'Racist' cartoon gets Charlie Hebdo comparison by Aussie Press Council

The Australian Press Council has declined to rule on a recent cartoon in The Australian newspaper that many dubbed as racist and offensive.

Illustrator Bill Leak contributed the cartoon after details of the "torture" of juvenile Indigenous prisoners at Don Dale Detention Facility was exposed via leaked security footage. The cartoon seemed to many to suggest Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander fathers don't know their own children and it received condemnation for upholding racist stereotypes.

Despite receiving over 700 complaints, which the Australian Press Council chair, David Weisbrot, said were "mainly from individuals but also from leading Indigenous groups and peak associations," the organisation decided to take no action.

Had the Press Council ruled that one of its core principles were broken by the cartoon, The Australian could have been forced to make a formal apology.

In a statement released Tuesday, Weisbrot said "the best outcome in the public interest is to promote free speech and the contest of ideas through the publication of two major op-ed pieces in The Australian, providing Indigenous perspectives on the cartoon and shedding light on the underlying issues."

Original image has been replaced. Credit: Mashable

He continued, "the Press Council understands and actively champions the notion that freedom of speech and freedom of the press are the essential underpinnings of a liberal democracy." However, he added, "longstanding tradition dictates that satire and cartooning should be afforded even greater latitude, which is why the 'Je suis Charlie' campaign, which started after a terrorist attack in Paris killed a number of journalists and cartoonists, resonated so powerfully around the world."

Contemporary Aboriginal artist Brenda Croft, who is of Gurindji, Malngin, Mudpurra and Bilinara heritage, said the cartoon's release (which coincided with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children's Day) "says everything about the black and white divide in Australia today."

"It's a shallow superficial easy target. Really that kind of cartoon is just outrageous, all it does is reinforce every stereotype put out there by right wing people," she told NITV.

Meanwhile, chief executive of the Secretariat of National Aboriginal and Islander Child Care, Gerry Moore, said in an op-ed the image by "cartoonist of the year" award-winning Bill Leak was "never going to foster a constructive debate about intergenerational trauma, or issues of alcoholism and family breakdown that are born from it, or the lack of support for frontline services that work to address these issues."

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However, the controversial cartoon inspired a powerful rebuttal in the form of #IndigenousDads, a nationwide hashtag celebrating fathers as they really are, not as they're perceived by some complete stranger.

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