Howard has already given the game away with his comment on compensating the aboriginals for any changes in land title. He is using this true national emergency (about which he has done bugger all until now) as a smokescreen to rapidly open up the vast area of the NT under aboriginal control to easy mining exploration and development. The cynicism of this move can only be appropriately labelled with the term "scumbag".

Howard's grand plan around Aboriginal child welfare seems like a combination of a lot of tough talk, some tough action but precious little to address a serious problem. If alcohol is a major contributing factor regarding child abuse then a national restriction on its sale would be more practical than in select areas. The same goes for pornography. And how much funding will go into refuges for women and children wanting to escape domestic violence and rape? What about more funding for community housing? It's hard enough to get emergency accommodation in the cities - how much more so in remote areas?

The Commonwealth can direct funding via the Supported Accommodation Assistance Program and the Commonwealth-State Housing Agreement. They could also try a more co-operatve approach with states and territories instead of grand standing. But I guess these approaches are not very interesting media-wise.

So glad you noticed - Jennifer Clarke - and so clearly and well-explained!
Of course Howard needs to do something about the aborigines land rights in the NT. After all, it's the one place where uranium mining, and nuclear waste dumping could go ahead, without the State governments kicking up a fuss. And, conveniently, it's the place with lots of uranium and lots of space, and fewer white people to make a fuss, too.

Removing the permit system is good, too. Howard's white mining mates can go in there and get started with exploration, and whatever else they might like to do. How about sexual abuse, for example?

While not denying the terrible problems that do exist amongst some remote aboriginal communities - it's very convenient also to get the picture across to the electorate - a picture of how incompetent etc the aboriginal people must be. Therefore - if that's the case - well, we don't need to give any credibility to their opinions.

Very handy, seeing that a group of traditional owners are travelling around - they'll be in Fremantle on July 9th - with a very clear and informative program on aboriginal opposition to the nuclear industry.
Christina Macpherson www.antinuclearaustralia.com

A cogent and well reasoned article. Thank you Jennifer Clarke. I trust and hope Australian voters will ask themselves the same pertinent questions that are raised here - but why am I so nervous about this 'mean and tricky' discovery of a 'crisis' that governments have known about for years?

Michael in Adelaide
"He is using this true national emergency (about which he has done bugger all until now)".

All you bleeding hearts are half the reason the Indigenous people can't move ahead. Everytime someone does something to help them people like scream racism or attack the Prime Minister again.

The bottom line is there needs to be tough action and the Indigenous people also need to take action. I don't know if you have ever visited communities in the NT, but it's sickening to see people sitting around all day on welfare, playing cards, and abusing drugs and alcohol. If they want a traditional lifestyle, they should start living traditional - go hunting and gathering. If they don't want a traditional lifestyle and want to live in a modern society and receive government money, they need to start trying to fit into society. Send their kids to school, clean their houses and clean their communities. If they want society to help them, well they have to start helping themselves.

Jackson - of course aboriginals should help themselves - as we all should.
Yes, it's a good idea to respond to the "Little Children are Sacred" report. However - an effective response would be to carry out the recommendations of that report. And - as one myself, who has worked for many years in the drug-alcohol rehabilitation service - I am sure that the first step is to get the co-operation of the people involved.

Put yourself in that position - a family, a neighbourhood, where there are abuse/addiction problems. the first step is to consult with the community, and work in partnership.

Coming in heavy-handed with coppers and troops is unlikely to win the co-operation of the people concerned.
I'm afraid that it all does look like John Howard - looking for the votes of people like you, and for helping his mining mates.
Christina Macoherson www.antinuclearaustralia.com

"One puzzling thing about the Commonwealth plan to “save” Aboriginal children is that it only applies to the Northern Territory."

Isn't that where some of our corporate 'leaders', our senior 'Public Managers' amd the 'people's representatives' (who make decisions behind the closed doors of a Cabinet) plan to dig up more uranium and dump loads of toxic waste ... the stuff they can't sell to the warmongers as 'depleted' uranium?

Yes a national emergency requires a national response. Talk to the states. The federal government has the capacity to move into territory affairs because the territory is not a state. It does not have the constitutional capacity to move into the states - and the states have spent the entire length of the present federal government ensuring that they block the federal government at every possible turn. This of course ignores the will of the people at federal level but that is apparently something the premiers are happy to ignore.

ChristinaMac,
The drug and alcohol problem is not the real root of the problem, the substance abuse is just a symptom.

These people are bored. Everyone screams about them not having fresh food in the communities, well they are traditional people, why don't they go fishing and hunting for fresh food.

I grew up in a poor family and my mother and father grew vegetables and had chickens so we had fresh food. My grandmother had 10 children and her husband young died and left her with 10 kids. She raised them without welfare (no welfare in those days), grew vegetables, went fishing, milked cows etc.

Something needs to change or Indigenous people will be living the same in 20 years from now. Forget about who votes for who, it's not about that, it's about a very serious problem that is finally getting addressed.

Australia’s proud history of achievement does not exist without its imperfections. The propriety of the 1967 referendum, which gave the federal Parliament power to legislate with respect to Aboriginal people, is a prime example. Approved by a record affirmative vote of 90.77 per cent, Australians indicated an overwhelming view that the Aboriginal people were entitled to be treated as the equals of other Australians. However, it must be said, that the noble intention of overcoming inequality has been imperfectly applied.

I fear that this Howard/Brough emergency intervention draws heavily on the noble intentions of Australia via a well-worn pathway of imperfect application.

A journey of a 1000 steps starts with just one step and the NT is as good a place to start as any because that is where the report came from that triggered the initiative and the Commonwealth can act without more delays. But hey, there is nothing to stop premiers from throwing their hats in the ring and saying, "Me too!".

I cannot understand the lack of humanity of activists and opponents of the initiative (which has support from the States). Why should more children suffer and die while ideological purists seek more podiums for their rants? Anyhow, if it has not been consultation and self-determination that has been happening in these self-managed communities and via government agencies staffed with Aboriginals and others 'sensitive to indigenous culture' what has been going on?

As for trying to make police and the army the boogey men to scare and sensationalise, I would say that the young mothers, children and youth who are presently being terrorised will find them a lot less scary than the criminals (what else are they?) who assault and molest them daily. In any event, who could label the army as scary when the units are local in every sense of the word. For the cynics, here is a primer on Norforce, which I posted to another thread:

http://www.theage.com.au/news/National/A-very-special-kind-of-force-minds-the-north/2005/03/04/1109700672482.html

I can imagine that had the Commonweath proposed a national program (as is now demanded by some)), there would have been a similar outcry from activists with headlines claiming a 'federal take over', together with demands for some more decades of round robin consultations, claims of racism and the like. There is a lot of benefit in trying smaller first and then carrying forward the learning to other areas.

The first priority for children and mothers is immediate relief and safety, but unfortunately that is the not the priority of some activists. Why should the Australian people allow a few activists to use the wellbeing and safety of women and children as a bargaining chip?

With 250,000 cases of child abuse reported and more than 7,000 alcohol related deaths across Australia in 2006, Howards attack on a single minority group is a token response.

Why is Australia’s capital, the porn capital of Australia? I would like to congratulate the Prime Minister, Mr. Howard, on his action to deal with the ongoing sexual abuse of women and children in Northern Territory's Indigenous communities. However, this is only the first step to help to mop up the deadly cocktail of drugs, alcohol and X-rated pornography in Aboriginal communities in NT. Many Australians would be shocked to know that the heart of the child abuse problem in the NT, lies in ‘Pornberra’, our nation's capital. X-rated porn is illegal in every state in Australia except the Labor dominated NT and ACT. Australia’s children will never be safe until the porn tap is turned off at the head. Real governments don’t siphon porn from the sewers of the earth to destroy our precious children!

David Bernard

You will find that most on these posts want to attack Mr Howard more than the want the abuse to stop. Don't u know he is to blame for every ill in society? If the devil was given as much credit as Mr Howard he would be very proud. To think that many of these posters accuse me of sarcasm!

I agree Jennifer, there are also non Aboriginal alcohol abusers and women and child abusers in every State of Australia.
John Howard has been selective in choosing Aboriginals in the NT, as they are in more remote areas and more difficult for the non corporate media to observe and report on the Federal governments activities, just as the placement of asylum seekers in remote areas off the Australian mainland.
John Howard has also chosen the NT because he can exercise his power over the administration of the NT, he is unable to do this in the States.
John Howard cannot be taken seriously, re his attempt to convince the voters that he is a humane person. He has denied Aboriginals their right to education and health, equal to other Australians, for the past eleven years.
It is my personal view that John Howard has another agenda, which will not be revealed to Australians prior to the election. If he wins the election, the NT could become the area for burying nuclear waste materials.

What's the mystery? It's just Howard playing wedge politics, as ever.

If he was at all serious he would do this Australia wide, not just selectively use the NT for his own motives. He is using the NT as it is the smallest and cheapest option. As he always does. The wedge failed and now all he will be doing is letting it fade away as the usual process takes place. Panic, emergency, oh what was the problem again? Sorry it's election time, let's "MOVE ON". Howard's standard procedure.

David Bernard is partly right. Yes the ACT does sell X rated porn but this isn't the porn the NT abusers use anyway. They don't have a lot of mail deliveris at these places mate. They just get normal men's magazines and movies which are even on Pay tv, which they can't watch. So DVD's or video's are dropped off. Who by? White men. These movies and magazines all have porn in them, some extreme.

Which begs a huge question. The ACT has just as much of a problem with drugs, alcohol and sexual abuse of children but Howard has ignored that Territory. Why? Because it's not an indigenous problem as such. That's too hard so he uses one of dozens of reports he has ignored to date.

Does anyone here seriously think this invasion will change anything? It won't as to get that change the indigenous community must initiate it.

Putting Police there will help, until they are pulled out after the election leaving the people sitting in the desert surrounded by those abusers that did not get either charged or found guilty.

How many white men are involved and how many will be caught. I'm betting about....zero.

Runner, get a life. Everyone wants this abuse to stop. Howard is pointed at simply because he is actually PM. You know Runner, the guy who takes credit for anything good but no blame for anything bad.

The Australian people voted overwhelmingly in 1967 to EXTINGUISH, to END, ALL discrimination between Australians on the grounds of race.

Commonwealth regards referenda differently for self interest reasons.

Appallingly High Court interprets '67 referenda so as to avoid need to enforce true objective of Australian People, justifying the same actions Australians sort to prohibit.

The Commonwealth discriminated against Aboriginals in the NT pre 67, and continued post 67.

Read again second reading speech for 67 referenda bill, the literature of the time, and read your constitution.

Were Australians voting to widen opportunity to practice racial discrimination or to extinguish it ? Clearly to extinguish it.

The Commonwealth and the States, authorities of power, discriminate against anyone and everyone they can, until stopped by the High Court.

Eviction from office merely changes the flavours of discrimination they prefer.

Only blinkered biggotted idiots believe Australians - with knowledge of how various governments treated their citizens differently on grounds of race, might overwhelmingly empower our own politicians to widen opportunity for them to exercise such racist segregationist treatments in Australia on a wider scale.

But of course there are a lot of thst mind around, snouts in the trough !

Howard is a criminal - simple as that. An extremely devious and lying little man.

I think its easy to keep arguing the negative case in all of this; to allow political perspectives to cloud the debate; to be cynical; etc .... the question of why the NT and not the ACT and or state Aboriginal communities as well is really irrelevant. Keep it simple .... tackle what you can. I can't see any harm coming out of the current exercise ... worst case outcome will be that we have even more awareness nationally of the terrible plight of these communities. That may then steer people to what I think is the more fundamental issue (not to belittle the sexual abuse crisis).... many remote Aboriginal communities are not sustainable communities if we are to apply standards applicable to the rest of Australia's communities .... and the majority seem intent on using these standards to judge these communities. Can these communities really afford to continue in their current form or should they just close? Jobs have not and will not materialise in these remote locations... and jobs are at the heart of the standard of living enjoyed by the vast majority of Australians living outside of remote Aboriginal communities.

Am I going to deny the political aspect to the 'timing' of this "Save the Aboriginals" thrust ?

No.
Is this a rehash of 'Tampa' ?

probably (by Timing)

Should it surprise us that "Politicians" of EVERY flavor, do this kind of thing close to democratic elections ?

NO!

Does this alter the reality of the issue ?

NO!

Frank, I noticed a little 'vilification' there :)

"Removing the permit system is good, too. Howard's white mining mates can go in there and get started with exploration, and whatever else they might like to do. How about sexual abuse, for example?"

Now 'that' was a bit of a leap into the 'blanket statement, guilt by default' wild blue yonder old son.
Yet you are quite enthusiastic in your criticism of me over my allegations/claims about Islam/Mohammad?

But to all posters "Howard is a Criminal" errrr.. good grief.. I suppose this is mean't to say "But ME... and my mob, well, we are saints, and we are beyond blemish and spot.. undefiled in every way, and if WE were in charge, aaah..all this stuff would be fixed overnight"

Well..excuse me for choking. I am reminded of the parable of the Pharisee "Oh God..LOOK at THAT sinner over there.. that tax collector.. eeeuwwwww what a baddddd person he is (unlike me) I thank you Oh God that I am NOT like that ratbag there"

But the Tax collector just beat his chest and poured out "Oh God..be merciful to me a sinner"

Jesus then said "THAT mans prayer was heard" Jesus said that the Pharisee 'prayed with himself'... and how true that is.

Drawing attention to evil, and pointing people to Christ as Saviour is called "evangelism". Pointing to evil and claiming self righteousness- is unholy pride.

Let's not point to 'Coalition/Howard' evil, with the suggestion that 'we/us/ourparty' is holy and righteous. But by all means compare ALL (them and us) to Christ.

Communicat - the article demonstrated quite convincingly that the Federal Government has all the power it needs under the Constitution to act in the States on this issue. They used it to get Workchoices through. Your objection is baseless. Try reading the article before commenting next time.

Jackson - your objections, which are obviously made in good-faith, seem to rest on the assumption that traditional Aboriginal lifestyles and contemporary Australian lifestyles are mutually exclusive and immiscible. According to you, they can either be hunter-gatherers, or be "modern" Australians. According to you, they can choose one and only one way. Your comments suggest that these two lifestyles are polar opposites, two ends of a spectrum, with nothing in between.

Your conception of Aboriginal culture seems to come from the same mould as the 'noble savage' camp who think that cultures are all hermetically sealed little separate units that must not be 'contaminated' by outside influence.

I would suggest to you that such dichotomous thinking is not able to capture the fine-grained nature of the problems faced in remote communities, nor the complexities needed to work out a solution. I don't claim to have an answer, but since you do, you need to explain why you think Aboriginal people can only go 100% one way or the other - and how choosing one way or the other would actually solve this problem.

For your comments imply that the problem of child abuse will somehow be solved if Aboriginals make a choice between being hunter-gatherers or living a contemporary Australian lifestyle. Would you care to expand on why you believe this? How does this choice, on which you place so much importance, have anything to do with solving child abuse?

BOAZ_David: Do you honestly believe, that in the days when the judges ruled, Boaz would have shown favour to Ruth had she come from her homeland, not out of love or sacrifice nor with such literal humility, but rather in numbers that demolished the annual barley harvest?

You encourage: "Let's not point to 'Coalition/Howard' evil, with the suggestion that 'we/us/ourparty' is holy and righteous. But by all means compare ALL (them and us) to Christ."

Not that I am an adherent to such a belief, but surely you would agree that much of the 'state of emergency' in NT indigenous communities deals with desert people suffering generations of oppression for their adherence to a spirituality that is much more Christ-like than either the Howard government or the majority of Australians that are not subject to this racially explicit intervention.

One could even go so far as to liken the Howard Government to the Pharisees in their ultimate solution to the recalcitrant firebrand from Nazareth.

Odd Mercurius your view about the Commonwealth's constitutional capacity in this respect goes against that of a respected constitutional lawyer I was talking to recently.

Glad you raised the point about the Commonwealth's constitutional powers over the Territory communicat. The states are more than free to start co-operating with the Cwth on this matter and invite them in to start the same approach on their own trouble-spots (Walgett, Goodooga, Wilcannia to name but a few in NSW). But they wont because they have political leverage at the moment.

Mercurius thinks he can dazzle with some big words. However his statement on the Cwth's use of the constitution to enable Workchoices is off-track. Workchoices only applies to constitutional corporations (companies, and trusts with corporate trustees). The Cwth has no power to enforce Workchoices on state govt employees NOr the employees of sole traders and partnerships (and trusts with non-corporate trustees). These are under the jurisdiction of the State laws (except Vic, because Kennett handed over this power to the Cwth while still in office). So we now have TWO sets of work place laws, just to make things even more complicated! A point frequently ignored. However, I digress...

Yes, it would have been ideal to have had some action on this issue before now. But remember that the trendy thing has been to aboriginal self-determination. Had govt intervened before, the cries of racist and paternalism would have been even more shrill than the are now. The indigenous communities have been given the chance over many years to sort this out themselves. They havent, so now it is time for intervention.

As for the nuclear issue, if we are going to dig up uranium and sell it, we should be prepared to take back the waste. Why not put it back where it came from (which contains radioactive material (uranium) anyway? Guess what - this is the NT!! But wouldnt be PC to put it back in Ranger in Kakadu. However, if that's where it came from, that's where it should go.

Mercurius, good questions and points, however i think you'll discover that Jackson does not understand his own subjectivity, let alone Aboriginal /white dichotomies. Good luck, miracles can happen..i hope

Communicat and Country Gal, regarding Commonwealth powers, again I say: please read the article.

You will find it's not "my view" or "my claim". It's there in the article, all quite clearly argued and justified in five short paragraphs.

In particular, paragraphs 3-8 explain why and how the Commonwealth has power to act within the states on this issue.

If you can't be bothered to read and understand as far as the first one-third of the article, then don't blame me if you miss the point of it.

Country Gal - the "biggest words" I used were five-syllables - 'contaminated' and 'contemporary'. I notice you used some five-syllable words too - 'constitutional' and 'determination'. So I guess we're even.

Another "big word" I used was 'dichotomous thinking'. It means 'black and white thinking'. So what I was suggesting is that 'black and white thinking' will not solve this problem. Ironic, isn't it?

The posts by the left on this thread are illuminating.

Ever since the progressives derailed the Aboriginal relationship with the community, and instituted the downfall of the black communities, they have had a reliable source of victims.

From the days of the aboriginal stockmen, paid low money to allow for the supplies given by the employers to their families, inveigled by the unions into gaining an award which made them unemployable, to the limiting of the education of aboriginals to useless topics, like their own outdated language and culture, the left have locked them into victim status.

They have formed the base of the aboriginal industry, blackmailing the government into wasting billions on welfare and other means of worsening their plight.

Howard is now acting to stop this travesty. We now have a myriad of suggestions from the left on how to bog the process down, and make it ineffective.

Involve the State governments, who will remove all traction from any initiative, anything to prevent the removal of this weapon of the left.

It is great to watch this ranting, knowing that it will have no effect on the Howard Government’s initiative, and despite all the bleeding heart’s efforts, the Aboriginal community will receive some genuine and lasting assistance.

A national emergency requires a national response. But the way to deal with an emergency is not with adhoc short term measures. Emergency managers talk about four phases:

1. Mitigation
2. Preparedness
3. Response
4. Recovery
See: http://www.tomw.net.au/technology/it/emergency.shtml

The current situation in NT seems to be about the third step: "Response". What seems to be missing are the other three. The measures currently being used; with the army, police and seconded public servants, can only be a short term measure. This will not be effective in the long term, would be prohibitively expensive and would start to cause more harm than good.

One way to address the problems nationally would be for governments to think nationally about the services they deliver and how they involve the community in those decisions. A remote community can be easily forgotten and then be seen as a "problem" when the effects of that neglect become apparent.

One way for communities to not be forgotten would be to put to use the infrastructure which governments are putting in place for online access. This can be used both for the community to more easily inform government and for the government to check up on the citizen: http://www.tomw.net.au/blog/2007/06/internet-to-empower-indigenous.html

How much this becomes the "nanny state" is open to debate. But at least that way the same services and opportunities can be provided across Australia. At the same time the community can use the same system to monitor government's delivery of services. Just as the government can check if children are attending school, the parents can check how much of the nationally allocated funding for schools actually was delivered in their community.

Communities could use a similar approach to the Google maps based projects designed to highlight human rights abuses in Africa.

Leo Lane,

So how do explain this same history you speak of whereby most of the states were controlled by conservative governments? Qld under Bjelke Petersen for example!

Are you suggesting the lefty intelligentsia were also in charge of the economic, legal, and policy machinery?

If the left can be 'blamed' for anything its their repeated call for a much more humane treatment of my people. Are you suggesting this was wrong? Your reference to unions advocating for my father to be paid an award wage instead of 1 third of that which was paid to his white co-worker is revealing of what you think Aboriginal people deserve.

I think it best if you read some history rather than borrow the ill conceived BS that you appear to be parroting.

Yes I know it makes you feel clever, but its not clever at all.

Think for yourself rather than employ Howard speak!

The political movement which fought for aboriginal “rights” was a creation of the left.

Among the myriad mindless and vicious mantras of this movement were “stolen generation”, “land rights”, “genocide”, “invasion”, “discrimination”.

Aboriginals were brought up believing that aboriginal children were stolen, that their land was stolen, that white people discriminated against them, that their country had been invaded by white people. We have seen the result of this negative conditioning, and we have seen that the progressives are unrepentant, for having administered it,

Black communities were conditioned to believe that white people wished to deprive them of their culture, which they were told was speaking an aboriginal language, and traditional aboriginal skills. They were not given the opportunity to gain a basic education, simply a sham education leaving some without the ability to speak English. What a giant step backwards.

What chance do they have of making their way in civilization? They are conditioned to see it as a threat, not as an opportunity.

These people, caught in a stone age backwater of evolution, had a wonderful opportunity to embrace civilization. Many of them did, and referred to themselves as the “saved generation”, until howled down and intimidated by the activists. These activists live off the victim industry created on the backs of people whose lives were ruined by progressive "help".

How many cases of saved children were there, whose lives were ruined by their activist relatives tracking them down and inculcating the negative emotional poison generated by the left wing?

The wrong headed left gained tremendously in influence by the actions of the Whitlam government which entrenched these vipers in tertiary educational institutions, where they are paid by the taxpayer, while working against the community.

The stolen generation myth, on its own, has facilitated countless cases of child abuse.

How about a “sorry” from the creators and facilitators of this vicious myth? And some support for the positive initiative of the Government?

Leo Lane

Just stop listening to all these other hysterical left-wing voices for a moment - and listen to your own voice:

• “a creation of the left”

• “mindless and vicious mantras”

• “negative conditioning”

• “Black communities conditioned to believe”

• “a giant step backwards”

• “caught in a stone age backwater of evolution”

• “a wonderful opportunity to embrace civilization”

• “howled down and intimidated by the activists”

• “the victim industry”

• “lives were ruined by progressive ‘help’”

• “lives were ruined by their activist relatives”

• “inculcating the negative emotional poison generated by the left wing”

• “entrenched these vipers in tertiary educational institutions”

• “the creators and facilitators of this vicious myth”

• “the positive initiative of the Government”.

Now, having listened to the audio, who owns which problem, and how can we help?

Thanks FrankGol and Rainier. I had dismissed Leo Lane's rants as the mendacious ravings of yet another racist troll, but your responses provide a window of hope for the very slim possibility that he is simply deluded.

FrankGol, brilliant.

But why stop at just Leo's most recent post? Here's the Readers' Digest version of his earlier one:

"progressives derailed the Aboriginal relationship with the community..."

"...and instituted the downfall of the black communities"

"inveigled by the unions into gaining an award which made them unemployable"

"limiting of the education of aboriginals to useless topics,"

"the left have locked them into victim status."

"blackmailing the government"

"Howard is now acting to stop this travesty."

"this weapon of the left."
---

Thank heavens we have Leo's calm voice of reason to save us from the hyberbolic foam-flecked ravings of TEH LEFT.

Perhaps his problem is that TEH LEFT keep putting 'emotional poison' in his drinking supply.

You have selected some of my phrases, and set them out in a disjointed arrangement, in an attempt to ridicule them. I suppose you are sniggering like schoolboys, at your puerile vandalising of a sensible post.

I notice you carefully avoided any phrases relating to the “stolen children” debacle, the badge of shame of the bleeding hearts, and the trigger for current Government action.

Are you unable to absorb an argument in a coherent form, and make a sensible observation on it?

I fully appreciate that you would not like to set out your own thoughts, even if you had any. You do not wish to underline your refusal to face reality.

Your own couple of paragraphs make no sense. Mercurius, I gather, thinks a clumsy attempt at trivialisation is brilliant. FrankGol, it seems, wants to help.

He might train for litter collection. The hardest part is to learn what litter must not be touched because of safety regulation or union ban, but his mentality might cope with that.

He should certainly avoid any activity which requires literary skill.

The three of you ( I include CJMorgan) seem to inhabit the same alternate reality, where fantasy passes for fact.

I sympathise with Ranier, if he gained his knowledge from the factless histories of Henry Reynolds, Stuart McIntyre, Lyndall Ryan, Manning Clark, and others of that ilk, since he will need to revise extensively, if he wishes to base his outlook on truth.

Thanks for your input, it has been instructive and amusing.

Leo, glad we could provide some amusement for you, but it's not half as amusing as your self-declared review of your own posts as 'sensible'. You seem to have learnt from the Paul Keating school of self-praise. (PS - It would be more convincing if somebody other than you said your posts were sensible.)

I did not set your phrases in a 'disjointed arrangement'. I merely repeated your vitriolic, hyperbolic phrases in the precise order that you set them down. Did it make for uncomfortable reading? If you still regard such phraseology as 'sensible', then we'll have to agree to disagree.

And I'm quite capable of absorbing an argument in a coherent form. I look forward to reading one from you soon.

About the only claim I could find amongst all your vitriol was a suggestion that the "stolen generations" were a 'trigger' (your word) for the current campaign in the NT.

Funny, and here I was thinking it had something to do with child abuse and grog. Neither the PM and Mal Brough have mentioned the stolen generation in any of this, and in fact whenever Mal Brough and his representatives have gone to these communities, they have been at pains to reassure the locals that no children will be removed.

So on what premise do you base your claim that the "stolen generation" is the trigger for government action? It will surely be news to the PM.

As for 'fantasy'. I wasn't aware that the Aboriginal people who according to government records grew up in boarding-homes and foster-homes after being removed from their parental home were all imaginary mythic people, or possibly hallucinations. Thanks for setting me straight.

And I've never read Reynolds or MacIntyre or Ryan or Clark, but I have seen photos of Aboriginal people working on farms in neck-irons. Perhaps those photos have been transported here from an alternate reality that never happened. Or maybe it was Photoshop.

Leo Lane

Here we go again. Your own words:

- puerile vandalising of a sensible post.

- the “stolen children” debacle, the badge of shame of the bleeding hearts.

- unable to absorb an argument

- not like to set out your own thoughts, even if you had any

- refusal to face reality

- your own couple of paragraphs make no sense... a clumsy attempt at trivialisation

- might train for litter collection

- his mentality might cope with that

- should certainly avoid any activity which requires literary skill.

- seem to inhabit the same alternate reality, where fantasy passes for fact.

Now this list of yours comes in the context of telling us that we are negative and just attempting to ridicule you. Ridicule!

Really, I think you don't need us to ridicule you when your own words speak so eloquently for themselves.

I will set it out step by step, Mercurius.

1 The myth of the stolen generation, founded on the fact deficient, and anecdote padded, report “Bringing Them Home”.

2. Protection of aboriginal children ceased, so that there would be no more “stolen” (pc for “saved”) children.

3. The politically correct cover up of the abuse of aboriginal children.

4 Court cases run at taxpayer’s expense to prove the myth of stolen children, produced no factual basis.

5 After some years, media attention was finally given to the abuse of aboriginal children.

6 The trigger for the current Government action is the abuse of aboriginal children.

Nothing esoteric, just plain simple fact. The root cause of the trigger is the pernicious myth.

I shortened this by saying that the myth was the trigger. Not so hard to follow, but an opportunity for you to nit pick.

Why would the PM or Brough mention the stolen generations? The aboriginal people have been brainwashed to believe this nonsense, and educating them out of it is a problem for the future, and not the immediate emergency, which is child abuse.

I never said that you had read any history, it was Ranier who made the assertions about history. You say you have only looked at photos. Perhaps you should have attempted to ascertain the context of the photos. You do not say what they are supposed to mean. You, no doubt, do not know.

I did not say the people used in the stories were mythic, I said the stories about them being stolen are myths. They were saved, in the way that current children are not. They are not because of the effect of the myth, political correctness and the aboriginal industry, all of which work against the interests of the aboriginal people, and for the interests of the activists.

This is reality, not fantasy.

FrankGol, you are quite boring. Your performance was a failure the first time, and now you repeat it. At least the bulk of your post is readable, and sensible, being copied from mine.

I said it was a slim possibility, didn't I? Looks like I was being optimistic.

Leo, thank you for setting out an argument. I'm not nit-picking, I'm trying to understand your position.

Of your points, I think numbers 5 & 6 are true. But they do not follow from points 1-4, either consequentially or in logic. Here's why:

1. If you totally reject the findings of 'Bringing Them Home' because you believe parts are inaccurate, then I have news for you: every report ever written contains errors and omissions - but that is not a sufficient basis to reject them in their entirety. It is inevitable that errors and omissions will eventually be found in the 'Little Children are Sacred' report too - does that mean that child abuse in Aboriginal communities is a 'myth'?

2. The protection of Aboriginal children was degraded by a decade of cuts to the funding of protective services for Aboriginal children. After starving their essential protective services of funds, the government has now declared those communities to be failures and dysfunctional and in need of being taken over. Self-fulfilling prophecy if ever there was one.

3. What cover-up? Over the last decade, there have been major public reports published by almost every state and territory government detailing this problem. Since 1996, almost every nationally prominent Aboriginal leader has made public speeches about it. You have a very strange definition of the term 'cover-up'.

4. Vague assertion. Details please? Also a mis-direction of what courts are there for. Courts are not places where historical questions are 'proved' or 'disproved'. They are places where cases are tried. You will not find 'proof' or 'disproof' of the stolen generation in a court of law. It's an historical problem, not a scientific theory or a legal conundrum.

Leo, you made a statement that previous generations of Aboriginal children who were removed from their communities were "saved" from child abuse. The clear implication is that the current generation of Aboriginal children should now also be removed. I know you haven't (had the guts to have) said so explicitly, but it is implicit in your statement that "They were saved, in the way that current children are not". The logic of your statement is a prescription to remove children now.

Either come out and say it, or else please clarify your earlier remarks. Neither the PM nor Mal Brough nor Noel Pearson nor the authors of 'Little Children are Sacred' believe that removing children is the answer; do you?

You have made a convoluted and bizarre attempt to link the reaction to the stolen generation report to child abuse in Aboriginal communities. Everybody else in this debate understands that the problem's origins are complex and manifold, involve failures at state and federal levels, substance-abuse, leadership failures, funding failures, a lack of care by other Australians, and many other contributing factors. Your effort to pin it on something to do with the stolen generation seems obsessive, and does you no credit.

After all, every weekday in the suburban newspapers there are reports of child sex abuse and pornography committed by non-Aboriginal people in suburban homes. There is no 'stolen-generation myth' in suburbia that you can blame those tragedies on. So what gives?

Occam's razor alone will tell you that the "rivers of grog" probably have more to do with it – or are the liquor merchants all part of the great pc conspiracy and co-authors of the stolen-generation report too?

PS – regarding the photos of Aboriginal chain-gangs, you ask about the ‘context’ (apologetics for ‘spin’). I don’t know - they were out for a picnic or school reunion, perhaps?

Images of Aboriginal people wearing neck-irons don’t require much of a ‘context’ to explain them, any more than do photographs of mass graves around the world. Such pictures tend to speak a thousand words, except to apologists/denialists who don't listen.

Leo

According to you, I'm "boring" and "readable" and "sensible" all at the same time.

And that's all because I copied most of my post from you. It's really you who should take the credit Leo.

Who needs to use their own words to demonstrate the level of intelligence of other posters when their own words do the job perfectly?

Images of Aboriginal people wearing neck-irons DO require a ‘context’ to explain them, as do photographs of non-Aboriginal people wearing them, as do photograpsh of mass graves, burning children running down the roads, wounded laying in hospital beds, countless other scenes all around the world.

ALL good photographs, all good pictures, all good cartoons, speak a thousand words, generate emotional responses linking what is presented to be seen by viewers to their own memories, own knowledges, own understandings or versions as taught to them, whether true or not.

Such images stand alone art forms.

Images and Truth are two different things except to apologists / denialists who do not wish to listen, not wishing hear anything different.

Sadly many are so emotionally and intellectually blinkered yet thinking they know better than everyone else.