I shared my story of confronting my biases with a Hala Abdelnour, a new connection, recently.

I spoke of being challenged to look at my racism and white privilege, and of how my experience with asylum seekers on Nauru changed the trajectory of my life.

Then I heard these four words…”off the back of…”

Those words cut deep into my soul.

I knew, cognitively, that I’d worked in a refugee camp run by the Australian government.

I knew that I was able to come and go at will, as those detained did not.

I knew that people were suffering trauma at our hands; that such treatment was persecution by policy.

And I knew that in that place I had come to understand that I held racist views and I saw white privilege clearly.

But, the price of that understanding was off the back of other people’s suffering. That is privilege at its ultimate!

I can’t change any of this. It all happened on the past.

But, as one song writer penned it….”Now that I have seen, I am responsible.”



I am responsible to listen to and believe the shared experiences of others, even if it seems foreign to me.

I am responsible for being an informed ally, educating myself about my privilege and know that it is real, even when it doesn’t feel like that to me.

I am responsible for calling out discrimination where I see it – in my friendship groups, in my circle of influence, on social media, via email.  

I cannot let the trauma of others, which was a space for educating me, to be wasted.