Hi Jules,

I'll probably lose even more friends by suggesting that the isolation of Indigenous Australians from other societies before, say, 1500, was a dreadful tragedy. And within Australia, by far the most isolated groups were those in the Western Deserts. Somebody wrote that, for some people in those tragic circumstances, they may meet only a dozen other people in their entire lives.

Given that, inevitably, all Indigenous people would be thrust into contact with other people sooner or later, a major disadvantaging factor for Australian Indigenous people was that, even for hunting-gathering people, they were almost unique in that they didn't produce: they foraged and consumed. This is a good summary:

file:///C:/Users/joela/AppData/Local/Microsoft/Windows/INetCache/IE/ZGYLBFMC/2001%20Winterhalder%20Panter-Brick.pdf

So the concepts of working to produce, and of producing at least partly for exchange, were largely foreign, except for what might be called symbolic or political trade between groups, for stone or ochre or hard-wood for spears and digging sticks, gathered mainly for the maintenance of good relations between groups. Instead, [and even though effort obviously went into hunting and gathering] this was not perceived as involving systematic work or effort.

Of course, many people would have found the concept of effort easy to grasp once they observed exchange relations between non-Indigenous people, or between themselves and Macassans over trepang and sandalwood. But self-sufficient groups by definition don't exchange: one doesn't exchange within one's family group, one shares.

But post-contact by whatever name, groups living close to towns, and over some years, would have become familiar with a 'European' economy, of exchange, of money, and of work. The Protector reported after barely eight years of 'contact' in Adelaide that Aboriginal people were often so mobile that when they met in town, they spoke to each other not in their mutually unintelligible languages, but in English.

In fact, I suspect that, in accordance with sociolinguistic practices, when they spoke to a fellow-countryman about 'modern' issues such as employment, money, grog, tobacco, horses, sheep, the harvest, boots, hats, etc., they spoke in English, the language of that 'modern' economy.

There's always more to learn .....

Joe

Loudy,

You need to provide an online link.

Re EJ's "As for the whining industry, let them put up....or shut up."

How about taking the full suite of gov't services to wherever aborigines want them including health, education, free public housing, free electricity, telephony and internet, free garbage gathering and disposal. Add in in free food, cooks, cleaners and house renovators, cars, petrol, mechanics, TVs and other mod cons and guns and shovels for traditional hunting and gathering. Throw in welfare benefits, childcare and native title and that should nearly do it.

Then invite Pilger for his approval.

HiLuciferase,

That article is "The Behavioral Ecology of Hunter-Gatherers" by Bruce Winterhalder (2001) - I apologise for the size of the URL:

http://www.google.com.au/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&ved=0ahUKEwj-teL7mJ_MAhVQ4WMKHUgBA0EQFggbMAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fanthropology.ucdavis.edu%2Fpeople%2Fbwinterh%2Fsite%2Fpublications%2F2001WinterhalderPanterBrickVol.pdf&usg=AFQjCNGYIKmGJu1BZfxxs1U3wR8giJbvpQ&bvm=bv.119967911,d.dGo

As for your proposals, I certainly support the rights of Indigenous Australians to whatever benefits other Australians enjoy, and I always will. But I'm not enthusiastic in supporting extra benefits for anybody without very good reason.

Just to clear up yet another Bilgerian misconception: poverty. I did a study back in 1982 of the incomes of residents in a community, house by house: we had lived there a decade earlier. I found that the average income at that community - then, let alone now - was equal to the Australian median. And taking very low rents into account, people there were better off by about 20 %. So I learnt that appearances can be deceiving: squalor is not poverty.

I was talking to a relative who had just moved into a new house with a big back-yard. She grumbled about how infrequently the bloke came to mow it.

Do you think that even your proposals would satisfy some people ? Don't kid yourself :)

Cheers,

Joe

It's incumbent on those who yipe about the gap and "aboriginal disadvantage" to make, and stand by, a statement of what should be DONE, and by whom, about the disadvantages they complain about. Not outcomes but actual policies.

Hi Jules,

Is there a rock-solid - and racist - assumption that Aboriginal people can't do anything for themselves ? That whatever is done to improve their situation, it's up to non-Aboriginal people ? Why ? Able-bodied people aren't, or shouldn't be, useless. Have people got so used to having everything just drop out of the sky ? And more and more of it, all they have to do is ask, and if that doesn't work, complain ?

So how to get across that they are not entitled to that free ride. Nobody is. If they have resources, then able-bodied people should be making use of them, sustainably of course. Are fruit and vegetables expensive in remote settlements ? Then grow the bloody things - almost all settlements have running water.

Meanwhile, 'down south', Aboriginal people, to a large extent, work for their money and get on with their lives. Working Aboriginal people have roughly the same life expectancy as other Australians, and almost the same rate of home ownership and university participation.

Is that 'assimilation' ? Is that what people want ? If so, then I'm all for it.

Cheers,

Joe

"squalor is not poverty"
Hear, hear.

There's a guy who drives an old rusty Bongo van around my suburb. Hair a mess, jeans ripped and frayed, toes out the end of his Dunlop Volleys.

Turns out he owns half the suburb.