WARNING: Content may be upsetting for some readers
It’s something that can affect our people deeply. From their mental and physical well-being to their sense of self, spirit and identity.
Lateral violence is commonly described as infighting between people from the same group who have historically been oppressed.
Paakantji woman, Dr Theoni Whyman, has investigated lateral violence and its effects throughout her academic career.
"It can look like gossiping, or sabotaging or undermining somebody else's work," she said.
"In my research, another kind of way that people identify that it shows up is when other Indigenous people are kind of tearing somebody else's Indigenous identity down."
Other examples can include both verbal and non-verbal gestures, spreading rumours, shaming, backstabbing, organisational conflict, isolation and exclusion, as well as physical violence and bullying online.
Trying to survive colonial violence
For the Head of the Department of Indigenous studies at Macquarie University, Professor Bronwyn Carlson, the spotlight is put on the wrong party.
"Instead of turning on and looking at other Aboriginal people and bringing each other down, we need to turn it back on the government, and remember who the actual oppressor here is and who's making these things possible for us to be denied,” she said.
"Lateral violence is us trying to survive colonial violence.”
Dr Whyman elaborates.
"The settler colonisers that came here enforced their idea of who is 'a true Indigenous person' was and then marked everybody against that," she said.
"They marked mob as a half-blood or a quantum or you know, you had one-sixteenth heritage and they kind of defined who an Indigenous person was so that they could reduce us.
You are not seen as Indigenous enough
"[They] reinforced this idea that there we're less Indigenous people and that we were a dying race. We've kind of adopted those settler colonial ideas, probably unknowingly, of who an Indigenous person is.
“Some of the systems that settler colonisers set up here, like rounding us up and putting us on missions, and restricting our access to resources. And then telling people that they're not truly Indigenous if they didn't fit their stereotype of who an Indigenous person is."
"That's where the names come from like city black or coconut, you are not seen as Indigenous enough."
Lateral violence can look like gossiping, sabotaging or undermining somebody else's work. Credit: NITV
The effects
The results of experiencing this violence can be devastating.
In Dr Whyman's research, she found serious effects on people's physical and mental well-being.
"People talked about feeling anxious or depressed, and associating lateral violence with suicide,” she told NITV.
"Other people talked about feeling the physical effects of feeling anxious, like a rising heart rate and shortness of breath.”
She mentions instances in the workplace like high absenteeism and being overlooked for promotions and leadership opportunities.
The fear of lateral violence can isolate people from their own communities.
"Then that impacts [the] transmission of cultural knowledge because if they're not attending cultural events and community events, they miss out on those opportunities to learn more about their culture, to learn more about their languages,” she said.
The fear of lateral violence can isolate people from their own communities. Credit: NITV: Brayden Gifford
So, what isn't lateral violence?
Aboriginal academic and activist, Kullilli man, Dr Stephen Hagan denounces that asking someone where they’re from, isn’t laterally violent but rather a way to understand connections.
“Asking 'who's your mob?' is about knowing about their connection to a particular Traditional Owner group in Australia,” he said on an last year.
But Professor Carlson said it’s all about intent.
"Asking someone who is their mob and where they are from is not an act of violence – in good faith, this is an ancient way of connecting and finding how we fit in with each other,” she said.
“Where this has been seen as being lateral violence is the intent the person asking has – if it is about asserting one is more Indigenous than the other or not taking into consideration the violence of settler colonialism and the fact that some people don’t know or are Stolen mob - can then come across as violent.”
But lateral violence isn’t just a disagreement between mob – it’s much more complex.
"I understand that there are complexities [like] who has the right to speak on particular issues for example. Not knowing who you are and where you are from, for example, might mean you should not contribute to some conversations," said Prof Carlson.
"This is not bullying – it speaks to context and expertise."
The online world
The immediacy of social media allows many conversations to evolve in real-time, and that brings with it a whole new set of challenges for our people.
Professor Carlson has studied online violence and believes it is growing.
"Social media does not facilitate an environment that is based on our own ways of knowing and caring and we see high levels of bullying masked as merely asking who one is and where they are from,” she said.
“Then there is a pile on – we should not diminish each other publicly. These questions can be taken offline and had with kindness and care."
Professor Carlson believes that an increasing amount of lateral violence on social media at the moment can be attributed to conversations on the upcoming referendum on the Voice to Parliament.
How do we deal with it?
Professor Carlson believes instilling a strong sense of belonging and pride in young Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people may be a key strategy.
"We need to protect our young people in a way that they grow up to feel strong about who they are, regardless of what they look like,” she said.
"We have to stop playing into the politics of identity ourselves. And we have to operate more on a sense of care for each other.
"Maybe generational is the change. Maybe we do focus on young people and try and build their strength and resilience."
The professor said it’s about creating a model of care.
“We need to operate in a model of care like we always have -inclusiveness, which is what our kinship systems are based on. There was none of this 'you get to count' or 'you don't count',” she said.
"If we concentrate on young people to learn what their history is so they have that compassion.
“But, they also have a forward-thinking where they're imagining a world where colonialism doesn't exist, but the strength of who they are does exist."
Dr Whyman said education is key.
"Programs that raise awareness around what lateral violence is, what causes it, the impacts that it has on people and strategies to kind of overcome them and tackle them."
"Dismantling some of the settler colonial systems and some of the ways they interact with Indigenous people probably has a bigger role to play.
"I think also we as Indigenous people need some sort of individual and collective healing, that focuses on developing a strong spirit."
If you have found anything in this story upsetting please reach out to 13 YARN, or your local Aboriginal Medical Service.
