Andrew Bolt reported on the recent more formal call to close Mt Tibrogargan by an activist Aboriginal group on his show last night and invited me on to comment . The text below expands on some of the discussion. The proposed closure of Tibrogargan and nearby Mt Beerwah, like Ayers Rock and Mount Warning and so many other special places now closed to the public based on racial grounds, has more to do with politics than culture. If it was about culture then what respect was given to the old men at Uluru, who grew up around the rock and were either indifferent to the Ayers Rock climb or like Tiger Tjalkalyirri actually encouraged visitors to climb . At Mt Warning the culture of the Aboriginal Group with the closest affinity to the Mountain, the Ngarakbal people who support public access, has been ignored for over 20 years by woke NPWS bureaucrats more interested in the views of groups with more distant connections to the mountain who want to ban access and make life easier for NPWS –...
Our mountains belong to all of us. The Right to Climb them and bask in their views that inspire awe and wonder is as old as the human genome. This long-established cultural tradition is under threat by a small group of bureaucrats determined to impose their way on the rest of the world. It is right to Climb because we have the Right to climb. If you don’t exercise your rights you lose them. Don't let petty nanny state bureaucrats take them away.