Dear JBowyer,

Do catch up mate.

That is exactly the point I am making. Pascoe abridged a similar quote and mhaze declared it the crime of the century. When these guys do it apparently according to you there is nothing to see here.

Can't have it both ways so make up your bloody minds. Which is it? Inconsequential or a hanging offence?

Hi Steele,

Could you comment on what you believe motivates the rabid right to be hysterical about Pascoe's book? It can't be a concern for the truth, they would'nt give a rats about Aboriginal people so why would they be concerned about a yam garden 10,000 years ago. Obviously they must feel threatened by Pascoe and his narrative to the extent they have to denigrate it without actually reading it. Is it that threatening to their cosy existence

SR,

With all due respect,

Firstly the extended quote adds to the point Sutton was making rather than detracting from it whereas Pascoes editing cut out parts that contradicted his conclusion

Secondly, Pascoe added words that weren't in the original text to make his directly fraudulent point.

Nice try, but no cigar.

Pauliar,

The conservatives have no issue with Pascoe producing a work of fiction, the problem is that the rabid left whingers are trying to push this crap into schools etc as legitimate historical research.

shadowminister,

'With all due respect' my arse.

Nothing you put is true. The full quote quote doesn't extend the point at all, it detracts from it.

The Monthly's piece makes this point and others I had put pretty well.

"Farmers or Hunter-gatherers? would have provided a
more effective critique of Dark Emu if its focus had
remained on these essentials. When Sutton and Walshe
turn to considering the historical record in south-eastern
Australia – Pascoe’s favoured locale – their vision shrinks,
and some points seem petty or overblown. On two
separate occasions, they pour scorn on Pascoe’s
perspective on village life in western Victoria by
providing low population estimates that would throw
doubt on such a characterisation. But it is not known, for
example, whether there was a serious smallpox outbreak a
generation before the 1835 invasion. And who, aware of
the historical context in the Port Phillip District in 1836,
would take seriously a “census” count of Aboriginal
people undertaken that year? We don’t know how many
people lived in the vast grasslands of the Western District
before British pathogens and guns arrived, or the full
truth of the complex economy constructed around its
extraordinarily rich wetlands. And it is wrong to imply
that the Wathaurong Briton, William Buckley, fills the
gaps with his reminiscences."

Dear Paul1405,

On a very base level it questions the legitimacy of ownership, the soundness of pride in our history, and causes uncomfortable reflections on what it may take to address those wrongs.

Thanks Steele,

That's very much how I read 'Dark Emu' as a threat to the cosy narrative of the "Poor Darkie" and his attempted salvation by the European. From the forums 'Usual Suspects' there is nothing ever that portrays Aboriginals, past or present, in a positive light. Aboriginal people trapped in the poorest of socio-economic conditions today have problems and issues, lots of them, just as poor whites trapped in the same circumstances do. Somehow Aboriginal people are portrayed differently, as a lazy unintelligent mob, ungrateful for the generosity bestowed upon them by the European.

As Pascoe portrays Pre-European Aboriginal society as complex and robust doing far more than eking out a rudimentary existence, then it does challenge the long held European narrative of the "Poor Darkie". Those holding with the European interpretation would much prefer Australian history books for schools to be the of the variety I was fed in the 1960's. Australia a vast empty continent discovered by James Cook in 1770, the beginning of Australian history. It was stoic European men who first explored and then settled and developed this land. Aboriginal people barely mentioned, totally irrelevant to the narrative.

SR,

While you might try and nitpick at Sutton's review of Pascoe, the simple fact that he pointed out several areas where Pascoe indisputably and deliberately misrepresented others' notes etc leaves Pascoe's fantasy tale without credibility.

Pauliar,

I'm sorry that your cosy narrative of the noble savage has been destroyed, but most of us prefer to live with reality and not edit history to our liking.