There is no solution to the on-going miseries of the Aborigine population that does not entail assimilation - realistically the debate should centre around the means of accomplishing that assimilation. Every ethnic group in the world has faced, or will have to face, that same circumstance. Our own culture was sufficiently flexible to amalgamate with the post-war European immigration, but the 'hybrid' culture that resulted now faces either assimilation or annihilation - take your pick - in the face of the ever growing Chinese onslaught. The australian Aborigines cannot exist as a 'culture within a culture'. Economics always has and always will maintain forward momentum, and the less economically viable will assimilate or go under.

The most beautifully written article for a long, loooong time!

"Now the current weapons mobilised in that war, the new psychological weapon of violent pornography, and the longer-term biochemical weapon of alcohol - these real weapons of mass destruction - are “discovered” and the Indigenous people have to be saved from them."

" the epicentre of pornography is the ACT suburb of Fyshwick, less than three kilometres from Parliament House; the government extracts huge revenues from the alcohol excises it collects."

You split the arrow Robin. Can we join you in the greenwood?

Inspirational...

An excellent essay Andrew.

I was especially taken by your comment that: "Australian society needs to declare that it wants to make peace, and to espouse a peace plan". And the conditions that would have to be met to achieve that plan: "It requires a vision of real Indigenous economic development based on the capacity to realise the value extracted from Indigenous lands by our forebears. It means removing the weapons of mass destruction - the epicentre of pornography is the ACT suburb of Fyshwick, less than three kilometres from Parliament House; the government extracts huge revenues from the alcohol excises it collects."

Such a vision would have to crystalise out of the fog of lies historically fed to the Australian people the majority of whom are focussed on matters they see as more important to them.

Your conclusion: "... it means having a government that commits itself to ending the war and that orientation depends on a people who want peace. Whether they do, is a question all Australians will have to answer for themselves" is vastly problematic. Howard's mob is and always will be categorically incapable of conceptualising the issues in those terms and Rudd's mob has lost its capacity to do much more than what is 'safe' and not too different from the way we've always done them.

Australians of good-will and vision, Indigenous and non-Indigenous together, will have to work around that massive impediment and achieve change despite governments, for the foreseable future. A people's movement for justice may eventually shift government hypocrisy...but that's a long way off.

The best laugh I've had in ages. Thanks Andrew.

You can put your pants back on now.

Unfortunately the only realistic approach to indigenous affairs is assimilation not separation. The latter approach has not worked in the 20th C and will not work in the 21st C. Demanding indigenous people 'retain their traditional way of life' is a nonsense that they could do without. From my discussions with them they have the same aspirations as anyone else but they aren't being given the opportunities because a small activist group decided on issues like 'land rights' and 'maintaining indigenous languages and culture'. I am told that a lot of what passes for traditional culture is nothing of the sort and that indigenous languages need a massive vocabulary input to cope with the modern world.
Another example of politically correct activism doing more harm than good?

Oh what a sad and angry individual Andrew Jakubowicz seems.

“Sexual abuse of Indigenous children is horrific. It has been going on and been reported on for a long time: indeed its unpoliced history demonstrates yet another of the war’s weapons of neglect and disavowal.”

So he complains when something is done, as well as when something is supposedly not done (the “each way bet” of the terminally cynical).

I agree with communicat.

Are we to assume the author supports the notion that indigenous people should not be assimilated into the wider Australian community and should not share the supposedly better living conditions and life expectancy, which is supposedly common in that wider Australian community?

Aboriginal culture represents one which has, like many others, been conquered and colonised. Other assimilated examples, the Huns, Vandals, Saxons, Angles, Celts and hosts of others over the centuries.

I note some wax lyrical at the prose of this piece of dross.

Personally, I find it the unimaginative swill of a lazy mind which criticises what is done by its betters from the secluded tenure of academia. Academia, where it is secure for subsistence and left with so much time on their idle hands that they can conjure up this meaningless drivel.