generalspeaking

Violently Disaffected

Aggrieved aboriginals who rebel against the history that disadvantaged them when their original possession of the land later 'discovered' by Europeans who exercised their assumed superiority of race and technology and might-of-arms to dislodge the original inhabitants of land from their positions of comfort in their place on the land, most certainly have a legitimate cause.

History, from the ancients to the relatively recent disruptions of original land entitlements as a result of constant and historical presence, is replete with details of original inhabitants experiencing the unsettling reality of another society and culture impinging on their own, through conquest leading to eventual assimilation with the newly-arrived in control and the original inhabitants being set aside.

History has also demonstrated that over a sufficient length of time both the original inhabitants and the succeeding and dominant newcomers gradually melded, often when the intruders eroded the legitimacy of the original settlers on the land by discounting the value of their society, their culture, their heritage and enacting laws to outlaw their language and religion.

In the most recent examples of such imperialistic human interaction, European countries colonized less developed and handsomely natural-resource-endowed countries with their ancient lineages and culture, to enrich themselves and extend their territorial holdings. In modern times this habitual colonization is viewed through a lens of self-disowning violations of human rights.

The former colonizers have spent decades within the last Century, doing reluctant penance for their forbears' assumption of cultural, social superiority. Within the British Empire formerly colonized countries in particular, have become proud and forward-looking honouring their pasts, while using their enforced introduction to British values, civil-structuring and justice to their advantage.

The former penal colony of Australia set up by Britain as a repository of those within its own society it wished to rid itself of, now represents as a strong Western, democratic-values-imbued island-country in the Pacific reflecting its source. Its treatment of Australian aboriginals as less than wholly human remains a blot on its history that the country has latterly been attempting to reverse.

The growing move to empower, respect and entitle Australia's aboriginal communities has resulted in a new level of interaction and co-operation between the Australian government and its minority aboriginal population. Some aboriginals have been welcomed into Australia's parliament. The slow but steady movement toward equalization of opportunities for all Australians is on track.

But as with all attempts at remediation of past wrongs, the devil is in the details, and no group is ever completely convinced that they have reason to be satisfied at the glacial pace of restoration of what has been destroyed. And when the leader of the country's opposition political party made a public statement that offended many within the aboriginal community, a typical scenario resulted.

"The indigenous people of Australia can be very proud of the respect in which they are held by every Australian. I think a lot has changed since the embassy was created, and I think it probably is time to move on from that"; referring to an impromptu and now-iconic structure named the "Aboriginal tent Embassy" that has been in place for the past 40 years as a symbol of aboriginal struggle for legitimacy and their rightful place in society.

That statement violated the feelings of those who consider themselves activists, and the very person who had originally been responsible for the presence of the 'tent embassy', characterized the suggestion it was time to dismantle it and return the park on which it stands to its original function for all Australians, as an "incitement to racial riots".

Unwilling to allow such an opportunity to pass without further comment, aboriginal activists, who mark Australia's 1788 arrival of white settlers as Australia Day with their own nomenclature of Invasion Day, created a riot in the capital. Their legitimate seeking out of a conclusion to their long struggle for land rights and Aboriginal sovereignty was blighted by a mob attack on Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard.
A ceremony that took place in celebration of Australia Day was the scene of a violent group of aboriginal protesters trapping Ms. Gillard and opposition leader Tony Abbott at the ceremony venue until riot police were able to free them from the violence-prone, shouting, accusing mob of protesters. Creating, in the words of a former Australian Labour Party president and indigenous leader, a "disgrace".

The Aboriginal tent Embassy, said Warren Mundine, had long ceased to be relevant as far as most aboriginals were concerned. Sufficient advantage had been accrued to the aboriginal community to make the ramshackle, shambolic structures nothing less than an eyesore. And the Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner had his own words to add:

"While we need to acknowledge that there's a real anger, frustration and hurt that exists in some indigenous communities around Australia, we must not give in to aggressive and disrespectful actions ourselves."

There is much for Australian aboriginals to feel aggrieved and disappointed about. Along with their historical state of disentitlement to their own land because of the actions of an entitled-feeling majority based on colonial-era prejudices, they have the present reality to contend with. They are hugely societally disadvantaged, with a much shorter lifespan and higher rate of crime and imprisonment and disease than their white counterparts.

At the time of British settlement they were said to have numbered approximately one million. At the present time Australia has a total population of 22-million, one-half million of whom are aboriginals.

Labels: Aboriginal populations, Conflict, Human Relations, Human Rights

posted by Pieface @ Saturday, January 28, 2012