The 'disturbing' truth exposed in Adam Goodes documentary

Journalist Chip Le Grand says the Adam Goodes documentary has exposed the ‘disturbing’ reality of racism in Australia.

Broadcast to a national TV audience for the first time on Thursday night, ‘The Final Quarter’ shone a light on the awful treatment that forced the Sydney Swans legend into retirement in 2015.

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The two-time Brownlow medallist and two-time premiership player was booed relentlessly at games around Australia before he hung up the boots.

The awful treatment was sparked by Goodes calling out a 13-year-old Collingwood supporter for calling him an ‘ape’ in 2013, and was re-ignited two years later when he performed an Aboriginal war dance in the direction of Carlton supporters during Indigenous round in 2015.

But despite the racial overtones, many have maintained that the saga had nothing to do with Goodes’ race, but rather for the way he handled himself.

Discussing the documentary on a special late night edition of The Project on Thursday, the Australian’s Le Grand said the most “disturbing” aspect of the film was that “a lot of us don’t seem to even know racism when we see it”.

He also said the AFL’s inability to stop fans from booing was “such a failure of leadership”.

“They just needed someone to clearly stand up, and it was Gill McLachlan’s time, in that instance, to just say: ‘Look, yes, it is complicated but, clearly, race is a part of this, it’s a big part of this, it’s ugly and it has to stop’,” he said.

Greats condemn AFL’s response

Indigenous player and former Brownlow Medallist Gavin Wanganeen said the isolation Goodes would have felt was particularly grating for him.

“The thing that stood out for me was just seeing how alone Adam was, and for how long it went on for, the booing, three years,” Wanganeen said.

“Looking back on it and watching the film, you certainly see it in a different light. But his resilience showed out, I fully felt for Adam.

“Not fully, no, I didn’t at the time. And in a way looking back now as a past Indigenous player, I felt that if I had my time again, I would have done something about it.”

Goodes’ former teammate Jude Bolton said the documentary had stirred feelings of “immense sadness” and “extreme anger” in him.

“I think from my perspective, the overarching sort of feelings and emotions during that film was just the immense sadness, but just the extreme anger, you know, watching,” Bolton said.

“It was a difficult thing to do go through and understand ‘well why are they booing?’

“But to see him just absolutely backed into a corner throughout what should be a fantastic finish to an incredible career was just extremely sad.”

Why didn’t the AFL act earlier?

Tanya Hosch, the AFL’s general manager of inclusion and social policy, said the league hadn’t responded soon enough to help Goodes.

“I think (the AFL failed in) taking too much time to determine how to respond,” Hosch said.

“And my recollection of the time because I wasn’t at the AFL then but I was working with the AFL through the Recognise campaign and also working with Adam through the Recognise campaign.

“And I feel like the AFL probably got stuck where a lot of Australia got stuck, which was having a conversation and getting bogged down into a debate about whether the booing was racist or not, rather than addressing the booing that was clearly racially motivated.”

Bolton said the AFL’s silence was “deafening.”

“Certainly, the AFL has shown that they’ve been able to politicise and jump into many different issues across the journey,” Bolton said.

“And that delay, as we’ve noted, it was just their silence was deafening.

“And I think that’s the biggest regret that certainly now, Gill (chief executive Gillon McLachlan) and some of the commissioners at the time will have to live with.

“I think that’s been the biggest issue is they didn’t inject themselves into the conversation.

“Okay, they may have been split as a commission, but how can they not walk out of that room with a directive to say ‘we’ve got to address these publicly?’”

Hosch said the AFL could have changed the nature of the discussion by acting sooner.

“If it was a different world and the AFL had led very strongly, that would have given the supporters of that position somewhere to head as well,” she said.

“So even if we end up in a situation where of course there’s pushback, there are still people claiming that their booing was fine, because it wasn’t racially motivated. And they will never acknowledge where that comes from, or they’re very comfortable to say ‘look it wasn’t about the race issue.’

“I would always wonder how much people really explore their bias and prejudice because, you know, we live in a in a world where it’s very easy for that to prosper.

“But eventually people took to their feet themselves and said, ‘we’re going to be really clear about where we stand on this.’”