Why I stand for Yes, and why that’s hard to say out loud

On August 29 2023, in the early afternoon, I tweeted what might have been my first unambiguous statement in support of a Yes vote for the Indigenous Voice to Parliament.  

I made this statement not because I was suddenly willing to support the Voice but because I was finally willing to say so publicly. It’s time for the Voice, and time for me to talk about it. I may lose friends. People I love might hold my support for the Voice against me. But I have to make a stand.

From the moment I stuck my head over the parapet, the abuse has been constant — and a constant reminder of why I have stayed out of it. Yet the abuse is why I will now continue. They come for me no matter how mild my statements are, so I may as well go hard.

My stance is not new. I was first exposed to the Uluru Statement from the Heart in its entirety at Barunga Festival in 2018, when a copy on canvas was produced, allowing visitors to the festival to sign the border in support. I signed my support back then, and I have supported the Uluru statement in its entirety, and the Voice to Parliament, since I first read the document. My support has never wavered. I have planned to vote Yes to the referendum from the moment it was suggested.  

Deciding to vote Yes and deciding to talk about it in public are different things.

I have been making ambiguous statements for months, and the vitriol has been intolerable. The debate has been toxic, as poisonous and disgusting as the marriage plebiscite but for one difference that rides this debate straight to hell. In the marriage plebiscite, there were few, if any, LGBTQIA+ people campaigning on the No side; we could be sure that if we were arguing with someone, we disagreed because of their prejudices. 

In the case of the Voice referendum, there are people campaigning for No who are like me, who are my friends, who stand to lose as much as I will if this referendum fails.

I didn’t speak on the referendum because I didn’t want to engage in this space. People who support the Yes vote get attacked from all sides — racist abuse from the mainstream No and attacks from our friends who are part of the “sovereignty No” and adjacent movements. For example, I was once accused by an Indigenous woman of wanting genocide against my own people for pointing out that the majority of Indigenous people support the Voice.

Perhaps if you wish to be brutal you could consider me afraid, and it would not be far from the truth to say that I was afraid of losing friends. In reality, I did not speak out explicitly because I didn’t want to hurt my friends or alienate anybody. I remain aware that after this referendum we all still need to live with ourselves.

Now that time, when I stayed in the shadows because people I love are fighting against what I believe in, is over. I will upset people no matter what I do, if I stay quiet or speak up, so the only option left is to take a stand for what I believe in. People I respect have asked me to speak up, to stand tall and be ready to fight. So I will take a stand: our people deserve and need a Voice.

If there are personal consequences from my stance, I will live with them. If I don’t take a stand I won’t be able to live with myself.

The Voice is far from perfect. The government having the power to decide its structure and how it is selected is one issue. However, after the long and complicated life I have lived, after all I have learned and said, one fact stands out: nothing is perfect, and you never get precisely what you want. Every action and every change requires compromise, both in our personal lives and in politics. 

The Voice referendum is no exception, and what I have learned from life and my Noongar elders is that you negotiate rather than demand, and you work with people who want to work with you.

That is why I will vote Yes, why I am joining in the campaign for the Yes vote, why I am taking a stand, and why I am, finally, talking about it.