Aboriginal People: The Wrongs Done To Them Essay, Research Paper
What Wrongs Have White Administrators Done to Aborginal people In The Past? Have
all wrong Been Righted?
Even though Hardy wrote his book in 1968, he gives a good definition of
how the Aborigines were treated in that time. A very bias ‘opinion’ based
difinition of the treatment of Aborigines:
“To this day the Aborigine is treated as less than a man, his situation
isapalling. His destiny and very identity is decided by his white superiors.
He can live only on terms dictated by the people, who despise him. He is paid
less, educated less, segregated, rendered landless, discriminated against,
insulted, deprived of dignity, his women molested.” (Hardy 1968)
The Aborgiines have been unfairly treated since European settlement.
Children have been taken from their parents, they have been humiliated. They
have shot down until not one Aborgine was left in Tasmania. Even though all te
worst of it has been over for the Aborigines – but has all wrongs been righted?
One of the most inhumane practices of white settlement in Australia
would be the taking of the Aboriginal children from their families. Some
Aboriginal children were brought up to feel ashamed of their race and heir
colour. “In a deliberate and callous attempt to conceal their cultural
identity,” Aboriginal children were taken from the families an forcibly placed
in an institution and were denied further contact with their families.
(Aboriginal legal service, 1995 pp ii)
For white Australia, the feeling of responsibility, shame, apologetic
and sympathetic for what their past people have done to the Aboriginals. The
Aboriginals feeling anguished, rejected and feeling in a sence made “different”
from the Europeans.
“For Aboriginal participants a catharsis for feelings of sorrow and rage,
and it encourages as to anticipate that, after generations of neglect, white
Australia is finally prepared to own the shame of its past, and to accept the
responsibility of effecting real and substancial reparation in the future.”
(Aboriginal legal service, 1995 pp ii)
Aboriginal children in Western Australia were removed from their
families until the 1960’s. The children were taken from police and ‘welfare
offices’ to be raised as white children for the purpose of assimilation.
(Aboriginal Legal Service, 1995 pp ii)
Surveys have been conducted from Aboriginal people. They were asked
about the effects the assimilation had on them. (See Appendix A)
“It is not only the intence impact of removal from families and culture
which has contributed to long lasting effects. Life at the missions, faster
care, or other institutions was for may a harsh experience which exacerbated the
dislocation, alienation, lonliness and pain felt from being rem,oved from
families and culture.” (Aboriginal Legal Service, 1995, pp 5)
Emotional, physical and sexual abuse were taking place apon Aboriginal
children in institutions and dormatories. “Spiritual hurt has also suffered the
Aboriginal children from the removal from their families. The following list
shows how Aboriginal children were abused. (Aboriginal Legal Service 1995, pp
5) (See Appendix B)
The often forcilde take of Aboriginal children from their families were
taken into orphanages, missions, and foster care. Aboriginal children were
assimulated and integrated and were in control of white people “allowing those
in control to educate and rear Ab
most cases that up-bringing was informed by the opinion that “it was in the
(Aborigines) best interest to be something other than Aboriginal.” (Aboriginal
Legal Service 1995 pp 10)
“The goal of assimilating children of mixed Aboriginal blodd ‘into the
white community’…. was an attempt to ‘breed out’ the Aboriginal race. It
amounted to genocide” (Aboriginal Legal Service 1995 pp 1 & 2)
Their has been two deliberate attempts in history where certain person
or race has tried to commit genocide. Hitler and his soldiers as well as the
white Australians. The germans were defeated in the war and Australia helped
prevent the extermination of the Jewish race. Maybe white Australian thought
that was a horrible cold cold blodded war. Did they actually think that they
did the same in their own country. ” White Australia was able to persue its
crime until not one Aborigine remained alive on the island of Tasmania.”
(Hardy 1968) (See Appendix C )
Five thousand Aborigines occupied the island of Tasmania in 1803. Just
21 years later only 500 remained. By 1876 the last of the Tasmanians,
Traganinc, were dead, here body dissected and her skeleton articulated for
examination by the pseudo-scientists. In truth we have one of the first
examples in modern times of the ‘final solution’ – the genocide of an entire
group of people in a specific area.” (Bessant 1978 pp 12)
The Tasmanian Island had the worst conflicts of all. “The most vicious
of all colonial administrations” and the most brutal of all convicts. Governor
George Arthur arrived in Tasmania in 1824 and was warning to end the killings of
the Aboriginals. “He intended to introduce a new policy of conciliation” and
civilise the Aborigines to make them like white families. In 1826, the governor
concluded that “Aboriginals were beyond salvation. The Aboriginals started to
fight back, obtaining firearms “and adopting kelly-type raiding techniques…
They were refusing to recognise the superiority of the Europeans.” The governor
onve hought of the Aboriginals as childish and then regarded them “as an evil it
was duty to destroy” (Bessant 1978 pp 12)
Arguments have been expressed about the contraversy of whether all
worngs have been righted. Aboriginals even today are not treated completely
equal by all white Australians. Even though the Government has allowed
Aboriginals to vote, receive pensions and the same benefits as all other
Australians, they still have problems with getting employment.
“The European settlers wanted land. Because the Aborigines did not
cultivate the ground or make permenant dwellings or settlements, the new comers
did not realize or care, that the land was owned and occupied… and so the
question of Aboriginal right to that land hardly concerned them at all” (Brendt)
The Mabo issue has in some sence been righted. Alot of sacred land has
been cultivatedm, and settlements have taken place. Therefore it is too late to
give this land back to the Aboriginals. Some land has been given back,to the
Aboriginals,and this land is under conservation by the Aboriginals.
Other problems cannot be righted, such as the worngs with the
dislocation of Aboriginal children and the genocide in Tasmania. Problems such
as these are impossible to be righted. But they can be apoogised by the white
Australian Government. The Government has taken responsibility for their
actions, and now look down with shame.
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