"Contested scholarship isn't fraud, and silence isn't proof."

But falsely claiming Aboriginality most definitely is fraud. OTOH referring to what Pascoe did as 'scholarship' is probably the biggest fraud of all.

That depends, mhaze.

//...falsely claiming Aboriginality most definitely is fraud.//

Only if intent, false representation, and material deception can be established by a court, regulator, or tribunal. Pascoe's ancestry claims are disputed and controversial, but they haven't been found to be knowingly false. You're doing precisely what Brendan O'Reilly did in his article: asserting fraud as a conclusion and then redefining the terrain to avoid having to demonstrate it.

Calling Pascoe's work "not scholarship" doesn't solve this. It simply shifts the goalposts.

His historical claims have been debated, criticised, and in some cases rebutted by other academics. That's precisely how scholarship works. You can argue that his interpretations are weak, selective, or wrong, but declaring them "not scholarship" is merely a rhetorical manoeuvre. Contested scholarship is still scholarship, even when you think it's bad.

You're also collapsing several distinct questions into one moral accusation:
- Are Pascoe's ancestry claims accurate? (contested)
- Are his historical interpretations sound? (debated)
- Did institutions respond appropriately? (arguable)
- Does any of this amount to fraud? (not established)

Treating all of that as settled dishonesty is exactly the ambiguity-intolerance I was pointing to. It replaces evidentiary thresholds with moral certainty.

None of this requires defending Pascoe or his work. It requires keeping categories straight. Dispute is not proof. Silence is not admission. And disliking conclusions does not transform disagreement into deception.

If you want to argue fraud, Fine. But as it stands, you're doing precisely what you accuse others of doing: asserting intent where complexity already explains the outcome.

"Contested scholarship is still scholarship,"

Fiction isn't scholarship.

And his aboriginality is only contested by those who haven't examined the facts.

mhaze,

Have you heard of the fallacy known as "begging the question"?

//Fiction isn't scholarship.//

I could respond to that with a sentence using exactly the same structure, minus the fallacy:

An assertion isn't evidence.

Neat, huh?

//And his aboriginality is only contested by those who haven't examined the facts.//

As you would say: If you say so.

As usual JD provides no evidence but demands it of others

"As usual," mhaze?

//As usual JD provides no evidence but demands it of others//

There needs to be multiple instances of me doing such a thing before we can get to "as usual." We haven't even had the first instance, so "again" would have been accurate either.

I haven't made a substantive factual claim about Pascoe that would require evidentiary support. I haven't asserted that his work is good, that his ancestry claims are true, or that institutions handled the matter well. What I've done is question your assertions and the way you're treating them as settled facts without showing how they're established.

There's an important distinction here:

- Challenging a claim is not itself a competing claim.
- Asking for evidence is not an assertion that needs evidence of its own.

Have you heard of a concept known as the "burden of proof"?