Aboriginals.

Perception can sway reality unfortunately. I live in an area of Sydney where my only interaction with Aboriginals are seeing them being verbally aggressive, having violent domestic bust ups on the street and being out of their heads on drink or drugs like crack or heroin.
I am sure there are many who are grand, try very hard to have a normal life and the above does not represent them but the above does paint a bad picture for any new arrival who sees this up close. You can then understand why the stereotypes of them are still present.

The treatment of them is often up for debate but the thing I never know or can understand is what do they actually want. They don't have a single unified voice to share their aims and goals. They have been very let down by their leaders. Some just want to be left alone and I am all for that but then again they want to have western style education and medical care, yet are also afraid that their culture will be diluted. How does that work and who pays for it? Some want to embrace modern Australia, some want us all to go away (you can't wish away 22 million people and wish it was still 10,000 BC) Its like they are lost, bewildered and don't know how to react. They live in this almost alien world even though many of them are born the same time as us. They are hamstrung by the past as its the only identity they have yet they have to leave some of it to move on. Its a delicate balancing act.

Some of course jump on the bandwagon of the blame culture and perpetuate a narrative of white guilt (John Pillinger for example) which is mostly found by the way not in the aboriginal community but in the streets of inner city Sydney and Melbourne's student suburbs. This does more harm then good imo and deliberately highlights division and hatred rather then try and move beyond it and look for common core solutions.

Some don't see any legitimacy in the government or the law which can lead to problems. I saw a poster a few weeks ago calling for members of the police of NSW to be murdered, as they were foreign occupiers. For 99.9% of Australians be they Irish, Chinese, Italian, Greek or whomever that is a shocking statement. Very hard to reconcile so many varied differences of opinions.

The government do spend a lot of money on them though but results can be mixed depending on the area and the type of aboriginals. Subsidised housing, free education, extra benefit payments etc, while all well meaning are actually bad and only enable them into the vicious poverty cycle that many find themselves in. It also rubs up the average Australian slightly when they look at the figures and find that more money is spent on an Aboriginal child than their own, who may also be poor, working class and be disadvantaged as well.

Some do brilliantly and do better at school then their white/asian Australians, others it's a disaster. Alcohol abuse as well as child abuse and domestic abuse is many many times greater then the norm. Child abuse within the community is a very very touchy subject, even mentioning it will get calls that you are a racist but the facts speak for themselves and the government are kinda hamstrung as they cannot really do anything due to the history of children being taken away from parents in the 60's. This is coming back to haunt them now.

As I said, its not something that is going to be fixed anytime soon as its a very complicated issue that is much more nuanced that people realise.

dim_view wrote: »

i guess its true what they say

" how you class opinions politically depends on where you are standing yourself "

i find the above post of be thee most inaccurate post ive ever read , boards.ie ( and after hours ) is for the the most part a liberal left love in

I think people who think boards.ie or AH is very centre right has not had much exposure to the world or mixes in the same social group whereby their world view does not go unchallenged.