Erasure of Indigenous women is common practice in Australia. 25 years ago I stood on that sideline like Jemma Mi Mi, the only difference now is Netball Australia has a RAP and an Indigenous round. That to me says we still have a very long way to go.
On Sunday September 20th 2020, the Queensland Firebirds played the Melbourne Vixens for the Inaugural Indigenous round of Suncorp Super Netball. For those that missed it, the league’s only Indigenous player Jemma Mi Mi was left off the court the entire match.
This has led to many people saying Netball Australia’s Indigenous round is a form of tokenism. It raises many questions, one being, if we have come a long way in terms of including Indigenous players in the sport then why have we only got one Indigenous player in the whole professional league, and how could this latest incident be allowed to happen?
I started playing netball at the age of nine, on the South Coast of New South Wales. At the age of 17, I left boarding school in Brisbane and spent two years at the Australian Institute of Sport (AIS) in Canberra. In 1997 at the age of 19, I was selected to play for the Queensland Firebirds in the Inaugural Commonwealth Bank Trophy. At the time, I was the only Indigenous player in the competition.
I was so excited to be selected, but there was a lot of pressure on me to perform. I always felt like I had to be not only good on the court but off it as well. I remember playing for the QLD open women’s team, we were away playing in a competition and I only had $2 to my name, this meant I didn’t go out to dinners. I remember the comments and rudeness I received because I didn’t have any money. All the other players had new shoes, new bags, good bras and my belongings were ones I busted my arse to buy or my mum sacrificed to pay for. I always knew I was different. There was just a feeling from how other players interacted with me. It’s hard to articulate but it was just like an unspoken kind of thing. This didn’t deter me from trying to reach my pinnacle as an athlete.
In 1998, Queensland Netball decided that I was going to be the face of netball in the state, and I was required to attend different functions with the then CEO Michelle Buck. We went to the 1998 Gold Coast Indy, but I honestly felt like I was the token Indigenous girl at these events.
Here I was dressed up, going to these really expensive places and I didn’t have a cent to my name. Then when it was time to play on the court I was benched and hardly made appearances for the actual playing team. Even now past players are celebrated for being a part of the Queensland Firebirds. Names are mentioned but if you do a search for my name I am not mentioned anywhere on any official websites, even though I was in the inaugural Firebirds team and the first Indigenous player.
My last season before I quit the Firebirds I was named co-vice captain (there is also no mention of that anywhere). Netball Australia can not allow this to be another Indigenous player to be used just for media purposes. I am a mother now, I have two young girls. I don’t want them playing netball, not until Netball Australia actually fixes the structural racism and classist attitudes that plague the sport.
This latest incident has brought back a lot of memories from my playing days. The feeling of not fitting in because you don’t come from that world. A part of me always thought things would change with time. But clearly there is still more work to be done.
We see Indigenous men thriving in the NRL and the AFL, but even with the high numbers of participation at the elite level, players still experience exclusion based on race and class. But unlike the men, we don’t get large salaries and opportunities once our careers finish.
These issues won’t go away, sporting codes need to dig in and get their hands dirty. We need more Indigenous representation at the board and management level, it’s not just enough to have us as players.
I’m a little angry about it all, I feel for this young player, all of us previous Indigenous players have been there and it seems like the sport has not changed and this is the reason I will not participate in Netball.
Erasure of Indigenous women is common practice in Australia. 25 years ago I stood on that sideline like Jemma Mi Mi, the only difference now is Netball Australia has a RAP and an Indigenous round. That to me says we still have a very long way to go.
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