Further Effects of "The Voice" debate

[Bruce Tuncks]

They ( the Aborigines) were not always treated well. There was miss Pink, a batty old lady who hung around the town courthouse ready to lecture the beaks about Aboriginal law, ( they would treat a ritual spearing as a violent crime and ignore Aboriginal law.)

I will never forgive my parents and teachers for not telling us about Olive Pink. Today she is practically a saint, but all we knew about her was that she was ugly and batty and hung around the courthouse with a bunch of Aborigines.

[octave]

Bruce, it is easy to say it did not happen because you personally did not come across it.   There was definitely a policy of removing mixed-race children.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stolen_Generations

 

 

[facthunter]

Some of these places are not white person friendly. Far worse than it was in the 60's in my  experience... Nev

[onetrack]

What about the Stolen Generations of British children? Kids sent halfway around the world, simply because a Govt decided their parents were incapable of caring for them - or simply because they were orphans? On top of that, large numbers of them were sexually abused and used as forced labour. These kids endured vastly worse treatment than any Indigenous "stolen child".

 

At the very least, the removal of Aboriginal children from their families was done with the well-intentioned aim of trying to ensure they didn't end up aimless, drunken deadbeats, like their parents.

 

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-39078652

 

 

 

[octave]

8 hours ago, onetrack said:

What about the Stolen Generations of British children?

I think there are many parallels.   There is an argument that wrong A doesn't matter because there is also a wrong B they were both misguided.  The fact that these were different times goes some way to explaining the thinking however this does not mean we should not acknowledge the harm done.  I am sure many Indigenous children were removed for genuine welfare reasons however often they ended up in pretty brutal institutions.   The more sinister side was the knowledgeable practice of taking  "half-caste" children with the intention of breeding out the aboriginality.

 

Numerous 19th- and early-20th-century contemporaneous documents indicate that the policy of removing mixed-race Aboriginal children from their mothers related to an assumption that the Aboriginal peoples were dying off. Given their catastrophic population decline after white contact,^[7] whites assumed that the full-blood tribal Aboriginal population would be unable to sustain itself, and was doomed to extinction. The idea expressed by A. O. Neville, the Chief Protector of Aborigines for Western Australia, and others as late as 1930 was that mixed-race children could be trained to work in white society, and over generations would marry white and be assimilated into the society.^[8][9][10]

Some European Australians considered any proliferation of mixed-descent children (labelled "half-castes", "crossbreeds", "quadroons", and "octoroons",^{[9][11]: 231, 308} terms now considered derogatory to Indigenous Australians) to be a threat to the stability of the prevailing culture, or to a perceived racial or cultural "heritage".^[11]: 160 The Northern Territory Chief Protector of Aborigines, Dr. Cecil Cook, argued that "everything necessary [must be done] to convert the half-caste into a white citizen".^[12]

 

 

This is not so much an argument for "the voice"  but is more about the assertion sometimes made that these things did not happen and that, unlike other countries that were settled whilst already occupied, we were exceptionally nice.  Anything negative that was done in our history either has to be hidden or justified by "it was done for the best reasons" or they were "different times"

 

I think was Geoffrey Blainey who used the term " Black Armband" history.   I can't remember who said it but the counter to that is that we don't want "White Blindfold History" either.

 

When I was at school the only thing I can remember being taught about settlement was one paragraph under a line drawing of Cook shaking hands with an indigenous person.   This certainly was a sanitation of history.  I certainly did not see pictures like this until relatively recently.  History is often not pleasant and it takes courage to not just celebrate the good things.

 

 

 

As I say one could accept past injustices and still have legitimate reasons to vote no.   When arguments such as it will be divisive are presented, I tend to look for similar situations in other countries.   Is Canada divided over their similar system? Or New Zealand? Or Finland or Norway?    In fact, we are one of the few first-world countries without this kind of arrangement and also and also a first-world country with perhaps the worst outcomes. 

 

We also should not brush under the carpet the history of British child migrants, we can care about more than one thing at once.

[nomadpete]

8 hours ago, onetrack said:

These kids endured vastly worse treatment than any Indigenous "stolen child".

Well, I agree with the parallel, both groups were 'stolen' and relocated allegedly 'for their own good'. Also, both groups were open to child abuse. But only one group has the support and recognition that this happened.

[octave]

12 minutes ago, nomadpete said:

But only one group has the support and recognition that this happened.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2019/feb/01/uk-child-migrants-sent-to-australia-offered-just-20k-compensation#:~:text=Child migrants from Britain sent,compensation by the British government.

 

National apology to Forgotten Australians and former child migrants

[nomadpete]

Octave, I went to a different kind of school. In primary school we were taught quite a lot about indigenous culture, hunting, tools, mythology, etc. Hardly an Anglo sanitised syllabus. As I mentioned before, as a child my grandmother had a indigenous nanny. She grew up in North Queensland  and her childhood stories were unaware of any stolen generations there, but spoke of aborigines freely practising traditional seasonal migrations on farms. She was aware that some isolated persecution happened but it was generally abhored where she grew up. Such persection was also suffered occassionally by the chinese gold miners/market gardeners, too. Of course that doesn't make it right,  I mention it to indicate grandma was not oblivious to events. I know you claim such stuff to be insignificant anecdotes. My take, is that my judgement is flavoured by first hand experience rather than by other writer's second hand storytelling, which often is flavoured by their personal echo chamber.

Edited September 18, 2023 by nomadpete

[nomadpete]

28 minutes ago, octave said:

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2019/feb/01/uk-child-migrants-sent-to-australia-offered-just-20k-compensation#:~:text=Child migrants from Britain sent,compensation by the British government.

 

National apology to Forgotten Australians and former child migrants

Thanks for supplying those links. I had not seen those.

 

I guess the media coverage was not particularly well spread about it. I like the Guardian but it is not what I call MSM.

Whereas the indigenous stories seem to be constantly in the media, implying that the bad events were universal, and callous, and always damaging, and that illustrates my point.

[Old Koreelah]

10 hours ago, onetrack said:

…At the very least, the removal of Aboriginal children from their families was done with the well-intentioned aim of trying to ensure they didn't end up aimless, drunken deadbeats, like their parents.

OT I’ll concede this is a valid point, but just a distraction from the issue.

 

Australia has a long and frustratingly bad history of public opinion being manipulated by the big end of town- much of it foreign-controlled. They’ll do anything to protect their tax-free gravy train exploiting our natural resources. They’ve always found it easy to whip up emotions about Aboriginal issues. This referendum debate has sure exposed some unsaviory aspects of our national culture. I’ve been apalled at some comments by people I know and respected; they are clearly parroting what they get from Right-wing shock jocks and the Daily Terrorgraph. There is still a disturbing remnant of the attitudes of our recent ancestors, who committed heinous crimes against the natives- or at least did nothing to protect them.

 

Looking back into Australia’s history we see so many cases where we were clearly lied to by the media or government. We never learn.
 

In a few weeks the vote will be taken and the hate campaign will be over…until the next time we try to reform our society. 

[pmccarthy]

60 years ago the "stolen" kids were living in religiously minded families in our town. Generally, with two or three white children of the family. But the sad part was they were only kept for a year or two then passed on to another family. I can see why they felt stolen and unloved.

[Bruce Tuncks]

I will reluctantly accept that there were some "stolen " kids. But the idea of "assimilation" was not wicked, it was preceded by the assimilation of negro slaves in England. They actually did disappear at least from common knowledge. When I was at school, assimilation was preached as the aim but I never thought that the numbers added up. More than half the class was black or partly-so. How could inter-marriage get rid of them, I doubted from the start.

If there were stolen generation kids around Alice Springs in the 1950's, they were unknown to me and Walter for sure.

I sure don't want to pay reparations to false claimants, and I would need convincing that their story actually happened.

With respect to the stolen pommy kids, I never met one of them either and I certainly never profited from them. I believe that it happened though, and those "homes" where dreadful things happened were known about and greatly feared.

[Bruce Tuncks]

One of the problems we face today is that the oldies have memories of "homes" being dreadful places and they sure don't want to go into one.

[spacesailor]

Not only " to Australia " .

English convicts were transported to America   then  ' Sold as slaves ' . ( with chains around their necks , & only their attire was different  ).

I have Never heard of  " convicts to Australia ' being sold as slaves . 

BUT

An awful lot of English " war Brides " ended up as virtual slaves in Australia .

spacesailor

 

 

[Bruce Tuncks]

I never met an english "war bride " either..can you tell me more spacy?

 

[Bruce Tuncks]

Octave, that picture is similar to the one I have been seeking. The blacks look the same, but the one I remember was taken just south of the gap at Alice Springs, and it has the old stone police station in the background, with a mounted white cop near the blacks.

The caption read how "cattle thieves" were about to be marched to court in Port Augusta. I wonder what happened....

The blacks, like in your pic, were whip-thin and clearly calorie-deprived, which explains their taboo on climbing hills.

I reckon the big problem is when you use your "culture" to justify sharing whitefeller things. Like cars and houses and grog. These are whitefeller things and should be treated by whitefeller rules, which means that they are not to be shared with good-for-nothing layabouts.

[spacesailor]

After ww2 . Dead soldiers widow's , were offered free passage to other commonwealth countries  With All or most paperwork done for them .

A good life with a chanc to remarry. 

Many came home " Broken " ., After years of slavery .

But they were throwaways , that the U K government didn't want . ( widows pension ) .

Those dumped orphane's were from that same era .

The widow went without her child , hopping to get the child back ,when settled .

spacesailor

 

 

[octave]

22 minutes ago, Bruce Tuncks said:

Octave, that picture is similar to the one I have been seeking.

 There are plenty of these pictures around.

 

https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/4456954/aboriginal-slaves-australia-chains-united-nations/

 

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2021/mar/07/how-western-australias-unofficial-use-of-neck-chains-on-indigenous-people-lasted-80-years#:~:text=At peak periods%2C from the,with Yale or Hiatt padlocks.

[red750]

Do an "aborigines in chains" image search, you'll find plenty.

[facthunter]

There wouldn't be a lot of demand for DEAD Soldiers widows. Live ones would be preferred surely? Nev

[Jerry_Atrick]

Necrophilia sufferers may have a different opinion 

Edited September 20, 2023 by Jerry_Atrick

[red750]

Sam Newman calls for booing or slow clapping of smoking welcome to country ceremonies.

[nomadpete]

2 hours ago, facthunter said:

There wouldn't be a lot of demand for DEAD Soldiers widows. Live ones would be preferred surely? Nev

What?

She's dead??

I thought she was just English!

[Bruce Tuncks]

Thanks guys! Well the pics are shocking for sure, I am more sure than ever about the pic I am seeking being real, but maybe it no longer exists. If I were that white policeman's family, I would destroy the pic.

Gosh it was terrible times huh....  the old mission places like Hermannsburg, existed because it was a safe refuge for the Abos and I agree with them. The whitefeller's hired guns would not shoot them in front of the missionaries.

[Marty_d]

3 hours ago, red750 said:

Sam Newman calls for booing or slow clapping of smoking welcome to country ceremonies.

The stupid shit that Sam Newman says would fill a sewage treatment pool.