During my teenage years one of my favourite books was My life with Martin Luther King, Jr, written by his wife Coretta Scott King. As the title suggests, it was the written by his widow, who was also a very talented individual, and described her perspective on the US civil rights movement in the 1950s and 1960s, and the extraordinary and ultimately tragic journey she had with him.

I read that book dozens of times.

Looking back, I don’t fully understand why I was so drawn to it, but it was unmistakably powerful. Martin Luther King was a brilliant orator, leader, and his actions led to transformative change on a grand scale.

Here are some of his quotes:

• “Intelligence plus character – that is the goal of true education”
• “True peace is not merely the absence of tension; it is the presence of justice”
• “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly”
• “Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter”
• “A riot is the language of the unheard”
• “Darkness cannot drive our darkness, only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that.”

In response to the 1967 race riots in the United States, the National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders, known as Kerner Commission was established by then-President Lyndon Johnson.

The 426-page document was released on 29 February 1968. The report was very critical of both federal and state governments for existing housing, education and social-service policies. “Our nation is moving toward two societies, one black, one white – separate and unequal”. “What white Americans have never fully understood but what the Negro (sic) can never forget – is that white society is deeply implicated in the ghetto. White institutions created it, white institutions maintain it, and white society condones it.”

The recommendations were never enacted.

On 4 April 1968 Martin Luther King Jr was assassinated and rioting broke out in 100 cites across the US.

Fifty-two years after Martin Luther King, Jr was assassinated, on 25 May George Floyd, a 46-year old black man, was arrested and subsequently died in circumstances that I am sure you are very well aware of. This single event reignited the #blacklivesmatter movement in the US and is now being played out across the globe. I am reminded of another of Martin Luther King’s quotes:

“History will have to record the greatest tragedy of this period of social transition was not the strident clamor of the bad people, but the appalling silence of the good people.”

As shown by the events of last weekend, systemic racism is not just a US matter; it is also entrenched in Australian society.

On a trip to Adelaide about 10 years ago I was fossicking through the second-hand bookstore at the Port Adelaide markets and came across the publication of the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody, which I bought and read (it was published in 1991).

Of the 99 deaths investigated, none were reported as due to police violence, with chronic disease the most common cause (almost always of premature onset), but abuse, neglect or racism common to all. It was noted that the rate of death was the same as for non-Aboriginal people but their rate of imprisonment was much higher.

Over the past week it has been heavily publicised that a further 434 Aboriginal people have died in custody. This is just one of many statistics demonstrating the ongoing substantial and residual differences in the socio-economic conditions encountered by the First Nations people of this land, compared with the dominant, white settler colonial society.

Many of Martin Luther King, Jr’s observations are just as apt in Australia in 2020 as in the US 60 years ago.

This is not just a law enforcement issue. I am very aware that we have many people in our College who have friends and relatives who are directly employed in law enforcement agencies to ensure the rights of all people in Australia are protected – people who are deeply committed to caring for all Australians.

This is our issue, all of us, universities included.

Only 1.6% of Flinders’ students are Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. Across the entire University, which employs around 3,500 staff, there are fewer than 50 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander staff.

All of our Indigenous students have to contend with unconscious bias and racism daily.

One of our Aboriginal academics remarked to me recently that coming to work is “painful, like receiving a thousand paper cuts”. Our Aboriginal staff and students feel their Aboriginality and their commitment to their communities so strongly, it hurts.

These are not experiences that I, a privileged, white middle-class man, have ever experienced.

As a College, we cannot realise our vision to transform the health of our communities through education and research without acknowledging and addressing some serious and uncomfortable issues that determine health – social inequities, unconscious bias, white privilege and systemic racism – that both exist within our systems and operate at the level of individuals.

To quote Martin Luther King, Jr again:

“Out of a mountain of despair, a stone of hope.”

Last week we celebrated Reconciliation Week and launched our first Reconciliation Action Plan. This represents Flinders’ commitment to acknowledging the disparities that exist in our community and in our University. They are not acceptable.

Equally importantly, our RAP outlines in detail how we as a University will address existing inequities, but this will only occur if we all play our part. I encourage you all to read this document and begin to construct your own, local, implementation plan, and how you and your team will address issues of unconscious bias, white privilege and systemic racism.

Here is a great vision for the future from the Uluru Statement From The Heart: “In 1967 we were counted, in 2017 we seek to be heard. We leave base camp and start our trek across this vast country. We invite you to walk with us in a movement of the Australian people for a better future.”

And finally, from Uncle Lewis Yarluburka O’Brien, Kaurna Elder: “…They don’t understand the beginning, and this is because they’ve been told nonsense in the past and the nonsense they’ve been told is that one culture is better than the other. This is a lot of nonsense because all cultures are equal.”

The Flinders University inaugural RAP can be viewed, downloaded or a print copy ordered here.

Professor Jonathan Craig, Vice President and Executive Dean, College of Medicine and Public Health