Kurt Tilse – the partner of Aussie fitness influencer Sarah’s Day – has shared screenshots of his DMs after the couple were accused of buying a didgeridoo (also known as a yidaki) from a non-Aboriginal-owned shop, as well as for silencing Black voices in the aftermath.
The vlogging couple’s problematic purchase was first called out by Insta account @blakbusiness, who tried to let them know their instrument was not actually purchased from an Aboriginal-owned business.
Olivia from the @blakbusiness account reached out to the couple at the time, but didn’t initially receive a response, and instead her comments were repeatedly deleted.
Now Tilse has shared screenshots of the DMs he sent to @blackbusinesses with Yahoo! Lifestyle, the tone and content of which hardly acknowledge Olivia’s previous offers to help educate the couple.
“We are happy to participate in dialogue that is helpful, informative, helps to educate ourselves and our community and brings positive change,” Tilse wrote in the message.
“Before making the purchase, we had researched Spirit Gallery [the shop in question] and it was our understanding that the profits from each purchase go directly back to the Indigenous community.
“Our intention was to support Indigenous business and we believed that this was enabling us to do so.
“Furthermore, by making the purchase our intention was to teach our son about Indigenous culture.”
Later in the message, Tilse said he and his wife are “doing our best” to educate themselves and be a positive influence on others.
However, he then brought up bullying, which is not only off-topic but also a bit sus.
“When people are aggressive, use vulgar language towards us or members of our community, threaten violence and incite hate, we must take steps to protect our community,” he said.
It was not clear if he was referring to the posts by @blakbusiness, which were neither aggressive nor threatening, or to the similar responses of others.
“We have zero tolerance towards bullying, violence and threatening behaviour,” he added.
Nowhere in the message did he acknowledge the fact he and his wife had deleted comments from Aboriginal people educating them about their purchase. However, he did stress to Yahoo! Lifestyle that the couple did research before buying the didgeridoo.
While the message did close by hoping to “create positive change” together, he also said he hoped to “cease diviseness”, which, tbh, could easily be ceased if the two of them simply listened to the Aboriginal people educating them about their purchase.
The initial problem was a white couple perpetuating the long tradition of white business profiting of Aboriginal culture. Now, it’s also about a white couple not properly engaging with the Aboriginal people who respectfully called them out.
