Tasmanian AFL player Aaron Hall wants all racism called out

Hobart-born AFL player Aaron Hall has spoken of his wish to “do what Michael Jackson did” and change his skin colour as a child because of the racism he faced. Now he wants people to call it out. READ HIS STORY >>

TASMANIAN AFL player Aaron Hall has spent most of his life laughing off the “N” word and being called a “black c---”.

Buoyed by the Black Lives Matter movement, Hall has decided no more.

The 29-year-old Kangaroo with a caucasian Aussie dad and a Fijian Indian mum, remembers as a young kid at school and being called a “n-----” and “blackie” and being told to “go back to where you come from”, which was confusing for a six-year-old born in Hobart.

Hall, and another Tassie Kangaroo Tarryn Thomas, of Aboriginal descent, live together at Aaron’s house in Melbourne.

They have welcomed the spotlight BLM has placed on their skin colour.

Aaron Hall of the Kangaroos. Picture: MICHAEL KLEIN

“I’ve got a daughter, Penelope. She’s two-and-a-half, and I have a baby boy on the way. I don’t want them to have to deal with racism,” Hall said.

“I want them to be comfortable within their skin.”

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Hall became acutely aware of his heritage at primary school.

“I went to a school where me and my brother and sister were among four or five kids who were dark-skinned, so we were obviously different,” Hall said.

“We’d get kids say ‘go back to where you come from’.

“I would ask my mum ‘my father is white, why don’t we look like dad? He’s blond-haired and blue-eyed. Why are we different? Why do we get treated different to Dad?’

“When I was seven or eight-years-old, I said to Mum ‘can I do what Michael­ Jackson did and make my skin colour white?’

“It’s pretty crazy for a six or seven-year-old kid asking his mum questions like that.

“My mum would laugh it off and say to tell people they are going to be out in the sun and in solariums one day trying to get the skin colour you have. Be proud of our Fijian culture and be proud of your skin colour.”

Aaron Hall of the Kangaroos runs with the ball during a match between Port Adelaide and North Melbourne at Adelaide Oval. Picture: DANIEL KALISZ/GETTY IMAGES

Hall automatically volunteers for the “bomb check” at the airport because he knows he will be singled out.

“And a lot of my teammates, who are the same skin colour as me, we know one of us is going to get picked,” he said.

“But North Melbourne is fantastic to us. We love going to work every day and if that can be the same for every indigenous person or dark-skinned person in Australia we will see the talents and attributes that these people have, that we have, and maybe they might fulfil their potential a bit more than what’s actually happening.”

Hall has experienced only a few instances of racial slurs in his football career and laughed them off — until now.

“There was a game where some guy called me a black c--- and I just brushed it off, laughed it off, which is what I’ve always done,” he said.

“Don’t feel guilty about not calling out racism, because I’ve been in those positions and I haven’t called it out either.

“I’ve chosen to laugh it off because I didn’t want confrontation, I suppose, whereas now it is not acceptable. If you walk past someone who is being vilified and don’t do anything, you are accepting what that other person is doing.

“Call it out.”