…the whirlwind of poetry joy, but i just had to crosspost this item.

in the murder capital of australia, it’s still safe to be a racist:

NATIONAL, September 10, 2009: An Alice Springs resident has responded to the alleged bashing death of an Aboriginal man by five young white men by selling “Alice Springs White Power” t-shirts and caps from his car.

And it’s all happening outside the Alice Springs Town Council offices, with local police and council officials refusing at least two requests by local residents to shut the man down.

The t-shirts and caps were yesterday on display in the passenger side window of a 4WD ute parked directly across the road from the council chambers. The number plates on the vehicle read ‘GANGSTA’, and a hand-written sign was taped to the back passenger window advertising the shirts and caps.

The sign included pricing – $25 for a shirt, $25 for a cap or to [sic] for $35. The shirt includes a Nazi swastika symbol, and the sign includes a mobile number, 0410 366 701.

writes Chris Graham in the NIT.

i would like to say that the majority of people in this town are not racist. but i’m afraid this is the extremist end of a sliding scale of opinions in a town where everyday racism is pretty banal. i have written elsewhere about the way the intervention has affected race relations here. more directly, the suspension of the racial discrimination act in the NT may have legalised this kind of vilification.