My apology, individual - you're quite correct that you haven't actually quite denied the existence of the Stolen Generations in this thread. Indeed, you haven't actually said anything very much of substance beyond suggesting that it all must have been necessary and that it was all in the past anyway so everybody should just get over it.

Loudmouth - Dr Raynes has already answered your hectoring demands, but it seems that on this issue no amount of evidence will sway your increasingly offensive denialism. In this thread you've gone way beyond skepticism, apparently for emotional rather than empirical reasons.

odo - back under your rock, troll.

Indeed, Paul. Sarcasm too.

It's understandable that many people have 'gut feelings' that the Stolen Generation has to be a reality, not a con. There is a lot of 'gut feeling', intuition, in Aboriginal affairs generally, a lot of what people believe in their bones, but which may still not have any basis in fact - it's a human thing to do: you don't demand chapter and verse for every single belief, you just take it sort of for granted: 'yeah, that sounds about right'. We all do it, but that doesn't make it a valid way to conduct research or to further inter-group relations.

A vastly more effective mode of investigation than intuition is scepticism and the search for evidence, painfully and slowly refined over the past couple of thousand years. We can see this in every pre-school play-ground, where some kid is arguing hotly 'It is so ! It is so !' [intuition, gut feelings] while some other priggish kid is expounding in detail why it isn't so [scepticism and evidence]. Of course the prig is just as likely to get clouted by a plastic sand-bucket, to resolve the dispute. Perhaps a collection of the best of research into Indigenous 'knowledges' (or 'beliefs') could be called 'The Sand-Bucket of Belief.' [come on, you fellas, get angry !]

So it may well be with the Stolen Generation narrative: the evidence may well be there, but many people seem to be content to just 'believe'. This is prejudging the issue and there is a word for that: prejudice. Dear angry reader: ask yourself, yes I believe, but do I know of any examples of a Stolen Generation ? If the answer is no, then withhold your judgment until you get some evidence.

[signed] Disgruntled old non-Indigenous male prig.

The myth of a stolen generation is not the only example of gut feelings (and prejudice), so is the myth of the myth of terra nullius.

When I was going through the SA State Records at Netley about ten years ago, looking at the activities of the SA Pastoral Board around 1899-1900, I was amazed to find that Aboriginal people actually had far more rights to use land in traditional ways - at least in law - than we realise now:

In every pastoral lease was a clause that lessees had to take note of and sign up to, declaring that Aboriginal people had the right to come on to their lease and hunt, gather and collect water, camp on and carry out their ceremonies on that land, 'as if the lease had not been made'.

That last clause in the lease document intrigues me: AS IF THIS LEASE HAD NOT BEEN MADE. In one document it was phrased: 'in such manner as they would have been entitled to if this lease had not been made.' Does it mean that Aboriginal people had those rights over crown land, land that had been reserved from sale or lease, as well ? In that case, we are talking about the vast majority of Australia.

Unfortunately, after Mabo when people thought they had no rights ('All whites are b@stards, they took all our land, we got nothing ! Nothing !'), the lawyers did not carry out due diligence and find out first-up what the legal situation was, as lawyers are supposed to do, they also assumed that Aboriginal people 'had nothing' and went into negotiations with government agencies, and accepted a lousy deal accordingly. All the people got out of it were a few piddly ILUAs and regional agreements. So thanks to 'gut feelings', Aboriginal people now are left with less than they actually had before: at least in SA, they now have to apply to a Committee for a permit to enter land that they had the complete free right to enter barely fifteen years ago

'Loudmouth - Dr Raynes has already answered your hectoring demands, but it seems that on this issue no amount of evidence will sway your increasingly offensive denialism...'

Thanks for the serve, CJ, but with respect, no he hasn't - yes, I was dopey enough to ask for names, but pretty obviously I meant cases: bare names you can get out of a phone book, but cases give us some detail, some direction, some idea of what sort of subterfuges would have been employed IF. As well, Dr Raynes should give us some idea of sources: whether he has seen documentation and where it can be found, or if he has only had a verbal report with no documentary back-up whatsoever.

Oh, my goodness.

Dr Raynes, surely you are not relying only on word-of-mouth, on oral accounts only, are you ? Again with respect, surely you could not be so naive as to rely on oral accounts AND NOTHING BUT ?! You must surely have documentation to back up your names; surely you've checked the files in GRG 52/1 or in other archives ?!

Morning Everyone,

I haven't read any comments since about #143. (The truth is I've pretty much given up on trying to have a rational debate with some of you. Loudmouth, I don't quite know what your point is about the reliability of oral history. There is NO oral history in The Last Protector. You would've known this if only you could bring yourself to read it.)

And don't bother responding. I have no intention of reading any more of your posts.

When Keith finally musters the ticker to respond to me, he has my contact details.

In the meantime, here's a short extract from The Last Protector, vol. 2. To be published in 2011.

On an evening in May 1951, Dr ___ examined a four-year-old Aboriginal boy from ___ and diagnosed tetanus. He ordered that the boy be sent immediately to the ___ Hospital.
At the time there was a long-standing dispute between the doctor and the medical staff of the hospital regarding the admission of Aboriginal patients. This dispute had played out over the previous decade, and more, with disastrous consequences for the health of the Aboriginal residents of ___.
On that night in May 1951, when he heard that an Aboriginal patient was on his way, the doctor in charge of ___ Hospital set up a road block to turn the utility away. Despite evading the doctor, the young boy was refused admission to the hospital. He was returned to the station and then transported to the Adelaide Children’s Hospital the following day. He died that same day.
This is the story.

That should ruffle a few feathers.

Cheers,

Cameron

So, really, a book on racism, I thought you were on about proving, the stolen generation?

Ruffle feathers - you are inclined to exaggeration and drama aren't you, what you have described is racism - do you think that's novel?