If you want to run a litmus test to find out who your racist friends are, then simply ask them what they think of the name "Gadigal" as a railway station. If they like it, then they might be sympathetic to the cause of first peoples. If they object with open racism, then believe them. If on the other hand, they come up with some half-baked semi-excuse such as "they don't know where Gadigal is", then they might be a quiet racist who fears what other people think and so remain quiet.
The usual objection to the name Gadigal by quietly racist people is that they prefer some other name which is ill-thought out but sounds nice to their ears. Consider the name "Pitt Street". While it is true that the station does have a station front at Pitt Street, unlike Martin Place which is also in the city, it is not short. In fact, Martin Place is so short that you can stand at one end of it and look up or down the hill to see the other end. Pitt Street though, is many kilometres long and that name might be equally valid for a station near Circular Quay, or in the older sandstone government building district, or near King Street, or under the mall where the department stores are near, or where it currently is, or further down towards the Masonic Centre. Calling the station Pitt Street would mean that the name fails at its only function; to tell you where it is. Before I explain why Gadigal is a better name though, I am going to take you on a metaphorical journey.
Yes, it is true that Gadigal is not a suburb. For a thing to be named as a suburb, it must go through the process of being gazetted by the Geographical Names Board. Even then, some places such as Golden Grove, Balmoral Beach, and Spit Junction still aren't suburbs but localities. For instance, Spit Junction is a locality with a Post Office and even postal addresses but even then, those postal addresses extend only as far as the post boxes which are in the Post Office itself. Spit Junction is a final header destination on buses and even has a bus station which is labelled at Spit Junction. Spit Junction is not a suburb. Spit Junction is in Mosman.
As for Gadigal Station, it is named not after a suburb or a locality but rather, the traditional Eora name for the region. Not that that matters as naming railway stations after things that are not suburbs is not without precedent. There are in fact quite a few stations in Sydney where the name of the station is not named after the suburb but the locality and in some cases, not even the locality.
Circular Quay Station is named after Circular Quay; which long before there was a railway station, was the name given to the place from where ships and ferries came and went. During the planning stages for the Sydney Electric Underground Railway, the usual name for the station was not Circular Quay but merely Quay as if was on the head boards for tram services.
Speaking of tram services, Wynyard Station which was conceived as an eight platform underground through terminal, is not named for the area at all. The park on top of the station was originally called Barrack Square, sometimes Quartermaster Square, and only really gained the name of Wynyard when the park was being redeveloped. The statue for John Wynyard at the northern end of the park, kind of cemented the idea of the locality in people's minds after the fact.
Central Station is even weirder. The suburb with Central Station is in is Strawberry Hills. There is no Strawberry Hills Station though. The grand terminal which faces Eddy Avenue and Railway Square, is Sydney Terminal. I do not think that you will find the official name anywhere on any of the signage but you might hear it occasionally over the tannoy when announcements are being made on long distance services. Sydney Station used to be where the historic mortuary platform is; and was moved in 1916. The extra platforms to the south which are numbered 16-23 (24-25 and 26-27) come much later) were originally called and signposted as Central Electric. The last vestiges that this was ever the case, used to be a lightbox which had the old L7 logo, at street level near the round doric columned enterance across the street from the Dental Hospital. It is long gone.
A more recent entry to this list of stations not being named for suburbs, is Tallawong. In the planning documents as far back ago as 2011, that station was called Cudgewong Road after the proposed site for the railway station. When the station was moved a few hundred metres to the south, the name Tallawong was picked after the next road that the railway line crossed, Tallawong Road. The suburb of Tallawong, which as eventually carved out of both Schofields and Rouse Hill is named after the station which was named after the road. The station itself when it was opened, was actually in the suburb of Rouse Hill.
So while Barangaroo might be named after the development, and Victoria Cross named after an intersection, St James being named after a church, and Museum after the museum, Gadigal is a bit like Wynyard in that it was named deliberately and the area then took on the name of the station as the local flair. Here's the thing though, you never ever ever hear anyone complaining about where Wynyard is supposed to be, even though it is the suburb of Sydney. People seemingly have no problem with naming a railway station after some guy that they have never even heard of.
In that respect it is identical to Wynyard, or Central and maybe even eventually Tallawong. There is no suburb called Wynyard. There is no suburb called Central. There was no suburb called Tallawong but there is now; after the fact. If you say to people that you will meet them at Wynyard or Central, do they care what the name of the suburb is? No. If you say to people that you will meet them at St James or Museum, are they even aware of the church or the museum? Mostly, no.
Your quietly racist friend who fears what other people think might quietly seethe inside about the name Gadigal but in the year 2074, they will likely be dead and with them their quietly racist fears about what other people think will have evaporated along with them. The children of tomorrow will know exactly where Gadigal is because it will be where it is. The fun thing about any kind of name is that as soon as it is normalised, it will become boring. The beauty of the word is that in most people's minds, it carries exactly zero expectations about where it is. This means that the name Gadigal serves a different function as a place name. It doesn't describe the destination. It IS the destination.
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