When first given the assignment to do a personal reflection on NITV, I first asked, what is NITV? Until that day, I had never heard of a channel that was specifically based only on the aboriginal culture. This was all a new experience to me therefore, it made me realise the restricted access to such programs as a non-indigenous Australian. This is something I was completely disappointed and saddened by as I would have expected this to be a public awareness as this channel plays a huge importance on the aboriginal culture as it depicts their lifestyle, challenges and culture especially institutionalized discrimination when it comes to law and order. .
Watching the Wednesday NITV National News report, which is said to "feature the rich diversity of contemporary life within Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities, broadening and redefining the landscape", I was absolutely appalled by the police brutality upon a young aboriginal girl. This institutionalized injustice got me really interested which made me wanting to find out more about how indigenous youths experienced law and order in westernized Australia. After numerous research, I came across an ABC news article- "Nearly 200 children locked in WA police station cells awaiting transfer to Perth after sentencing" (2015). This also brought to my attention the heat between the African youths-especially those of Sudanese background- and the justice system in Australia. The rate is so outrageous and horrific that it has become an embedded rite of passage for both Aboriginal and African youths especially for those of the male gender. According to Creativeinfo's report "Aboriginal prison rates", "half of the 10- to 17-year-olds in jails are Aboriginal. More than 30% of all Australian Aboriginal males come before Corrective Services and 91% of all Aboriginal prisoners are male". This brought to my understanding that the institutionalized discrimination of aboriginal youth is just a repetition of the stolen generations which occurred between the years 1910 and 1970.
