The death of a black American man killed by law enforcement in the US made headlines around the world ins 2020. The protests that followed reignited the conversation on how Australian authorities have treated the country's Indigenous population.
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In the Bega Valley on the far south coast of NSW, Indigenous elders and US expats alike united in their condemnation of the treatment of black Americans and indigenous Australians.
"Things haven't changed as much as people think they have," Ngarigo and Djiringanj Elder Aunty Colleen Dixon said.
"We're still losing people right now, we haven't moved or gone forward."
In May, Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin was filmed kneeling on the neck of handcuffed and unarmed George Floyd, the AAP reported.
Charges against Chauvin over Mr Floyd's death were recently upgraded to second-degree murder, and the incident sparked widespread protests in the US and across the world, including Australia.
Djiringanj elder Ken Campbell said if it had been a black man kneeling on a white man's neck they would have been charged with murder straight away.
"It's wrong, it's just wrong," he said.
Ngarigo and Djiringanj Elder Aunty Ellen Mundy said there were many cases where charges had not been laid over Indigenous Australians deaths in custody.
"Our lives aren't considered valuable, so it's been swept under the carpet," Ms Mundy said.
A study by the Australian Institute of Criminology found 393 Indigenous Australians had died while in the custody of police or a prison over 1991-2016.
Ms Mundy said the US and Australia were similar in that people of colour across the two countries were picked on by police, but many Indigenous Australian deaths in custody were not reported on by the country's media.
"A lot of people feel uncomfortable talking about it in Australia," she said. "In order for us to move forward in the future, the past needs to be rectified.
"It needs to be acknowledged. We do need to talk about the violence and aggression to Aboriginal people in Australia."
Ms Dixon agreed about the need to have a wider discussion of deaths in custody, saying it was about getting on in life and understanding each other.
"We've all got to live in this country together," she said.
She also believed elders should set up a committee to meet with police every month and check on what was happening with First Nations people.
The NSWALC said the over-representation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in the Australian criminal justice system and the number of deaths in custody in Australia was a "persistent and unwavering concern".
"It's been more than 30 years since the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody but this serious issue often fails to command social or political attention in Australia," they said.
Black American and founder of Bega Valley's Funhouse Studio Cayce Hill said when it came to the struggle for equality and freedom from persecution by police the biggest difference was that black Americans did not have much to stand on, while black Australians had 60,000 years of history behind them.
"Even our recent history, all that I know about my people, was crammed into one month out of the year," Ms Hill said.
"All we know is America, but we're constantly denied being Americans.
"Whereas here, though there is still erasure, there is still a strong tie to culture, to the land. I am envious of that."
She said otherwise there were many similarities, such as a denial of history, culture, identity, as well as "being othered, being outcasted" and being punished for not conforming.
Albert McKnight
Journalist at Bega District News.
Journalist at Bega District News.
