Hi Rodney,

Culture is not genetic. Culture is not genetic. Culture is not genetic.

Culture is learnt. It therefore depends on experience. From the earliest days, the experience of Aboriginal kids, at least in SA, has been of buildings, horses, schools, rations, ships, etc., and NOT of foraging, etc. So, in a single generation, much of traditional culture would have simply fallen into disuse, and got put on the back-burner. Nobody forced it, people made choices within constraints.

Once, we were all Africans. Once we were all foragers, only fifteen thousand years ago. There's nothing particularly wonderful about a foraging life, it was hard, brutal and (on average) short. I don't see too many Aboriginal people flocking to go back to that sort of life, even though it is perfectly possible even now - but of course, there is much flapping of lips advocating it.

Cheers,

Joe

Hi Rodney,

You've made me think through many issues with your posts :)

For example: a simple thing like rubbish. In many 'communities', rubbish is everywhere. A friend has pointed out that, since it wasn't actually created BY Aboriginal people, but by packaging companies, white fellas, therefore they should come and clean it up. Kimbies, fast food packaging, anything, it's not their problem. And after all, as far as many Aboriginal people can see, in white fellas' towns, obviously somebody cleans up there, maybe fairies each night, so why not in Aboriginal 'communities' ? Isn't it racist to clean up white towns but not Aboriginal communities' ?

Seriously, is it possible that Aboriginal people have an incredibly distorted understanding of how everything works ? White people get houses, with nice gardens, so why not Aboriginal people ? White fellas get cars, so why not Aboriginal people ? Somebody comes in and looks after white babies and kids, so why not Aboriginal people ? Why should Aboriginal people have to look after their own kids, feed them, clothe them and find beds for them, when white people don't have to ?

Question: do Aboriginal people think that everything should be done for them ? That's what it means to have 'self-determination' ? If they want another house, bingo, it should be provided ? Toyotas ? Yeah, when are we getting a new one ? Some social worker to wipe their kids' arses ?

Let's get something else straight: in 'communities', Aboriginal people have money, they are not in some sort of dire poverty. They get everything they are entitled to, plus royalties. There's no shortage of actual cash.

Thirty-odd years ago,

[TBC]

[continued]

Thirty-odd years ago, I did an income study of a community I had lived in and thought I knew. I found that the average (mean) income there was equal to the Australian median income. One large family was pulling in four times the weekly wage. I checked my figures over and over. It was so traumatic that I thought of topping myself. I chucked in my studies and studied for a taxi licence. I've since understood that I confused poverty with squalor. I won't be doing that again in a hurry.

Joe

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Dear Loudmouth,

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You wrote :

« Culture is not genetic … Culture is learnt … From the earliest days, the experience of Aboriginal kids, at least in SA, has been of buildings, horses, schools, rations, ships, etc., and NOT of foraging, etc. »

Yes, of course. What amazes me is that over 40 000 Aboriginal people (university graduates) have achieved in 228 years (since 1788) and less than 10 generations what it took us 50 000 years (since the arrival of the first Africans in Europe) and 2 000 generations to achieve.

It seems to me that that is a remarkable performance which could not have been possible if, as LEGO affirms, Aboriginal peoples were of inferior intelligence to Europeans.

But then, as you rightly point out with your examples of rubbish, domestic help, Toyotas, financial income, and the difference between poverty and squalor - intelligence is one thing and culture another. It is not sufficient to be intelligent to bridge the gap of 50 000 years and 2 000 generations of achievements. There is also a huge cultural gap.

It is a characteristic of most human beings to wish to respect and perpetuate their traditional culture. Aboriginal peoples are no exception to the rule. I am no expert on such matters, but I suspect that it is something that is deeply imbedded in the psyche of each individual. We are the product of our ancestors and the bond to our lineage is indestructible.

Some of us manage to assimilate more than one culture - if we have parents of different cultures, for example. Children of those parents are the products of both cultures and assimilate both. In my case, it has been a little more difficult. I was born and bred in Australia but lived half my life in France. Assimilation of French culture has been a long and difficult process. I came here of my own free will and, despite all the difficulties, I have always avoided the facility of living in a cultural ghetto with the British community in Paris.

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(Continued ...)

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I have assimilated French culture to the best of my ability while conserving my Australian culture and nationality.

As a European culture, French culture is not all that different from British culture, the language being the principal difference. I can imagine the huge difficulty Aboriginal peoples must have assimilating European culture, particularly since it is not something they have chosen of their own free will and it is so vastly different from their own traditional culture.

Of course, they should be free to perpetuate, cherish and honour their own traditional culture exclusively if they so wish, just as the members of the British community in Paris perpetuate, cherish and honour theirs living in their ghetto. Our Aboriginal peoples have every right to do so. They are not living in a foreign country. They are living in their own country. They have been here for about 60 000 years.

We are the foreigners who have come to live with them. We should try to assimilate their culture and adjust to theirs, not the other way around. That includes adjusting our products and services – everything, including our financial services. It’s a question of marketing. We have to do our homework.

Your friend is on the right track in pointing out “that, since it wasn't actually created BY Aboriginal people, but by packaging companies … they should come and clean it up”. But perhaps that is not the most appropriate solution. We have to make an effort of intelligence in marketing our products and services to the Aboriginal community that is compatible with their culture.

That and the whole question of adapting our European culture to traditional Aboriginal culture is a matter of foremost importance that needs to be investigated and implemented by our federal government in co-ordination with our state governments.

It is a vast program that involves prior consultation with the Aboriginal communities and all other parties concerned, manufacturers and service providers etc. (including education), the promulgation of quality standards and relevant rules and regulations and the subsequent monitoring of their effective implementation and respect.

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Hi Rodney,

1. My friend was not suggesting for a second that whites should come and clean up Indigenous 'communities': of course, if they used something with packaging, regardless of where it was packaged, they should clean it up. Their community, their responsibility to keep it clean, or not. No ifs, no buts.

2. If you had moved to France with a one-year-old child, by the time he/she was ten, my bet is that he/she would speak perfect French and be fully integrated into both your value system AND the local French one. He/she wouldn't have to wait fifty thousand years. So it has been with Indigenous people: you learn from what you see around you.

In that connection, what do people in remote 'communities' see around them ? No production, no factories, nobody actually having to produce anything - and when it does appear dimly over the horizon, it can be said that only whitefellas do that, Blackfellas don't have to.

3. You suggest that ' .... What amazes me is that over 40 000 Aboriginal people (university graduates) have achieved in 228 years (since 1788) and less than 10 generations what it took us 50 000 years (since the arrival of the first Africans in Europe) and 2 000 generations to achieve.'

Actually, it's more like 39,500 graduates over the past thirty five years (overwhelmingly in the cities) :) We may not be aware of how recent mass university education has been for anybody in Australia: there are probably more Indigenous university students today than there were non-Indigenous students across Australia in 1950. [Those figures are on the Dept. of Ed. web-site].

Again, none of us walks around with a 50,000-year-old mind-set, we all learn from birth from what's around us, like it or not, Black or white: a twenty-year-old is thus only twenty years from outright barbarism. We're all only a couple of generations from utter barbarism, after all [see (2) above]. He/she has learnt otherwise since birth.

There are simple and clear reasons why

[TBC]