Is there any evidence of "wide-consultations amongst the First Peoples over years"? Or, is it just another lie from megamouth media types and intellectuals convinced that they know everything about everything, and the rest of us should believe them.

To get even sillier than normal, this bloke describes as a "tragedy" that a majority of Australians had the intelligence and the desire to protect their Constitution and democracy without the help of a "national leadership".

The people make the decisions in a democracy, buster, not 'leaders'.

And there is no point in blaming Albanese, idiot though he is, when the people resoundingly voted NO. Chek Ling is just another elitist, with nothing in his background to suggest he knows anymore than average about anything except engineering, who thinks the hoi polloi doesn't have the sense to make up their own minds.

So out of touch is Chek Ling, that he thinks that the Liberal Party has been "purged of its moderates" (Leftists), when every man and his dog knows that had this happened, the Library Party would still be in government. A right of centre party is no place for Leftists.

As for the totally boring diatribes against Dutton - inevitably popping up here - they are just more crap suggesting that Dutton was the reason why the Voice was thrashed.

Dutton is just not that powerful. It was the power of the people that did it. A wonderful reassurance that the silent majority still exists, despite all the put downs and contempt from far- Left motor mouths.

And, the more people keep yapping about 'First Peoples' and the even more ridiculous 'First Nations' to describe a small minority which has largely assimilated into modern Australian, the more irritated the majority of Australians will become.

Details of consultations? Just read Prof Megan Davis's quarterly essay.
Dutton decided to Divide and Win. History was on his side.
Silent majority? Is it the same sort that perpetrated the killing of the Aboriginal peoples for "revenge, convenience and sport"? Read David Marr's Killing for Country, and you might be surprised.
Then again, I am reminded of my erstwhile Premier, Joh, who once uttered, "You can take a horse for a drink, but you can't make it water.

So here we have this blow in, who arrived after white folk had, with a lot of very hard work, built a prosperous successful society, to harvest for himself what had been built.

He now thinks a few years living here, & taking advantage of what we had built, gives him the right to criticise the fact we don't want to be ripped off any more than we are at present.

Perhaps in stead of preaching at us he could just say thanks for being allowed to hitch his well being to the work white Ozzies had done before his arrival.

I accept he put in a good level of work to achieve his status, the same as any aboriginal could have done, if they had bothered to do some school work themselves.

Thank you Chek Ling for your considered article.

I don't agree with all of it but appreciate the perspective.

I don't think Albanese did a great job of being the visionary needed to get the Voice over the line but I think he is the product of the toxicity of Howard, Abbott and especially Morrison.

I feel the country needs to be lead gently out the the morally bereft wasteland which has bedevilled LNP politics for a long while now. The country needs some healing time, to right its course, to become a nation we can be proud of.

Give it time.

Thank you Steele.
Let's hope that Albo will be in minority government after 2025, and that the Greens,Teals and Independents would band together to bring in a new era - Proportional Representation in the Lower House.

I cannot see any other way out of our quagmire.

way out of our quagmire,
Chek,
Crapping in your own nest sure is a quagmire ! The activists' rhetoric did that.
Judging by your posts you're activist friendly so, reflect on yourself too a bit !

Aboriginals are actually well off; more than most!

With Native title extending over forty percent of the Continent, and the latest advent of sea claims to add to the war chest, its well to remember, that almost twenty percent of that figure is Freehold title.

The freehold title extends predominantly over the most valuable portions of real estate on the East Coast, right on the beach fronts. They are not poor nor downtrodden.

They could sell these portions for development and help themselves with the proceeds towards better health and educational outcomes, and a renewed sense of personal achievement.

The alternative is to be used as fodder for idiocies promoted by poisonous indoctrination towards helplessness, by a naive bleeding heart exhibition of idiocy with content such as this article crying over a lost and unacceptable cause.

Like all Leftists, Chek heads for Leftist propaganda for 'proof' of his own propaganda.

Dutton had one vote like the rest of us. I don't take any notice of the man or what he says. I decided to vote NO without any help from anyone. So would have lots of other people who think for themselves.

The living silent majority didn't kill anyone.

David Marr! Another extreme Left activist.

Not sure what a horse making water (pissing) has to do with anything.

So Chek wants Australia to be something like China, with Teals, Greens and crackpot independents LEADING us. I reckon he and his kind will find the silent majority 'making water' all over them at the next election. Cost of living. Mass immigration. Soaring electricity prices. Soaring interest rates. Vandalism of the environment with windmills. Net Zero. Identity politics. Division by race. Dumbing down of education. Brainwashing kids. Normalising perversion.

The Voice was just a petty distraction from the real issues in Australia.

As for all the mass killings supposedly perpetrated by people we don't know against other people we don’t know, the 'frontier wars' were a theory of historian Henry Reynolds, who used mathematical formulas, not evidence. There were no bodies (30,000 according to Reynolds) found with gunshot wounds. No medical records. No police records. No archaeological evidence to support the Frontier War theory.

Lots of money has been spent looking for remains with musket ball wounds or sword cuts. None were found where these 'wars' were said to have been fought.

"When intellectuals are unable to find enough contemporary grievances to suit their vision or agenda, they can mine the past for harm inflicted by some on others. By conceiving of those involved in the past as members of intertemporal abstractions, the intelligentsia can polarize contemporary descendants of those involved in past acts. The kind of society to which that leads is one in which a new born baby enters the world supplied with prepackaged grievances against other babies born on the same day". (Thomas Sowell, 'Intellectuals and Society').

It's a bit of a self-serving article that is light on the facts. What was ignored is that this was a monumental cock up by a PM more interested in virtue signalling than implementing useful policy. It was so badly implemented and sold to the public that it probably would have failed even if Dutton had not opposed it.

Albozo's blunders were as follows:
* Not attempting to moderate the voice scope
* Rejecting Dutton's offer to compromise (making the voice partisan)
* Making the "question" non-specific and open-ended.
* Refusing to define the scope and limits of the voice
* lying to the public about the risks
* Heavily biasing the voting by subsidizing the yes vote but not the no vote

At this point, the voters smelt a rat and Albozo lost their trust and should have cancelled the $400m doomed referendum.

P.S. Only 59% of polled indigenous supported the voice.

Australia didn't reject Aboriginals, they rejected Albozo's bait and switch.

Two things, those that committed those terrible atrocities in our distant past need to be the ones to pay for them.

Other than that, the British Crown may be asked to repent and reconciliate. They decided to claim it and use it as a bastard penal colony. And transported those with NO VOICE to the other of the world, separating them from family, friends and traditional homeland!

And given that is so, there has to be even greater generational trauma for that cadre!

No one alive today in Australia can be asked for compensation. And those who are 25% white or more, should also bear some generational shame, if that's the path our leaders want us to follow?

And makes a nonsense of the whole proposal.

Simply put, a treaty should be sought and terms and condition writ in stone. In a series of small incremental steps all can live with. The goal being to put aside the past and consider it a foreign country none can ever return to!

We are one, but we are many and from all the lands on earth we come! We as Australians need to set aside the highly flawed concept called the voice and focus on all that unites all Australians, old and new!
Alan B.

Barely three weeks from the referendum we are seeing the indigenous sense of entitlement. A rock climber in the Grampians has been officially threatened by the wokeness police. A gas pipe to be laid 50m underwater off the Tiwi Islands has to be halted because chipped rocks were found 14m underwater; that's desecration. A housing subdivision north of Adelaide has to be halted since moving ancient bones to a new location is unacceptable.

That's all in a bit over two weeks. Imagine what would have been in store if Yes had got up. You'd think Yes advocates would read the national mood and tone it down.

Thank you Chek for your article.

I thought that enshrining the Voice in the constitution was a bad idea in principle, and unlikely to deliver much practical benefit to Indigenous Australians given the failures of ATSIC and similar previous bodies, and the complex and intractable problems that underpin indigenous disadvantage.

I nonetheless voted Yes, reluctantly, because I think the outcome of the No vote will be far worse than a Yes vote. The result of a Yes vote would have been an expensive, ineffectual, disappointment. I fear the No vote has set reconciliation back decades with no clear path forward, and must feel like a massive slap in the face even for Indigenous Australians who didn’t support the Voice. The government has no mandate to push on with the other arms of the Uluru Statement – truth-telling and treaty – which are arguably more radical and unpopular than the Voice. And while I think the vision of reconciliation of No campaigners like Jacinta Nampijinpa Price and Warren Mundine is attractive – based on colour blind equality and empowerment, not grievance and identity politics – I doubt the sincerity of the Coalition’s commitment to work for it in practice. And it will be a very long time before we have another referendum – I may not live to see Australia become a republic.

It is not only the outcome I find disheartening, the process was democracy at its worst. Neither side gave serious consideration to their opponents’ strongest arguments, instead delighting in tearing apart the weakest ones. The “No” case included blatant disinformation and fearmongering. The Yes case was shrill and sanctimonious and abusive – calling people d*heads, dinosaurs and racists was hardly likely to win hearts and minds. The preening virtue signalling of major corporations, sporting and arts organisations that backed the Voice was repulsive to watch and almost certainly counter-productive – who was going to vote Yes on the moral authority of Alan Joyce?

Many people share the blame for his train wreck, but the main culprit is Albanese

'Reconciliation' is misleading and irrelevant here.
I have never had an argument or disagreement with 'the group'.
So I have no need to reconcile with them.
I doubt anyone else has either.

And a successful 'yes' would have meant introducing blatant racism in to the constitution.
Such a divisive idea can never succeed as long as thinkers are in the majority.

And I have a simple approach to a problem some seem keen to promote.
Let us stop being racist in our speech.
Let us cease referring to these 'peoples' as a different race.
No reference whatsoever in print or spoken word.
Never another reference to midgie-widgie land or country.
Absolutely zilch.
It is not done for others of different racial origin, so why for them?
Stop it altogether.
Make sure EVERYONE is treated equally under the law, and in social ways as well.

And we need to remember that when someone dies, he ceases to be COMPLETELY.
The person doesn't exist anymore.
Only the physical material he used to communicate and support himself remains.
And do we really want to moan and groan over bones which are perhaps 50,000 years old?
I would have thought common sense would come to the fore here.
But apparently not.

I sometimes wonder how the 'adults' around me got to be adults.

.

Dear ttbn,

.

You wrote :

« As for all the mass killings supposedly perpetrated … there were no bodies … no medical records, no police records, no archaeological evidence to support the Frontier War theory. »
.

That’s true. However, an investigation was carried out in 2010 by a team of researchers under the direction of Prof. Lyndall Ryan of the University of Newcastle based on the methods of massacre investigation devised by the French historical sociologist and political scientist, Jacques Semelin, consisting in the analysis of a range of printed and archival sources.

Here are the results for the period 1788-1930 :

http://c21ch.newcastle.edu.au/colonialmassacres/introduction.php

.

Interesting that inter-tribal killings & killings of shipwrecked people don't qualify for such research.
Any frontier conflict is sad & deplorable in hindsight & as I have stated before, had there been Welcome to Country in those days many such conflicts would have been avoided !

.

Dear Chek,

.

The word “requiem” in the title of your piece could have two meanings : a religious (Catholic) mass said or sung for the repose of the soul of a dead person, or perhaps a type of shark, a requiem shark, an extraordinarily fast and effective hunter.

Time will tell which of the two is applicable.

There were probably multiple reasons for the massive rejection of the proposed modification to our old colonial Constitution, the democratic vote being one of them – but, as Churchill wisely observed : “Democracy is the worst form of government except for all the others” – so we just have to accept that.

An interesting result of the exercise is that the Uluru representatives did not simply want inclusion in the Constitution of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as first inhabitants – which means that now that inclusion of the Voice has been rejected, we can forget about modifying the Constitution to include our indigenous compatriots.

The parliament is free to legislate without the constraints of the referendum process.

As I have previously stated on various threads here on OLO on this subject, I consider that our indigenous peoples should just set up a lobby with the help and advice of professionals on such matters.

I see no sense in our indigenous citizens negotiating treaties with our state and federal governments. That could give rise to the sort of black separatist and black nationalist movements that exist in the US.

Australia is a single, multicultural nation and I’m sure most of us want it to stay that way. We don’t want Australia to become divisive. We want it to remain inclusive. That was probably the main reason for the overwhelming NO vote at the Voice referendum.

It was not a racial vote. It was a vote against separatism, against division. It was a vote for the preservation of unity, national unity.

Nor was it a vote against the specific rights and needs of our Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. They should be assured not by treaties but by legislation.

.

The Voice was the world’s first referendum on identity politics. And the result has proved that dividing people by race in the name of social justice is a minority obsession.

They should be assured not by treaties but by legislation.
Banjo Paterson,
I'd be inclined to say 'They should be assured by Rights & allowed common responsibilities'.
Legislation is invariably fraught with fraud as is treaty !
Opportunists on all sides exploit legislation & I don't think even the most ardent activist would deny that. One set of rules for all is the best method at this stage. As the Indigenous everywhere are gradually morphing away from originality so morph all aspects of human life.
It is impossible & utterly unrealistic to think that this process of evolution can somehow be legislated against. Irrespective of people agreeing or opposing that the past can not be undone !

No treaty? Well then, how about a universal bill of irrevocable rights all can live with and share, as a common equality guaranteeing feature!
Alan B.

.

Dear Alan B.,

.

Excellent suggestion, Alan B.

Everyone has the right to practise his/her own culture, religion and lifestyle in peace and harmony with all others, on an equal basis, and with mutual respect.

Human rights are universal and inalienable, indivisible, interdependent and interrelated. They are universal because everyone is born with the same rights, regardless of their location, race, gender, religious, cultural or ethnic background. Inalienable because people’s rights can never be taken away. Indivisible and interdependent because all rights – political, civil, social, cultural and economic – are equal in importance and none can be fully enjoyed without the others. They apply to all equally, and all have the right to participate in decisions that affect their lives.

Australia endorsed the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP). in 2009. Since then, Australia has committed to taking action to implement the Declaration and promote indigenous people’s enjoyment of rights on an equal basis.

But Australia has not yet :

• taken steps to implement the UNDRIP into law, policy and practice.

• negotiated with indigenous peoples a National Action Plan to implement the UNDRIP

• audited existing laws, policies and practice for compliance with the UNDRIP.

When new legislation is introduced to federal Parliament, it must have a statement of compatibility with human rights – defined as the rights in the 7 instruments that Australia has ratified.

This does not include reference to compliance with the UNDRIP.

Australia has identified the Closing the Gap Strategy as its key policy platform to give effect to the Declaration. To date, this process has been government-led without significant engagement of indigenous communities in setting priorities or in delivery.

Australian Governments have committed to addressing this through the 2019 National Partnership Agreement on Closing the Gap which involves the Coalition of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peak Bodies as partners and decision makers. The government develops a national program to implement UNDRIP and schedules it according to the definition of human rights in the Human Rights (Parliamentary Scrutiny) Act 2011 (Cth).

It's time to implement the UNDRIP.

.

Banjo Paterson,
Again, nothing about human responsibilities !

Just saw a Facebook post in which an Australian Indigenous refers to a rather obese white female as a "cheap Guthwarr".
Imagine the outrage if a non-Australian Indigenous made such a statement about an indigenous female ?

.

This is what the eminent Australian historian, Henry Reynolds, has to say :

.

« The UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) was introduced by the Australian Indigenous leader Les Maelzer who, at the time, was Chair of the Global Indigenous Caucus. One hundred and fifty countries supported the Declaration. The Rudd Government signed the declaration in 2009. Australia has, therefore, been committed to the principles for fourteen years. It has had bi-partisan support. The Law Council of Australia observed in 2019 that the Declaration was, “the authoritative international standard informing the way governments across the globe should engage with and protect the rights of indigenous people”.

The resounding defeat of the referendum totally undermines Australia’s hope to present itself to the world as a progressive nation in step with international law and global opinion. Australia was recently asked by U.N agencies to report on what steps had been taken “to provide for constitutional recognition of indigenous peoples”. In reply, DFAT reported that Australia was committed to ensuring that our First Nation’s people were “heard, respected and empowered” and that their voices would “have a say in the decisions that affect them”.

We should not be surprised if as a consequence of the defeat of the referendum the world judges us harshly, accusing us of bad faith and hypocrisy. The extraordinary fact that our international commitments were rarely, if ever mentioned, in such a consequential debate suggests, at least, that the face that we turn to the world is very different from the one we present to the domestic electorate, and that international documents we sign up to are kept from sight rather than explained and publicised. »

Here is the article :

http://johnmenadue.com/what-happened-to-indigenous-rights-the-world-will-judge-australia-harshly/

.

.

Dear Indyvidual,

.

You wrote :

« Again, nothing about human responsibilities ! »
.

The current discussion is in relation to the Voice referendum which, as you know, concerned : “A Proposed Law: to alter the Constitution to recognise the First Peoples of Australia by establishing an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice”.

The purpose of the Voice was to allow our indigenous peoples to express their views on laws concerning them prior to the promulgation of any such laws by our state and federal parliaments.

It goes without saying that if the referendum had succeeded, the state and federal executives and legislative authorities together with the state and federal indigenous representatives would have been responsible for putting that into practise – if those are the “human responsibilities” you are referring to.

If, however, your concern relates more broadly to indigenous responsibility, which seems to be your leitmotif, allow me to point out that common law applies to our indigenous peoples just as much as it applies to everybody else in Australia.

In fact, our indigenous peoples are held responsible for their acts to such an extent that their incarceration rate is 17 times higher than that of non-indigenous people.

According to the Australia Institute, “the Voice could have offered a new way forward to end Australia’s appallingly high incarceration rates” for our indigenous peoples.

But of course, we voted against that, didn’t we ?

.

But of course, we voted against that, didn’t we ?
Banjo Paterson,
NO ! People voted against 101% certainty of corruption & misplaced power for people (activists & bureaucrats of all ethnicities engaged in the Token industry) who have already proven that fact all too clearly !

.

Dear Indyvidual,

.

You wrote :

« NO ! People voted against 101% certainty of corruption & misplaced power for people (activists & bureaucrats of all ethnicities engaged in the Token industry) who have already proven that fact all too clearly ! »
.

Thanks, Indyvidual. No doubt that’s the reason for your own vote and probably for that of many others who share your opinion. But I see that the media is full of interviews of people having voted NO and that there are almost as many different reasons for their vote as there are people interviewed. None of them mention the reason for your NO vote.

I managed to find one major reputable news source, the Financial Review, that published the results of a professional survey conducted quarterly by JWS Research called “True Issues” that gauges the issues of most concern to voters, and rates how they feel the government is dealing with them.

The latest “True Issues” survey reveals that while 8 in 10 voters wanted the government focused on the cost of living, just 1 in 10 felt the same about the Voice. The Indigenous Voice to Parliament barely registered as an issue with voters during the final days of the referendum campaign, but concern over the cost of living had escalated to record levels.

The survey found that :

« Frustration among voters that the Voice was distracting the government from bread-and-butter issues was commonly cited as one of the reasons driving the No vote, even though the government was at pains to show it had not lost focus ».

“True Issue” also notes that :

« The government’s overall performance rating slipped to an index of 48, the first time it has been below 50 since Labor won the election in May last year. »

.

Banjo Patterson,
I spoke with quite a number of indigenous & self-proclaimed indigenous & was surprised at how many said they didn't support the Voice for the same reason I did.
I suppose we all had experience as a decision maker for our choice !

I will have to presume your background is Malaysian Chinese (education in Malaysia, self identified Chinese ethnicity).

In talking about the referendum, I often started with my experience living in Malaysia for 6-years as an expat (with 10-years in Singapore before that) with its constitutional enshrinement of Bumiputra which I saw as very analogous to the Voice.

I'd be fascinated to learn if you also see any similarities?

Anthony
I know little about the Bumiputra issue.
I left in 1962, poorly "educated" and woefully ignorant of anything beyond Sibu, the little town that was my homeland.
What little I have come across over the years tells me that The Voice would have little similarity with the Bumiputra provisions.
The fundamental difference is that The Voice confers no material rights or privileges. It is a fraught compromise that the desperately weak, oppressed for 230 years, thought that they would be allowed to have to begin a dignified new start, without rancour. Alas, terra nullius intervened again!

thought that they would be allowed to have to begin a dignified new start,
Chek,
They have had every help one can possibly expect to receive but only a very few have accepted & made use of it.
Labor supporting Academia has chosen (for their own benefit) to indoctrinate the majority to believe the situation to be as you are trying to say it is which it is not.

The attitude of the 'losers' to the success of the NO vote is, I think, to be abhorred.
We live in a democracy.
We are very lucky that we do.
And, we make major decisions democratically.
That is the way we do business.

Their lack of understanding does not reflect well on those who cannot accept this.
The referendum was not a contest.
It merely sought to establish the majority view on particular matter.
And we proceed the way the majority decides.
That is our democracy at work.
Making decisions.

There is no room for active annoyance over the result.
We live in a modern era.
(we cannot live in the past)
And to prove this there is not a dinosaur in sight.

I might add that the high court recently changed its mind.
(keeping asylum seekers in indefinite detention unlawful)
That gives us hope?
Perhaps it can reverse the 'mabo' decision next, and get us out of this absurd impediment to logical thought which cloaks us all.