Tory Shepherd: Uluru is nothing like Bondi Beach. It’s sacred
When it comes to climbing Uluru, only the wilfully ignorant and blatantly disrespectful would ignore the significance of someone else’s sacred site all for the promise of an Instagram selfie, writes Tory Shepherd.
What sort of person looks at a sign begging them not to climb a sacred rock, and thinks “Bugger them!” and straps on their boots?
Most people who make their way to the middle of the Australian desert, intent on clambering up Uluru, have probably done their homework anyway.
So they’ve been thinking “Bugger them!” for quite some time.
They must be supremely blithe, these individuals, or mean. The same sort of people who take selfies at Holocaust memorials.
They travel into Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park, look at the large signs in several different languages, then go right ahead.
Reports this week say tourists are rushing to Uluru in the final days before the climb is banned. While some locals say it’s often this busy, photographers are posting pictures of people nose to bum on the way up, leaving their junk on the sacred joint on the way back down.
It’s their personal Everest, to conquer and trash.
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One Nation Senator Pauline Hanson, who seems to have downloaded a bot that, whatever happens, ensures she spits out a dull but offensive response, hopped on to Channel 9’s Today show to say Uluru was like Bondi Beach.
“It’s no different to coming out and saying we’re going to close down Bondi Beach because there are some people there that have drowned,” she said, apparently believing that outback drowning deaths are behind the traditional owners’ feelings.
“How ridiculous is that. This is an iconic site for all Australians. I can’t see the cultural sensitivity when people have been climbing the rocks all these years and now they want to shut it down?”
What a drab false equivalence. Uluru is not Bondi Beach. Lourdes is not St Tropez, the Bodhi tree is not Calangute Beach, and Mecca is quite different to lounging around on Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman’s $700 million yacht.
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I’m an atheist, but only a bum would ignore the significance of someone else’s sacred site.
Only a bum would spit in the water at Lourdes, scramble up the Bodhi tree, or prance around Mecca in a bikini.
Senator Hanson wasn’t finished, though.
She went on to say Uluru is “money making” and “giving jobs” to the local Aboriginal population.
You’d almost think her algorithm had sprung an empathy leak — after all, this is the same Senator who talks about the “Aboriginal industry”, claims “no one should get assistance based on their cultural background” and was reportedly gobsmacked when she heard an Acknowledgement of Country on a recent plane flight (although she recently said she was Indigenous because she was born in Australia, so maybe she’s not really xenophobic.).
Her economic argument is bunkum because fewer than one in five people who visit the park actually climb the rock (If you’ve been there, it’s a magnificent spectacle from any angle and there are plenty of other things to do).
That would be far too many words about Ms Hanson, but she doesn’t exist in a vacuum. As an elected leader she represents the view of a small sector of society and as such should be accountable for her mean-spirited, misleading words.
The traditional owners, the Anangu, ask visitors to respect their law and culture by not climbing Uluru.
The first reason they give is they don’t want people to be hurt — about 35 people have died conquering that rock.
The second is that it is a sacred site for them. “Please”, they ask. “Don’t climb”.
“We ask visitors not to climb Uluru because of its spiritual significance as the traditional route of the ancestral Mala men on their arrival at Uluru.”
The sign could go on, but doesn’t. It could go on to point out that Uluru is owned by the Anangu, and that it is entirely disrespectful to overlook their wishes.
There was another point of view aired on the Today show. From someone with yards more credibility, empathy, and understanding.
Journalist Brooke Boney, a Gamilaroi woman, said: “The thing about (Uluru) is it is so sacred to them, every time someone gets injured or hurt or has to be airlifted out … it hurts them and they say that the ancestors mourn the loss of those people,” she said.
“They are not doing it to be nasty or protective of themselves, they are doing it to protect others.”
And from October 26, people will no longer be able to climb it, and life will go on.
Maybe those tourists who really need the thrill of conquering something, of taking on something bigger than themselves can head to the San Fermin festival in Pamplona.
I hear the bulls are less inclined to be as polite as the Anangu.