Mayor Rod Kendall's endorsement of the Wagga Citizen of the Year Joe Williams’ refusal to stand for the Australian national anthem may have set a dangerous precedent.

If Mayor Rod is genuine, which I am sure he is, and to continue his support and endorsement, he should now refuse to stand for the national anthem whenever it is played.

What is your point Mary Kidson (DA, Letters, “Blind leading the blind”). 

Is "blind Freddie" discriminatory or sexist?

I LISTENED to your conversation with Stephen Spink on 2AAA on Monday morning regarding the Joe Williams saga.

Stephen mentioned that Joe had posted on a Facebook page that he accepted the award because it was given to him as a result of his contribution over the past year. 

As the nominator of one of the candidates this year, I am now confused about the criteria for the award.

The nomination form asks for a summary of achievements, including any outstanding achievements over the past year.

This to me meant that the award is based on what the person has done over their lifetime, not just the past year, which is how I wrote my nomination and I suspect how other nominations were written.

Had I known that the past year was more important, I may have changed the way I wrote it.

Please note that this is not "sour grapes" on my part as I was present at the ceremony and had decided, after listening to the testimonials, that my nominee would not receive the award as I felt that there were more deserving winners.

THE only way to heal a wound is to treat it; the style of treatment decision lies with that of the wounded. 

There appears to be two clear sides to the controversy erupted over a silent protest by our recognised citizen of the year, Joe Williams.

One side feels disgusted, disrespected and insulted that Joe sat during the national anthem.

Also about Joe's conflicted feelings over the acceptance of the award and the deep grief he felt about the date and history surrounding it.

“Ancient history, get over it”, they say, “be grateful for all we have done for you. Ignore the history, your life is better because of us”.

The other side says: “We recognise the shameful way our ancestors took your way of life away and killed many of your ancestors in the process.

“We recognise since then, you were first treated as less than human, then as humans that were less then us, then as a resentful, lazy, welfare-using, crime-riddled people and now in 2016, recognised as the same as us; some of us successful, some of us troubled by upbringing with historic ripples of grief and it's affects.”

What can we do, what do you need to help heal our history together as one community of human beings?

What reason stops our national Australian recognition day being held at another time of year, ancient history?

What stops our national anthem being rewritten to represent all Australians – history?

The iconic songwriter and singer Paul Kelly would be ideal to collaborate a new anthem.