Does it really matter whether it's been 4,000 or 40,000 years?

"Indigenous" means "native to", or "originating from".

So it doesn't even apply to Australian Aborigines, "Native" Americans, Maoris or virtually anybody else.

Almost every people on earth migrated from somewhere else at some point in history.

Grahame Walsh, the leading expert on the Bradshaws rock art claims that the Bradshaws (which are at least 17000 years old) were painted by a culture *predating* the "Indigenous" Australians.

So there was another group of people here *before* the "Indigenous" arrived!

One could claim that after 200+ years, Anglo-Celtic Australians are "Indigenous".

If you were born here, and your parents, and your grandparents, and your greatgrandparents, aren't you a "native"?
How many generations does it take?

And before you reply that Anglo-Celtics "obviously" descend from the British in a far away land:
The Aboriginals arrived from New Guinea.
The Native Americans from Asia.
And the Maori from Eastern Polynesia.

The only difference is the length of time.

‘Oh dear, another biblical creationist!’ CJ, are you concerned at the growth rate of creationists? It’s true, some people are beginning to question certain evolutionary assumptions before swallowing them whole or believing everything they read on Wikipedia.

Speaking of growth rates, has anyone ever stopped to consider the possible growth rate of a small group of migrants who multiplied over a continent for 40,000 years? Let’s do the maths (CJ Morgan, be warned, this might require some thinking rather than just reading Wikipedia).

Let’s start with a group of 20 people and a minimal (but realistic given the circumstances of our continent) annual growth rate of 0.28%. After 3500 years, they would arrive at around 300,000 people. This is similar to the number of Aborigines present in Australia at the time of European arrival.

Now let’s take the same 20 people with the same growth rate, and calculate the population after 40,000 years. The number is too ridiculous to imagine, bigger than most pocket calculators can handle.

On one hand, we say that the rock paintings at Kakadu, made by mixing ordinary ochre and water, are tens of thousands of years old, then we build protective rain covers over them so they won’t wash away in the next rainy season!

Can’t anyone stop and think? These painting have not been there more than a few hundred years (and sometimes we even know who painted them). But yes, saying they are many thousands of years old, does help to sell Aboriginal art T-shirts.

Please CJ, in saying this, I am not trying to denigrate Aboriginal art. And how does saying that the Aborigines have been here for only a few thousand years denigrate their culture or ingenuity? And how does insisting that they’ve been here ten times longer increase their legitimacy?

The revered figure of 40,000 years might also be 70,000, according to CJ Morgan and Wikipedia. That is, the first figure is 75% wrong if the second figure is correct. But don’t dare challenge CJ or most the ‘experts’ - they’re all in agreement!

Leaving aside for a moment Mick V's idiosyncratic understandings of population demographics and of archaeological dating methods, it's worth pointing out that the UN Declaration's working definition of Indigenous peoples is not dependent upon the relative antiquity of Indigenous peoples' ownership of their lands, but rather upon the invasion and colonisation of their land by non-Indigenous States in which the Indigenous peoples become incorporated but marginalised minorities:

"Indigenous communities, peoples and nations are those which, having a historical continuity with pre-invasion and pre-colonial societies that developed on their territories, consider themselves distinct from other sectors of the societies now prevailing on those territories, or parts of them. They form at present non-dominant sectors of society and are determined to preserve, develop and transmit to future generations their ancestral territories, and their ethnic identity, as the basis of their continued existence as peoples, in accordance with their own cultural patterns, social institutions and legal system."

http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/unpfii/documents/PFII%202004%20WS.1%203%20Definition.doc

So I guess I'll have to concede that the length of Indigenous peoples' ownership of their territories - whether this extends to centuries or millennia or tens of millennia - is a red herring in the argument. The crux of the matter is that these are peoples whose Indigenous status is a marginalised one in the contemporary States that now claim sovereignty over Indigenous land.

The reason for the declaration is that Indigenous peoples have invariably suffered appallingly at the hands of the invaders, settlers and colonists as their rights and identities have been systematically assaulted by the contemporary States that were created in relatively recent history on previously Indigenous territory.

Of course, it's hardly surprising that contemporary States like Australia, New Zealand, the United States and Canada would vote against the declaration - given that they are the contemporary manifestations of the worst excesses of European imperialism as it impacted upon Indigenous peoples.

Mick V,

Re: colonization

As for what we were like before we met you, I no longer care. No periods of time over which my ancestors held sway, no documentation of complex civilizations, is any comfort to me.

Even if I really came from people who were living like monkeys in trees, it was better to be that than what happened to me, what I became after we met you and yours.

And what did you become after you met "us", Rainier?

A Christian. How tribal of you.

CJ Morgan: "It's hardly surprising that Australia, New Zealand, the United States and Canada would vote against the declaration - given that they are the contemporary manifestations of the *worst excesses* of European imperialism as it impacted upon Indigenous peoples."

Ahem (clearing throat)

Have you not heard of the Spanish?

I don't think there's a single indigenous person left in Chile, Argentina or Uruguay!

Shoka, I was born on a Christian mission/ reserve, not my or my parents choice. Also, I was not born a citizen of this nation but a ward of the state (as were my siblings and of course my parents and extended family.

No, I'm not looking for your sympathy, just pointing out the facts.

I could cite a plethora of readings that would provide you with more knowledge of these times, but i sense you are quite happy to wallow in an ignorance of Australian history - simply because it so connected to rationalising your own your bigotry.

I truly wish you were more inquisitive, deeper thinking and compassionate. But I guess you are still growing up emotionally and intellectually.

And no, I am not a Christian.