My brief attempt at a deconstruction of Racist mythology in this Perth Indymedia thread:

Willy Willy" said:

1. "The Aborigine tribes came to Australia across the from the Indonesian islands just as the Europeans came here via the sea"

Me: No. This is not the same. Some 50,000 years ago (perhaps longer) the australian continent was indeed uninhabited. This island's Aboriginal Culture is arguably the oldest human culture on the planet.

The original migration was via land bridges - some tens of 1000s of years ago. Whereas Cook and others came here, [a few years ago], to forcibly appropriate this country in the name of an Empire. Indeed, a declaration of "war".

The Aboriginal Nations were stolen by England and in terms of historical context - very recently.

So, this is very different than the original migrators. Don't you think so?


Willy Willy" said:

"They were conquered by the Europeans, just as the many countries in Europe and Britain were themselves conquered through history. Perhaps I could sue the descendants of the vikings for invading the land of my ancestors?"

Me: No. We're talking a total modern disregard for culture and deliberate Genocide. And we're talking less than 200 years ago. Whereas, the "Vikings", and indeed the Romans, invaded England etc in the early centuries. Before the "Enlightenment".

Geographical australian Aboriginal People have only legally been considered people [and not "Fauna"] since the late 1960s. They were explicitly denied any say in the Constitution in 1901. They have been completely denied access to democracy until then. There is a long and bitter scar across our history - which will take years of discussion and amelioration.

But, we're certainly talking COMPLETELY different moments in the history of humanity. Apparently we have been reasonably "civilised" for the last few hundred years - civilised enought to realise there is something wrong with stealing other peoples property. Theres something abhorrent about murdering people for their land and so very recently.

Effectively, "so called" aboriginal rights have only recently been recognised as citizens - within OUR generation. And since the relatively recent Mabo and Wik cases, some recognition of the distortions of a Terra Nullius has been established, that is, it is now officially recognised that there were indeed People here before the Invasion. Yet little has been achieved.

In fact matters are far worse than ever:

June 1 2005: "Kuruma Marthudunera elder Neil Finlay said local people had not benefited from mining in the region. "Our country has been mined for iron ore for 30 years, making billions of dollars worth of profit for Rio Tinto and Robe River and nothing has been done for us - while our people live in poverty at their door and die 20 years before their time."

http://www.industrysearch.com.au/news/viewrecord.asp?ID=16848

It seems that, since Britsh Invasion of the late 1700s on these Aboriginal Lands, there has been continuous and deliberate exploitation. These ideas now being discussed as by definition Genocide. And High Courts are looking at such issues in terms of Sovereignty.

See http://aboriginalgenocide.com

We NEED to rcognise this - and not deny it with semantics as you are doing. I could go much further into your post, but I won't. Your argument is typical of the reasons this country's Traditional Owners cannot move forward.

Australia was built on Racist foundations, it has a Racist Constitution and much work is needed to heal the wounds of our disturbing racist past...

Will you help us? OR continue to deny the engrained racist philosophy this country was founded on...