Speaking in Melbourne, Invasion Day organiser Tarneen Onus-Williams made clear her opinions on Australia Day, the flag and Australia itself.

Turns out those opinions were not completely positive:

“F--- Australia, hope it f-----g burns to the ground,” Invasion Day organiser Tarneen Onus-Williams said. “If you celebrate Australia Day, f---er, you’re celebrating the death of my ancestors. “All you fellas with the Australian flag should be so embarrassed with yourself, it’s embarrassing. It’s embarrassing that you celebrate people’s deaths, the people of this land’s death. You make me sick to my stomach.”

media_camera Some of Tarneen’s Invasion Day friends

Ms Onus-Williams, who also serves on the state government’s Aboriginal Interim Treaty Working Group, made no apologies for trying to crash the party. “People who celebrate Australia Day are celebrating the genocide of Aboriginal people, waving Australian flags in our faces. It’s disgusting,” she said. “Yes, some people use that language but it’s nothing compared to the way Aboriginal people have been treated. “People will try and attack us or worry about the language but I feel like Aboriginal people dying in custody is much worse.”

Onus-Williams is an executive on the state government-funded Koorie Youth Council:

The council received $875,000 in state government funding in the 2016-17 budget and shared in a $17.9 million indigenous grant.

Let’s start our national immolation by burning that money.

UPDATE. Onus-Williams subsequently clarified her comments, claiming her words were a “metaphor”:

"It's been an emotional day and it was a strong statement, but I am not going to apologise for it,” Ms Onus-Williams who identifies as a Yigar Gunditjmara and Bindal woman said.

Melissa Cunningham puts into context and perspective, Melb.Age, activist Tarneen Onus-Williams passionate use of metaphor, not meant to be taken literally, in her address to thousands of conscientious objectors Melbourne. — FatherBob (@FatherBob) January 26, 2018

"It was a metaphor, not actually a statement to be taken literally. I just want everything, all the governments to fall apart, because our people are dying and nobody cares and the whole system needs to change.”

Note to fellow conservatives: keep the Onus-Williams defence in mind the next time you face Human Rights Commission or Press Council persecution.

UPDATE II. “A bit poetic”:

Cheers to @theage interviewing me for this.

sometimes when you're a bit poetic things get taken out of context.https://t.co/yk6z5ouP1x — Tarneen (@Tarneen) January 26, 2018

Earlier:

Neil got really angry that I called him a racist. He really needs to get some anger management, inviting guests onto his show and getting angry at them lol. Typical angry white man @ it again https://t.co/sjFZmCBKgF — Tarneen (@Tarneen) January 23, 2018

Maybe Neil Mitchell’s anger was just poetic metaphor and Tarneen is criticising it without context.

UPDATE III. Roger Franklin:

Ms Onus-Williams’ yen for a conflagration of colonialist oppressors might pose some problems close to home. There’s her job at Oxfam, for starters. How would the donations roll in if all those racist letterboxes were turned to ash? Perhaps, were donations to dry up in the meantime, the charity might come to grasp what Australia and, indeed, its very own future, would look like were its employee's dream ever to come true. Current donors might also wish to ponder that question.

They aren’t kids. Tarneen Onus-Williams is 24. At that age I was a father with a mortgage and was working 3 jobs. She wants to be a radical activist she can take the heat. — Nyunggai W Mundine (@nyunggai) January 26, 2018

And there is her executive membership of the state-funded Koorie Youth Council, plus her gig as a client services officer at the Aboriginal Legal Service. She also finds time to be a member of the Aboriginal Interim Treaty Working Group, again state-funded. Readers curious to know how an incendiary activist spends her days and builds a career will find her LinkedIn CV quite interesting. Undoubtedly some also will wonder at the sums involved in payrolling these activist organisations.

Read on.