Hi Poirot,

The problem - which many people on both sides, I suspect - have exploited, is that without evidence one way or the other of some dreadful atrocity, one cannot say yea or nay. We can suspect, but we can't be conclusive about anything, without some sort of evidence.

Take massacres, for example: we know one occurred at Myall Creek in 1839 in northern NSW - and nine white men were hanged for it. One occurred here in 1840 or 1841, 28 Europeans killed, and two Aboriginal men hanged on the beach on the Coorong for it.

Maybe people were pushed over cliffs all around Australia, and therefore there is no evidence - washed away, all gone. There are a couple of rumoured sites here in SA, at Moonta and Elliston. But how do we know ? How do we know it's not just some boogey-man story used to frighten Aboriginal people into submission ? That sort of thing happened, on Yorke's Peninsula around 1867.

Now that there are Aboriginal archaeologists, they may be persuaded to identify some notorious site and actually do a thorough search of it. That sort of thing is certainly not impossible now.

But without 'proof', evidence, something tangible that stands up to scrutiny, then it's all idle rumours which people are free to believe as they wish. But that's as far as it can go. It's not 'proof'. It's not 'history'. And invariably, in order to believe it, it has to depend on a prior assumption of motive, and usually in these cases, of fundamental white evil. But I don't believe anybody's fundamentally evil, not me, not you.

So I start from there, in my suspension of belief, and look for evidence :)

Love,

Joe

I have actually witnessed history being invented very subtly in my many Years on Cape York.
It is achieved by a community funding some integrity-devoid academic to write history. One was so blatant that even an indigenous academic friend of the academic denounced the writing.

Hi Individual,

That's amazing ! You mean that an Indigenous academic had some integrity ? I think I may need some evidence of such a rare phenomenon :)

We have to be sympathetic towards academics, anthropologists, etc. - they work with particular groups, and become captive to those groups, in the sense that they dare not say anything which puts the group - i.e. the elite, the 'leaders'. the 'elders', of that clique - in a bad light. So they become that group's bitch, sluts for hire. Well, how do you keep a lifelong career in those fields ? So we can't blame them for being sluts. They have to bend data, ignore others, invent some, to keep their careers going.

There is an interesting to-and-fro on this topic on

http://www.linkedin.com/groupAnswers?viewQuestionAndAnswers=&discussionID=251249296&gid=3451857&commentID=146009994&trk=view_disc&ut=0cg9hJBiZlURM1

All great fun !

Loudmouth,
It is my experience that indigenous people are selectively targeted for positions which enables slimebag bureaucrats to manipulate them to end. I see it all the time, some presentable, eel spoken character is picked for a top position to make it look like they attained the position on merit & bingo ! Suddenly all policies & decisions are made & approved by indigenous leaders as is portrayed in some glossy pamphlet & the manipulated & indoctrinated poor sods actually believe it all. Well, why not, after all the money comes with it.
Meanwhile this Labor originated idiocy is costing the rest of us more than we'll ever be able to afford & most of that money goes to ALP govt appointed consultants not even from Australia & is invested outside Australia. Thank you Labor for ruining the future of so many of us.
See at the election!

individual,

This doesn't pertain to you personally, but have you noticed, and it's something that I find strange, is that often the people who trumpet indigenous participation and success in accessing higher learning at places like universities, are the first ones to sling mud at academics and academic learning and practice.

Surely that must be a contradiction in terms.

the first ones to sling mud at academics and academic learning and practice.
Poirot,
I think it is extremely poor character to not speak up against wrong simply because one has benefitted from that wrong. The reason why people do speak up is because they have seen what's going on AFTER they have been exposed to those circles. As the old saying goes it takes one to know one. Without experience one should not remark but sadly too many do.
Some decent indigenous do get a gut full of the manipulation just like I do. Just because they pay you so they can continue the rorts doesn't make the rorts any less.
You say education but I call it indoctrination. Educated people don't say the things you say here quite often.