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G4EBT > STOLEN 04.02.08 21:37l 159 Lines 6088 Bytes #999 (0) @ WW
BID : F77837G4EBT
Read: GUEST
Subj: Re: Stolen kids; Rudd to apologise
Path: DB0FHN<DB0MRW<OK0PPL<DB0RES<DK0WUE<GB7FCR
Sent: 080204/1827Z @:GB7FCR.#16.GBR.EU #:60591 [Blackpool] FBB-7.03a $:F77837G4
From: G4EBT@GB7FCR.#16.GBR.EU
To : STOLEN@WW
Tony, VK3API wrote:-
> Hi David and others,
> I note you couldn't resist having another go at the stolen black
> generation without talking about the stolen white generation in
> particular your comments:-
> > Some were brutalised or abused, physically and sexually.
Not my comments.
The words of the Australian Human Rights & Equal Opportunities
Commission's FAQs and the conclusion of the National Enquiry "Bringing
them Home - The 'Stolen Children' report (1997), now more than a decade
old.
The report was commissioned due to mounting concerns by right-minded
Australians and reflects great credit on Australia. Oz is a strong
advocate of human rights and a party to all of the treaties I've
mentioned several times on here - ICCPR, UN Convention on the Rights
of the Child, CERD, and so on.
In apologising for past wrongs, Kevin Rudd is simply implementing a
recommendation which is now over a decade old. The fact that it will
be the first item of business which he is to attend to from the floor
of the house when he opens parliament shows the importance he attaches
to this.
We shouldn't of course overlook that it behoves indigenous people
themselves to take responsibility for bettering their lot too. Many
"movers and shakers" among their number say as much.
Noel Pearson - a leading Aboriginal lawyer and Director of the Cape
Institute, has said "Indigenous people must stop expecting help and
start taking responsibility".
He's spoken out against the cult of "victimhood" saying "It's a terrible
thing to encourage people to see themselves as victims - it concedes
defeat".
"Victims do not take responsibility for what they eat or drink, or for
their health and mental wellbeing. Their families become dysfunctional
and their children are damaged".
"We need a proud and principled defence against racism, and many
Aboriginal people possess this dignity and strength. We must make this the
dominant outlook of our people and abolish the absurd notion that "my
rights depend upon you fulfilling your responsibilities to me".
End quote.
I don't think any of us could have put that any better.
I can only repeat - as I've said before, that from my perspective this
reflects great credit on Australia in trying to sort out this messy legacy
of British colonialism.
Let's not forget that these kids were not simply mistreated by the today's
standrds, but even by the standards which applied in much less enlightened
times.
Indigenous people are just 2% of present day Australians. It ought not to
be beyond the wit or will of the other 98% to move the agenda ahead over
time.
>I note also that the cries for compensation are already rolling in,
An official apology has little bearing on whether compensation is paid,
and in any event, it depends on the merits of each case. A landmark court
case has already set the precedence for that, in a truly shocking case of
institutionalised duplicity and deceit.
Not all will have fared badly - some had a good start in life and
benefited from the removal. But remember that it wasn't done as a welfare
measure, it was an act of genocide to eliminate a race of people over
time. They only took the light skinned ones.
Time moves on - few today defend those actions, and IMHO Australia's human
rights framework is first class and full of good intent. I'd be really
chuffed if the UK was on a par.
Rudd is picking up where Paul Keating's Redfern Park statement left off on
International Human Rights Day, 10 Dec 1992. It raised Australia's
standing in the world immensely.
I'd repeat a few of Keating's words:
Quote:
We simply cannot sweep injustice aside. Even if our own conscience allowed
us to, I am sure that in due course, the world and the people of our
region would not.
There should be no mistake about this - our success in resolving these
issues will have significant bearing on our standing in the world.
However intractable the problems seem, we cannot resign ourselves to
failure - any more than we can hide behind the contemporary version
of Social Darwinism which says that to reach back for the poor and
dispossessed is to risk being dragged down.
That seems to me not only morally indefensible, but bad history.
We non-Aboriginal Australians should perhaps remind ourselves that
Australia once reached out for us.
Didn't Australia provide opportunity and care for the dispossessed Irish?
The poor of Britain? The refugees from war and famine and persecution in
the countries of Europe and Asia?
Isn't it reasonable to say that if we can build a prosperous and
remarkable harmonious multicultural society in Australia, surely we can
find just solutions to the problems which beset the fist Australians - the
people to whom the most injustice has been done.
We fail to ask - how would I feel if this were done to me? As a
consequence, we failed to see that what we were doing degraded
all of us.
If we needed a reminder of this, we received it this year.
The report of the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody
showed with devastation clarity that the past lives on in inequality,
racism and injustice.
End quote.
Full statement: http://www.mountainman.com.au/redfern.htm
I'm perplexed as to how any Australian citizens can take issue with that.
I've said before that anyone who left school before about 1980 won't have
been taught anything about human rights. The White Australia Policy didn't
end until 1973, and the Racial Discrimination Act only came in 1975.
What matters in what the Australian citizens of tomorrow are being taught.
In that regard, HREOC provides first class educational resources to help
today's teachers and parents.
In December 2007 updated the "Bringing them Home" education module
to commemorate the 10th anniversary of the Bringing them home report
http://www.humanrights.gov.au/education/bth/index.html
Best wishes
David, G4EBT @ GB7FCR
Cottingham, East Yorkshire.
Message timed: 18:17 on 2008-Feb-04
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