Since being granted their licence, WAM Clothing has sent cease and desist letters to various designers, demanding that they stop using the Aboriginal flag on their clothing. Their fees — which would see 20% of all sales diverted to WAM Clothing in exchange for use of the flag — have even resulted in several AFL teams being unable to use the Aboriginal flag on their uniforms, or to fly it during their Indigenous rounds. This has lead to some teams replacing it with the "Free The Flag" logo by Clothing The Gaps, the business that originally brought this issue to the forefront.
While Harold Thomas is legally within his rights to give the license to whomever he chooses, that doesn’t change the fact that morally, he shouldn't. Thomas knows our struggles, he knows how hard it is to be Aboriginal in Australia. Do we, his people, mean less to him than a paycheck? Do our collective hardships mean nothing to the man who thought to unite us under one flag? Does our pain mean nothing to the one who created this flag as a means of protest against the treatment of Aboriginal people?
I look at the flag and see my great grandmother when she was five years old and stolen from her family. I look at those colours and see the fact that my living grandmother is only now being paid for her work as a slave 50 years ago. The black, red and yellow reminds me of when my mother and I couldn't leave a hotel without being searched to make sure we didn't take anything. I see the flag and I remember not being allowed to play with one girl because her mother didn't like her having an Aboriginal friend. How could Moore and Wooster understand that? The short answer is, they don't.
The people at the helm of these companies do not know what it is like to be Indigenous in this country. They are not being murdered for being Blak. Their children are not being stolen. Their land has not been taken. They have not been enslaved. They do not get to profit off of our pain. They do not get to look at our trauma and see dollar signs. This flag is meant to represent us as a people, but instead it shows us how much money white Australia can make off of us while they press their boots to our necks.
Blak culture is not for profit. Our culture is not a meal ticket. Blak culture should belong to Blak people because we are the ones who fought and died for it. We are still here and we deserve, at the very least, a damn flag to wave around for our efforts.
If you want to join the cause to Free The Flag, you can:
—Head to www.clothingthegaps.com to learn more.
—Donate at https://www.gofundme.com/f/free-the-flag-fighting-fund.
—Or sign the petition at https://www.change.org/p/let-s-celebrate-a-freed-aboriginal-flag-in-its-50th-commemorative-year-flagrightsnow.
Nikki Erin is a writer, singer and actress who cares deeply about Indigenous Australian rights. She tweets at @nikkierinmusic and grams at @realmofnikki.