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The Forum > Article Comments > Lest we forget: The Coniston Massacre > Comments

Lest we forget: The Coniston Massacre : Comments

By Amanda Midlam, published 11/11/2010

What was the Coniston massacre? Lest We Forget became Best We Forget as Australia developed amnesia.

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There are two basic attitudes that one can take to this kind of incident. Or two extremes, if you will.

You can burn it into your psyche, so that it colours everything you say and do for generation after generation.

Or you can accept that "the past is a foreign country: they do things differently there" (L P Hartley, opening sentence of "The Go-Between", for those trying to place that quote).

The first approach is typified by the Irish, where Protestants still talk of The Battle of the Boyne as if it were yesterday, instead of 320 years ago. The Scots have the same attitude, in their case towards Culloden, a mere 264 years ago. As indeed do the French, who insisted that Henry V be "tried" for war crimes at Agincourt, nearly 600 years later.

Now that's what I call carrying a grudge.

http://dctheatrescene.com/2010/03/18/high-court-rules-for-french-at-agincourt/

The second is a trait often exhibited by the British. There is no lingering resentment, for example, over the treatment of 64 prisoners in the 14ft by 18ft Black Hole of Calcutta, only 21 of whom survived. Nor over the systematic despatch of 12,000 civilians during the retreat from Kabul in 1842, including the massacre of the sick and wounded left behind in Kabul, despite a guarantee of their safety by Akbar Khan.

These are both "relatively well-known and documented instance(s) of atrocities", but I suspect that you wouldn't find too much residual emotion about either of them, even if you deliberately went out and tried to stir it up. And you would be pushing it uphill to build any kind of campaign on the back of them.

I have immense sympathy for those involved, and those directly affected. But I'm afraid the motivation of people who claim such personal affinity with random historical events, eludes me.

Can anyone out there put me straight?
Posted by Pericles, Friday, 12 November 2010 5:04:21 PM
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Whistler,

Would a men's and a women's legislature each deliberate over the same issues, or would some higher power designate issues as male and female ? Who ? A male and a female president or G-G ? Who would prevail ? What makes an issue a male or a female one ? What are the budget implications of two sets of deliberations, and decisions ? Should there be two Treasurers ? Two Treasuries ? Therefore two sets of taxes ?

Frankly, to get real, this is nothing more than Apartheid, Whistler. As citizens, we should deliberate together, or choose our delegates to do so. Anything less is a diminished society: how to make a fully functioning, fully-involved society work - that is the task for us all, not to fragment society and find yet more ways to differentiate it and set one part against another. Try to get that through your head.

Meanwhile, out here in the real world, and back to topic, yes, there must have been many, many massacres all over Australia. But we have all watched enough forensic crime shows on TV to know that where there is a major crime, there should be evidence: if thirty people are killed, no matter how long ago, there may well be tell-tale signs in the environment, or remains of bullets or casings or large bones. Family trees would have unexplained omissions, as might mission school enrolments, ration-station issues, etc.

For instance, to burn thirty bodies would take many tons of wood, which - in sparsely wooded parts of Australia - would denude many hectares, so a relatively young patch of bush all about the same age might be a clue. Hopefully, Indigenous archaeologists can turn their skills to investigating sites which are reputed to be massacre sites.

[TBC]
Posted by Loudmouth, Friday, 12 November 2010 5:17:48 PM
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[contd.]

By definition, massacres are secret. But this does not necessarily mean that they occurred - the absence of evidence may well reflect the absence of a crime (after all, rumours and hearsay have lives of their own: people often believe what they want to believe, embroider it and pass it on: it's called oral history). Then again, it may not: it really would be up to proper investigations.

This should include the massacre of whites by Aboriginal people as well - for example, the Maria massacre of 28 people in 1841 along the coast of SA.

Then again, what constitutes a massacre ? Does a straight-out running battle, over many months, between hundreds of men, regardless of disparity of weaponry, constitute a massacre ? Just asking.

Joe
Posted by Loudmouth, Friday, 12 November 2010 5:23:30 PM
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Only ALGOREisRich could twist this sad event into some sort of case against multiculturalism.

There was no Multiculturalism poicy in existence in those days.

If anything this demonstrates the outcome of the cultural intolerance of one dominant group over another - quite a different thing and the opposite of what he claims.
Posted by wobbles, Friday, 12 November 2010 5:43:18 PM
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hi Loudmouth, i've already discussed your concerns. http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=10320#169006. Gender apartheid is when there are only men's legislatures which admit women under supervision inclusive of leadership as with Australia. Perhaps you could start a new topic if you wish to press the matter.

hi jorge, the world in 1928 is very much equal to the world in 2010, there are no women's legislatures and so there is no treaty.

hi wobbles, ALGOREisRICH did have the chutzpa to swoop on cause over an enquiry. Rob Riley passed away over the misery of the Deaths in Custody inquiry.
Posted by whistler, Friday, 12 November 2010 8:57:44 PM
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Pericles, I believe if someone had a parent or grandparent who was a direct witness to the event, their emotional trauma may be felt by their kids and grandkids;
An extra half-century leaves a lot less people to be acquainted to direct witnesses, and heal more wounds.

Although I imagine the event itself, distant or otherwise, would stand between us and the communities in question with us as an occupying power; a differentiation between Scottish/Irish/English atrocities is that in Britain they are more an equal member of society as the other, and such events feel more like 'ancient history' between two tribes that their country descended from.
In our country, on the other hand, there is more a chasm of rights, equality and integration with most of our Aboriginal communities and the mainstream "Australian" civilization represented in the massacres (and subsequent trials).

Your point is quite reasonable, but there is a indeed good reason why this issue is still the way it is.
Posted by King Hazza, Friday, 12 November 2010 9:51:12 PM
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