As part of the BOSS True Leaders 2016 deliberations, the judges identified four moments that exemplified leadership, including Stan Grant's stand against racism.
In the past two years Stan Grant has put his journalistic career to one side to shine a spotlight on the true history of Indigenous Australia and, specifically, the brutality, poverty and injustice visited upon the original inhabitants of this nation.
When a video of his appearance in an IQ2 debate (an initiative of the Ethics Centre), in September 2015, about racism was released in January, it went viral. It connected the maltreatment of Indigenous Australians throughout Australia’s history to the AFL fans who booed Aboriginal footballer Adam Goodes the previous winter.
He said, “We are better than this,” but argued the Australian dream is rooted in racism and pointed out that the prejudice and violence heaped upon Australia’s first inhabitants is something many Australians never think about.
In July, just after the broadcast of an ABC TV Four Corners report about the abuse of children in juvenile detention in the Northern Territory, he threw out his speech notes for a public lecture he was to deliver at the University of New South Wales and revealed how he had struggled to contain his rage when he saw the graphic footage of prison guards stripping, assaulting and mistreating a teenage boy at the Don Dale Youth Detention Centre in Darwin.
For Grant, the matter continues to be highly personal. When he watched his son watching that Four Corners report, he said, “I saw him lose his place in the world. With each scene of horror, he became less sure of his country.”
Grant has urged Australia to negotiate a treaty with its Indigenous population, and has also called for a broader truth and reconciliation commission.
WHAT THE JUDGES SAID:
Stan has graduated quickly from television commentator-journalist to national thought leader and commanded significant public attention.
The speech he gave that went viral was outstanding and at every level a transformational leadership moment. You could not listen to it and see the Indigenous landscape differently; particularly through the lens of how recent past history so shaped and formed the life of someone like Stan.
Many would look at him and say: “What’s the issue? He’s done well, so why the big deal about bad things that might have been done to his forbears?” He explained with such passion and eloquence why that history matters at every level.
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