I had to re-read this article a couple times to make sure I was understanding it correctly:
“Race Discrimination Commissioner Tom Calma wants the burden of proof in cases of racial discrimination to fall on the alleged offender, instead of the person making the complaint.”
No more innocence until proven guilty?
“Mr Calma said Australia’s laws made it difficult to prove there had been discrimination.”
Well then, let’s make it easier by eliminating the need for proof entirely. Unless you want to prove your innocence, that is.
Bolt and Blair are on the case.
[Hat tip: Andrew Bolt]
Australian Libertarian Society (old site) 
It is a travesty of liberal democracy that the state pays a fortune to airheads like Calma to stoke racial tensions. To make matters worse he does it by privileging the political/moral/legal authority of the UN over our own parliament!
HREOC is an anachronism of a bygone era and should be closed.
Maybe genuine discrimination, based on the notion of some races being inferior, is in fact quite rare.
I accuse Mr. Calma of being a racist. I see Bolt has the email address needed to send in complaints. If the burden is on the accused, then prove to me, Mr. Calma, that you are not a racist.
Isn’t that what they used to do with witches in the 16th century?
Pommy, you must be a racist as well then, for having the temerity to question the Infinite Wisdom of the Race Relations Industry.
No, Mark, apparently not. You see under our new proposed race laws, my action of outing Mr. Calma as a racist, places the burden of proof on him to prove he is not.
Let’s accuse Mr. Mugabe of being a racist! He’ll have to resign to fight the case here, so Zimbabwe will gain immediately, and when he loses the case (I remember all those anti-white laws he passed, and his anti-British statements, so the case is a sinecure), he’ll be jailed here! Or have to apologise, or something.
Australian race discrimination commissioner Tom Calma wrongly claims that people should have to prove themselves innocent of racism.
To support this disturbing claim, he cites an erroneous Australian human rights commission report falsely claiming that American law puts the burden of proof on defendants to prove themselves innocent.
That is false. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in St. Mary’s Honor Center v. Hicks (1993) and Texas v. Burdine (1981) that the defendant does NOT have the ultimate burden of proof; the complainant or the government must prove the defendant is guilty.
I discuss those cases, and the false claims of the Australian “human rights” authorities, in an April 16, 2008 post on international law at OpenMarket.org, the blog of the Competitive Enterprise Institute, where I work as an attorney.
(I spent years as an attorney handling discrimination cases in private practice, and also worked briefly at the U.S. Department of Education, Office for Civil Rights, helping adjudicate discrimination cases).
Thanks for that Hans. Yes, I was skeptical about the report’s claims of the US, though I can believe it about Canada after the Ezra Levant story.
Here is a link to the OpenMarket.org article for anyone interested in reading it.
Let us put aside for a moment the inherent evil of requiring one to prove one’s innocence of anything. Instead, consider the consequences of Calma’s call in a mechanical sense. A accuses B of racism. Under Calma’s scheme, B would be presumed guilty. How can B prove his innocence? How do you prove a negative in such a nebulous thing as motive? B would be reduced to feebly proclaiming ‘Why, some of my best frieds are (insert A’s race here)’.
All that would really be left for B would be to claim that A’s allegation is in itself racist. Setting up an accusation, counter-accusation loop that would, in an ideal world, overheat the whole system and cause it to explode but which would, in our imperfect world, merely add to the suffering of all.