Jacinta Nampijinpa Price has branded critics of the Melbourne Storm as childish, defending the NRL team for scaling back homecoming ceremonies.
The Storm made the decision last week, sparking a backlash, particularly from high-profile Indigenous rapper Adam Briggs, a former ardent supporter of the club.
Senator Price, shadow minister for indigenous Australians, responded with an article in Nine newspapers on Thursday saying those demanding a welcome to the country on every occasion lacked “nuance” and “rational thinking”.
He questioned the mentality of Australians who believed it was racist if someone “wasn’t willing to wholeheartedly implement a welcome to the country on every occasion”.
“It is childish and a nation cannot function properly or expect to be strong with such fundamental rhetoric,” Senator Price wrote.
Senator Price said the Storm was not scrapping Welcome to Country but was “engaging Indigenous communities to consider how they recognize Indigenous people and culture in local games”.
It is believed the club will hold the ceremony on culturally significant occasions, such as the NRL’s annual Indigenous Round.
The senator said she is “saddened” that such a sensible approach could be brandished as an “oppressive force.”
Jacinta Nampijinpa Price says those criticizing the Melbourne Storm’s decision to cut homecoming ceremonies are “childish”.
The Melbourne Storm announced they will not automatically hold a Welcome to Country before every home game.
Instead, he said a nuanced approach would make the “legitimacy and importance” of Welcome to the Country “more clearly confirmed as we limit its proliferation.”
Senator Price believed that the best way to preserve the “sacred and genuine nature” of the ritual was to “cease with activism” and not use it as an opportunity to “deliver a sermon on colonial guilt.”
“Celebrate the ceremony, but abandon extremism,” he advised.
“It only discredits the person doing it and risks alienating the community at large.”
Senator Price questioned what the ‘Indigenous recognition’ offered by Welcome to Country did for disadvantaged Indigenous people living in remote areas and experiencing high levels of violence and sexual assault.
“I’m not interested in pointing out race or treating people based on their race, just because,” he wrote.
‘So if that’s the ultimate goal of the recognition being promoted here, I don’t want to be a part of it.
“But if the goal of recognition is to address the disadvantage faced by our most marginalized Indigenous Australians, I’m all for it.”
Following the Storm’s announcement that they would not automatically host a Welcome to Country during home games, rap star Adam Briggs, also known as Briggs or sometimes Senator Briggs, sharply criticized the club of which he was once a member.
“Look, the cost of living means cultural recognition just isn’t viable in this economy,” he wrote on social media platform X.
‘Cultural inclusion has a price. Storm could do it if she wanted to; “If anyone knows how to enforce a salary cap, it’s them.”
He followed up with a post on Facebook.
“Not surprising and disappointing,” Briggs wrote.
‘What is your identity @Storm? I couldn’t care less about the pageantry, but the thin veil of respect finally disappeared.
‘We revealed that a co-owner donated $175,000 to the NO campaign. What value does a welcome have when these are the people behind the decisions and identity of the club?
The salary cap jibe is a reference to Storm being caught deliberately breaching the salary cap by secretly paying players, causing the NRL to strip all of the club’s honors from 2006 and 2010, including two premierships. minister at that time.
Briggs announced he would no longer support Storm in 2023 after discovering that a board member made a substantial contribution to the No campaign during the Indigenous Voice referendum to Parliament.