are well off. Even more difficult when you can see that it is not all bad, and we often have some amazing things going for us. Fake or even genuine rationality does not account for the fact that we do exist as emotional beings, and we Black Australians have a few generations of trauma and dislocation running in our blood. Even when we are not conscious of it. It is certainly visible when we fight among ourselves, and get defensive about how we manage our daily affairs as Black people. It is there as we contemplate our lives which are often lived away from country and dreaming. It is there as we share our working and intimate spaces with those who fundamentally do not understand us and who often have some power over us. Black Guilt breathes softly on our necks and whispers in our ears when we question whether or not we have earned ourselves and what little we have.

When you get down to it this is our lot and it’s OK to say that is sucks. We do not individually or collectively command the very elements that coalesce into our existence and the subjective experiences that characterise it. What we do have is the spirit and soul of our forebears: some of the most resilient, wise and intelligent people to have walked the lands. Even for those of us who consider ourselves pariahs of sorts like myself, draw from this strength that keeps us going even when we struggle forth with a profound feeling of emptiness. None of us Aboriginal people are given a choice if we wish to remain true to ourselves, but we do not need to justify our existence despite the Black Guilt. What we must absolutely do is find generosity and empathy to guide us forward.

You can read the original article on ‘Black Guilt’ by Rachael Hocking here. 

Part 1 can be read here.