I see in my absence that the educated and informed contributors continue to try and reason with the wilfully ignorant contingent. It's interesting to see how the denialists attempt to justify their obdurate, essentially racist, positions by attempting to redefine the notion of genocide to suit their prejudices.

Col Rouge: "at least the Jews have a real holocaust to complain about and not the make-believe one which the Australian indigenes have dreamed up"

Stick to the bean-counting, Col. Besides being no expert on Australian history, you're exactly the sort of neo-colonial immigrant that is not needed here. We have too many racists and accountants already.

Democritus seems belatedly to have read the article upon which this discussion is based, in which the author clearly defines his use of the notion of 'genocide', i.e. in accordance with internationally accepted contemporary usage.

boudjika: "i was born here on australian soil ,i live on australian soil ,therefore that makes me indigenous of australia ,not aboriginal ,but indigenous i too was created from the dust of this land "

Boudjika seems to deliberately confuse "indigenous" with "native". In the Australian context, the former refers to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island people, while the latter refers to everybody who was born in Australia. The only dust in boudjika's creation is his/her propagation of bulldust.

I hope this helps to elucidate some of the discursive games that are still being played in the name of racism.

Boudjika,

The Tassie Blue Gum is indigenous to Tasmania. A friend planted one in suburban SA. A seed has germinated from it and is starting to grow. But neither are indigenous to SA suburbs. In fact, if I strain the analogy to another "blue" native, the Cootamundra wattle, I'd go so far as to say that it has become a feral pest plant outside of the area to which it is indigenous, in NSW. Sort of like some humans.

A number of my indigenous friends don't like the term "indigenous", because it's open to the sort of misinterpretation and lack of clarity that we are discussing. They are proud to be Aboriginal and regards the "indigenous" label as depriving them of their Aboriginality. I'm not sure where I stand on that issue because to me the terms are synonymous.

To be indigenous means that you are descended from people whose culture, language, economy and so on has developed its distinctive features in a defined locality, just as a Tassie Blue Gum has features distinctive from e. burdettiana.

Walk outside you house and count out 60 house bricks in a row. Each one is a thousand years. Look at the last fifth of the last brick. That's the relationship of we settler peoples to our indigenous countrymen and -women. The entire European history of this country is in that last fifth of the last brick.

For any of us descendents of settler peoples to claim that we are indigenous becuause we were born here diminishes and trivialises the just claims and struggles of indigenous Aussies.

CJ Morgan.. “I see in my absence . . . “

Yes I did notice that something filled the vacuum.

“you're exactly the sort of neo-colonial immigrant that is not needed here.”

That is not what the DFAT officer said when I applied for my residency visa or the migration officer at Sydney airport, my business clients, corporate and government nor my wide circle of friends since.

I guess you are just out of step. Then again, you are usually out of step, simply breathing and walking at the same time probably challenges your cognitive skills.

Please tell, did you migrate to Australia (ie did you have to prove your worth and character) or is your presence an accident of fate (left laying where your mother spat you out)?

Obviously, that is a rhetorical question. However, I would suspect your ancestry is of Scandinavian origin, that is, after all, where trolls come from.

Mike-servethepeople
“For any of us descendents of settler peoples to claim that we are indigenous becuause we were born here diminishes and trivialises the just claims and struggles of indigenous Aussies.”

I would disagree.

Our time here, aur contribution or otherwise, is not a matter of what our parents or grandparents did or did not do.

What matters is how and what we, not as migrants, the children of migrants or aborigines but as individuals do, irrespective of racial origins.

I support your right to disagree with that view but would note,

Racism is to distinguish between people based on race. I do not support racism and those aborigines who demand different treatment or rights to the non-aborigines born in Australia are pursuing a racist agenda.

I support the aspirations of DR ML King who considered race in the same context as I have expressed it.

Incidentally, what % of being “aboriginal” qualifies someone to claim “aboriginal status?

I do not know the answer but if there is a bucket of government money out there for the taking, I bet you anything, the majority of claimants will be genetically “aboriginal” only in “minority”.

Col Rouge: "I guess you are just out of step"

Oh, I don't know about that, old boy. It seems to me that your curmudgeonly opinions are more 'out of step' with others here at OLO than my somewhat more enlightened (not to mention better informed) ideas are. Perhaps it's a matter of perspective.

I note that as a human geneticist you still remain a good bean counter. However, it's good to see that your vituperous nature still seethes waspishly along, rendering you a legend in your own mind.

Sorry to hear about your cardiac problems. I had thought you were immune to such human frailties, given that the prerequisite to that particular disability is the possession of a heart.

Blimey, he's really purging himself now, its not unlike an exorcism.
Someone ask him a question about Thatcher before he falls over, clutching his chest, blue in the face

CJ Morgan “Sorry to hear about your cardiac problems.”

Please do not worry about it, I have lived with it for the past 18 years and will eventually die with it, if not from it.

My uncle suffered Parkinsons disease, as far as being blighted, I would not swap my state of being for his.

“I had thought you were immune to such human frailties, given that the prerequisite to that particular disability is the possession of a heart.”

The truth is, you know far less than your self aggrandizement “more enlightened (not to mention better informed) ideas” support but that comes as no surprise.

I balance and condition the feelings of my heart with the thought processes of my mind but can understand how, by contrast, your healthy heart would out run the functioning of such a feeble mind.

Oh rainier I see you are dribbling again, someone should provide you with a bib, preferably a plastic one with the built in gutter, then you could use the drool for finger painting.