Adelaide forward Taylor Walker was suspended for six games and fined $20,000 for making a racist remark. Photo: AAP

My heart sank when I heard that Taylor Walker had made a racist comment about Indigenous player Robbie Young during the quarter-time break at a recent SANFL game between the Crows reserves and North Adelaide.

Walker, who was there as a spectator, made the racist remark to one of his Adelaide teammates, Matt Crouch, who was playing in the match.

The fact that this is still happening in 2021 tells us there’s still a long way to go when it comes to stamping out racism, both casual and overt, that lies beneath the surface in sport (and Australian society).

I am a supporter of the Adelaide Crows and I am a club ambassador. My connection to the tri-colours is strong and this new revelation hurts deeply.

Indigenous AFL champion Michael O’Loughlin responded to the incident by saying it “rips your heart out”. The 303-game player shared 11 seasons alongside current Crows coach Matthew Nicks at the Sydney Swans.

At his media conference last Friday, Nicks spoke about his ‘shock’, ‘disappointment’ and ‘anger’ upon hearing the news, and fought back tears when he revealed he’d made phone calls to apologise to some of the Indigenous players he’s played with over his career.

Nicks’ raw emotion made me feel better about my club.

In a sport that’s had its fair share of faux apologies, weasel words and staged media conferences – Nicks’ words were genuine, heartfelt and faith-restoring.

Something else gave me hope too.

It was an Adelaide official who overheard Walker’s slur and made the decision to tell the club. This takes courage. The Crows then self-reported the matter to the AFL.

Is it sad that calling out racism is still viewed as courageous?

Yes, it probably is, but hopefully one day it won’t be viewed like this, it will just be seen as the right thing to do.

The incident was then investigated by the AFL Integrity Unit under the Peek Rule (Rule 35 of the AFL Rules). It went to conciliation, Walker apologised to Young and the official and both accepted his apology. Walker was suspended for six matches and will make a $20,000 donation to an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander program in South Australia as well as undertake further education.

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In the past, a comment like Walker’s would have found itself swept under the carpet along with all the other sordid muck – where it would have emulsified with everything else deemed too difficult to confront in broad daylight.

In footy chat groups (and in society) there are people who still think this should have been handled by the carpet-sweepers or, at the very least, by the Crows, in-house.

These same people feel it is their right to know exactly what Walker said, so they can make their own ‘informed’ opinion on the matter.

But this isn’t about them. This is about the impact of those words on Robbie Young. This is about the impact of those words on the Indigenous community.

In a recent interview I did with Yorta Yorta woman and public health advocate Dr Summer May Finlay, she spoke about some of the things non-Indigenous people can do to provide more than ‘tokenistic’ support for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people (symbolic gestures like wearing an Aboriginal flag t-shirt, or acknowledgement of country at the start of a conference) in order to become allies.

One way to show you’re an ally is to call out racism, offensive stereotypes and behaviour that’s dismissive of Aboriginal people and their culture.

Staying silent, Dr Finlay says, condones the action, making you as bad as the person who made the racist comment.

Too often casual racism is dismissed as a joke, a throwaway line, a momentary lapse of reason.

The good old “larrikin defence” is a favourite of those who indulge in this kind of behaviour, but while there can be something charming about the Australian larrikin attitude (which writers and poets have romanticised for years) it has a darker side – it can camouflage and subtly reinforce racism, sexism and homophobia.

One act won’t wipe out the culture of silence around racism within the AFL and broader society – lord knows, if Adam Goodes couldn’t shift attitudes after the sustained racial abuse he copped, it’s hard to imagine what it will take.

But the standard you walk past is the standard you accept.

The Adelaide Football Club and the game of Australian football are better for this act of courage.