Runner, you would have to be in total denial if you thought that greed and corruption is solely the domain of one race or culture.

I would be howled down if I stated that it is a cultural trait of white Australians to pay bribes and engage in corruption to gain business and or personal advantage as per AWB, Securrency, the East Timor negotiations etc. even though there are many examples to support such a claim.

You see, Indigenous Australians are very smart and learn quickly, and one of the things that some have picked up is the dodgy practices of their non-Indigenous overseers.

As for making direct comparrisons to PNG, that is pretty offensive and indicates you cannot tell the vast differences between the two.

'Runner, you would have to be in total denial if you thought that greed and corruption is solely the domain of one race or culture. '

I agree Aka it is the domain of every race and culture. Christian influence ensured checks and balances needed to be in place. Secular Governments today are becoming more and more corrupt. Look at our biggest unions as another example. Our first female PM was up to it with a corrupt boyfriend. Also look at places like Germany, Australia and France where the leaders tell bare face lies to the population about Islamic beliefs. The more secular we have become the more corruption is envitable. With no moral base to draw from even barbaric parts of aboriginal law start to look reasonable.

Hi Minotaur,

Welcome to your introduction to Indigenous history. [This is my third attempt of a useless, bastard computer which goes blank: it pays to copy as you go]. Evidence is what counts, not just passionate assertions - although they can be very satisfying. Perhaps if there had been many more massacres, atrocities, etc., you would be even happier ?

No, I don't agree with almost everything you assert. Evidence, not just passion. Find out for yourself, don't just rely on 'authorities'. I hope that in the next few years, you can keep learning - it's really a lifelong journey.

Cheers,

Joe

Hi Aka,

You assert: " Indigenous Australians are very smart and learn quickly, and one of the things that some have picked up is the dodgy practices of their non-Indigenous overseers."

Indigenous Australians are not sheep, or puppets. They do their own thinking. They do their own thing. The notion that they somehow have to be carefully shown how to be corrupt is so off the wall, so laughable. Back in the 1980s, before ATSIC (of which the less said the better: that will neve come again), the old Aboriginal Development Corporation gave out loans totalling billions of dollars. Every one went bad. Many of the loans were to directors of the ADC, home loans, loans for boats, etc., and they all went bad. So tell us about corruption. Blame whitefellas.

And then there was ATSIC ......

And so many other organisations, so many crooks, so many people with their hands in the till for millions upon millions, to blow at the local casino or on the fruit machines .......

Good try, Aka :) But have enough respect for Indigenous people to understand that they can think quite well for themselves, they're not just empty vessels.

Joe

Minotaur wrote: "In Tasmania there was a brutal war against Aboriginal people that saw the population almost completely destroyed. From around 7000 in 1806 by 1834 there were only a couple of hundred. In 1828 Martial Law was declared and there were bounties for capturing Aboriginal people. In reality was financially prudent to catch a few and kill the rest, particularly if wounded and troublesome."

Disease was one of the biggest killers of the Aborigines, both on the mainland and also in Tasmania.

Martial law was declared in 1828 by Lieutenant Governor George Arthur in an effort to end conflict between Aborigines and the settlers. According to historian Robert Murray, Arthur wanted to relocate the Aboriginal population to a reserve near Hobart where it was hoped they would adopt a more peaceful, settled life (The Making of Australia, 2014). This was an attempt to preserve a people who were facing demographic decline due to, among other things, illness and small family size.

Of course, efforts by colonial authorities to protect the Tasmanian Aborigines are ignored by those who wish to unfairly portray the early British settlers as genocidal murderers.

"Even Great Britain, the greatest colonial power the world has ever seen, endured a period of bloody occupation by the Romans early in its history."

Not to mention subsequent invasions, occupations and migrations by the Anglo-Saxons, Scots, Scandinavians, Normans...