Rest as Resistance

by Mililma May

Rest as resistance feels lazy, inapt, and inappropriate when we look through the eyes of capitalism; those eyes that admire productivity. As an outspoken and proud Blak woman, I used to think that rest was simply not an option. After a few burn out breakdowns I have since realised how wrong I was. Capitalism and white supremacy taught my recent ancestors that they were only valuable because of the labour they contributed to this society. A Blak woman who couldn’t clean, cook, and serve Whitefullas was useless to the colony.

The early movements of Aboriginal self-determination saw the tireless fight of my recent ancestors. They were enslaved on white-run stations and homesteads, and yet still managed to organise movements to get us land rights, voting rights and bare minimum access to some resources that whitefullas take for granted (although we are still fighting for this).

A Blak woman of the 70s, 80s and 90s was seen as staunch and busy: a mum, a cook, a cleaner, a shoulder to cry on, a wisdom keeper and a warrior. These expectations of Blak women were and are simply unsustainable, particularly in this pandemic climate where we are now confronted with Blackfulla-White-Supremacists and neo-Nazi-anti-vaxxers. Blak women are expected to keep households together, hold jobs and instil hope in our families all whilst juggling with our own anxieties about the impacts of COVID on our community members; many of whom have pre-existing medical conditions that make them even more vulnerable to COVID.

Blak women, in no small feat, carry the weight of every new case, and the increasing risk of another COVID death all whilst the racism and inaction of the governments leave our communities without the resources to protect us. This is a weight that no one can maintain forever.

Not only are Blak women busy, but we are also sleep deprived. Sleep deprivation is historic amongst oppressed peoples. A Black-Latinx organisation in the US, Black Power Naps, found that sleep deprivation of Black folks led to the foundational success of slavery. A sleep deprived person is less likely to oppose their conditions, speak up about it or retaliate.

Here in Australia, Blackfullas are not getting enough rest either. A study by the Paediatrics and Child Health Division in 2012 found that Indigenous children aged 6-13 were having more sleep-related problems than their non-Indigenous peers.

“In summary, data from various studies show that, compared with non-Indigenous children, Indigenous children report poorer sleep quality (e.g., sleep scheduling, sleep fragmentation), decreased sleep duration, worse sleep hygiene, increased sleepiness, and more instability and irregularity in their sleep–wake patterns, particularly in “get up” times. Furthermore, these sleep problems were related to aggression, withdrawn behaviours, thought problems and internalised behaviours, reduced reading ability and numerical skills (122-127)”.*

When I read this for the first time, I was confronted with just how insidiously colonialism picks at us. How can us Blackfullas dream if we cannot even have a good sleep? Here in the NT, many of us are homeless or, if we live in houses, they are over-crowded with more than 10 people per 3-bedroom home. We often face power outages in our remote communities leaving us without fans, let alone air-conditioning in these tropical conditions and repairs on wear and damage to houses is systemically problematic, prolongled and unhelpful. The depressing part of unpacking what impacts a good sleep for Blackfullas in the NT, is that I haven’t yet raised the impacts of mental illness on sleep.  

So this year you will not see me marching in the streets on Invasion Day. Instead, I will be sleeping in as the rain pours and cools us down on another lazy morning.

*Blunden, S. & Camfferman. Can sleep contribute to “closing the gap” for Indigenous children? Med Journal Aust 2013; 199 (1): 19-20. || doi: 10.5694/mja13.10302. Published online: 8 July 2013

Teh Cha would like to thank Mililma and UP:Uprising of the People for their hard work and generosity in sharing knowledge and information with the wider community living on Larrakia country. You can see their posts about deep rest and what to do with your Invasion Day here.