As always, it strikes me that as a political ideas man, whistler makes an excellent artist.

As Cornflower said, Aboriginal communities, whether in the backblocks of WA or in the heart of our cities, are the most dysfunctional in our nation. It is those communities, more than any other, that cause the national rate of child abuse, neglect, sexual abuse, and violence to be as high as it is. According to the ABS, an Aboriginal child is 6 times as likely to be harmed as a non-Aboriginal. I do not regard that as a condition worth aspiring to.

One of the reasons for having men's business and women's business in aboriginal communities is that many of these communities have essentially been two in one. Women performed one set of tasks and men performed another. It was a specialisation based on gender and just as occurred in the West, specialisation involves some separation and some self-regulation.

European and Asian societies developed guild-driven self-regulation to a high state. It remains important today, with many professions being run by guilds, especially Medicine and Law. The trade unions evolved because of the lack of guilds for unskilled or semi-skilled workers. The Masons started as a guild and woe betide anyone who tried to tell a Mason how to behave.

European society, however, never developed guilds based on female labour AFAIK until the unions came along. The female-dominated unions are now the most powerful of all, but they are not gender-exclusive, merely reflecting the gender balance within the specific trade, such as nursing or teaching.

It seems to me that whistler simply doesn't much like blokes and that he has been kindly treated by Aboriginal women.

Severin, I maintain Banks is the best writer of English fiction today. The sheer breadth of his output, from Feersum Enjin to the Wasp Factory to the Culture series is staggering. His use of vernacular, character sketches and his willingness to experiment with prose forms is quite simply masterful.

I'm sure knowing that Antiseptic is a fan will ruin the experience for you...

I admit my knowledge of the law is
limited to say the least, however the
problem that I see is if we start getting
into gender specific legislation, that is,
if the ball starts rolling - it won't stop.

If we're to consider separate legislation for
women then we should in all fairness consider
separate legislation for gays, ethnic, and
religious groups.

There will be an outcry or demand by these and
various groups for their specific individual interest
legislation.

I really can't see us wanting to open up this sort
of Pandora's box.

Severin

Suffice it to say that Aboriginals who have made the transition by education to the 'burbs and the middle class have rejoiced in having some excuse to curtail the tradition of longrassers (so-called kin) dropping in to stay with them and their families. That is how a lot of the violence especially sexual assaults of children occur.

There is a lot of Disney style myth around and all it does is ensure that the cries for help from young mothers, children and youth go unheard and unheeded.

Cornflower, i would argue that what you've seen is a consequence of the imposition of european law.

Cornflower, Severin, unlike european patriarchies, what happens with adolescent girls in the Aboriginal tradition is entirely dependent upon what Aboriginal women with autonomous authority allow to happen to adolescent girls.
a father's advice about the loss off virginity, for instance, is considered on an equal footing with a mother's and her aunties and the experience they bring to bear, not accompanied with the status of head of a household in which a mother's advice is considered only in private, and can be overruled in any event.
marital arrangements in communities where men boss over women differ from those in which women and men are their own bosses.

Severin, Aboriginal culture is very much what it used to be as Tom Calma's congress, with the endorsement of the Australian government, will demonstrate.
the ecology has changed, as it has over millennia, albeit more rapidly with the arrival of europeans, but the infrastructure is still there, and as the essential expression of the human condition, always will be.
the failure of government to recognise decision-making conducted by agreement between women's and men's committees is precisely the reason for the breakdown in communication with Aboriginal communities directly responsible for the squandering of billions of dollars on attempts at advancement, as well as indifference to the cries for help from young mothers, children and youth.

Antiseptic, in the quest for dysfunction no civilization has done more damage to both the planet and its people than the patriarchies of european civilization, with reparation impossibly beyond its means.
its so drop dead obvious its not even a competition.

Foxy. there is no gender specific legislation just as there is no House of Representatives specific legislation or Senate specific legislation.
legislation is enacted by agreement between both, of which there isn't a great deal at the moment as men lock themselves in a legislative standoff of their own making.
gays, ethnic, and religious groups are comprised of women and men equitably represented in women's and men's legislatures.

whistler I'd like to add my thanks for the response. I'm rather tied up with other tasks today so I won't try and do a serious post here today.

R0bert

Whistler <" Cornflower, i would argue that what you've seen is a consequence of the imposition of european law."

Does it really matter, at this late stage, whether the current living conditions and relationships between Aboriginal people today have been "... a consequence of the imposition of European law?

Many Australian Aboriginal people, with women and children in particular, have a very poor lifestyle and a shorter lifespan than all other ethnic groups in Australia. We have to work on fixing the current problems, regardless of what happened 200 years ago.

As far as I am concerned, if we are using the example of the separate
men's and women's groups of the Aboriginal culture as something we should be aspiring to, then I don't like the idea!

Whistler, you say you lived amongst the Aboriginal people at one time?
I wonder would a Caucasian woman of the same age, putting herself through the same experience as you, have a similar conclusion as to the benefits of the Aboriginal way of government and lawmaking?
I very much doubt it.

I believe we currently have a men's legislature, and that hasn't been very successful. How about just having a women's legislature by itself? Couldn't do any worse really, could it?