Foreign musicians are not the reason so many Australian women are being killed by their partners. By focusing on one man, we let the government off the hook
In 1928 an American jazz outfit called Sonny Clay’s Colored Idea – a troupe of African American singers, musicians and dancers – toured Australia. As soon as they arrived, the commonwealth investigative branch – the forerunner to Asio – put the group under surveillance, determined to prevent them “consorting with white women”.
After one of the Colored Idea’s gigs, the police launched a 3am raid at the band’s apartment. The Melbourne Truth reported: “Empty glasses, half-dressed girls, and an atmosphere poisonous with cigarette smoke and fumes of liquor – and, lounging about the flat, six negroes.”
In parliament, an MP read out headlines like “Nude girls in Melbourne flat orgy” and “Raid discloses wild scene of abandon: flappers, wine, cocaine and revels”. Neville Howse, the minister for homes and territories, was asked whether he thought “that in the interests of the white Australia and moral decency, permits to such persons should be refused?”
As it happened, he did.
The Colored Idea were bundled out of the country, and it was not until 1954 that another band led by an African American would tour the country.
It’s worth thinking about that history in the context of suggestions by Michaelia Cash, the new minister for women, that the immigration department should ban Chris Brown from entering Australia.
There’s no doubt that Brown, convicted of punching and trying to strangle his then girlfriend Rihanna, is a nasty piece of work. Nor can anyone dispute the seriousness of violence against women in Australia. According to a much-quoted statistic, a woman is killed roughly once a week by a partner or former partner.
But the immigration department is not the solution.
Quite obviously, the perpetrators of domestic violence in Australia are everyday Australians, not foreign musicians. They’re ordinary people – husbands, partners, boyfriends. They’re steeped in Australian culture. They’re not brainwashed by American R&B or led astray by song lyrics.
“Chris Brown is an extremely influential figure,” explains a GetUp petition to the immigration minister, “particularly among young people. Allowing his entry into Australia sends the message that the Turnbull government does not place significant weight and condemnation on men’s violence against women.”
It’s difficult to imagine anyone seriously thinks a ban on Brown will diminish whatever influence he wields on young people who, by and large, don’t look to border patrol for affirmation of their musical tastes.
As for “sending a message”, GetUp puts the situation entirely the wrong way around.
At best, a ban on Brown is a distraction, a cheap headline-grabbing stunt that takes the focus away from the real work – and the allocation of real resources – necessary to make women safe.
By emphasising the menace of a foreign entertainer, it obscures the real locus of violence: the nuclear family. It’s much easier for politicians to denounce musicians than to acknowledge that most women are hurt or killed within their family, a fundamental social institution.
Furthermore, the exteriorisation of the threat via an immigration ban plays to persistent racial stereotypes about African American men, ideas not so dissimilar to those expressed in the campaign against Sonny Clay and his band.
Everyone knows that rock music is full of misogynists, many of whom have been known to express their sexism in song. Yet somehow it’s always black artists turned back at the borders.
“He has a whole string of convictions,” said Kevin Andrews back in 2007, as he explained why Snoop Dogg wouldn’t get a visa. “He doesn’t seem the sort of bloke we want in this country.”
Could you imagine a similar conversation about, say, serial drug abuser Keith Richards?
In 2015 it’s still far more palatable for politicians and moralists to denounce black artists working in black genres than it is to ban musicians who appeal to white baby boomers.
Over the past decade, border policing has become increasingly central to Australian politics. Think of the publicity the Abbott government gave to its proposal to render terrorism suspects stateless, a concept that appalled civil libertarians. Think of the asylum seekers held in permanent detention without trial, on the basis of Asio assessments that they can neither see nor challenge. Think of Scott Parkin, the non-violence activist denied a visa in 2006 on – wait for it – character grounds.
That’s the context for this debate.
“We urge you to refuse Chris Brown a visa to visit Australia,” says GetUp’s petition. “Due to his conviction of felony assault (a criminal charge), we believe he is in breach of the Australian visa character test, for having ‘a substantial criminal record’,”
When a progressive organisation campaigns for the government to apply its “character test”, it legitimises a mechanism that will invariably be used against asylum seekers, immigrants and progressive activists.
Yes, we must end domestic violence. But that’s not – or shouldn’t be – a fight to close the borders. It’s a fight to change Australia.
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/sep/25/banning-chris-brown-would-only-distract-from-the-fight-against-domestic-violence