tag:theconversation.com,2011:/id/topics/cronulla-4955/articlesCronulla – The Conversation2016-07-29T05:35:51Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/632592016-07-29T05:35:51Z2016-07-29T05:35:51ZThe tragi-comedy Down Under appropriates Cronulla rather than offering insight<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/132455/original/image-20160729-24648-1ehnur1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Courtesy of the Melbourne International Film Festival</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Abe Forsythe’s black comedy <a href="http://tix4.miff.com.au/session.asp?sn=CENTREPIECE+GALA+-+DOWN+UNDER&s=2037&plbsrc=g_f#_ga=1.12111735.2145922839.1463115282">Down Under</a> is set the day after the <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/cronulla-rioters-10-years-later-speak-of-pride-regret-death-im-not-ashamed-20151127-gl9mrh.html">2005 Christmas Cronulla Riots</a> and undertakes a re-processing of these events. It starts with newsreel footage that brings back this raw, racist national wound of running mob fights, the derisive calls, the cars, the drinking, the police batons, the flags and the arrests. </p>
<p>A group of “Leb” and a group of “Skip” men plan retaliations for this event. They are destined to meet in an inevitable car crash that tragically unravels on a dark suburban street. </p>
<p>“Skip” is an inventive piece of Australian slang that simultaneously delivers both the image of the kangaroo and the idea of “white trash”. The film’s archetypal characters promise the in-your-face irrational gestural and verbal violence that Paul Fenech has effectively delivered to our television screens with <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2103538/">Housos</a> and <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0244357/?ref_=fn_al_tt_2">Pizza</a>.</p>
<p>Jason (Damon Herriman) brings together the locals, the movie store employee Shit-Stick (Alexander England), Shit-Stick’s Down’s Syndrome cousin Evan (Chris Bunton) and Ditch (Justin Rosniak), a Ned Kelly admirer. </p>
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<span class="caption">Alexander England, Chris Bunton, Damon Herriman and Justin Rosniak in Down Under (2016).</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Supplied</span></span>
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<p>Ditch, whose head is wrapped in bandages to nurse his new tattoo, is reminiscent of those blurred heads that bring anonymity to some criminal activity in newsreel footage. (Interestingly, this is a news gatherers’ technique that was glaringly missing in the original footage of the riots.)</p>
<p>Lakemba’s Nick (Rahel Romahn) gathers rapper D-Mac (Fayssal Bazzi), the studious Hassim (Lincoln Younes) and the devout Ibrahim (Michael Denkha) to his group for a raid. Guns are involved, each group obtaining theirs by comical means. One is an operational family heirloom from the first world war, the other obtained through a surreal drug underworld situation. </p>
<p>Unlike Fenech’s concoctions, Forsythe uses the Evan and Ibrahim characters to slip in a moral voice, that somehow blunts the “irrational” violence rather than explains it. Trauma is experienced viscerally in the heat of the moment. It is not explained but felt, to be re-processed later, a struggle to bring meaning, story and context. </p>
<p>Yet rather than closing the wound, the film further dumbfounds it. Down Under is entertainment, after all, that appropriates these historic events to its service. It does not deliver any insights into the racism at their core.</p>
<p>Though entertaining, with strong acting performances, Forsythe’s characters lack the unpredictable edge of Fenech’s “working class” characters, who, with their staccato voices and body gestures, affect us before reason kicks in.</p>
<p>In this film we are not inside the storm, but witness an aftermath from both sides of a suburban fence. Both group’s stories are uncannily similar. The perfect storm has subsided, and these are its echoes treated through reason, morality and the “foolishness of male youth” trope of storytelling.</p>
<p>The inherent repetition of the title “Down Under” reminds one of the Australian preference for double negatives like “not bad” rather than “good” and “never say never” for unbridled hope.</p>
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<span class="caption">Down Under (2016).</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Supplied</span></span>
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<p>The crossover between Australian entertainment, comedy and politics has an uneven history. There were Norman Gunston’s gesticulations on the steps of Parliament as Gough Whitlam addressed the crowd during his dismissal and Bob Hawke’s brush-off of Gunston that this was too serious for send-up.</p>
<p>There was the underdog humour of Nick Giannopoulos’s 1980’s Wogs Out of Work and <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0122333/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1">Acropolis Now</a>, which reconfigured the word <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0216417/?ref_=tt_rec_tt">wog</a> as a badge of honour. This was comedy that sourced and transformed the real-life experiences of its writers and their audience. Even earlier, Paul Hogan had re-branded the Australian Ocker from the inside, to later transform it into the heroics of <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0090555/?ref_=nv_sr_1">Crocodile Dundee</a>.</p>
<p>Today, we’ve got to the point where a significant amount of our current affairs news and commentary is actually dished up by comedians on shows like <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2115160/">The Project</a>.</p>
<p>Down Under also brings to mind a 60s and 70s Melbourne radio news program on 3UZ called <a href="https://soundcloud.com/alex-hehr/3uz-newsbeat-dec1964">Newsbeat</a>. Every Sunday morning Newsbeat documented the road accidents of the night before, with on-the-spot reportage and interviews, harvesting the impulsive “Strine” lingo of the misguided youth at the heart of many of its incidents. These documents provided a source for the raw violence expressed through Mad Max’s road culture. Indeed, Down Under’s story would not have been out of place on Newsbeat.</p>
<p>The power of Down Under lies most clearly as a tragic commentary on impulsive male youth car culture, where the inept behaviour of the group visits irreversible consequences on its participants. </p>
<p>Forsythe’s tragi-comedy effectively addresses those switches between the emotional ride and its consequent carnage. As an engaging, deftly-structured male coming of age film it forgets Cronulla, rather than understands it.</p>
<p>Mischievously, I’d make the point that this is our tradition. Forgetting lies at the core of our national identity. After all, “our” foundation event was that Terra Nullius moment when the Union Jack was raised on these shores with the understanding that there was nothing here.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/63259/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dirk de Bruyn does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The male coming of age tale Down Under is set in the aftermath of the 2005 Cronulla riots. But while entertaining, the film doesn’t help us understand the racism at the heart of these traumatic events.Dirk de Bruyn, Associate Professor of Screen, Deakin UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/461402015-12-10T19:14:08Z2015-12-10T19:14:08ZFriday essay: a response to the Cronulla riots, ten years on<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/105194/original/image-20151210-7467-bketzw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The cultural context in which class, ethnic and racial tensions explode into open violence must be analysed honestly. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AAP Image/Paul Miller</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>In mid-December 2005, politicians of all persuasions branded the violent clashes that had just occurred on Sydney’s southern suburbs as “<a href="https://dro.deakin.edu.au/eserv/DU:30043760/halafoff-unaustralianvalues-2006.pdf">un-Australian</a>”. Whether the term was being applied to the racist white thugs who attacked Lebanese beach-goers or to the Chardonnay sippers who defended the “new Australians” right to be there was sometimes not clear.</p>
<p>“Un-Australian” was a <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2005/03/14/1110649126449.html">zeitgeisty linguistic shield</a> a decade ago, successfully wielded by then Prime Minister Howard to fend off accusations that his government insidiously bred divisiveness and enmity among the populace. </p>
<p>(Ousted former Prime Minister Tony Abbott recently tried the same tactics with “<a href="http://www.smh.com.au/comment/tony-abbotts-team-australia-entrenches-inequality-20140821-106sdk.html">Team Australia</a>” but found the nation’s love of a sporting metaphor had hit a sticky wicket.)</p>
<p>Following the Cronulla riots, Howard looked us straight in the eye and <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/pm-refuses-to-use-racist-tag/2005/12/12/1134235985480.html">told us</a> that, “I do not accept there is underlying racism in this country”. Howard insisted that people would not “make judgements about Australia on incidents that occur over a period of a few days”. Cronulla was simply an isolated spot fire, a matter of law and temporarily disturbed order.</p>
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<span class="caption">Former Australian Prime Minister John Howard holds a press conference in Sydney, following the 2005 Cronulla riots.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">AAP Image/Dean Lewins</span></span>
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<p>Since 2005, the emergence of the <a href="http://www.reclaim-australia.com/">Reclaim Australia</a> movement and <a href="https://www.partyforfreedom.org.au/">The Party for Freedom</a> (tagline: “Sydney is fun: Cronulla is a riot”), among other outbursts of brute bigotry and unalloyed stupidity, suggests otherwise. </p>
<p>But, of course, violent civilian conflict is not a recent trend. You don’t have to dig very deep into Australia’s past to reveal multiple episodes of riotous behaviour. Some might say that the peasants have always been revolting.</p>
<p>In fact, Australia’s key foundation stories have a narrative arc based on the slow simmering of social tension and anxiety culminating in an explosive release of group hostility. Similarly, some of our most iconic spaces are written over by the language and logic of territorialism, resistance and cruelty.</p>
<p>These events and places are not footnotes to our history; not graffiti on a pristine landscape of harmonious national growth and development. The frontier violence that lies at the dark heart of our colonial beginnings is the first clue that Australians have always drawn lines in the sand with blood.</p>
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<span class="caption">Chairman of the Party for Freedom Nicholas Folkes (centre) is confronted by Shayne Hunter (left) as he arrives at the Supreme Court in Sydney, Friday, Dec 4, 2015.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">AAP Image/Joel Carrett</span></span>
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<p>Perhaps the armed defence of homeland from an invading force is not strictly riotous behaviour. (The Australian War Memorial <a href="http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/queensland/australian-war-memorial-should-recognise-revised-aboriginal-death-toll-researcher-20140716-ztqr6.html">doesn’t think it’s military behaviour either</a>, for the record.) It is certainly unlikely that any redcoat or man in blue read the Riot Act before condemning Indigenous Australians to massacre.</p>
<p>But there are plenty of bona fides riots. In March 1804 at Castle Hill, 300 convicts rioted against their captors in the <a href="http://monumentaustralia.org.au/australian_monument/display/22941">Vinegar Hill uprising</a>, otherwise known as the Irish Convict Rebellion. Troops killed nine insurgents and the ringleaders were hanged.</p>
<p>In June 1861 at <a href="http://www.sbs.com.au/gold/story.php?storyid=56">Lambing Flat, NSW</a>, 3,000 miners attacked a Chinese camp on the diggings after months of mass protest meetings “for the purpose of taking into consideration whether [the district] is an European gold-field or a Chinese territory”. Tents were burned and the Chinese diggers fled for their lives. The NSW government considered the issue finally settled and restricted Chinese immigration.</p>
<p>The early-closing legislation that ushered in Australia’s infamous “<a href="http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/the-6-oclock-swill-wed-not-have-a-bar-of-it-now-20140111-30ns3.html">six o’clock swill</a>” had its origins during the first world war, as a response to a riot among soldiers. </p>
<p>The Liverpool Riot of 1916, otherwise known as the <a href="http://www.sydneyoutsider.com.au/SydneyOutsider/battle-of-central-station/">Battle of Central Station</a>, saw 15,000 returned Australian soldiers (otherwise known as Anzacs) rampage drunkenly through the streets of Sydney. The soldiers looted shops, commandeered pubs and smashed the windows of stores with foreign sounding names. </p>
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<span class="caption">Kalgoorlie after the race riots in 1934.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia Commons</span></span>
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<p>In 1934, on Australia Day no less, simmering undercurrents in the Western Australian mining districts erupted in open conflict after a bar room brawl. The <a href="http://museum.wa.gov.au/explore/wa-goldfields/getting-gold/ethnic-riots">Kalgoorlie Boulder race riots</a>, as the episode is conventionally known, began after a young, popular local footballer was knocked down and killed by an Italian barman at the Italian-owned Home from Home Hotel. </p>
<p>What followed, in apparent revenge for a mate’s death, was three days of riotous destruction and looting of hotels, shops and businesses belonging to the Italian and Slav communities. Witnesses reported that the mob “just got out of hand”. At the core of the conflagration lurked the politics of envy (imported European miners earned better wages than their local co-workers) and sensitivity to cultural difference. </p>
<p>One bystander reported that,“our women had to step out of the way when an Italian man walked down the street”. (The Cronulla rioters would use similar logic, claiming to be protecting clean Aussie sheilas from the Lebanese men who said “filthy things” to them at the beach.)</p>
<p>Burning down pubs is so common to the history of Australian political expression that it can almost be called a national pastime. Our most emblematic act of rebellion, the <a href="http://www.australia.gov.au/about-australia/australian-story/eureka-stockade">Eureka Stockade</a>, also has its antecedents in the mob attack on a hotel. </p>
<p>In October 1854, a popular young miner was killed by a blow to the head outside Bentley’s Eureka Hotel, on the predominantly Irish-Catholic Eureka lead. </p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/105185/original/image-20151210-7431-kpx6f0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/105185/original/image-20151210-7431-kpx6f0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/105185/original/image-20151210-7431-kpx6f0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=432&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105185/original/image-20151210-7431-kpx6f0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=432&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105185/original/image-20151210-7431-kpx6f0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=432&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105185/original/image-20151210-7431-kpx6f0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=543&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105185/original/image-20151210-7431-kpx6f0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=543&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105185/original/image-20151210-7431-kpx6f0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=543&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Battle of the Eureka Stockade (1834). JB Henderson. Watercolour.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">J. B. Henderson – State Library of NSW. Wikimedia Commons</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The people suspected Bentley, the newly wealthy and well-connected, Irish-Protestant ex-convict publican. When local authorities exonerated Bentley, 5,000 miners converged on the hotel and burnt it to the ground. A subsequent parliamentary inquiry into “the Ballarat riots” found that the incendiary mob included men and women, frustrated at the arbitrary exercise of local justice and the dying hope that the newly appointed Governor Hotham would address miners’ hatred of the iniquitous license fee and lack of access to farming land. </p>
<p>Two months later, Hotham’s law-and-order response to the escalating grievances of the Ballarat population ended in carnage.</p>
<p>In 2004, in the same week as the 150th anniversary of the Eureka rebellion was being commemorated, residents of Palm Island rioted after the death in custody of a <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-09-30/palm-island-riot-footage-shown-to-court-in-class-action-trial/6818074">young Aboriginal man</a>, with chilling echoes of the Redfern riots only ten months earlier. </p>
<p>Both incidents highlighted the “two tribes” mentality that existed between local residents and police in these areas. Informed commentators pointed to the underlying social problems of poverty, unemployment and alcoholism in both communities, problems that successive administrations repeatedly failed to address despite warning signs that intense aggravation was mounting. Blind Freddy, they said, could see it coming.</p>
<p>Riots are not like tsunamis. They do not rise out of nowhere, capriciously assailing all who stand in their way. Riots conform more to the laws of physics than acts of God: pour another teaspoon of liquid into a bowl that has reached its maximum surface tension and the bowl will overflow, no matter whether the last spoonful contained any more bitter medicine than the critical mass below.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/105195/original/image-20151210-7422-1pdq6bd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/105195/original/image-20151210-7422-1pdq6bd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/105195/original/image-20151210-7422-1pdq6bd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=438&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105195/original/image-20151210-7422-1pdq6bd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=438&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105195/original/image-20151210-7422-1pdq6bd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=438&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105195/original/image-20151210-7422-1pdq6bd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=550&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105195/original/image-20151210-7422-1pdq6bd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=550&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105195/original/image-20151210-7422-1pdq6bd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=550&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A man is chased by an angry crowd at Cronulla beach in Sydney, Sunday, Dec. 11, 2005.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">AAP Image/Paul Miller</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>We might not be able to predict exactly when grievance will spill over into riot, but there are some striking parallels in the episodes here briefly recounted. </p>
<p>Young men. Alcohol. Revenge. Contest over shared terrain, whether between autocrats and democrats, insiders and outsiders, gaolers and inmates. A liminal space – the goldfields, the beach, an island – seemingly ungoverned by the rules of everyday life. The oppressive heat of an Australian summer. The peculiar allure and entertainment of mob activity. A sense of entitlement unfulfilled: golden opportunities, the lucky country, we were here first. </p>
<p>Of course, there are points of difference too. Miners at Eureka were responding to the myriad economic and social cleavages wrought by the rapid change of a gold rush, where convicts would be overnight kings. Residents of Cronulla – the “insular peninsula” – demonstrate a resistance to change, defending their long-held monoculture against a feared invader.</p>
<p>Either way, the lesson is that governments would do better to listen to the word on the street, and act with due diligence and a duty of care to all its citizens, rather than to resort to meaningless jingoism and finger-wagging. </p>
<p>The cultural context in which class, ethnic and racial tensions explode into open violence must be analysed honestly and intelligently, alert to (and alarmed by) the gap between rhetoric and reality, between expectation and delivery.</p>
<p>Australia was never <em>terra nullius</em>. Its streets were never lined with enough gold for all. Boys do not have to be boys.</p>
<p>And clearly, not everyone is relaxed and comfortable, or even optimistic and agile, in our sunny suburbs.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/46140/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Clare Wright receives funding from the Australian Research Council.</span></em></p>Australia’s key foundation stories have a narrative arc based on the slow simmering of social tension and anxiety culminating in an explosive release of group hostility. Was Cronulla any different?Clare Wright, Associate Professor in History, La Trobe UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/505852015-12-10T02:52:20Z2015-12-10T02:52:20ZTen years on from the Cronulla riots, how much has really changed?<p>The tenth anniversary of the <a href="http://www.sbs.com.au/cronullariots/">Cronulla riots</a> would be best commemorated through reflection. Two debates erupted immediately after Cronulla – one over Australian racism, the other over Muslim integration. Neither debate is over, as ex-prime minister Tony Abbott’s <a href="http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/opinion/the-religion-of-islam-must-reform/story-fni0cwl5-1227638212523">Wednesday article</a> on Islam’s cultural problems shows. </p>
<p>After Cronulla, Australians were said to be drunken louts who were fundamentally racist, xenophobic and Islamophobic. Australians were also said to be inclusive and tolerant, but when pushed they would defend their space as their great-grandfathers had at Gallipoli. A small minority were fruitcake racist extremists, but they did not reflect the true Australia. </p>
<p>Muslims were said to be angry, racist and sexist, intolerant of others and rejecting of Australian customs and lifestyles. They were also said to be proud, family-oriented and good citizens, but when pushed they would respond physically against their tormentors. A small minority were extremists in love with violence and anxious to use violence to change the world. </p>
<h2>A changing Australian Islamic community</h2>
<p>From Cronulla, a group – led by now deputy NSW police commissioner Nick Kaldas – successfully argued for greater community contact and liaison, with better human intelligence gathering. The building of trust between police and community leaders was accompanied by a greater sophistication in planning, servicing and implementing public order challenges. </p>
<p>This post-Cronulla emphasis on “prevention” has intensified in the wake of more recent public order confrontations – such as the <a href="http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/extremists-seen-among-muslim-rioters-at-sydney-protest/story-fn59niix-1226475406735?login=1">“Sixth Pillar Riot”</a> in Hyde Park in 2012. Some of the protesters included radical Islamists who would later become Islamic State (IS) <a href="http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/nsw/how-the-hyde-park-riot-fired-up-two-australian-muslim-terrorists-khaled-sharrouf-and-mohamed-elomar/story-fni0cx12-1227077119640">activists</a>.</p>
<p>The riot flared after a section of the crowd, participating in a <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/police-gas-sydney-protesters-20120915-25yrb.html">protest</a> against an American anti-Islamic film, broke away and tried to reach the US consulate. Police stopped the group and physical confrontation ensued.</p>
<p>That marked a critical point in how Sydney’s Muslims would perceive and engage with organised violence perpetrated in their name. Detailed discussions between leaders of various groups urged a group of religious leaders, alongside Kaldas, to <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/national/islamic-protests-hit-home-20120915-25zjr.html">publicly denounce</a> the violence. Following this, imams were pledged to do the same within mosques and prayer halls. </p>
<p>The tension placed these leaders under two strong pressures. The radical and violent wing demanded the mainstream surrender to a caliphatic agenda of separating Muslims from a supposedly irredeemably Islamophobic Australian society. The integrationist – but more fearful – mainstream insisted on civil engagement and performance of Australian citizenship. </p>
<p>Bravely, leaders denounced the breakaway activists and reasserted their loyalty and commitment to Australia. </p>
<p>That period marked the further intensification of the wider Muslim community’s partnership with Australian authorities in confronting violent extremism. It also marked the jihadist minority’s separation from the wider community and their further commitment to violence. </p>
<p>Soon after this, Australian IS supporters began to appear on the public radar – and the tension between jihadists and everyone else continues.</p>
<h2>Rise of the racist right</h2>
<p>The caliphatic bloom was matched by a surge of anti-Islamic fervour, self-described recently as <a href="http://www.reclaim-australia.com">Reclaim Australia</a>. Australia’s organised racists used the Cronulla events to reflect on and rework their strategies. Cronulla was a very successful expression of their ideology and practice – one that poked their message into the public eye. </p>
<p>Over the past decade, the rapid transformation of social media has expanded the way in which their activism is organised and their ideologies communicated. The focus on Muslims has provided them with a more unitary, and much larger, target than the Cronulla focus of “Lebs”. </p>
<p>The NSW Police <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/mediawatch/transcripts/ep38cronulla1.pdf">Strikeforce Neil report</a> demonstrated the crucial role of media in mobilising hate. Radio, as it was listened to in cars (as in <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-10-02/tribunal-rules-alan-jones-incited-hatred/4292052">hate-mongering from Alan Jones</a>), and SMS on mobile phones – in the era before the new smartphones were omnipresent, but when texts could be sent and rebroadcast on a mass scale – helped wrap people in a shared sense of purpose. </p>
<p>The racist groups have demonstrated their proficiency with the leading edge of media ever since. Twitter feeds, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, WhatsApp, Snapchat and, most recently, Telegram are used to organise and focus supporters, and to recruit new followers. Jihadists, as well, have perfected the use of social media. Authorities are running to catch up.</p>
<p>The speed with which Reclaim Australia came into being and its success in feeding off local issues, such as the <a href="http://www.sbs.com.au/news/video/543390787711/The-Bendigo-mosque-debate-The-Feed">Bendigo mosque debate</a>, suggests we will see a continually invigorated nativist and racist movement in Australia. Larger inter-group confrontations are likely, too, appearing with extraordinary rapidity, sought by those who grow on insecurity and fear, and drawing in activists carrying real weapons.</p>
<h2>Learning to invest in integration</h2>
<p>Governments, at the level of officialdom, increasingly realise that a co-ordinated approach integrating policing with community development is the only way to secure social cohesion. Local government has become one front line, working with state government and not-for-profit organisations. </p>
<p>Yet confidence in government among young activists from both “sides” of the story has never been lower. Even the middle ground finds government unconvincing and intimidating. </p>
<p>The NSW Liberal Party has discovered that close links with the Muslim community can produce great outcomes. The federal Liberal Party, however, has discovered nothing of this. Its leaders – other than Turnbull – <a href="https://theconversation.com/yes-lets-have-a-frank-and-open-discussion-about-the-causes-of-extremism-and-terrorism-51726">delight in Muslim-baiting</a>.</p>
<p>Those conservative Muslim-heavy seats that tilted towards the Liberals in 2013 won’t stay there, especially as Islamophobia seems to be a mindset among the conservatives at the national level. </p>
<p>As a society, we are beginning to learn that investing in and expressing inclusion works better than focusing on exclusion. That’s been a slow learning process, and we’re not there yet. Thinking about how everyone can have a stake in the game is crucial – on all sides. </p>
<p>But a decade on from Cronulla we haven’t worked that one out. Both the racist right and the jihadis see this failure as an opportunity for their agenda to progress. They need each other, but we don’t need either of them.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/50585/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Andrew Jakubowicz receives funding from the Australian Research Council for research on cyber-racism. He is a member of MulticulturalNSW Advisory Board, and has been a member of the NSW Police Commissioner's Community Reference Panel. This article is written in his capacity as a researcher, and does not reflect the opinion of MNSW or the NSW Police, nor does it use any information available confidentially to members of the MNSW Board or the NSW CCRP. </span></em></p>A decade on from the Cronulla Riots, Australia needs to reflect upon the lessons that should be learnt following the riot which divided a nation.Andrew Jakubowicz, Emeritus Professor of Sociology, University of Technology SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/279272014-06-19T04:30:23Z2014-06-19T04:30:23ZOnce Upon a Time in Punchbowl rescues Lebanese honour from shame<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/51454/original/jbx66xc2-1403058527.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C59%2C1080%2C780&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Muslim and Christian Lebanese join with other communities to rally against racism. The Lebanese in Australia story is the subject of a new SBS documentary series, Once Upon a Time in Punchbowl.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Andrew Jakubowicz</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Mediterranean societies have been described as communities of honour and shame. The fundamental currency of their social order is respect. When the Lebanese civil war drove thousands of its citizens to seek refuge in Australia after it began in 1975, a moral economy of respect travelled with them.</p>
<p>This moral economy confronted a society not ready to receive the migrants; nor were they expecting what they found. The story of the sometimes fraught relationship of Lebanese immigrants, their children and Australian society underpins SBS and Northern Pictures’ four-part series <a href="http://www.sbs.com.au/programs/onceuponatimein/?position=CTA&cid=23224">Once Upon a Time in Punchbowl</a>, which is set to premiere on SBS One on Thursday, June 19, at 8:30PM.</p>
<p>In the midst of Australia’s confusion in 1976 over how it should or could respond to people fleeing crises, the Fraser government introduced a <a href="http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/num_reg/magr1989n365400/s107.html">Lebanese concession</a> that eased restrictions applying to normal immigration applications, especially in relation to employment skills, language and ability to assimilate.</p>
<p>Around 20,000 Lebanese <a href="http://researchbank.swinburne.edu.au/vital/access/services/Download/swin:5217/SOURCE1/">arrived in Australia</a> over the next four years. Just under half were Muslim (mainly Sunni but also Shia from the south), joining a Lebanese Arabic community that had been until then overwhelmingly Christian with smaller Druze and Alawi groups.</p>
<p>As <a href="http://recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/DetailsReports/ItemDetail.aspx?Barcode=8861629&isAv=N">government reports</a> at the time show, many of the refugees from rural parts of Lebanon were poorly educated and lacked skills necessary for work in Australia. They were often traumatised by the war, and some had lost family and homes in the back-and-forth movement of forces. They also entered the country as industrial employment opportunities were contracting and investment in education was being reduced.</p>
<p>As a result, the conditions were put in place that would lead to significant and growing frictions with wider Australian society, especially for a minority that would become more marginalised and alienated.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/51449/original/ds8hsvhr-1403058140.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/51449/original/ds8hsvhr-1403058140.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/51449/original/ds8hsvhr-1403058140.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/51449/original/ds8hsvhr-1403058140.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/51449/original/ds8hsvhr-1403058140.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/51449/original/ds8hsvhr-1403058140.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/51449/original/ds8hsvhr-1403058140.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/51449/original/ds8hsvhr-1403058140.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Multicultural services officer Nemat Kharboutli will feature in the Once Upon a Time in Punchbowl series.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">SBS Publicity</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>These initial conditions of settlement were not to be easily resolved. Sociological <a href="https://www.ncjrs.gov/criminal_justice2000/vol_1/02j.pdf">research</a> suggests that the first period of immigrant settlement is chaotic, and the first things to get organised are <a href="http://www.multiculturalaustralia.edu.au/doc/viet_aust.doc">crime and religion</a>. Each struggles for the hearts, minds, money, fears and hopes of people setting out on new lives.</p>
<p>By 1977, the first Lebanese Sunni mosque was established in Lakemba in Sydney’s southwest, but there were also signs that both the longer-established Christians and the newly arrived Muslims were generating what would become significant criminal networks. </p>
<p>There is <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/society-and-culture/in-the-cross-fire-20100320-qn4m.html">some evidence</a> that it was the Christian-background criminals who were moving in on Sydney’s lucrative Kings Cross drug trade that were recruiting Muslim-background youth from the western suburbs to provide muscle and deal the drugs at street level.</p>
<p>This latter group would later break away – or be forced out – and build its own black economy in Punchbowl around Telopea St and Punchbowl Park. Meanwhile, the same generation of refugee Vietnamese youth was doing much the same <a href="https://theconversation.com/i-love-pho-tough-love-democracy-and-the-vietnamese-journey-4912">in Cabramatta</a>, a few suburbs away.</p>
<p>The Lebanese story has been marked by moments of public crisis, and these have served as the backbone for the Once Upon a Time in Punchbowl narrative. The 1991 Gulf War, where anti-Arab racism was widespread in public and media reactions to the conflict, confronted the Lebanese with <a href="http://statecrime.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/poynting2007a.pdf">questions</a> about their loyalty to Australia. </p>
<p>As during World War Two when Australia <a href="https://theconversation.com/when-ethnicity-counts-civilian-internment-in-australia-during-ww2-3273">interned thousands of Italians</a>, many of whom were citizens, paranoia about the enemy within was widespread. This had a major impact on a generation of young people who had been promised they were both Arab and Australian in contemporary multiculturalism, but were now told they had to choose. This period marked the first major upsurge in anti-Arab sentiment. </p>
<p>By 1993, tensions were growing between police and young people, especially in southwest Sydney. Facing an education system that had systemically failed many of them, as well as mainstream racism and being drawn into alternative ways of gaining respect in criminal networks, some young Lebanese found a certain freedom and respect in a world of drug use. </p>
<p>In October 1993, police attacked a group of young people at an Arabic community picnic, using dogs and batons to break up what they claimed was a riot. Later <a href="http://www.parliament.nsw.gov.au/prod/parlment/hansart.nsf/V3Key/LA19931027028">inquiries</a> supported community claims of police racism. The situation deteriorated further with the <a href="http://ro.uow.edu.au/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1211&context=apme">rise of Hansonism</a> in the mid- to late-1990s.</p>
<p>Into the midst of these local events came a series of new global crises involving Australians – the 9/11 terror attacks by Islamic terrorist group al-Qaeda and the subsequent invasion of Afghanistan, the murders of Australians among others by jihadists in Bali in 2002, and the 2003 invasion of Iraq in which Australia was also involved. </p>
<p>Each of these events set up “the enemy” as either Arab or Muslim – or both. With the largest single group of Muslim Arabs in Sydney coming from Lebanon, they became the proxy target despite not being involved in any of these events.</p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/51458/original/gj8fzkf2-1403059077.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/51458/original/gj8fzkf2-1403059077.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/51458/original/gj8fzkf2-1403059077.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/51458/original/gj8fzkf2-1403059077.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/51458/original/gj8fzkf2-1403059077.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/51458/original/gj8fzkf2-1403059077.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/51458/original/gj8fzkf2-1403059077.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/51458/original/gj8fzkf2-1403059077.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">In Once Upon a Time in Punchbowl, the Lebanese in Australia story is told by those who have lived it.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">SBS Publicity</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>These events also introduced a new dimension into the Australian mix: radical jihadism. Some young people found the promise of new meaning and a form of ego-asserting salvation in the <a href="http://www.theage.com.au/news/national/controversial-mufti-attacks-australia-in-tv-interview/2007/01/11/1168105116655.html">increasingly militant language</a> of some minority Islamist preachers. </p>
<p>Imbued with a masculinist discourse which confronted the demeaning racism that had undermined the perceived honour of men for generations, many were drawn to the space in which faith could be used not to reassert a Muslim identity within Australian society, but rather assert a new identity against Australian society and the wider targets of jihadism. </p>
<p>It would have been hard to imagine a more volatile situation. It boiled over in December 2005, when – <a href="http://www.theage.com.au/news/national/alan-jones-im-the-person-thats-led-this-charge/2005/12/12/1134236003153.html">spurred on</a> by Sydney radio shock-jock Alan Jones – <a href="http://www.sbs.com.au/cronullariots/">Cronulla beach</a> became the scene for savage attacks on anyone of Middle Eastern appearance. </p>
<p>That evening, young men gathered at Punchbowl Park and moved east in convoys, retaliating against those symbols of the “other” Australia that had so debased them. The RSL at Brighton–le-Sands, cars and shops in Maroubra and Anglo-looking men walking along the darkened streets of the eastern suburbs all became targets for revenge. </p>
<p>Out of that conflict arose a new determination by the mainstream Lebanese Muslim community to assert a right to be seen as part of Australian society. This took on a number of forms, from the conservative to the deviant. In the 2011 NSW state election, the new leaders of the Lebanese Muslim Association <a href="http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/state-politics/muslim-lobby-group-backs-libs-in-labor-strongholds/story-e6frgczx-1226010987975">publicly supported</a> the Liberal Party, thereby delivering two or three seats that might otherwise have stayed in Labor hands. </p>
<p>Not far away, local bikie gangs such as Notorious were growing as they <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/national/religious-divide-drives-bikie-war-20090215-887l.html">recruited young Lebanese</a> of all religious origins into their ranks. Ultimately, Notorious in Sydney was closed down by police action.</p>
<p>Once Upon a Time in Punchbowl tells this story and others through the eyes of those who have lived it. If anything is clear it is that the politics of respect has had to be rescued from those who have turned it toxic, and though the perpetrators exist on all sides the rescuers are gaining strength.</p>
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<p><em>Once Upon a Time in Punchbowl premieres at 8.30pm, Thursday June 19, on SBS ONE.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/27927/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Andrew Jakubowicz was consultant sociologist and wrote the "multicultural narrative" on Once Upon a Time in Punchbowl produced by Northern Pictures for SBS, in which he also appears. He has received funding from the Department of Immigration and Citizenship for academic and policy research on Muslim youth. His research work with Lebanese communities goes back to his honours government thesis on Redfern in 1969, when he first met Dr Marie Bashir, a community psychiatrist. He is especially grateful to academic colleagues whose work over many years has produced such a rich reservoir of empirical information about how the challenges of multiculturalism and the Lebanese have been intertwined, and to his many Lebanese informants from across the board who have shared openly their fears and hopes and insights.</span></em></p>Mediterranean societies have been described as communities of honour and shame. The fundamental currency of their social order is respect. When the Lebanese civil war drove thousands of its citizens to…Andrew Jakubowicz, Professor of Sociology and Codirector of Cosmopolitan Civil Societies Research Centre, University of Technology SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/131512013-03-29T22:07:33Z2013-03-29T22:07:33ZASADA can throw the AFL into chaos - and here’s how<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/21888/original/znf9zkmd-1364536916.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">James Hird suffers an injury as a player. Could yet worse hurt be to come?</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AAP Image</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>AFL club Essendon has so far avoided the imposition of any sanctions by the Australian Sports Anti-Doping Authority (ASADA). Yet the investigation into the activities of the club, especially the supplements program allegedly involving injections to the stomach of players, remains ongoing.</p>
<p>While the principle of innocence until guilt is proven remains, the Bombers are still a long way from walking out the proverbial front door, their heads held high. They are not the only AFL club under investigation, with Geelong and Gold Coast also facing questions from ASADA.</p>
<p>Journalist Caroline Wilson speculated recently on the Channel 9 program Footy Classified as to the implications of Essendon being found guilty of breaching various elements of the ASADA code. They are potentially disastrous not just for Essendon FC and some of its players, but for the whole AFL.</p>
<p>While it is important to re-iterate that no such breaches have yet been found or admitted, it is also worth investigating what might happen to the competition if penalties like six month or even two year bans are imposed on players and coaching staff.</p>
<p>As it stands, such an outcome is still a definite possibility.</p>
<h2>Stripping points</h2>
<p><a href="http://www.theage.com.au/afl/afl-news/bombers-secret-deal-exposed-20130327-2guq0.html">As a recent article by Roy Masters outlines</a>, a deal had been mooted with ASADA whereby Essendon escaped sanction while the Cronulla Sharks received a six month ban. </p>
<p>The AFL has yet to strip a team of a premiership or deprive them of the opportunity to play for premiership points or suspend them from the competition, but the National Rugby League has stripped the Melbourne Storm of two premierships and required it to play out a season without receiving points.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.asada.gov.au/">ASADA</a> is an agency of the Commonwealth, so it is subject to Commonwealth administrative law, but it relies on its contractual arrangements with individual sports to enforce its recommended sanctions.</p>
<p>The ASADA Code requires that individual players be sanctioned for taking banned substances. This seems unfair in the case of the Essendon players, who had reason to believe that they were being administered the substances in the course of their employment. </p>
<p>If anyone is to be sanctioned, it should be the club that allowed the treatment to take place. Yet ASADA and the World Anti-Doping Authority (WADA) is clear that players must take ultimate responsibility for what goes into their bodies: ignorance is not a defence, no matter how unfair it may seem.</p>
<h2>The letter of the law</h2>
<p>There is a massive issue of due process here. Essendon players (and indeed the Cronulla players) have returned no positive tests for banned substances. Yet Lance Armstrong never tested positive either.</p>
<p>In keeping with the approach of ASADA and the Australian Crime Commission when they went public with their allegations, ASADA is trying to negotiate guilty pleas and implication of others in return for imposition of light sanctions. </p>
<p>Proper process is to investigate, lay charges and have the charges heard by an independent tribunal. ASADA attempts to be both prosecutor and judge, recommending a penalty to the sport’s governing body which that body then imposes.</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/21887/original/gjk4d4w4-1364535763.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/21887/original/gjk4d4w4-1364535763.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/21887/original/gjk4d4w4-1364535763.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/21887/original/gjk4d4w4-1364535763.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/21887/original/gjk4d4w4-1364535763.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/21887/original/gjk4d4w4-1364535763.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/21887/original/gjk4d4w4-1364535763.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Cronulla Sharks coach Steve Flanagan was stood down and reinstated during the course of an ASADA investigation into supplement use at the club.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">AAP/Jane Dempster</span></span>
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<p>Essendon and its players are yet to be charged, let alone found guilty. However the ASADA code allows for an Anti-doping Rule Violation “ADRV” to be found against an athlete even without a positive test.</p>
<p>If there is some sort of plea bargain, the AFL may indeed seek to impose sanctions mid-season. The ASADA code focuses on individual guilt, so it is not clear whether it could sanction the club as a whole. Individual players could be suspended and Essendon could perhaps field its VFL team, though it would then disrupt the VFL. This would also require the approval of the AFL Commission and the other 17 clubs.</p>
<h2>In the event Essendon are found guilty …</h2>
<p>Essendon might withdraw from the remaining games, unable to field a team. This would clearly affect contractual arrangements for the staging and broadcast of matches. The AFL might allow Essendon to continue to compete but without the possibility of further premiership points, as occured with the Melbourne Storm. </p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/21886/original/km4v3rdg-1364534900.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/21886/original/km4v3rdg-1364534900.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=807&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/21886/original/km4v3rdg-1364534900.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=807&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/21886/original/km4v3rdg-1364534900.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=807&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/21886/original/km4v3rdg-1364534900.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1014&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/21886/original/km4v3rdg-1364534900.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1014&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/21886/original/km4v3rdg-1364534900.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1014&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">James Hird wears a North Melbourne Kangaroos jumper in honour of North champion Glenn Archer. Essendon is under investigation by ASADA for possible breaches of the anti-doping code.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">AAP/Martin Philbey</span></span>
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<p>It is hard to see how they could be stripped of any points already won as the AFL is allowing the club to compete while under investigation. In any case, any sanctioning of the club should be in relation to the 2012 season when the alleged violations occurred.</p>
<p>The AFL certainly has cause to regret signing on with ASADA. Threatened with the withdrawal of federal government funding if it did not sign on to the WADA requirements, the AFL felt its hands were tied. The richest sporting organisation in the land may yet come to bitterly regret that decision.</p>
<h2>No winners in a tawdry saga</h2>
<p>The ASADA code does not seem well adapted to dealing with club-approved doping as it is geared to punishing individuals.</p>
<p>The least disruptive method would be for the players to serve a six-month ban during the off-season, but this would bring ASADA further into disrepute. It would also call in question natural justice - if players are to be punished, surely they must miss matches?</p>
<p>This is an opportune moment to take a good look at the operations of ASADA, which is affiliated with the WADA, headed by Australia’s own John Fahey. </p>
<p>It has the power to destroy not just individual careers but whole teams and indeed competitions. While the investigation into Essendon and Cronulla for injecting their players with substances that may not have been banned at the time has been a wake-up call to clubs, ASADA’s powers and investigative methods would benefit from an injection of due process.</p>
<p>One thing is for sure. The AFL, and especially Essendon, would like this whole sorry business put to bed as soon as possible.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/13151/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Matt Harvey does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>AFL club Essendon has so far avoided the imposition of any sanctions by the Australian Sports Anti-Doping Authority (ASADA). Yet the investigation into the activities of the club, especially the supplements…Matt Harvey, Lecturer in Law, Victoria UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/126772013-03-06T19:44:21Z2013-03-06T19:44:21ZNRL: more than Sharks in the water at Cronulla?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/21019/original/s3bj5yhd-1362564949.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">NRL CEO David Smith at this week's season launch. The NRL now faces a challenge to its credibility with an ASADA investigation into performance enhancing drug use.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AAP Image/Mick Tsikas</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>When millimetres can be the difference between glory and anonymity, how far will some athletes go to get an edge? For some, it seems, not even their soul is too high a price.</p>
<p>In a day sports authorities have been fearing, fallout from ASADA’s “Organised Crime and Drugs in Sport” report begins with the reported drug code breach of up to 14 players from the Cronulla Sharks, all of whom face bans if proven to be guilty of offences against the ASADA code.</p>
<p>At the time of writing, no formal action had been taken by ASADA against Cronulla or its players, <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/rugby-league/league-news/suspensions-loom-for-host-of-cronulla-stars-hit-by-scandal-20130306-2flrf.html">although reports suggest</a> players thought to have been discovered using illegal performance enhancing drugs have been offered six month bans if they plead guilty as opposed to the two years such offences normally warrant.</p>
<p>What does this mean for the NRL? It remains to be seen, but one can only think that this is the beginning of a long, hard saga for new CEO David Smith. What we know is that at least six NRL clubs - Cronulla, Penrith, Manly, Canberra, Newcastle and North Queensland (although Manly and Canberra have <a href="http://www.news.com.au/sport/nrl/phil-gould-says-panthers-have-been-given-no-details-of-accs-mention/story-fndujljl-1226575884763">subsequently been cleared</a>) - are the focus of ASADA’s “Project Aperio”, cracking down on performance-enhancing drugs and the influence of organised crime in sport. </p>
<p>At least one of those clubs – the Canberra Raiders – appears to have been cleared. The Newcastle Knights and Penrith Panthers are also suspected to be among those targeted. Given the fallout from the Sharks, there’s reason to believe we’ll be hearing more from ASADA and the NRL in the future.</p>
<p>For the present, what the NRL faces is serious questions of integrity: How many players are still to be ousted? Is my club next? How informed were the players? Did they know what they were taking? Would it matter? Were the coaches in on it? </p>
<p>You can bet your bottom dollar the punters will raise an eyebrow at the clubs sitting on top of the ladder once the season begins. How can we believe in a sport populated (to some extent) by cheats?</p>
<p>There could be financial repercussions as well. If the competition loses its intrinsic credibility, ticket sales will fall away, fewer people will tune in, sponsors will turn away (it’s lucky the new TV deal is already finalised). Ironically, the Cronulla Sharks are currently seeking a new major sponsor. These developments cannot help in that process.</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/21021/original/vjczwd84-1362565376.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/21021/original/vjczwd84-1362565376.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=339&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/21021/original/vjczwd84-1362565376.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=339&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/21021/original/vjczwd84-1362565376.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=339&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/21021/original/vjczwd84-1362565376.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=426&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/21021/original/vjczwd84-1362565376.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=426&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/21021/original/vjczwd84-1362565376.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=426&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Sports ‘chemist’ Stephen Dank is at the centre of an ASADA investigation stretching across two codes.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">ABC/730</span></span>
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<p>The Sharks will still be able to field a team, that much is clear. Recruiting over the last couple of years has been a priority for the Sharks, so a lot of their roster weren’t there in 2011. But it’s unlikely that they’ll be competitive: if even half of the players in question are from their first grade roster (rather than junior players), it will leave a serious dent in their side; a wooden spoon sized dent.</p>
<p>The bigger question to come out of this saga is how long this kind of doping has been going on within the NRL and how widespread is it? People tune in to WWF wrestling knowing it’s pretend - could professional sports like rugby be headed the same way?</p>
<p>In response to Lance Armstrong’s scandalous revelations of systematic doping, the response of some was that doping should be made legal. The manner in which some substances are banned and others are not is arbitrary; given all athletes are on something, why not open the door to all substances? After all, faster, stronger athletes make for a more exciting game.</p>
<p>But in reality, it would be the legalising of currently-banned substances that would turn professional sport into a WWF-like farce. Sport pushes athletes to their physical and psychological limits in the interest of self-discovery: their ability to handle responsibility; to work well with others; the respect they show the opposition and so on. </p>
<p>In striving for the best, athletes not only find themselves, but shape themselves for the better. If we eliminate the limits of the human body, we eliminate what makes sport a truly human endeavour, and with it, sport’s ability to make us better people.</p>
<p>The fallout of the ASADA investigations is unfortunately likely to affect a number of different sporting codes, and players and fans alike may lose heart. </p>
<p>Over the coming months it’s likely that the debate about legalising performance enhancers will resurface. When it does, it’s worth remembering that it would change the nature of sport forever. It isn’t worth it.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/12677/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Matthew Beard does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>When millimetres can be the difference between glory and anonymity, how far will some athletes go to get an edge? For some, it seems, not even their soul is too high a price. In a day sports authorities…Matthew Beard, Research Associate, Centre for Faith, Ethics and Society, University of Notre Dame AustraliaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.