Maggie Blanden - Beyond the Vote: First Nations Yarn on Post-Referendum Impacts

This podcast is brought to you by on Track Studio. Welcome to Yarning Up, the podcast that showcases First Nations stories and conversations to help us learn and unlearn Australia's history to work towards a better future. I'm your host, proud barber woman and founder of Black Wadel Coaching and Consulting, Caroline cow We acknowledge the rundery people and elders where this podcast is taped, but we also acknowledge the lands

Well.

I'm super super excited to speak to my next guest, a young sister girl who I've been following for quite some time, who's been doing amazing working community, especially around educating the masses on the now failed referendum. It's been a week since Australia.

By a large margin, voted against enshrining the Aboriginal voice in the Constitution, and so I'm really excited to be meeting with Maggie Blandon today decide to talk a little bit about the aftermath of the referendum.

And where we can possibly possibly go next.

So thank you so much for being here with me today, sister Lovely, to connect in this way.

Absolutely, thank you so much for having me. I actually have to double take when I saw the message, I was like, are you soest? This is so special, So thank you so much for even considering me to come on and have a yarm.

Oh no, don't be silly.

We'd love to have you on. You've been doing so much amazing work and this is what the show is all about, is bringing people like you to Australia and across the other side of the world.

So the feeling is very mutual. Before we dive.

Into the referendum and what you're doing at Melbourne University, I'd love you to start, you know, as we always do it, yearning up with just a little bit about yeah, who you are, who's your mob, a bit about your personal story, anything you feel called to share.

Absolutely so.

My name is Maggie Ida Blandon. I'm a proud pallow, a woman from Lutuita, Tasmania. I always like to pay tribute to the people that have come for me, the giants whose shoulders and I'm trying to stand on. So I've got my great grandmother, Auntie Ida West or Grunny Ducks to me. She was an amazing advocate for Aboriginal

His absence has really felt.

He passed away a few years ago, but I feel like he's most known in our community. For I feel like everyone knows the Tasmanian Dam's case, or you know, the Franklin River campaign where we wanted to stop the damning of the Franklin River. It was kind of the birth of the Greens Party, and you know, it's where Bob Brown kind of came to light. But it was also for us a moment where our community banned together

It was it was us.

It is our community, and we didn't want it to be absolutely destroyed by the damning of it. So his legacy is something that I'm trying and my Auntie Ida West legacy is something that I'm always trying to live up to. I've grown up in community down in lotrowa biggest mob down there. Shout out to you all. Went to our Aboriginal daycare down there, which was the coolest experience of my life. I'm so grateful that we even

You know.

We've grown up jumping on the Aboriginal school bus heading to all the protests that were happening in Nippolona whenever we were needed, us young fellas, and that was something that I've continued to kind of hold onto, that fight and that passion.

So that's me.

Well gosh, So you know, after hearing that, I'm not surprised that you come from this long line of worriors. All my follows do.

But you know, just to hear that story about your your old ones and where you come from, it can't of makes a lot more sense about you know, the person that you are and the legacies that you're creating and the pathways you're creating.

And I love.

Hearing those stories. I mean, stories are medicine. They there are ways that we make sense.

Of the world, but as Black followers, there's ways that we make sense of ourselves.

And so to hear that, that's so beautiful.

I loved I love a garden named after me one day.

Literally at the sight of such a violent and like horrible genocide that happened to our people, it just it forms who we are as Poloor people today. And to have a sight of healing named after you to remind us all to keep going, to have those moments of joy to have those times where you sit and reflects something so special about her legacy. I love that people felt that that was the right thing to do. Yeah.

Yeah, there's obviously no way to look at that in terms of you know, how horrific the genocide and that the massacre would be. But there's something to be told about black fellows to make things that are so inherently violent still have that black and rich beauty to some expert, and the remembrance and the reclamation of that is really something that can be yeah, to be explored. But yeah, wow, that's really fascinating to learn about your your personal story.

But yeah, I mean what led you to law and justice? Was it your old ones? Was it your family? What what talked me through how you got there in your life? Yeah?

Absolutely, it's always my old ones that inspire everything I do. I've always had the power of education driven into me as a young The younger, it was always you will go to school and you will get terstory education. And you know, people can get resentful about that and can be like, but I just want to, you know, go

Could be criminal law.

Sadly, you know, overrepresented in the criminal justice system. The most incarcerated people on this damp planet could be family in law, with having children ripped away from us like nothing else. We're literally witnessing a second stolen generation could be land rights, it could be ip I'm not sure. I'm graduating in a few weeks, so I really need to narrow that down and pick something to work on

Yeah, gosh, it's so I mean, you're so right a lot in that context about you know, the importance of education and how you know, so many of our old ones really instill that legitimacy by the colony to have that sort of degree, to be able to give something back to our communities.

And I guess it's also really interesting.

To hear you say that, you know, it's the hardest thing you've done, because I could imagine, Yeah, the proximity to these very big imperial systems, academia, governments, it does bring up a lot sometimes for mom. I've worked with a few clients who are coach who have expressed, yeah, that sometimes that proximity to these big systems that they don't really value our knowledge, They don't really value how we do business, they don't really value the importance of

Still have to toe the line to.

Get their paper and then bring it back make sense of it. So we're always doing so much labor here, So I'm not surprised to hear that it's been challenging.

So true, Roestly, we're the hardest work in colors.

Absolutely, even like the referencing guide for the law the bloody what is it? A GLC? You can't give lived experience. There's something that you want to talk about in an so you have to find a primary or a secondary legal source, like what about our you know, opal traditions, what about these stories that have passed down? I want to talk about that in my property rights? Best way to talk about Marbo. Why can't I be doing that?

Yeah, exactly right. And also too, you know a lot of this work is yet you know.

Not only do we have like we can't author or our own information, but also it's kind of like, yeah, who's telling the story.

And on whose term? Sometimes you know, And so I imagine it would be difficult. But I must say we've had Taylor Gray on the podcast, you know, we've I work with a couple of sisters who were in the legal firm. We did vowel strategic plan. There is this not maybe it is an explosion.

I feel a young lawyer powerhouses who are really trying to change the discourse in yeah, what's good and right and fair in our worlds. And it's really bloody exciting to see so many young ones really take up that charge because yeah, we do have such a problem in Australia with overrepresentation in these areas.

And so yeah, congratulations on getting through.

This and being at a point where you're about to graduate and you don't have to have all the answers just yet. If you can work it out as you.

Go, absolutely doors will open. Trust the pros.

Exactly right, and I think doors will open for you because you have been a very very busy person. You know,

Yeah.

Absolutely, You've been following us the whole time, which has been really special.

Was like, oh, cousins like this post.

Yes, we're doing well here and sharing and sharing.

I was like, get on board.

I was so awesome. I was like, yeah, we got the tick of approval. Let's keep going. Yeah, I feel like no more students on Voice. It really was triggered by feeling absolutely disheartened by the increasing wave of disinformation and misinformation that was spreading our through our worlds at the time we started in May. Obviously the referendum campaign was occurring way before that, but this is when we felt the most disheartened about what was going on, and

Area of expertise, and I did.

We were so fortunate enough to collaborate with some legal experts to help train us up to be constitutional law mini experts to help spread the information. So we've had Ryl Saunders and of course most importantly doctor Eddie Cabillo from the Indigenous Law and Justice Hub. And you know, we started to witness these violent and damaging information that

How do I vote?

So we wanted to create this community legal education campaign. It was very important to us that it be Indigenous led, community informed, and culturally safe. The yes and no from mob and the positionality mob were taking was very important to us that we tiptoed a line that had to be neutral and it had to be fact based because most of my community back home, they're very staunched no voters.

But then we're in these echo chambers of yes. So we were just like, we want to.

Canvas all of this and bring it into one place so that everyone has a one stop shop for information. So that's what kind of motivated no UM law students on Voice. We wanted people to be having conversations with friends and families and strangers on the tram and colleagues tea break prior and beyond the referendum, and we quickly noticed that we filled a gap in the market as such for this neutral and fact based information. The two sides of the campaign were dominating social media and the

And then another.

Favorite session was with Anka alongside brother boy Connor Bowden, which was really cool. It just showed that there was an appetite for information that wasn't colluded and wasn't flavored with some type of campaign. And so we've yeah been running this campaign since May and then it officially kind of closed obviously with the referendum, but you know, we've built up this important network and this platform, so it's definitely not the end for us. Kashi and I are

Oh wow, wow, well wow, it's so fascinating to hear that. Yeah, you mob off your own that got together as a multidisciplinary sort of team to be able to really combat, as you say, the avalanche of misinformation and for for you know, our overseas listeners, of which there are many who have been following along as we've had you know, Thomas Mayo and Niagara Murray and you know Benny Appenttondello, people you know, continuously talking about this over the last

But I feel like.

It was, yeah, akin to this kind of Cambridge analytica. Trump is a rhetoric about you know, mob taking you know, and resources. But in actual fact, the proposition that was put to the Australian public was fairly simple. And what I guess I'm concerned about now is that if they don't understand a voice, how on earth are they going to understand things like treaty and blah blah blah.

And as you said before, you know, you said you're a lawyer and you failed constitutional recognition. It's almost as like the everyday Australian has to become a constitutional expert to be able to understand this. And so because you know, there's no you know, going back and you can always look and dissect in it with fine tooth comb. But you know, at the time, the Yes campaign had used very simple messaging to be able to sway more of the masses, and they had really compelling, an emotive.

Campaigns.

But I felt like there was these two camps. There was the people who were too lazy to find the information, people who were too easily swayed to actually that whole if you don't know, vote no. And then there's this whole camp that just like don't care enough to go and actually understand the information. And I think that was the hard pill for me to swallow, is is that there are so.

Many people who by virtue have taken a choice, which is to.

Do nothing, and that you know, a five minute Google and a yes, like two seconds out of your lives could have potentially saved some of our lives. And so I think the fact that you follows identified this and tried to combat this avalanche of a very well funded racist no campaign and the misinformation and then tried to make this palatable and understandable for the everyday person is yet really commendable. And I'm really delighted to hear that you have been nominated.

And received this award. But I think it leaves us in a really scary place as black follows now because the everyday Australian one doesn't have the comprehension or two doesn't give a shit, And you know, how do we pull at heartstrings? I mean if seeing us being alarmingly locked up and all of us in the streets and us crying and pleading with the colony isn't enough to

Fallout of this. You know, for myself personally, I was a very skeptical Yes, I held reservations like most black fellows working with the colony, but I guess at the end, I wanted to believe that we were a country that was willing to tell the truth and move through this process of healing and reunification as people. That when the vote actually came through, it's almost like the optimism I had was so soul destroying.

When that night I remember just I.

Was actually meant to go to a black Black up party, this mob and you know, hang out, and I was just sobbing. I was wailing, I was crying. I I had three days off work. I didn't leave my couch. I you know, barely looked.

At my phone.

I just went really inwood because and then I got.

To the point where I was like side eyeing everyone, thinking, am I even safe here? My nervous system just didn't feel safe. I was like, wow, and the only the only now.

And I'm still like you probably two sis trying to process it. I'm certainly not on the other side. It's still very raw.

But it's almost like the only thing that I can think of that is remotely good is that now we all unequivocally know.

How Australia stands. We're starting from a point where there's nowhere, there's no ambiguouy.

It's like, oh, that's not my problem. It's like, well, now we can see it clear as day one.

Just how much.

Fricking more work we have to do? And I think that's the challenge. We're already just so exhausted and burning out the idea of restrategizing, recampaigning. So with all that said, you know, I'd love to see you know, I know you were busy, but how did you process it all emotionally, like what came up for you, you know, the week of and the results.

How did you feel?

Yeah, I felt I was lucky. Someone actually said to me two weeks in advance. I hadn't strategically been looking at the polls. It was just something that I just hadn't done. I'd just been so head down. We've got work to do. We've got to educate these people. We've got to inform all these voters who have no idea what they're talking about.

And so yeah, Yeah, this person came up to me and.

Was saying how they can't believe that Australia is going to vote know, and that it's going to be yeah, this overwhelming no, And I just I don't.

Think i'd heard that yet.

It hadn't actually been in my co chamber.

I was in such an this is this is.

Terrible, but an educated ally environment where of course it was going to be yes. You know, everywhere I looked there were the yes banners and the yes posters, and I was just shocked when this person came out and said it. I was just I didn't know what to say. And I think from there. The two weeks before the referendum. I agrieved preemptively for this result. It kind of hit me for the first time and I was, as you say, walking down the streets, like which one of yours was it?

Like, yeah, it's not. And it hit me so hard.

We've been experiencing racism and hate in our comments for months now, so and you know you always get it every time you do any form of advocacy your comments. Lesson, do not read the comments. My cousin and my sister girls, Nala Mansell always says to me, Margaret Blandon best from read the comments, and I do it every time.

However, I'm reading the.

Comments now, I'm lost in some voice. And during that two week period, I was just like, oh my god, these are the people, these are the people that are voting, know, and.

I was grieving.

I couldn't get out of bed days that last week, and I remember we had our breath work workshop and I'd finally gotten out of bed, I'd finally gotten myself out into the like the outside world, and I sat there with this beautiful breath work lesson with you guys. But one that week was so hard and so by the time I actually hit Saturday, and I you know, I'd blocked out the whole day.

I bloked out the day.

After, I'd made sure i'd made no plans, you know what. I was actually okay.

I'd come to.

Terms with it, obviously, not on the long term, in the short term kind of, I was okay, and I it was It was great because I could be there for my friends and my family and I could talk them through it. You know, my cousin back home, she was struggling. That was really hard for me. But in saying that, I was so grateful that I could be this strong big cousin for her and talk her through

And I think, like you're so right in so many black colos, or people of color, or any marginalized or press group is so multifaceted that the idea of you know, placing yourself in some binary box like I'm this or I'm that was really hard for so many of us.

And you're right, we had to like fight to have our our pleas heard, like we weren't. We weren't treated with any dignity. And I think, you know, I can see, I can see what happened and what led to this, and elders worked hard and they called for it, and it was perhaps the right thing to do to test, you know, unequivocally, like I said, where we're at. But I think maybe in the process, like because we are

Just I just feel like you know, I do not a grammar.

Yeah, like we were just just it was a really challenging time and we've we've navigated a pandemic, big civil rights movements, we're still navigating a lot of ills in this place, and then put that to be thrust upon us, and then now to have this result, and like you say, now where all the ones who are having to pick up all of these pieces?

And it's it's a lot. I'm hearing a lot in my circles of such mixed feelings anger.

You know, it's now turning into fuel to be able to continue to fight this place. A lot of people have now just retreated from it all entirely and taking steps back. A lot of sadness, you know, held space for a lot of big emotional conversations.

So we're all just navigating this grief. But I think Benny Appintondalu said this on the podcast a while ago, and at the time I was like, hmm, But I've been thinking about it, and he's said that a no vote could be regenerative because it does show us where our energies and efforts lie. And often it's not sympathizing with the colonizer, it's really supporting the strength of our people.

Of talk a little bit about post referendum, you know, I feel, and I'm just I haven't really refined this thought, I guess, but I feel there are a lot of people are my family for instance, who are now like not willing to cooperate and they want to go into a guerrilla mode in the sense of like, you know, all right, you don't want to play fair in the place, in the same Pitt's let's play ball, And you know that that's their sort of ethos at the moment, and

That does exist, you know, in your work or in your conversations, or is there anything beyond the vote that we can do to yeah, work towards this mechanism through other channels, through legislation, through any changes.

Absolutely. I feel something that I also noticed last week post referendum was the onflow of you know, the the apology emails, the the ongoing solidarity. We are so sorry that this has happened. We can't believe, we can't even imagine how you're feeling. You know, it was so burdensome

What are we doing about it?

So I feel like there's so many ways that we can fuel energy.

Into Yeah, gosh, it's so.

I think it's really comforting to hear that from a lawyer and somebody who is in this space, and it's useful to know. I mean, we as black fellows, we have resourceful and there are a lot of things that haven't been honored. As you said, Ricky Dieck, the bringing Them Home reports, you know, you name it, countless reports.

I think that's the thing.

You know, mob have done an extensive body of work. I think in essence, the National Voice would have consolidated those efforts and given us a single point of contact into the government buyaut that. But now it just means we've got to go back to the drawing board and look at all of those things that have already been started.

But we're still you know, this is the thing about you know, whatever has happened on October the fourteenth, and why I believe that, you know, the greatest threat to this colony is the fact that we are still here and we ain't going anywhere. So you know, we're only going to come back stronger, more resourced, and more I think more collegial.

Because the Voice divided us like nothing I've ever seen before. And so I think that that notion that we're going to.

Ever let a policy get in the way of MOB I think will change. I mean, what's your you know, the stats we were alarming because, as I said, all states voted no. I think from memory it's almost like eighty or seventy percent of Australian said no.

Is that right?

Something to that effect. Gosh, I could. I feel like I haven't really engaged with it.

I feel like I sort of this sounds awful, but I kind of had to just disassociate from it.

However, one of the main stats that I did see, which was around young people, and we had a huge amount of young Australians vote in the referendum for the first time, all to vote yeah exactly, which is incredible.

Like I had family who have never voted to have voted, and so now they're on part of the democracy and so I think.

That is promising.

But you know, how how do you.

I guess someone like you know the work you're doing now with NUMB how do we continue to create these spaces for people, and especially our young people to get informs?

Now?

How do you think you can go about creating more spaces for this young generation to get informed so that they're not you know, that apathetic. You know, they're not apathetic at their latest stages of life.

Do you have any ideas?

Absolutely, we were so scared at the beginning of our journey with NUAM because we, you know, we realized that these freshly eighteen year olds were deciding our humanity and you know, all they're worried about is, you know, what color they're going to wait at they're eighteen, but what what uni they're going to pick. But they're the people who's our lives that we're in there hands, and we were just petrified at that thought, which is something that really motivated us to get on board.

So we were like, how many wors can we get to?

This is so scary, But yeah, it was really special to see the incredible amount of young people in the road to vote this year. That was a really heartening thing. And to see how they voted. It was very much a yes vote from the young people. And someone actually said to me the other day, you know this means that and it's a pretty sad thing, but you know,

Yeah, exactly right, I mean, yeah, the goal, I mean, two hundred and thirty five years of colonization in one week grace period.

I'm sorry, but yeah, that's that's I mean, it's beautiful to hear you say that. I mean, black Joy, I do feel exactly the same as you.

It's the biggest antidote to combat the colony and we do deserve to be wow s for you to.

The colony, isn't it?

It really is?

And I think you know, it's also biggest f you to the colonizers for them to see us happy and well, because it's like, well, you know, their project failed.

But yeah, I think it's really I think what's really.

Heartening to me in a way we're hearing you say that is that, you know, Annie Marcia Langton said that it's going to take about two generations now to see any change. That's kind of like I'll be an elder at that stage, which kind of blows my mind, and it's really is going like that level of change on the national scale is going to be now my children and their children and so you know, having these conversationations and spaces for young people to connect and.

Learn about this is really helpful. And I also do just think they're just such a different generation to be open to really wanting to see what's right and fair in the world.

And you know, we don't have to look too far right now to see how harmful these systems of you know, long standing colonial oppression can be. You know, thinking of people in Palestine right now who have experienced, you know, seventy five years of complete occupation and genocide, and you know, I could just think if we really have to wake up as people now and we can't be sleeping at the wheel.

The power and the control and domination hasn't worked for.

Anyone, and so it really is over to this next generation now to continue to fight this fight. And you know what we as you say, Sis, you know, we we're down, but we're not defeated. We are not defeated, and we will probably.

Come that stronger in a way and much more resourceful.

We always do, we always do.

Annie Jackie, Annie Jackie Huggins said, I remember she was a no, and she flipped to a yes because this is the last time in her lifetime that she'll see something like this, and how is she going to stand by and watch this happen and not support it? And I just I remember it so much to this day, because that's going to be, as you say, when you will be an elder and you'll be in this position of authority and power in our communities and maybe we'll

You know, these are the people.

These are the Shama Like environmental Case Award people. You know, these are the people that are so passionate about climate justice. And I feel like we can bring them on our journey. I feel like we've always had kind of allies in the environmental space. You know, we're always really close with the greens, and they're always really empowering of us. And I feel like that's what the young people are worried

That's what I say, absolutely, And you know what, I've got great confidence with people like you helping to bring young people together. And yeah, I just want to thank you for all of your labor in all of this it. You know, we're very much as you're listening to this episode today, you know, we're really a week out of this process, and so we're very much trying to make sense of it. We're trying to process it, we're trying

How do you find time for joy? What does it look like for you? How do you find time to balance it all.

I'm very much a soul ordered girl.

I love the.

Ocean and I love just sitting still near nature and the ocean, and so I feel like a lot of my free time, if I do get it, as you say, is spent surfing or just being near the beach. I like to practice mindfulness as much as I can in nature, and just being outside is just such an active joy for me. And I'm just trying, as you say, we're still processing this referendum, and you know, I might seem okay today, but I'll probably wake up tomorrow and be

Something that I really valiant of.

Of course, you know, putting on your favorite songs and having a bit of a dance. That's my guilty pleasure at the moment.

No, that's beautiful to hear.

I love that. Thank you for sharing that. I mean, we're always trying to do our best in the colony to look after ourselves. Some days it's easy, someday it ain't easy. Some days we have it, sometimes we don't. But it's beautiful to hear you share that. And I think it's also beautiful that we're.

Just out here normalizing some of these conversations, because yeah, as we navigate these waves, we do need to give ourselves permission to just step out of the arena when we need to to come back into the arena.

So thank you for sharing that.

And the last thing, Sorry, I know I said the last thing before, but one thing I want to just call out. You know you mentioned before about you know, allies and feeling helpless and sorry and sad for them.

You know all of this. I want to say that if you are an ally and you're listening to this episode right now, there is one thing that you can do in this moment. You can do it as you're walking.

Maybe not if you're driving pull over, but you know I want you to just let's don't do that. Just don't be bulling it at your phone, but get out your phone type in pay the rent. You know, we've got amazing grassroots organization who works directly with families on Grandmothers against force removal, so having children removed from.

A state deusing custody. Someone has an issue, which we've just had recently in the last days after the referendum, we sadly have lost another young person and these these groups work with the families directly to get them to courts, to get them to their legal supports, get them food.

Do you have an hour a month that you can provide some back of house support.

We really need communities supporting communities in communities of care right now. And you might think, oh, I haven't got anything to contribute, but it might be you know, one hour of labor or five dollars a month that could really go such a long way. What do you have any tips? Fali?

Yeah?

Yeah.

It's also sharing and engaging with black content on social media. If yeah, we're all time poor, we're all poor poor, but you use your phones so regularly, how about you just start to think about the accounts and the people that you're following and switch the mindset to be like, who can I empower today? Who can whose content can I share? And elevate their voice in a system that's trying to make black people less as we have just seen.

I love that. I love that. Who can I empower today?

Is a really great way to frame it, and it really takes you nothing. And the sad reality is is that where three percent of the population will never have the influence and reach online than what you know female sexp birth white women have for instance, So really elevating our voices online. There are three very simple things you can do right now, like after you finished this episode, So.

Do it now, Do it now.

There's no time like the present.

Subscribe to this podcast and go follow all the amazing Maggie's doing and none law school. Since it's been great to talk to you today as we navigate this wild.

Thing we call life.

At the moment, I just want to say, yeah, I really appreciate you your time, your labor, and your love.

So thank you, thank you so much, and thank you for creating space for us to come and chat. And yeah, I'm through these impossible things that we're having.

To deal with.

It's almost even just a sign of healing just to chat through these things as we know where Yeah, oral traditional people, this is our chance to just talk through some tricky things that we're dealing with at the moment.

So thank you anytime. I can't wait to have you back to see what's next in store for you. Where can people go and follow you along?

I've got Instagram, Muggi, Muggi.

It's hard to spell. I actually don't know how to spell it. Every time I have to like every time I'm not like a conference or that somewhere out and they're.

Like, what's your hat?

And I'm like, oh, I'm going to have to get up my phone.

I don't know how to spell.

MUGGIGGI I think it's double oh one gee. And then we'll views the same. But lots of these you'll find me, and then you've got no. I'm last in some voice, which we love your support for. We're on all the socials. TikTok is where we get the most hate, so come play with us there of course.

Yeah, beautiful. We'll link all of these details in the show notes as well, so you don't have to.

Try to put Moggie. We'll get into your notes.

First time.

Didn't get as much hate from the settlers, but they found me.

Don't worry well, Maggie slash wu Willie. It was great to chat with you today. I appreciate you and all the best, my fish.

Thank you so much for listening you mob. If you are fiving this season of Yarning Up, then please head over to Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts from to show us some love, rate and review. Alternatively, you can get in contact and give us some feedback by visiting www. Dot Caroline Cool dot com, dot a