Australia Rejects Recognition of Aboriginals - For Shame

Ironically that division already existed in the census question when I lived there.

I think questions broke down something like this:

A. Are you Australian

B. Are you Aboriginal.

I found this a very divisive existing paradigm. The wording of the question in this referendum didn't really have anything in it that was socially divisive for Australia, both the transplanted and native.

It is bizarre to think that aboriginal people of Australia were only allowed the right vote in the late 1960s because civilised whitey voted to let them have that right. Later referendums raised concerns that native title meant people losing their gardens etc...

Anyway, here's a link with whitey the squatter complaining about the natives.

Planters going plant.

And several to New York from my generation. Generally they weren’t nice people , very quick to form opinions on people , especially non Caucasian people . Just my experience though

Myself and other Irish discussed this comparison when we were living out in Oz and there's a gulf of a difference. Irish travelers are distinct from European gypsies, a distinction traveler advocacy groups make too. So even on an ethnic level they see themselves as Irish, whereas white Australia see themselves as distinct from native australians.

While we might grumble about traveler behaviour we understand that they are part of our history, whereas many non native Australians see the native as subhuman.

Before federation the native australian was actually more equal in being a royal subject, upon federation they are classed and managed under the department of flora and fauna. They were abused, mistreated and murdered when they resisted forced resettlement off their traditional habitat. I met one aboriginal elder who saw his grandfather being shot dead by a farmer in the 1960s and there was no consequences.

I think a more true comparison is our present is how Israel systemically brutalised Palestinians over decades and then when Palestinians repay that brutality they are demonised as animals. Australians actually had what were effectively rape camps where the black would be bred out of the native.

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Is anyone surprised? Look at the Australian flag, look at their printed money as 2 examples of how they still show deference to an outdated, privileged racist institution that subjugated the Aboriginal people in the first place.

The thing that I found most comical about white Australian society was how much they were in denial about how dependent they were on China buying commodities from lands stolen from native australians. I heard it a good few times that Australia didn't go into recession after 08 because of their superior management culture, with no mention of the massive Chinese capital spending spree that attracted so many of us over there.

Also I really got sick of being referred to as an expat while Asian colleagues on the same pay and visa were called immigrants, and worse. I'd get invited to Bbq's, they wouldn't.

Racists and dumb people, no surprise

Can say as a citizen of Australia that's lived there for 10 years that this was the correct outcome and delighted it got shot down

The Yes agenda was half baked at best by the Yes vote and Albo.

Yes the Aboriginals were treated very bad by generations passed but some proposals to rectify some of this were just as wrong and unjust to newer generations which would of in effect punished newer generations for issues of the past.

In essence two wrongs don't make a right.

There is lots of ways to help the Aboriginal people going forward and to be fair there is a lot of schemes and policies in place for this.

First mistake in all of this stuff is separation

By all means let try and right the wrongs of previous generations but let's not do it in such a way that we are going to repeat the mistakes albeit on the other side

Have to laugh at all the comments calling Aussies racist, slow, dumb etc on the basis of their week long holidays or meeting an Aussie in a pub once. Might be missing some irony when you label an entire people as racist. Although I would have liked to see this passed, it's a hell of a lot more complicated than people are making out and wasn't about just recognising the indigenous people.

I wasn't in the NT but I have been to remote Aboriginal communities in outback WA for extended periods.

I can tell you from first hand experience if you got on plane and ended up in those places your outlook might be a lot different.

I do feel for the Aboriginal people what happened them was clearly wrong but trust me there is elements to there society that are also wrong.

Just speaking from my own experiences over there.

.h

It sounds like you are trying to make a point about us white christians being better than blacks and muslims. You're on shaky ground though if that's your point, as the bones of indigenous peoples in the whiter parts of the Americas, Australia and various other parts of the globe attest.

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I lived in australia for 20 years from 1974, have family still living there and still travel there, but not so regularly as my ma would like!!

White Australians are incredibly racist. Even until the 1970’s aboriginal children were still removed from their families to be ‘westernised’ with white Australians.

Aboriginals are not the only people to be discriminated by the Aussies over time; Vietnamese, Italian and Greeks to name a few. Aboriginals were always treated as second class, herded into reservations and lost their traditional ways. Now they rely on social welfare and alcohol, a sad way to treat one of the oldest indigenous people in the world.

All that referendum asked was for aboriginals and Torres Strait islanders be able to advise government on matters relating to them - no them and us, just advice - a bit like a lot of spin doctors used in our political system by interested parties.

Shame on Australia, the lucky country my arse