UNIFY EVERYONE: HOW YOUNG AFRO-AUSSIES ARE DEFYING RACIST STEREOTYPES
“Victorians are scared to go out to restaurants because of African gang violence.”
Peter Dutton, 2018
That’s a now-infamous quote from then-Home Affairs Minister, Brisbane-based Peter Dutton during an interview in 2018 addressing youth crime concerns in Melbourne— the same Peter Dutton hotly tipped to be Australia’s next Prime Minister. The words of the now-leader of the Liberal Party represent an attitude shared by many Australians; one which is quicker to stereotype than to fact-check, and faster to condemn than to investigate. This attitude has only intensified since the defeated Indigenous Voice to Parliament referendum gave rise to a new era of public debate concerning the rights and recognition of minorities.
Just last week, the Refugee Council of Australia made an urgent call to reconsider an immigration bill made to Parliament which they say “represents a departure from democratic principles”, and “erodes refugee protection, seeks to remove accountability and transparency and risks sending people to harm.” Australia has a long and troubled history at the intersection of race, justice, and politics – one from which Victoria is not exempt. The State’s Police Chief issued an official apology in 2023 at the Yoorrook Commission for “systemic racism and discrimination against Indigenous Australians”, an attitude and practice which has neither been unique to the force nor the marginalised group, with their NSW counterparts found in multiple reports to have over-policed and harmed young people from minority communities.
Most Victorians can vividly recall the ‘African gang’ moral panic that reached its greatest heights in the lead-up to the 2018 State Election, fueled by conservative news channels in Sky News and 7 and amplified by the now twice-defeated Liberal candidate for Premier Matthew Guy. While the media panic may have subsided as years passed and attention turned to other stories, the damage done to these communities – particularly the young people within them – remains evident through persistent marginalisation. Damage to reputation, to psyche, and to access that takes great work to reverse.
ORIGINS OF THE PANIC
During 2016’s Moomba Festival, an annual family-friendly event held in Melbourne’s CBD, an altercation broke out within a group of teens among the masses.
“You basically had an issue between one group of young people and another group of young people that had met in the city and had a fight. They had chairs being thrown but, yeah, it wasn’t as many people as it was portrayed”, explains Titan Debirioun, the current interim Secretary of Youth for the South Sudanese Community Association of Victoria.
The altercation, which resulted in groups of people running away from the incident throughout the city, occurred at Australia’s largest free community festival – generating major news coverage. Moomba traditionally caters to Melbourne’s proud multicultural status, attracting more than one million diverse attendees annually, and but for the one incident – nothing was any different about the crowd at the 2016 iteration. Yet still, the event was overshadowed by the fight which was quickly labeled a brawl and eventually a ‘riot’ in press circles, igniting a media frenzy primarily aimed towards South Sudanese people, with major aftershocks felt across most African communities in Victoria and nationwide.
“South Sudanese kids cannot hide. I got dark skin, so you’re gonna see me. When [these narratives] are pushed at a very public event where there are families, it get a lot of attention because immigrants look crazy.”
Where there’s smoke, there’s fire—and that’s exactly what happened.
In the months following, African crime became a priority media focus. According to The Age, “newsrooms went on high alert for African offending, trawling police media releases and court listings for reports about suspects of ‘African appearance‘ or with African-sounding names.” South Sudanese youth became the scapegoat for sensationalist crime reporting across the election-bound State, despite statistics showing Sudanese-born offenders accounting for less than 1% of Victorian offenders at the time. The exaggerated and targeted reporting created an environment where young African boys and girls, regardless of their age, background, or association, fell victim to a swathe of racist objectification.
“There was definitely a change in perspective around the media portrayal, especially in an election year. It impacted the average white Australian perspective of what the South Sudanese community looked like.”
Titan Debirioun
African kids were treated as threats to society, with police removing them from communal areas and forbidding groups to hang out in public. The particulars didn’t matter — if you had black skin, people assumed you were involved in street crime.
“African communities are very communal in how they operate. It’s always the collective before the individual. Here, you might be categorized as African or Black, but within that, there’s Nigeria, South Sudan, Zimbabwe, Ghana etc. Saying we are Black/African is true but there are so many nuances and tribes within cultures that each have their own significance.”
At large, the issue only created further unnecessary division on all fronts. Important issues including mental health, settlement, and access to services, remained unaddressed within the community, while there was no acknowledgment of any wrongdoing by the media and police.
“I’m having to deal with repercussions for actions that I didn’t take just for the simple fact that I’m also Black and because of what’s reported in the media,” says Titan. “If my grandma sees the news, she’s going to look at me saying ‘You can’t go outside, you guys are doing this. Why are children doing this?,’ which creates tension if you’re not involved in that, and you’re trying to explain that it’s not the truth.”
Families and communities became divided as stereotypical narratives wreaked havoc, leaving a generation of African-Australian youth feeling disenfranchised in the country they call home. The continued media onslaught on South Sudanese communities was confusing for all sides and caused division within; on one were parents and grandparents who held the land to which they sought refuge in deep reverence, while younger first-generation African-Australians often felt targeted and resentful. Older generations were discouraged to bother speaking out while youth experienced a growing frustration.
“It was really hurtful. The media knew what they were doing. They drove people to a point where they feared us, and with fear you bring hatred. Creating hatred towards others gets more views, and bad publicity sells”
Tébir
THE EFFECTS ON COMMUNITY
While 2016 certainly saw an explosion in anti-African rhetoric, it certainly was not the starting point. Niasha is a Zimbabwean-born artist who moved to Australia at 13. As her family were the only Black people in the countryside town they moved to, making friends here was difficult initially. She recalls a time in P.E. class when her joyful singing was abruptly stopped via a classmate’s kick to her head – in front of a teacher who did nothing.
“I had to sit on a bus with the people from that class all the way home, snickering and talking about it.”
Niasha, speaking on a racist childhood bullying incident.
The sentiments are shared by VV-Ace, a Congolese/Angolan rapper born in Melbourne. He struggled to fit in at his mostly white school, facing a continual onslaught of racist jokes, under the guise of friendly banter.
“It was kinda hard to fit in and find myself. I got a lot of love at school in the beginning because I was the only Black kid. Everybody had love and respect for me, but it wasn’t until later on that I realised what was really going on.”
The media hype snowballed issues of displacement that were already prevalent in migrant and refugee communities, with few if any stopping to consider the impact on future generations of African-Australian youth.
“It creates more frustration within the young people,” explains Titan. “We’re going to the parties or the park and we’re seeing police there. The police are there because they’re getting pressure from the community which is being driven by the news reporting—it became a cycle of exaggeration.”
The constant demonisation led a cohort of the victimised youth to begin internalising and believing the false narratives being pushed – questioning their own identities. Whether outside playing basketball, or simply walking through a shopping centre with friends, the sense of being followed and perceived was inescapable, and only further compounded by the typical water cooler discussions which evolved into near interrogations. Interactions with police became even less desirable, as the presumption of innocence seemed non-existent to those with black skin – instilling a deep sense of fear of, and distrust towards, authorities.
“When you’ve been told your whole life that you’re a bad person, you become the role.”
Tébir
A NEW LENS FOR A BRIGHTER FUTURE
Though the climate has somewhat subsided since its 2018 peak, there remains today an undertone of weariness within the community concerning mainstream media and law enforcement. While former Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has since apologised and conveyed regret for supporting Peter Dutton’s infamous comments, and County Court officials have slammed the media’s ‘skewed’ reporting, in 2024 the Victorian Police remains embroiled in further racial profiling scandals. Despite the odds being continually stacked against them, a wave of positivity is flouring within the African-Australian community as individuals seek to reclaim their own narrative.
Niasha, popularly known as the ‘Boss Queen‘, has travelled the globe as part of the live act for proudly outspoken ARIA Award winning artist Sampa The Great, while simultaneously being an ambassador for the Chozen Foundation, an organisation “very close to my heart” founded to help socially and economically disadvantaged people in Zimbabwe by providing aid for basic needs and education. She also hopes to release her debut project in 2025.
Born in Yemen before immigrating to Australia, Tebir had never been surrounded by as many Black people until he arrived. This sense of identity and community became a key contributor to his flourishing music career, following on from his success in a dance crew during his early teens.
“Community is always going to be the first people that support you. That was definitely the case for me, and I’m very grateful for my upbringing and the way things organically panned out for me.”
He just released his newest project last month titled ‘The Proposal’ – an EP full of Afro-R&B sounds that focuses on love in its varying forms. It has been hotly received by his fanbase which he dubbs the ‘Tribe’ – a collective of people both geographically and culturally connected whom he helps through his work with Multicultural Arts Victoria.
Earlier this year Titan Debirioun was invited to speak at the United Nations in Geneva about trauma-informed care. The trip saw him representing refugee support organisations Foundation House and the Centre For Multicultural Youth in presenting and connecting with like-minded community leaders from across the world. It was his first time leaving Australia since his arrival from South Sudan in 2004. He remains hopeful for the future and is focused making a positive impact locally. According to Titan, there’s a wild variety of needs, but more youth investment – with emphasis on providing community spaces that are dynamic, sustainable, and affordable – is a clear priority.
“Young people’s needs are pretty obvious, they just need support. For that we need resourcing, community, mentors”
It took until his family moved to Melbourne’s more diversely populated northern suburbs for VV-Ace to begin to grow comfortable in his identity. Now, a stellar run of releases in 2024 including singles ‘Waka‘ and ‘Neglected‘ have publications including Rolling Stone turning their eyes towards the prodigious talent, proclaiming him as one to watch.
“I feel like it’s most kids’ dream to be a legend in your city. I want to unify everyone, and have a solid fan base in my home city”
VV-Ace
Be it art, sport, academics, or community work, refugee and immigrant populations have unequivocally helped build the foundation of the nation we call Australia. The recent increase of the African diaspora domestically has ensured that long-held institutional beliefs and practices of marginalisation have been extended to the latest cultural collective to reach the southern shores – at times with dire unforeseen consequences. While it may be a colloquial ‘tradition’ to give new-comers a hard time, ensuring their character is robust enough to withstand local norms; the actions of the media, politicians, and police have undoubtedly gone beyond, causing real damage to a population already fleeing war toward a so-called ‘safe-haven’.
Just as the aforementioned parties have been quick to jump on the negativity bandwagon when it suited, so too should they publicise, promote, and celebrate the achievements of African-Australians; a mere handful of which this masthead has highlighted here. Australia has a funny habit of claiming immigrant communities as our own when they succeed, and quickly lambasting and othering them in less celebratory moments. However, it is the latter that gets more widely circulated.
Just as we have since our birth in 2016, AUD’$ promises to continue championing the works and achievements of not only the African-Australian community, but all maginalised groups, and the incredible contributions they make to our diverse, vibrant land. It’s the only way to unify everyone.
Lead Image of Lxrdmc and VV-Ace by @4k.sliki
This feature has been supported as part of The Music Writer’s Lab 2024 Commissioning Fund.
