Crocodile tears and myths

or how to halt a gas pipeline was brought to my attention yesterday.

I was waiting for a Zoom meeting to start and someone else asked if I knew anything about the attempt to stop a pipeline being laid between Darwin and a site 140km away from the Tiwi Islands. I knew nothing but I thought what I was being told was so unlikely I looked it up. 

Yes, a resident of the Tiwi Islands is attempting to halt the project because, he claims, it will upset Wiyapurali, the Crocodile Man, and Mother Ampitji, a Tiwi version of the Rainbow Serpent. Wiyapurali is apparently a man who turned into a crocodile because he was greedy. He refused to share his food with others.

I didn't know the story at all. It seems that very few people know the story. It also seems that the version given to the court by the person who was demanding the pipeline not be laid is not the same as the version other Tiwi Islanders tell. All this however makes no difference. The court has halted the work on the pipeline. It is costing the company millions of dollars. It is putting at risk billions of dollars in development and employment.

I know there are people who will say, "Oh good! This is another environmentally unacceptable project about to go under. We don't want gas being extracted when we are trying to bring global warming under control."

The project however has already been through the environmental mill - more than once. It was given the go ahead after consultation with all sorts of groups and agencies. It is only now that one man is claiming it will upset Crocodile Man. 

This is all rather like another major development 375km off the west coast  being halted because an indigenous clan claims it was not properly consulted.

I have mixed feelings about both projects but it is clear what is happening here. Environmental groups are using indigenous people to halt the development of projects they do not want to go ahead. It is all too easy to alter stories, especially stories which rely on oral traditions. They will happily dismiss the religious texts of major religions as "fantasy" and "fairy tales" but a man who becomes a crocodile is apparently acceptable if it prevents a project they object to going ahead.

Is this really helping the Tiwi Islanders, the vast majority of whom now claim to be Christian, have their stories accepted and retained?

My paternal grandfather told me stories about "selkies". His grandfather told them to him. It did not prevent his descendants from drilling for oil in the North Sea. If anyone had tried to prevent it on those grounds they would have been laughed out of court.