Steven Oliver’s Poem On Aussie Racism Headed For 2 Million Views

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A poem by Aboriginal writer and performer Steven Oliver which confronts Australian racism, hypocrisy, fragility and privilege has climbed to almost two million views on Facebook.

Oliver performed Real two years ago at the 2015 National NAIDOC Awards ceremony in Adelaide. The event was broadcast by National Indigenous Television (NITV), and the footage was shared on their Facebook page. It’s been growing a fan-base ever since.

Oliver wrote Real in response to a discussion “this country was having… about who had the right to call themselves Aboriginal, yet most of those people had no connection to Aboriginality apart from their racist views”.

We can’t embed Facebook videos on new Matilda – bug in the system – but you can watch the same performance from Oliver below, on Youtube.

https://youtu.be/G_-lt8VVGW8

http://bit.ly/2sparkkebubbles

Launched in 2004, New Matilda is one of Australia's oldest online independent publications. It's focus is on investigative journalism and analysis, with occasional smart arsery thrown in for reasons of sanity. New Matilda is owned and edited by Walkley Award and Human Rights Award winning journalist Chris Graham.

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