Social media went crazy yesterday afternoon when 4BC host Peter Gleeson casually mentioned that there were plots afoot to change Brisbane’s name to something Indigenous before the 2032 Olympics.
After the news went viral, you could almost hear the ‘No’ vote surging in response. Millions of ordinary Australians rolled their eyes and decided that ‘enough is enough’ with this erasure of culture and history in service of activism.
‘No, that is absolute nonsense,’ the Queensland Premier replied – although a lot of Queenslanders would like her to write that denial in a binding contract, just to be on the safe side.
Having watched Fraser Island’s name hacked out of the history books, Queenslanders remain deeply suspicious and unhappy about the activist re-naming campaign, especially considering these decisions have never been put to a public vote. Australians have been subjected to an undemocratic process of quiet surveys followed by celebratory headlines.
‘The Palaszczuk government are working with First Nations People and the Greens to change its name to its Indigenous equivalent, Meajin, prior to the 2023 Olympics.’
Meajin is not equivalent to Brisbane, because Brisbane is a person’s name – Sir Thomas Brisbane – who was the Governor of New South Wales in 1823 when he directed the famous explorer, John Oxley, to delve into the area which Oxley named after Sir Thomas Brisbane.
A year later, in 1824, Sir Thomas Brisbane made the trip up the Brisbane river to visit his namesake – staying overnight in a tent. This makes Brisbane the only capital city in Australia to be visited by its namesake. This piece of history will be erased if Brisbane’s name is casually changed by a fame-seeking State Premier.
Without its colonial heritage, Brisbane would still be a scrap of riverside bush rather than a thriving international city, and that is the truth of it. Brisbane was built first by convicts, then free settlers, and finally by waves of migrants, all working together and its landmarks, streets, and buildings reflect this. As they should.
Meajin wasn’t always the first choice of Indigenous name, nor is this the first time people have chirped up wanting to rename the capital. In 2018, Brisbane was meant to be renamed Miguntyun from a proposal put in front of the Queensland Department of Natural Resources.
When asked about why Brisbane should be renamed, one punter on the street said that not many people know who Sir Thomas Brisbane is. That’s not a criticism of Brisbane’s rich history, it’s a F- Grade on the performance of Queensland teachers who’ve somehow skipped over basic local history.
As with everything Woke, it won’t only be Brisbane on the chopping block – anything named after a King or Queen will be up for grabs in the activist feeding frenzy. They might even take the statue of George V down. Indeed, it’s astonishing Palaszczuk didn’t float the idea of renaming the whole state. No, wait, that suggestion was already made by the press after the death of the Queen where some wanted it to be changed to ‘Freeland’ in the event Australia becomes a republic.
At least Liberal Opposition leader David Crisafulli poked his head up this morning. ‘Not a chance,’ he said, of changing Brisbane’s name. ‘Every Queenslander would be looking at this this morning would be shaking their head and say they’re not going to change that…’
When asked, Federal Treasurer Jim Chalmers said that he’s ‘got a few things on his plate’ at the moment. Like re-imagining capitalism into a financial crisis?
The president of the Brisbane Olympics Organising Committee has already flagged ‘big changes’. He apparently said at a planning roadshow last year that the 2032 Games should be a lighthouse to elevate First Nations culture. ‘I’d love to make the Olympics one of the workstreams the nation has to integrate Aboriginal and Indigenous First Nations culture into our program.’
Isn’t this meant to be a sporting event?
And here we were thinking the most controversial part of the Brisbane Olympics would be trying to work out whether there’d be any women in the women’s events.
We must not forget that these are the same controversial games that the Premier flew out to secure in the middle of a pandemic when the citizens of Queensland were not allowed to see their dying relatives. Thousands signed a petition to stop the Premier attending Tokyo which was described as a ‘snub’ to the suffering of the state.
Australians are increasingly feeling that Indigenous activism has become an industry, not a calling. It prowls around looking for things to attack and destroy instead of solving the multitude of very real issues inside remote communities.
Re-branding tourist locations is expensive, but that’s nothing compared to re-naming a capital city. Every business. Every home address. Every sports team. Every school. Every government department. The sheer physical cost of renaming Brisbane – in the middle of a financial crisis, no less – is catastrophic. It would constitute a self-made disaster and imposition on all citizens.
Then there’s the social trauma. Brisbane is not a conquered Indigenous city that the colonisers renamed. The ‘colonisers’ build Brisbane, from scratch. It is an original creation.
By coming after Brisbane’s name, activist groups are offensively destroying a piece of Australia’s history.
Flat White is written and edited by Alexandra Marshall
