Uploaded November 2025 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
As Australia becomes a more progressive country, where racism and sexism are to be vanquished at all costs, the very people who are leading the charge are also the very people who can’t help but bring race and gender into everything they touch. Take for instance, the humble dingo.
Just to be clear, the dingo isn’t a native Australian animal. According to the ABC’s Deep Time project—a 65,000-year scientific (allegedly) history of Aboriginal Australia—they note that “Scientists believe the dingo arrived on the mainland around this time [3,500 years ago], becoming the continent’s first introduced species. DNA evidence suggests they came here with seafarers from Asia.” So dingoes are essentially Asian dogs. It should be noted that “Some Aboriginal groups developed a special relationship with dingoes.”
In true ABC style, they somehow brought race into the dingo debate in this article from today: “Queensland considers allowing dingoes to be kept as pets.” They interviewed a dingo genetics researcher Kylie Cairns, where they write, “Dr Cairns pointed out that dingoes had been in Australia for thousands of years, while domestic dogs mainly arrived with white colonists.” Why did they have to say “white” colonists? Couldn’t they just have said “colonists?” What does it matter what the skin colour of the colonists was?
The scientific name for dingoes is “Canis familiaris,” which is exactly the same name as domesticated dogs. Scientifically, they’re one and the same, but there is some debate around whether they should be categorised as a different species or not.
For example, in the article, they interview Alix Livingstone, Founding Director of not-for-profit Defend the Wild. She said, “Dingoes are not dogs. They are a genetically, evolutionarily, and behaviourally distinct species that play an irreplaceable ecological role as Australia’s apex land predator.” Here she is with an Aboriginal lady with paint on her face (or is that bird poo?).
Ms. Livingstone is a self-proclaimed vegan soldier who sometimes gets in the news for raiding abattoirs and piggeries and the like.
On her Defend the Wild website, surprisingly, the leadership team consists entirely of women. Not a single pesky man to be seen. Director of Cultural Heritage, Sonya Takau, as seen here hugging a dingo, they note that “To Sonya, the dingo is kin, and she has a cultural obligation to protect them from harm.” Even though, remembering, they were only introduced to Australia a few thousand years ago, so are certainly not a native Australian animal. It’s interesting that they “need protecting.”
Simon Stretton from Durong Dingo Sanctuary in the South Burnett made his views very clear: “I just tell people, ‘you can't have a dingo’—they’re not a dog, not a pet.”
Either way, the Queensland Government are planning to allow them to be kept as pets. Ms. Takau commented, “From my cultural perspective and growing up with my old people, my father and my family, the dingo is very culturally significant… ”
So yes, this wild, once-Asian, introduced canine is caught up in some sort of cultural, racial, uniquely Australian war of words.
Of course, this is not the first animal to get involved in some kind of racialised debate. What about this little fella, a bird I know as the Indian Myna? But no! You can’t call it the Indian Myna anymore, because you know, you might upset Indian people. It’s now known as the Common Myna. In this article sent in by a viewer from a couple of months ago, they show a photo of a native Noisy Miner on the left and an invasive Common Myna on the right. So obviously, when using the word “invasive,” they don’t want to associate that with Indian people. They note, “It’s easy to tell the two species apart—the Noisy Miner is mostly grey, while the Common Myna, which was introduced from India, is brown.” So the bird that comes from India, the one that you’re not allowed to refer to as Indian, is brown. Oh it’s amazing how we tie ourselves up in knots trying to avoid offending people!
Interestingly, in 2016, the ABC tended to focus more on the facts, rather than worry about who they’re going to offend. They wrote: “Invasive Indian Myna birds displacing wildlife. The chocolate brown bird has a black head and distinctive yellow beak, eye patch and legs.” It sounds like some kind of Indian pirate!
Anyway, that’s modern day Australia for you: From the very first introduced species—the dingo that is somehow culturally significant to Aboriginal people, but domestic dogs are somehow not significant because they were brought in by white colonists, to birds of Indian origin that we’re not allowed to call Indian anymore, so instead we dance around the fact by using the word “common” instead. This is modern, woke Australia. Now if you excuse me, I’m off to eat an Indian curry… Sorry, I mean, “Common” curry.
MUSIC
Allégro by Emmit Fenn
As Australia becomes a more progressive country, where racism and sexism are to be vanquished at all costs, the very people who are leading the charge are also the very people who can’t help but bring race and gender into everything they touch. Take for instance, the humble dingo.
Just to be clear, the dingo isn’t a native Australian animal. According to the ABC’s Deep Time project—a 65,000-year scientific (allegedly) history of Aboriginal Australia—they note that “Scientists believe the dingo arrived on the mainland around this time [3,500 years ago], becoming the continent’s first introduced species. DNA evidence suggests they came here with seafarers from Asia.” So dingoes are essentially Asian dogs. It should be noted that “Some Aboriginal groups developed a special relationship with dingoes.”
In true ABC style, they somehow brought race into the dingo debate in this article from today: “Queensland considers allowing dingoes to be kept as pets.” They interviewed a dingo genetics researcher Kylie Cairns, where they write, “Dr Cairns pointed out that dingoes had been in Australia for thousands of years, while domestic dogs mainly arrived with white colonists.” Why did they have to say “white” colonists? Couldn’t they just have said “colonists?” What does it matter what the skin colour of the colonists was?
The scientific name for dingoes is “Canis familiaris,” which is exactly the same name as domesticated dogs. Scientifically, they’re one and the same, but there is some debate around whether they should be categorised as a different species or not.
For example, in the article, they interview Alix Livingstone, Founding Director of not-for-profit Defend the Wild. She said, “Dingoes are not dogs. They are a genetically, evolutionarily, and behaviourally distinct species that play an irreplaceable ecological role as Australia’s apex land predator.” Here she is with an Aboriginal lady with paint on her face (or is that bird poo?).
Ms. Livingstone is a self-proclaimed vegan soldier who sometimes gets in the news for raiding abattoirs and piggeries and the like.
On her Defend the Wild website, surprisingly, the leadership team consists entirely of women. Not a single pesky man to be seen. Director of Cultural Heritage, Sonya Takau, as seen here hugging a dingo, they note that “To Sonya, the dingo is kin, and she has a cultural obligation to protect them from harm.” Even though, remembering, they were only introduced to Australia a few thousand years ago, so are certainly not a native Australian animal. It’s interesting that they “need protecting.”
Simon Stretton from Durong Dingo Sanctuary in the South Burnett made his views very clear: “I just tell people, ‘you can't have a dingo’—they’re not a dog, not a pet.”
Either way, the Queensland Government are planning to allow them to be kept as pets. Ms. Takau commented, “From my cultural perspective and growing up with my old people, my father and my family, the dingo is very culturally significant… ”
So yes, this wild, once-Asian, introduced canine is caught up in some sort of cultural, racial, uniquely Australian war of words.
Of course, this is not the first animal to get involved in some kind of racialised debate. What about this little fella, a bird I know as the Indian Myna? But no! You can’t call it the Indian Myna anymore, because you know, you might upset Indian people. It’s now known as the Common Myna. In this article sent in by a viewer from a couple of months ago, they show a photo of a native Noisy Miner on the left and an invasive Common Myna on the right. So obviously, when using the word “invasive,” they don’t want to associate that with Indian people. They note, “It’s easy to tell the two species apart—the Noisy Miner is mostly grey, while the Common Myna, which was introduced from India, is brown.” So the bird that comes from India, the one that you’re not allowed to refer to as Indian, is brown. Oh it’s amazing how we tie ourselves up in knots trying to avoid offending people!
Interestingly, in 2016, the ABC tended to focus more on the facts, rather than worry about who they’re going to offend. They wrote: “Invasive Indian Myna birds displacing wildlife. The chocolate brown bird has a black head and distinctive yellow beak, eye patch and legs.” It sounds like some kind of Indian pirate!
Anyway, that’s modern day Australia for you: From the very first introduced species—the dingo that is somehow culturally significant to Aboriginal people, but domestic dogs are somehow not significant because they were brought in by white colonists, to birds of Indian origin that we’re not allowed to call Indian anymore, so instead we dance around the fact by using the word “common” instead. This is modern, woke Australia. Now if you excuse me, I’m off to eat an Indian curry… Sorry, I mean, “Common” curry.
MUSIC
Allégro by Emmit Fenn
