‘Why we can’t have Coon cheese’: Controversial post sparks social media outrage

A controversial post on a community Facebook group comparing Black Friday to Coon cheese has sparked outrage, including from a prominent Indigenous activist.

A South East man has sparked outrage after he took to a regional community Facebook forum questioning the “hypocrisy of the woke brigade” over the retention of “Black Friday”.

Tim Smith took the Mount Gambier Chat Group Facebook page asking “Can someone explain why we can’t have Coon cheese, but we can have Black Friday?”

The post was met with a mix of comments, sparking outrage among some and defence from others.

“Love this question — fair point seeing everything else is being changed,” one commenter said.

“He has a point though … can’t have baa baa black sheep anymore, why Black Friday?” another said.

Tim Smith sparks outrage over controversial Coon Cheese Facebook post. Picture: Supplied

A former Mount Gambier resident took aim at both Mr Smith and others who defended the post.

“This is why there are issues with bullying in schools — grown adults like you role modelling the exact behaviour that’s ruining kids lives,” she said.

“If you see his laughing emojis all over the place you’ll see he’s getting a kick out of causing unnecessary BS and bringing up old endless debates.”

Mr Smith said he was “just showing the hypocrisy of the woke brigade”.

The woman called on admins of the page to remove the post, which was mirrored by Indigenous activist Dr Stephen Hagan.

Dr Hagen, who was behind the campaign to change the name of Coon cheese, slammed those who continue to defend the old name and blasted the post as a “publicity stunt”.

“It’s never coming back. They should enjoy its replacement, Cheer Cheese, or give up the yellow culinary delight altogether,” he said.

Year 12 students from elite South East private school Tenison Woods College dressed up as Coon Cheese for school muck up day celebrations sparking outrage. Picture: Supplied

Earlier this month, in a separate incident, Year 12 school leavers from the prestigious private South East school Tenison Woods College sparked controversy after they dressed up as Coon cheese for muck up day celebrations.

The year 12 Tenison Woods College students were captured donned in yellow shirts with Coon branding on a Facebook post by a Mount Gambier car dealership they attended as part of a muck-up day treasure hunt.

The school shared the car dealership’s post to its own Facebook page, with the caption “some great photos from our year 12 graduates earlier this week”.

Both the dealership and school removed the photos from their pages.

Tenison Woods College principal David Mezinec previously said the school was not involved in any muck-up day celebrations.

On their last day students arrive and leave in full school uniform with any muck-up day celebrations privately organised by the students.

Mr Mezinec previously said the shared post was “an error of inexperience on the part of a public relations and event team member of the college”.

Mr Mezinec said on their last day students arrived and left in full school uniform.

“We do not sanction any muck-up day,” he said.

Dr Hagen said the photos being shared to the schools social media page was inexcusable and called for Principal David Mezinec to be disciplined.

“He’s an experienced teacher who should have known better,” Dr Hagen said.

“He is tone deaf and needs to be accountable for his action or rather, inaction — he should have known the promotion of the dress up costumes on the college website were inappropriate.”

In response a spokesperson for Catholic Education said the students involved in the incident indicated their costumes were worn for an entirely different reason in tribute to a teacher.

“We believe that the matter was dealt with appropriately by the principal at the time,” a spokesman said.

“Tenison Woods College does not accept or tolerate racism.”

An admin from the Facebook group who did not wish to be identified said as “distasteful” as the post may have been, it did not violate the page’s community guidelines.

Mr Smith was contacted for comment.