It is trendy and particularly lefty for Australian self-haters to blame their own country for anything amiss in countries with which we have been associated as “colonialists”. Carefully ignored, of course, is the fact that these countries have bludged on us for years, got their independence, and then continued to bludge on us, while putting the quality of their governance on a par with the performances seen in spaghetti Westerns.

Now, for heavens sake, we have a foreigner from piddling little New Zealand flapping his wings.

So low is this man’s opinions of people whom he tells us we have taken advantage of, that he felt the need to speak up for an adult person from New Guinea, obviously sure that the man wasn’t capable of speaking for himself. It’s OK for him to treat some people like idiots, apparently. Maybe the ‘native’ already knew of the airline policy and had learned to live with it.

While their might be some truth in what the author claims concerning Australia’s past relationship with New Guinea, the country has had it’s independence long enough – with the help of aid – to have done something about any past wrongs, real or imagined.

Perhaps they are not capable of it. And, it’s all to easy to blame someone else

Could not agree more Leigh. It is amazing how many want to blame all the uncivilized world's problems on the civilized. When are we going to wake up to the fact to continue to give everyone except white Australia a victim mentality results in them never taking responsibility for their own actions. It won't be long before the East Timorese are blaming white Australians for their ills. I wonder if you have to have these self hating views in order to become a professor at our major universities.

“I wonder if you have to have these self hating views in order to become a professor at our major universities.”

I think that would be the main qualification, Runner. Did you see that McConvill has resigned from his university because the very people who hired him to counteract feminism and leftism have turned on him because they think he is too far to the right?

I have always thought his contributions to OLO have been middle of the road

Thanks Ron for reminding us of the antecedents to Australia's rapidly burgeoning problems with our neighbours. The comments thus far simply demonstrate their authors' obnoxious prejudices and complete ignorance of the geopolitical historical context of the current debacle(s).

Those of us who've actually worked in the area are perfectly aware that our chickens are coming home to roost - and our current government hasn't got a clue about how to deal with them.

"And all this time Papuans were Australian citizens and had been since 1906, since Britain required that."

Wasn't Papua a German colony until 1914?

Anyway the article was very one sided and all it proved was that the author could find bitterness in a bag of lollies if he look hard enough!

Easytimes

The Territory of Papua was a de facto Australian possession comprising the southeastern quarter of the island of New Guinea, existing from roughly 1902 to 1949. It had previously been administered from London as British New Guinea and remained a de jure British possession until 1975 when Papua New Guinea was granted independence by Australia. The territory now forms the southern part of Papua New Guinea, and makes up roughly half of that country.

In 1883 Sir Thomas McIlwraith the Premier of Queensland ordered Henry Chester (1832-1914), the Police Magistrate on Thursday Island to proceed to Port Moresby and formally annex New Guinea and adjacent islands in the name of the British government. Chester made the proclamation on 4 April 1883, but the British government repudiated the action.

The next year, after the Australian colonies had promised financial support, the territory became a British protectorate on 6 November 1884.

On September 4, 1888 it was annexed, together with some adjacent islands, by Britain as British New Guinea.

The northern part of modern Papua New Guinea, then known as Kaiser-Wilhelmsland and part of the colony of German New Guinea, had been under German commercial control since 1884 and passed to direct rule by the German government in 1899.

In 1902, Papua was effectively transferred to the authority of the new British dominion of Australia. With the passage of the Papua Act of 1905, the area was officially renamed the Territory of Papua and Australian administration became formal in 1906 although Papua remained a de jure British possession until the independence of Papua New Guinea in 1975, an anomaly which has continuing minor legal significance with respect to certain statutes which have force in the former Papua but not the former Australian New Guinea.