The Necessity of Reparation for Historic Injustices

bluediamond started the topic in

Sunday, 25 Jul 2021 at 1:26pm

Uni assignment i did a few years ago. This is my take on things. I'm sure this will ruffle many feathers. I hope so.
Love Blue Diamond x

Introduction – Compensatory Justice
Disparities between the standards of living of humans on this planet have long been a part of our history on this planet. From the wealthy nations of the West to the developing and undeveloped nations on this globe, the diversity in the quality of life when viewed from a moral standpoint are without a doubt grossly unfair.
In this paper I will look at why historic injustices do require some form of reparation. I take a strong stance that we are more obliged to solve current injustices than to provide reparation for every act of injustice in the past. In doing this I will first investigate the historic injustice of the Aboriginal people of Australia and I will look at the argument that they are entitled to some form of reparation and why.
I will incoroporate some interesting views from Jeremy Waldron, Robert Nozick and others which will help me slowly build to my conclusion that reparation should be in the form of Non Indigenous Australians surrendering some of our priveleges as a form of reparation.

Historic Injustices to Indigenous Australians:
Australia the continent was well inhabited for many years long before white settlement. It is commonly known that in 1788 Australia was colonised as a country under the rule of the British Empire, with total contempt for the fact that it was already inhabited by a native indigenous race of people.
The way the original inhabitants have been treated, including forced assimilation, execution, stolen families and not even allowed to be recognised as citizens for a large part of white Australia’s history are also well known facts. (Poole, 1999,pp114-142)
There exists now a situation where there is a large divide between Aboriginal and non Aboriginal Australian’s that can be traced back to the moment Australia was invaded by English settlers and the brutal and unfair treatment that has followed.
So at this point now, in 2013 what is the just and fair way to make amends for past actions?
I would argue that a moderate to large amount of reparation is overdue for this nation of people, the Aboriginal people. But there are many challenges to this view point especially that of how much reparation, and what sort of compensation.

Past injustices or present suffering?
One of the questions raised in an issue like this is whether it is better to provide compensation or reparation for past deeds, which have already been done in a previous generation and cannot be changed, or whether it is better to now provide assistance to those who are suffering in their current situations and consider that as a form of moral duty.
To understand this we need to delve a little deeper into this issue and hear some differing viewpoints.
Firstly we need to understand what the best way to provide reparation. How do we judge what is the best way of giving back and how much? Jeremy Waldron states “The historic record has a fragility that consists, …in the sheer contingency of what happened in the past” (Waldron,1992,p5 )
This is saying that we can’t trace every single injustice back to the original act therefore reparation for every act would be almost impossible because it would ultimately be guess work.
In this statement he has an objection from Robert Nozick who believes it is in fact possible to address this problem by “changing the present so that it resembles how the past would have looked had the injustice not taken place” (McKenzie, 2013)
This would be a way to ultimately provide maximum reparation, but is it the correct approach? I believe this is a fairly radical approach, although it does have some merits in the fact it would be working in a positive way for indigenous people, I don’t think it is entirely the right way to deal with these issues but it is on the right track.
Waldron argues that it is based on too many unknowns. “The status of counterfactual reasoning about the exercising of human reasoning of human freedom is unclear”(Waldron 1993,p10)
Which leaves the question somewhat open about the sort of reparation that is required, but provides one clear answer to the key question. Both agree that yes, reparation to some extent is required. But how much and in what form?
Another philosopher who leans more towards Waldron’s views is Kymlicka. He is somewhat more straightforward in his assessment that property rights in particular for Aboriginals would create “massive unfairness” and also he maintains the argument “Aboriginal rights must be grounded in concerns about equality and contemporary disadvantage. (McKenzie, 2013) I agree with both these views but I don’t think they provide any active solutions.

The Solution?
So if its not handing back all of Australia’s land to the original inhabitants that is the most appropriate way to deal with past injustices, then what is?
I look at the current country I grew up in, as a white Australian. I ask myself why I never had Aboriginal friends growing up, no understanding of Aboriginal culture and why my basic understanding of Indigenous Australians is mostly 200 years old. I look at our flag, a symbol of a nation that stole a country from its original inhabitants, with no recognition of the Indigenous people at all on it. I see that Australia considered Indigenous people as less than people until only 40 years ago and I see the way that Indigenous Australians live a completely separate life to the way of life I know as an Australian. I see that the only indigenous politician I am aware of is a former Olympian and it is because of this fact of her sporting status that I know this. I see no collective power or representation of Indigenous Australians and I see non Indigenous Australians,( a culture built on a history of stealing a land and mistreating its people) still taking, taking as much out of this land as they can, with little to no regard of sharing or giving to the original inhabitants. I see a government that says lots of words about ‘closing the gap’ and bringing the living standards of non- indigenous and indigenous Australians closer together, but apart from nice words, there is no conviction, no follow through, just assimilation , and all that still remains are injustices.
As stated by Sparrow, “Continuity gives rise to responsibility on part of present generations of Australians for our history”.(McKenzie,2013). Although deeds happened in the past beyond our control, what we do now to either ignore, or rectify these issues will reflect on us in history. So if we choose to do nothing, we are contributing to the history of the mistreatment of non- indigenous Australians. And this is simply unacceptable in my opinion.

Conclusion
So what is fair? I believe that the way forward is a surrendering of some of our privileges as non- indigenous Australians. The simple fact is it was morally wrong without a doubt what has happened in the past. And it is also morally wrong without a doubt to ignore these facts and not offer some form of reparation in the present. But how much?
I think that going back to Robert Nozick’s argument is a start. I think Nozick is wrong to make the present resemble the past in every aspect. But I do think that it would be reasonable to restore some aspects of the way things should be. The things that happened in the past were out of our control and we can’t go back to changing the way things were. But we could change the way things are.
For some examples. Why not give at least 50% of political power to indigenous people? It surely would be a fair thing to do considering this is their country. Media control. 50 percent. Industry. Realestate. The list goes on. Why do we not acknowledge the indigenous people on our flag, or better still use their flag? Why is Australia still a part of the Commonwealth when it serves little purpose to any of us and serves as a constant reminder to Indigenous Australians that they are still controlled by the original invaders. These to me are fairly simple reparations that would have minimal impact on Australia as a whole. Perhaps, it would alter the way we live but I think it is our responsibility, morally to forfeit some of our privileges for the greater good. Basically a little bit goes a long way.
In closing, it is a fact that a huge injustice occurred to the Indigenous population and suffering continues to this day. There is no easy solution to such a burden of pain. I believe the only solutions are for the non- Indigenous population to take responsibility and sacrifice our own way of life to bring about an overall equality. Sacrifice is not an easy word. But it all comes down to right and wrong. We are in a position to give, in this current generation. What are we so scared to lose, that was never ours in the first place??

Bibliography
McKenzie,C.”Prof” (2013), Lecture, Historic Injustices and Indigenous Rights, Macquarie University
Poole, R. (1999). Nation and Identity.Routledge, London, pp.114-142
Waldron,J. (1992). ‘Superseding Historic Injustice’. Ethics, 103 (1), 4-28

References
Poole, R. (1999). Nation and Identity.Routledge, London, pp.114-142
Waldron,J. (1992). ‘Superseding Historic Injustice’. Ethics, 103 (1), 4-28

I focus Saturday, 24 Jun 2023 at 3:26pm

Question for Adam 12 is it fair to say the Constitution represents British Colonialism or more Westminster System

indo-dreaming Saturday, 24 Jun 2023 at 4:52pm

AlfredWallace wrote:
Indo Dreaming. . You seriously need to check the sources of your information.
I read all your garbage, of which I no longer respond to in a meaningful way , it’s mostly inaccurate, contains so many errors that if you were being assessed in say a scholastic manner, you’d fail the grade for sure and would be coming back to repeat class year after year.

What is your beef with Australian Indigenous people ? Can you simply answer my question please ?

See, I find this difficult to understand, because if you are telling the truth, you’re married to an Indonesian national and not some Anglo, so I’d of thought that you would at least have some kind of cultural understanding or connection to people from neighbouring countries where it’s assumed some type of ancestry may exist. You know the story, you’re not that daft.

I happen to know Bruce Pascoe, your attack on him and his writing is highly offensive. How many books have you ever written or how often are you compelled to write about the plight of people who have had their whole bloody country ripped off them ?

He should never have needed to write Dark Emu, but he did, because he was sick to death of the myths and inaccuracies applied to Aboriginal existence and their cultural ways of life. They were doing very well without us and simply didn’t roam aimlessly (an Anglo/European preconceived notion) as today’s society thinks they did. They were the best land managers known, let’s call them farmers.

Historical views and thoughts in Australians minds today, sadly come from a past which lacked any substantial understanding or education about the existence of its original inhabitants. I’d say a deliberate ploy by early colonists and resultant governments.

So I say to you Indo. What would you do today if Indonesia was about to have a referendum about having a Voice to parliament or changes to its constitution, would you be proud and back your wife the whole way for a YES vote ?

I’ll leave that up to you to ponder my question.AW.

Firstly i obviously have NO beef whats so ever with indigenous Australian's the very fact you think i do shows me that you are not paying attention and joining dots that aren't there.

Ive shared many times how one of my best mates has Indigenous ancestry (and visually obvious too), and at one point lived with him and another Indigenous mate with darker skin, (plus other white guys) not that we ever really talked or thought about skin colour or ethnicity it was the 90s though, both still don't seem to focus on their ancestry (like most of us) , although i think some of their siblings have embraced the while identity thing at least at a social media level.

I can only assume you have jumped to this conclusion because not only do i not swallow this whole narrative of white man bad, blak fella good, white culture bad, blak culture good, and every negative indigenous issue is a result of white fella, but i even push back on it cause its lazy and not true.

Or thinking that some voice in the constitution is going to magical fix things, when i see bull shit i call it out.

Which brings me to Dark Emu, look it was quite obvious from the get go that the main or more interesting aspects of Dark Emu was fiction written by someone with no real qualification's in the areas and much of it had been examined and debunked, but it wasn't until Peter Sutton wrote a book debunking it that people really took notice because of who he is and his experience and knowledge and how highly respected he is.

If you still believe that the main points of the book are true, well i dont think you are ever going to change your mind no matter who or how much evidence is provided.

That last question is weird, my wife would obviously vote No as would never support that kind of racial inequality and division, and it does my head in how people can you can even dare to try taking some moral high ground thinking voting Yes is morally right thing to do.

Its a weird world these days thats for sure.

BTW. Im not sure what you even meant by that question were you suggesting one Indonesian group have more say than some other?

You do know Indonesia is made up of 1300 ethnic groups bonded by similarities between each other but still with many different languages and different cultural aspect's which makes it an interesting comparison, as while we also think of indigenous people as one group they too are really about 500 ethnic groups with many different languages and variation in culture.

southernraw Saturday, 24 Jun 2023 at 5:10pm

Hey Indo. Have you actually read Dark Emu yet?

indo-dreaming Saturday, 24 Jun 2023 at 8:29pm

southernraw wrote:
Hey Indo. Have you actually read Dark Emu yet?

I ordered it from the library during Covid and got through a few chapters completed up to a chapter about Housing but I found it a hard read and kinda boring, much of it im sure was fair;y true mostly pretty unexciting known stuff but some areas it was very clear the truth had been stretched (putting it nicely) and the overall vibe/narrative had a very clear agenda from the get go.

Straight after i also read Peter Suttons "Farmers or Hunter gathers" and eventually completed the whole book, it's far more interesting because it breaks down Dark Emu and shows you things like what was said before and after the passages Bruce chooses to use, often giving a totally different context to things, it's obvious Bruce has picked and chosen things he likes and ignored things he doesn't or just totally misinterpreted or twisted things to reach the conclusion he has already decided on rather than just examining all the evidence possible and then coming to a conclusion.

It also provides other evidence and text for why certain things are not true and explains all kinds of things that Bruce would have no knowledge of from an Indigenous perspective.

Im sure if you read "Farmers or Hunter gathers" your perspective on Dark Emu would be much different than now, and you will be going, oh okay yeah, um lets talk about the voice again instead.

southernraw Saturday, 24 Jun 2023 at 8:44pm

You read a few chapters?
So you didn't read it.

indo-dreaming Saturday, 24 Jun 2023 at 9:04pm

Yes a few chapters and flicked through the rest, your point?

I mean ive only read bits and pieces of the bible not the whole thing, but i still get the jist of the bible and dont need to read it all to know its not some magic book of teachings from god or something, i dont think im going to become a born again Christian if i complete the whole thing.

Have you read Peter Suttons;"Farmers or Hunter gathers"?

I mean if your open minded and genuinely curious for truth and all that why not hey.

GuySmiley Saturday, 24 Jun 2023 at 9:20pm

Well I clearly remember that a commitment was made to read the book on a post covid trip to Indo last year and when I asked whether the commitment was honoured I was told in no uncertain terms why would “I bother” etc

Soooo, what is the real story?

southernraw Saturday, 24 Jun 2023 at 9:26pm

I have no further questions your honour.
Seems a clear cut case of bullshit as per usual.

indo-dreaming Sunday, 25 Jun 2023 at 7:21am

GuySmiley wrote:
Well I clearly remember that a commitment was made to read the book on a post covid trip to Indo last year and when I asked whether the commitment was honoured I was told in no uncertain terms why would “I bother” etc

Soooo, what is the real story?

Would have been before covid.

indo-dreaming Sunday, 25 Jun 2023 at 8:04am

southernraw wrote:
I have no further questions your honour.
Seems a clear cut case of bullshit as per usual.

So clearly you havent read Peter Suttons;"Farmers or Hunter gathers"

So clearky not very open minded and not interested in the truth

I mean seriously who's word are you going to trust one of Australias most respected anthropologist and linguist with 40+ years in Indigenous studies or some random guy who mostly writes fiction books.

Not to mention you can actually see first hand what was left out of historic quotes or how he has minterpreted things.

BTW. im sure you would like the book, it focusses a lot on all the spiritual aspects of indigenous culture too and has an argument that hunter gather societies are not down the evolution end of things and and as complex as any other society, i personally dont agree with that whole narrative as doesnt reflect reality of the world seeing all societies started at some point from hunter gather societies and at some point there is a population growth point where hunter gather societies deplete the land the next step is to then move to a settled agriculture model, *

Dark Emu book is really an argument that this transition was happening or even had happened, while Peter Suttons argument is just thinking or saying this falls into the whole western thinking of "social evolution" and doesn't respect the complexity of indigenous society and hunter gather lifestyle.

BTW i do agree 100% it still takes a lot of knowledge and understanding to just survive on country, watching a show like alone really puts this in perspective all these people would die if kept going even with some modern tools etc.

100% a respect should also be had for that, i myself have always found aspects of indigenous culture and living on the land really interesting, i think this stems from being an 80s kid into the whole harry buttler/world safari/leyland brothers thing and being a kid that spent hours in the bush and countryside looking under rocks and logs for lizards etc or trying to catch eals, plus my grand parents were fully into gem stone collecting and gold detecting so if our holidays weren't spent on the coast we were in some weird place in the bush camping.

* This is easier in some areas of the world than others due to what plant and animal species you have available natively, also interaction and trade comes into play when you have this you get a huge advantage to settlement and agriculture being a viable option and then once settled can build and create other aspects outside of just surviving.

This all touches on the influence of interaction/trade which effects cultural evolution/reformation an important topic to understanding why cultures that were generally cut off from the rest of the world often have the biggest problems today in some ways after being flung to fast into a new world.

southernraw Sunday, 25 Jun 2023 at 9:15am

Geez you can dribble Indo.

indo-dreaming Sunday, 25 Jun 2023 at 9:26am

ha ha fair call.

But you really should read the book, i do think you will dig it.

Anyway have a good weekend.

udo Sunday, 25 Jun 2023 at 9:34am

https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/data/UQ_345997/s33652117_phd_submission...

basesix Sunday, 2 Jul 2023 at 3:39pm

https://timesnewsgroup.com.au/surfcoasttimes/news/surf-coast-to-gather-f...
is this happening right now?

AlfredWallace Sunday, 2 Jul 2023 at 4:22pm

basesix wrote:
https://timesnewsgroup.com.au/surfcoasttimes/news/surf-coast-to-gather-f...
is this happening right now?

Good stuff.AW

basesix Wednesday, 5 Jul 2023 at 2:42pm

^^ "Fist Of Fury was the obvious choice", haha, love it -
I think that a Noongar-Daa voice-over translation of a Bruce Lee film sounds.. absolutely.. awesome! Go SW Oz!!!

I focus Wednesday, 5 Jul 2023 at 2:43pm

Udo great link

GuySmiley Thursday, 13 Jul 2023 at 8:37am

Onward christian soldiers marching off to war…..

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/jul/13/indigenous-voice-...

southernraw Thursday, 13 Jul 2023 at 11:01am

GuySmiley wrote:
Onward christian soldiers marching off to war…..

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/jul/13/indigenous-voice-...

Fair Australia. All Indo's heroes on board. Putrid.

indo-dreaming Thursday, 13 Jul 2023 at 12:19pm

I wouldn't call them my hero's i didnt even take much notice of them until about two weeks ago when they started exposing some of the activist types behind the voice.

First one was Thomas Mayo then Tela Reed, its a pity that many Australian's wont actually hear the views of these people before voting as its important that we know who these people are that are involved in the voice and their views, i think a lot more people would be cautious and wary if they knew that they are basically radical activist who even admire communist.

BTW. Since Linda Burley claimed the voice wont be trying to change Australia day Tela Reed has tweeted

'It is truly disingenuous to be claiming mob won't be demanding to #AbolishAustralia day,' she tweeted.

&t=4s

southernraw Thursday, 13 Jul 2023 at 3:12pm

hahaha!

flollo Thursday, 13 Jul 2023 at 3:42pm

Indo, to your point it's good to know the characters on both sides of the aisle. One clearly has some religious lunatics while the other has some rebranded communists. News like Guardian above will only talk about the religious mob while News Corps style will only talk about the communists.

GuySmiley Thursday, 13 Jul 2023 at 3:59pm

Wilhelm Scream wrote:
#Linda Burley??

Well she’s probably baited @info often enough to the point where he waits on everything she says with bated breath!

What intellectual vigour can people like Lyle Shelton bring to the Voice debate apart from his ultra right conservative christian say no to any social progress? I had the pleasure of bailing him up in a park during the SSM debate, one on one, absolutely shat his Yfronts he did, wouldn’t engage with me at all the cockwomble.

indo-dreaming Thursday, 13 Jul 2023 at 4:03pm

flollo wrote:
Indo, to your point it's good to know the characters on both sides of the aisle. One clearly has some religious lunatics while the other has some rebranded communists. News like Guardian above will only talk about the religious mob while News Corps style will only talk about the communists.

The important thing to remember with all this is its up to those behind the voice and the government to sell it to us and give us a reason to vote yes.

Hence its really important to know who is behind the voice and what they have been unofficially saying as well as officially saying.

While its not the same when looking at the No side, they are just saying hey wait a minute before you make your decision consider these aspects.

indo-dreaming Thursday, 13 Jul 2023 at 4:22pm

Even the far left are divided

"We’ve always had a voice — one to Parliament is not the answer

The Indigenous Voice to Parliament is born out of white appeasement, not Black ambition. Let’s not pretend we were offered a blank canvas."

https://www.crikey.com.au/2023/07/11/indigenous-voice-to-parliament-whit...

andy-mac Thursday, 13 Jul 2023 at 5:21pm

Wilhelm Scream wrote:
#Who Does Abbott Think is Centre Right? Him? Dutton??

Hahahahahahahahaha

"Far left" "Neo-Marxist"

#File Under 'Rebranded Communist Progressive Fake Left Anti-Economics Anti-Corporation Anti-Market Economy Fake Woke Virtue Signalling Communist Struggle Agenda Fake Left Woke Mind Virus Movement'

Hahahahaha

Abbott is still pissed off he lost worst PM in Australia's history to his mate Scomo....
LNP Ship of fools....

GuySmiley Friday, 14 Jul 2023 at 10:27am

“ … While it’s not the same when looking at the No side, they are just saying hey wait a minute before you make your decision consider these aspects.“

No they’re not

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/jul/14/no-campaign-socia...

GuySmiley Monday, 17 Jul 2023 at 11:51am

Onward christian soldiers marching off to (cultural) war

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/jul/17/indigenous-voice-...

indo-dreaming Monday, 17 Jul 2023 at 1:17pm

GuySmiley wrote:
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/jul/14/no-campaign-socia...

GuySmiley wrote:
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/jul/17/indigenous-voice-...

These two article are actually good/positive, its good to see the No camp being smart and strategic using different avenues and methods and targeting a range of demographics, its also good to see they are targeting different ethnic group's and religions, LNP should be doing this too.

Traditional white Christian conservatives shouldn't be working against ethnic groups or Muslims or Hindus etc, they should be working with each other because while they may share some different religious ideologies they are all conservative based and share much more in common.

All that said this shouldn't be a left/right issue, every Australian should be doing the right thing and not voting for division and inequality in our constitution.

AndyM Monday, 17 Jul 2023 at 1:51pm

“ and not voting for … inequality in our constitution.”

Just continue with gross inequality in the real world eh?

GuySmiley Tuesday, 18 Jul 2023 at 7:15pm

ABC TV 8.32 pm tonight

https://m.

&embeds_referring_euri=https%3A%2F%2Famp.abc.net.au%2F&source_ve_path=MjM4NTE&feature=emb_title

https://amp.abc.net.au/article/102606182

GuySmiley Tuesday, 18 Jul 2023 at 10:12pm

Well worth a look on iview if you missed it

Supafreak Wednesday, 19 Jul 2023 at 1:08am

GuySmiley wrote:
Well worth a look on iview if you missed it

That was excellent, its a YES from me .

southernraw Wednesday, 19 Jul 2023 at 9:37am

Thanks GS. It's a rainy day here so will check it out. Cheers!

basesix Wednesday, 19 Jul 2023 at 1:46pm

Thanks Guy, I checked it out too, I knew nothing about the book, other than people's reactions. Really enjoyed the presentation.

southernraw Wednesday, 19 Jul 2023 at 2:39pm

Just brilliant @guysmiley.
That was one of the best i've seen.
Highly recommend anyone with an interest to watch it.
I especially loved the latter part of the doco, which focuses on what i would deem, reparations that are possible. A way to give back.
When the, erm, author of this thread was discussing what does reparation look like, this is what i'd imagine was visualized.
A willingness to invest ourselves in learning. I have always hated the term 'closing the gap' but...if there is a gap to be closed, it is us(the introduced) who need to make the move towards closing it, not forcing assimilation on an indigenous culture at the expense of them losing touch with theirs and not being abled to pass on their knowledge to us all.
The reality is, 'we' are sitting on a beautiful culture and we don't even know it. Imagine if we could embrace that and it was as simple as that to moving forward to a better future for all.
Surely it's a start and this doco highlights that beautifully.
Thanks GS.

basesix Wednesday, 19 Jul 2023 at 3:15pm

yup, as we've discussed before southern, people either get it (or are willing to try to get it), or don't (and aren't). Hey, SR! ...are your mob responsible for a mailbox-nastie (as in A4 folded in my letterbox) I got entitled 'Agenda 2030'? appears to have come from 'the light australia' who's newsletter seems decidedly western-sponsored? classically cheesy and poorly written heroes-and-villains pseudo-news for the disempowered or frail of mind:
https://thelightaustralia.com/assets/pdf/ISSUES-1-THE-LIGHT-FINAL-VERSIO...

GuySmiley Wednesday, 19 Jul 2023 at 5:07pm

G'day Guys

Yes there is much to like about that ABC TV program on Dark Emu.

Highlights for me were the way the program gently, yet precisely, addressed the errant theories of Pascoe"s critics with examples of forestry practices, mining/manufacture of grinding stones, fish nets, the construction of permanent dwellings and astronomy dating back 10s of thousands of years.

But what especially shone through to me was the graceful generosity Pascoe and others extended to all of us like a warm hug to share their story, to be part of it moving forward.

southernraw Thursday, 20 Jul 2023 at 1:10am

haha Nah Basesix. The small mob i do run with are too busy surfing to get into mailbox drops.
Yeah i had that newspaper, or something along those lines passed onto me by a mate, to which it still gathers dust.
Wilhelm that's great news. I was wondering about this one the other day. And to think there were people on this thread who couldn't understand the injustice occuring by shutting the traditional owners of the land out of the debate and not allowing them a voice on whether it should be allowed to go ahead. A voice huh?
Agree thoroughly on your thoughts @guysmiley. He's definitely a good egg ol Brucey.

gromfull Friday, 21 Jul 2023 at 11:46am

THE CURIOUS IMPACT OF FACTS ON ABORIGINAL HISTORY
Joe Lane - Quadrant, 1st January 2014
My wife and I made the first Aboriginal flags, back in 1972, and more than a hundred of them up to 1981 or so, and sent them all around Australia. We were ardent supporters of land rights and self-determination and used to devour any new book on the subject. Invariably these books were based on secondary and tertiary historical sources, but they fitted in with our way of thinking at the time. Later, I was to find that without attention to primary source documents, indigenous history will remain seriously defective.
In the 1980s, I found the journals of George Taplin, the missionary who set up the Point McLeay Mission on Lake Alexandrina (where my wife was born) and managed it between 1859 and 1879. The journals were (and still are) in the State Library in Adelaide, in an old typewritten copy. At the time, I thought that some fool should type them up again. As it turned out, I was that fool. But I had discovered a goldmine of information, much of which did not conform to the dominant narrative.
A friend gave me some old letter-books from the mission, covering up to 1900, which I carefully copied. By then I was hooked on searching out first-hand sources and went on to type up the thousand pages of the various Royal Commissions “into the Aborigines”, of 1860, 1899 and 1913–16. Many other documents have now suffered the same fate. More recently, I have been typing up the correspondence of the Protector of Aborigines in South Australia, more than 13,000 letters in, and 8500 letters out, 1840 to 1912.
All in all, I’ve transcribed around 6000 pages of primary-source material and put it all on a website: www.firstsources.info.
Comprehensively, this primary source material does not support the current narrative. In fact, it supports a more complex and interesting perspective. The dominant paradigm, which is being taught around Australia, in schools and at universities, asserts that
• Aboriginal people were “herded” onto missions;
• Aboriginal people were driven from their lands;
• Countless children were stolen from their families.
I have found no unambiguous evidence of any of this. Let’s look at each of these assertions in turn.
Herding Aborigines onto missions
Between 1840 and the present, the Aboriginal population on missions never exceeded 20 per cent of the total Aboriginal population in contact with the state, except during the Depression when it rose to about 30 per cent. In other words, for most of the time, more than 80 per cent of the Aboriginal population lived away from missions, across the state.
The total number of full-time staff of the grandly-named Aborigines Department was one, the Protector. His main task was to set up and supply up to forty ration depots, as well as roughly as many issuing points for individuals and families. Issuers, who were mainly police officers, station managers and pastoral lessees, and missionaries, were not paid. So: one full-time staff member and seventy-five or more issuing points. Who was doing the “herding”?
Mission staff rarely numbered more than three or four. They were flat out issuing stores, building cottages, supervising farm work, running the schools, providing medical attention. As far as I know, no mission ever had a fence around it to keep people in.
Many times in the Protector’s correspondence, an issuer would ask urgently for more stores as a large number of “Natives”, sometimes hundreds, had arrived at their depot. A few weeks later, they were gone again. People came and went as they chose.
The Protector sent rations to a mission near Port Lincoln, located on 18,000 acres of crop and grazing land, with the express instruction that the rations were not for the residents but for “travelling people”, passing up and down Eyre Peninsula to and from Port Lincoln, and that the rations were to keep them supplied on their journey. The mission population there were supposed to be self-supporting (which they were from about 1868 onwards). The “travelling people” camped a couple of miles from the mission and occasionally worked for wages on the mission, grubbing stumps.
At Point McLeay, from Taplin’s journal, from the letter-books and from the Protector’s letters, one can read of hundreds of people suddenly arriving from down the Coorong or from up the Murray for ceremonies. They camped a mile or two away, and needed provisioning. A week or two later, they had gone back to their own country.
Rations were strictly for the sick, aged and infirm, mothers with young children, and orphans. Able-bodied people were expected to hunt or fish or gather, or work for farms and stations. Families that had been deserted or widowed were also provided with rations. Rations included: flour, tea, sugar, axes, rice, sago, tobacco, soap, fishing lines, fish-hooks, netting twine, needles and thread, clothes, clothing material, blankets, blue serge shirts, cotton shirts, spoons, quart-pots, pannicans, billy-cans, tomahawks, bags and tarpaulins for wurlies, occasionally tents, and free medical care and travel passes to and from hospital.
Rations were provided to isolated individuals. For example, on many occasions, an old man or woman on a station might need to be looked after. The Protector asked the lessee to ask the person if they wanted to go to a mission to be better cared for there, but they said no, they wanted to stay on their land, so he arranged for the station-lessee to provide that person with rations, often for years. One Aboriginal woman on Kangaroo Island, originally from Tasmania, was supplied with rations in this way for at least twenty years. A deserted wife and her family in Adelaide were provided with rations for many years, at least until the record ends.
Missions regularly expelled people who had behaved badly or immorally. In other words, they were fairly particular about who could and couldn’t stay on a mission. I suspect that one mission had to wind down in the 1890s simply because it couldn’t get enough working men to stay there: it seemed to have a chronic shortage of labour from the late 1870s as capable men found better-paying work in the district.
In sum, there does not seem to be any evidence of “herding”, or any obvious intention to ever do so.
Driving Aborigines from their lands
There is only one instance in the Protector’s letters of a pastoral lessee trying to drive people from his lease (in 1876), and as soon as the Protector was informed, he wrote to remind the lessee that he would be in breach of his lease, which stipulated that Aboriginal people had all the traditional rights to use the land as they always had done, “as if this lease had not been made”, as the wording went. It was assumed that traditional land use and pastoral land use could co-exist, as, of course, they could and still can. I’m informed that that condition still applies in current legislation.
By the way, six months later, that pastoralist was applying for rations. The depot there was still issuing rations at least thirty years later.
The Protector provided dozens, perhaps a hundred or more, fifteen-foot boats, and fishing gear (fishing lines, fish-hooks, netting twine) to people on all waterways, even Cooper’s Creek, so that they could fish and “stay in their own districts”. He provided guns to enable people to hunt more effectively. Boats and guns were provided free—as well as their repair—to people unable to earn a living, and able-bodied people were expected to pay half their cost. The Game Act has always expressly exempted Aboriginal people from restrictions on hunting and fishing in “close season”, even now.
The Protector advised a woman who had been living on a mission, but whose husband had been knocking her around, that he could provide her with rations at a town near her own country. Over the years, whenever particular individuals or groups were “loafing about the City” or drunk and disorderly, or begging (what we call “humbugging” these days) about the streets, he provided them with rail or steamer passes to “go back to their home districts”.
From the earliest days, Aboriginal people were encouraged to lease plots of land, up to 160 acres rent-free, and to live on the land, which was usually in the country they came from. The earliest record seems to be a woman who had married a white man. Often white men thought that, if they married an Aboriginal woman, they could get a piece of land, but no, the lease was always vested in the Aboriginal partner.
During the 1890s, more than forty Aboriginal people, including at least three women, held such leases. One mission may have wound down precisely because the more capable men took out leases of their own, leaving the mission bereft of labour and in debt.
In sum, there does not seem to be any evidence of any intention to drive people from their country. Again, quite the reverse.
Stealing children from their families
Colonisation disrupted Aboriginal traditional life and family patterns. Women had children by white men (as well as by Africans, Chinese, Afghans and West Indians) and lived peripatetic lives around the towns. Many children were abandoned or orphaned by single mothers who either could not support them or died. Many children were brought down from the north by stockmen and survey teams, sometimes from interstate, and then abandoned in the city.
All states have fiduciary obligations to their inhabitants, especially to children. The Protector was, in effect and in law, the legal guardian responsible for the well-being of such abandoned children. Facilities in those days were either rudimentary or non-existent, so the most suitable place for such children, short of locating their living relatives (which occurred occasionally), was to ask a particular mission if they could take them. Often this was not possible, so the Protector had to look around to find a place for a particular child.
So how many? I typed up the School Records, 1880 to 1960, from one mission/government settlement and found that, for example, between 1880 and 1900, only eight children—out of a roll of 200 over those years—had been brought to this mission. There were barely as many again in the next fifty years.
And just in case “stealing children” means taking them from missions and settlements, it should be pointed out that, in that period 1880 to 1960, during which 800 children were, at one time or another, enrolled at that school, a total of forty-seven school-age children were transferred to homes or institutions or the Adelaide Hospital, and the vast majority of them came back within a year or two. Mothers died, fathers died and mothers re-married, families fell destitute or broke up for all manner of reasons. The reasons for Aboriginal children being put into care of any sort were not much different from those for any other Australians, and at 4 per cent, neither was the rate of “removal”.
Incidentally, more than thirty years ago, I got hold of the birth and death records from an Aboriginal community covering the period from 1860 to 1965. I typed them up and tried to identify the decade in which infant mortality was highest. I was surprised to find that the worst decade in all that time for infant mortality (including one poor child who died of “starvation”), was the 1950s. Why so?
Tentatively, I would suggest that, after the war, the movement away from the community by more enterprising Aboriginal men and their families, in search of better work and schooling opportunities, left the community short of carers, people who had customarily been expected to provide food and shelter for the children of the “stayers”, so that levels of neglect rose significantly.
In the period under study, 1840 to 1912, under the Protector’s watch, if children knew their own country and wished to go back there, he arranged for their travel home. At one mission a boy from the far north was unhappy and wished to return home, so the Protector promptly arranged for him to travel up to Oodnadatta and then on to his own country. A year or so later, he was back at the mission, working and asking for some financial support to buy a harmonium.
So, from the record, there does not seem to be any concerted effort to take children from their families. In fact, the Protector notes that he does not have the legal power to do so, and I suspect neither did he have the intention.
* * *
So why did I believe as I did, without evidence? Because the conventional paradigm, the “black-armband” version, fits together. It makes sense. It doesn’t need evidence. And perhaps in other states—Queensland, for instance—conditions were harsher for Aboriginal (and Islander) people. But that’s for researchers up there to follow up on, if they will.
There are such things as facts. There was only one full-time staff member of the South Australia Aborigines Department. There were forty or more official ration depots from around 1870 onwards. Sometimes facts are like rocks in a stream of interpretation: flow this way or that, twist and turn as one may, the interpretation of history still has to deal with the facts. What comes first, reality or ideology?
It may not have been all sweetness and light, but neither was it as brutal as the conventional paradigm supposes. Nineteenth-century people were no different from ourselves. It’s time we relied more on evidence than on feelings or suspicions, otherwise we will forever be getting it wrong.

file:///C:/Users/Fred/Documents/Steve%20Personel/Aboriginal%20stuff/361859063_679973954175058_2327518330752776917_n%20-%20Copy.jpg

basesix Friday, 21 Jul 2023 at 12:32pm

Really interesting gromfull, nothing is simple, as you show. Thanks for the in-depth post.

2 exhibits at the Beachport SA museum (gloriously old-school, pioneer-village-style, curated and maintained by aging local history enthusiasts) provide my favorite example of this stuff.

The displays are about Christina Smith.

Display 1 - in the grass-roots section of the museum, hand typed accounts, old records, a copy of her Booandik book, basically summing up Christina and her son Duncan's life of dedication to the local aboriginal community, learning Bungandidj language with Duncan being appointed interpreter in 1853. pretty much as wiki does: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christina_Smith_(missionary)

Display 2 - in the snazzy new Indigenous room, with glitzy minimalist display boards, sums up Christina Smith as a person who harbored aboriginals who were on the run from traditional law, encouraged them away from their tribe, and taught them to be God-fearing and white.

From primary sources, both accounts are true. Good history is, and should be, complicated.

indo-dreaming Friday, 21 Jul 2023 at 2:37pm

gromfull wrote:
THE CURIOUS IMPACT OF FACTS ON ABORIGINAL HISTORY
Joe Lane - Quadrant, 1st January 2014
My wife and I made the first Aboriginal flags, back in 1972, and more than a hundred of them up to 1981 or so, and sent them all around Australia. We were ardent supporters of land rights and self-determination and used to devour any new book on the subject. Invariably these books were based on secondary and tertiary historical sources, but they fitted in with our way of thinking at the time. Later, I was to find that without attention to primary source documents, indigenous history will remain seriously defective.
In the 1980s, I found the journals of George Taplin, the missionary who set up the Point McLeay Mission on Lake Alexandrina (where my wife was born) and managed it between 1859 and 1879. The journals were (and still are) in the State Library in Adelaide, in an old typewritten copy. At the time, I thought that some fool should type them up again. As it turned out, I was that fool. But I had discovered a goldmine of information, much of which did not conform to the dominant narrative.
A friend gave me some old letter-books from the mission, covering up to 1900, which I carefully copied. By then I was hooked on searching out first-hand sources and went on to type up the thousand pages of the various Royal Commissions “into the Aborigines”, of 1860, 1899 and 1913–16. Many other documents have now suffered the same fate. More recently, I have been typing up the correspondence of the Protector of Aborigines in South Australia, more than 13,000 letters in, and 8500 letters out, 1840 to 1912.
All in all, I’ve transcribed around 6000 pages of primary-source material and put it all on a website: www.firstsources.info.
Comprehensively, this primary source material does not support the current narrative. In fact, it supports a more complex and interesting perspective. The dominant paradigm, which is being taught around Australia, in schools and at universities, asserts that
• Aboriginal people were “herded” onto missions;
• Aboriginal people were driven from their lands;
• Countless children were stolen from their families.
I have found no unambiguous evidence of any of this. Let’s look at each of these assertions in turn.
Herding Aborigines onto missions
Between 1840 and the present, the Aboriginal population on missions never exceeded 20 per cent of the total Aboriginal population in contact with the state, except during the Depression when it rose to about 30 per cent. In other words, for most of the time, more than 80 per cent of the Aboriginal population lived away from missions, across the state.
The total number of full-time staff of the grandly-named Aborigines Department was one, the Protector. His main task was to set up and supply up to forty ration depots, as well as roughly as many issuing points for individuals and families. Issuers, who were mainly police officers, station managers and pastoral lessees, and missionaries, were not paid. So: one full-time staff member and seventy-five or more issuing points. Who was doing the “herding”?
Mission staff rarely numbered more than three or four. They were flat out issuing stores, building cottages, supervising farm work, running the schools, providing medical attention. As far as I know, no mission ever had a fence around it to keep people in.
Many times in the Protector’s correspondence, an issuer would ask urgently for more stores as a large number of “Natives”, sometimes hundreds, had arrived at their depot. A few weeks later, they were gone again. People came and went as they chose.
The Protector sent rations to a mission near Port Lincoln, located on 18,000 acres of crop and grazing land, with the express instruction that the rations were not for the residents but for “travelling people”, passing up and down Eyre Peninsula to and from Port Lincoln, and that the rations were to keep them supplied on their journey. The mission population there were supposed to be self-supporting (which they were from about 1868 onwards). The “travelling people” camped a couple of miles from the mission and occasionally worked for wages on the mission, grubbing stumps.
At Point McLeay, from Taplin’s journal, from the letter-books and from the Protector’s letters, one can read of hundreds of people suddenly arriving from down the Coorong or from up the Murray for ceremonies. They camped a mile or two away, and needed provisioning. A week or two later, they had gone back to their own country.
Rations were strictly for the sick, aged and infirm, mothers with young children, and orphans. Able-bodied people were expected to hunt or fish or gather, or work for farms and stations. Families that had been deserted or widowed were also provided with rations. Rations included: flour, tea, sugar, axes, rice, sago, tobacco, soap, fishing lines, fish-hooks, netting twine, needles and thread, clothes, clothing material, blankets, blue serge shirts, cotton shirts, spoons, quart-pots, pannicans, billy-cans, tomahawks, bags and tarpaulins for wurlies, occasionally tents, and free medical care and travel passes to and from hospital.
Rations were provided to isolated individuals. For example, on many occasions, an old man or woman on a station might need to be looked after. The Protector asked the lessee to ask the person if they wanted to go to a mission to be better cared for there, but they said no, they wanted to stay on their land, so he arranged for the station-lessee to provide that person with rations, often for years. One Aboriginal woman on Kangaroo Island, originally from Tasmania, was supplied with rations in this way for at least twenty years. A deserted wife and her family in Adelaide were provided with rations for many years, at least until the record ends.
Missions regularly expelled people who had behaved badly or immorally. In other words, they were fairly particular about who could and couldn’t stay on a mission. I suspect that one mission had to wind down in the 1890s simply because it couldn’t get enough working men to stay there: it seemed to have a chronic shortage of labour from the late 1870s as capable men found better-paying work in the district.
In sum, there does not seem to be any evidence of “herding”, or any obvious intention to ever do so.
Driving Aborigines from their lands
There is only one instance in the Protector’s letters of a pastoral lessee trying to drive people from his lease (in 1876), and as soon as the Protector was informed, he wrote to remind the lessee that he would be in breach of his lease, which stipulated that Aboriginal people had all the traditional rights to use the land as they always had done, “as if this lease had not been made”, as the wording went. It was assumed that traditional land use and pastoral land use could co-exist, as, of course, they could and still can. I’m informed that that condition still applies in current legislation.
By the way, six months later, that pastoralist was applying for rations. The depot there was still issuing rations at least thirty years later.
The Protector provided dozens, perhaps a hundred or more, fifteen-foot boats, and fishing gear (fishing lines, fish-hooks, netting twine) to people on all waterways, even Cooper’s Creek, so that they could fish and “stay in their own districts”. He provided guns to enable people to hunt more effectively. Boats and guns were provided free—as well as their repair—to people unable to earn a living, and able-bodied people were expected to pay half their cost. The Game Act has always expressly exempted Aboriginal people from restrictions on hunting and fishing in “close season”, even now.
The Protector advised a woman who had been living on a mission, but whose husband had been knocking her around, that he could provide her with rations at a town near her own country. Over the years, whenever particular individuals or groups were “loafing about the City” or drunk and disorderly, or begging (what we call “humbugging” these days) about the streets, he provided them with rail or steamer passes to “go back to their home districts”.
From the earliest days, Aboriginal people were encouraged to lease plots of land, up to 160 acres rent-free, and to live on the land, which was usually in the country they came from. The earliest record seems to be a woman who had married a white man. Often white men thought that, if they married an Aboriginal woman, they could get a piece of land, but no, the lease was always vested in the Aboriginal partner.
During the 1890s, more than forty Aboriginal people, including at least three women, held such leases. One mission may have wound down precisely because the more capable men took out leases of their own, leaving the mission bereft of labour and in debt.
In sum, there does not seem to be any evidence of any intention to drive people from their country. Again, quite the reverse.
Stealing children from their families
Colonisation disrupted Aboriginal traditional life and family patterns. Women had children by white men (as well as by Africans, Chinese, Afghans and West Indians) and lived peripatetic lives around the towns. Many children were abandoned or orphaned by single mothers who either could not support them or died. Many children were brought down from the north by stockmen and survey teams, sometimes from interstate, and then abandoned in the city.
All states have fiduciary obligations to their inhabitants, especially to children. The Protector was, in effect and in law, the legal guardian responsible for the well-being of such abandoned children. Facilities in those days were either rudimentary or non-existent, so the most suitable place for such children, short of locating their living relatives (which occurred occasionally), was to ask a particular mission if they could take them. Often this was not possible, so the Protector had to look around to find a place for a particular child.
So how many? I typed up the School Records, 1880 to 1960, from one mission/government settlement and found that, for example, between 1880 and 1900, only eight children—out of a roll of 200 over those years—had been brought to this mission. There were barely as many again in the next fifty years.
And just in case “stealing children” means taking them from missions and settlements, it should be pointed out that, in that period 1880 to 1960, during which 800 children were, at one time or another, enrolled at that school, a total of forty-seven school-age children were transferred to homes or institutions or the Adelaide Hospital, and the vast majority of them came back within a year or two. Mothers died, fathers died and mothers re-married, families fell destitute or broke up for all manner of reasons. The reasons for Aboriginal children being put into care of any sort were not much different from those for any other Australians, and at 4 per cent, neither was the rate of “removal”.
Incidentally, more than thirty years ago, I got hold of the birth and death records from an Aboriginal community covering the period from 1860 to 1965. I typed them up and tried to identify the decade in which infant mortality was highest. I was surprised to find that the worst decade in all that time for infant mortality (including one poor child who died of “starvation”), was the 1950s. Why so?
Tentatively, I would suggest that, after the war, the movement away from the community by more enterprising Aboriginal men and their families, in search of better work and schooling opportunities, left the community short of carers, people who had customarily been expected to provide food and shelter for the children of the “stayers”, so that levels of neglect rose significantly.
In the period under study, 1840 to 1912, under the Protector’s watch, if children knew their own country and wished to go back there, he arranged for their travel home. At one mission a boy from the far north was unhappy and wished to return home, so the Protector promptly arranged for him to travel up to Oodnadatta and then on to his own country. A year or so later, he was back at the mission, working and asking for some financial support to buy a harmonium.
So, from the record, there does not seem to be any concerted effort to take children from their families. In fact, the Protector notes that he does not have the legal power to do so, and I suspect neither did he have the intention.
* * *
So why did I believe as I did, without evidence? Because the conventional paradigm, the “black-armband” version, fits together. It makes sense. It doesn’t need evidence. And perhaps in other states—Queensland, for instance—conditions were harsher for Aboriginal (and Islander) people. But that’s for researchers up there to follow up on, if they will.
There are such things as facts. There was only one full-time staff member of the South Australia Aborigines Department. There were forty or more official ration depots from around 1870 onwards. Sometimes facts are like rocks in a stream of interpretation: flow this way or that, twist and turn as one may, the interpretation of history still has to deal with the facts. What comes first, reality or ideology?
It may not have been all sweetness and light, but neither was it as brutal as the conventional paradigm supposes. Nineteenth-century people were no different from ourselves. It’s time we relied more on evidence than on feelings or suspicions, otherwise we will forever be getting it wrong.

file:///C:/Users/Fred/Documents/Steve%20Personel/Aboriginal%20stuff/361859063_679973954175058_2327518330752776917_n%20-%20Copy.jpg

Interesting read, thank you.

udo Friday, 21 Jul 2023 at 2:54pm

Flag Designed by Harold Thomas in 1971.

indo-dreaming Friday, 21 Jul 2023 at 3:40pm

GuySmiley wrote:
ABC TV 8.32 pm tonight

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Z1Vq7rrTsY0&embeds_referring_euri=https%3A...

https://amp.abc.net.au/article/102606182

Watched this yesterday.

Pretty much what you would expect, no big surprises.

It was good that they did include Peter Sutton in it to provide some kind of balance, although it felt like it had a clear ABC edit & bias(as expected) would have liked to hear more from Peter and less from random activist types.

basesix Friday, 21 Jul 2023 at 4:18pm

indo-dreaming wrote:
would have liked to hear more from Peter and less from random activist types.

why?

Supafreak Friday, 21 Jul 2023 at 4:30pm

https://johnmenadue.com/racism-the-no-campaign-and-the-americanisation-o.... “ The Voice to Parliament is not, as they lie, a “third chamber” of parliament or any other such threat to equality. It is literally nothing more than an advisory body to try to ensure that the best policy is deployed to reverse the deep disadvantage faced by First Nations people. It is placed in the constitution to ensure that cynical governments in the future cannot abandon it. The design of the body itself will be built by parliamentary consultation with First Nation representatives. “

basesix Friday, 21 Jul 2023 at 4:34pm

I just wanna mung on some of that sweet Aussie bread, unleavened or not!
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2020/nov/10/australian-resear...

Robwilliams Friday, 21 Jul 2023 at 4:36pm

excellent basesix
https://www.sbs.com.au/food/article/2023/06/27/native-flour-reflects-650...

basesix Friday, 21 Jul 2023 at 4:45pm

awesome rob, spear and kangaroo from the doco ordered, also some mitchell and button! Post-session flapjacks with the kids - Grizzly Adams and Jack would go!
(tunes selection today awesome as always ; )

udo Friday, 21 Jul 2023 at 4:52pm

https://www.indigenouspromotions.com.au/

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