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The Forum > General Discussion > Talk about racial discrimination upon white Australians

Talk about racial discrimination upon white Australians

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Tonny Abbott today announced he would fund a training scheme for indigenous Australians, whereby their training would be funded and they would be guaranteed a job.

How come we white Austrailains usually have to pay for our training, only to be told, sorry, you have no experience when applying for a mining job.

Talk about racial discrimination, in reverse.
Posted by rehctub, Saturday, 17 August 2013 6:10:29 PM
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this endless apologies and recompense to aborigines is senseless
when will it end?
tony offer $10m and rudd ups the ante to $20m and the wonderful greens top it up to $100m

wrongs were done to them in the past
like treating them like vermin
and taking away their children
such wrong doings must not be repeated
i believe the govt had apologised unreservedly for these past incidents

let us move on

the aborigines were conquered
taken over
that is a fact
wars between countries is a fact of life
wars are fought for all sorts of reasons
religion
ideology
resources
racial

whatever

the victors will have the final say
who is to going to argue with that?

BUT let the victors treat the vanquished with some basic human dignity and rights
we can discuss this in detail later
Let the victors not forget they in turn will be conquered one day
so, do not do to the aborigines and minority what you do not want to be done to your or your family in the future

forget about renaming roads with names too long to even finish reading when you drive past them ...bridges... and thanking this tribe and that tribe for every tv show made

i for one think that these are just farcical.

let us move on
Posted by platypus1900, Saturday, 17 August 2013 7:03:29 PM
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Oh yes indeed, we would all be much better off living the great life that some Indigenous people live, with all this VAST wealth that the Government supposedly gives them.

Their children and babies are far more likely to die before the age of five than any other group, and their elders die much younger too.
They are far less likely to be employed, usually just because they are Indigenous.

I say they need all the help they can get...
Posted by Suseonline, Saturday, 17 August 2013 10:44:22 PM
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Suseonline,

What you say is no excuse for racial discrimination. If their children are sick then they should be treated just like any other sick child, if their elders are ill then they also should be treated just like any other person who is ill. Their is no excuse for singling a group of people out based on racial grouping and giving special treatment, that is simple racist.
The best test of this is to simply ask, would we accept the same treatment given to any other racial group. If you cannot obviously say yes to this, then that treatment should be deemed racist.
Thus would we accept this treatment if it was just given to whites? I think most people would say no. Thus this is clearly racist and should be seen for what it is.
Posted by ozzie, Saturday, 17 August 2013 11:38:04 PM
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Ya know what?

I think this cruddy little mean-spirited thread just about takes the cake.

Who can be bothered with a forum filled almost exclusively with mean-minded, petty, whinging fools.

Nothing better to do than count their pennies and begrudge the downtrodden a crust.

For the most part they're "little men" with petty concerns.

Waste of time coming here these days.
Posted by Poirot, Saturday, 17 August 2013 11:56:21 PM
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Poirot, you have allowed your bias to get the better of you.

If we were talking about pure bred Aborigines, living in slums, then I might be partially agreeable, but, as usual with indigenous affairs, one only needed to have a fraction of aboriginal blood to qualify for these schemes.

This is why it is discrimination.

......Oh yes indeed, we would all be much better off living the great life that some Indigenous people live, with all this VAST wealth that the Government supposedly gives them.
Suz, the reality is that many indigenous chose to live the life they do. Mining has proven that to be true, because if any Aboriginal person was to turn up seeking work in the industry, they have a guaranteed free pass.

They simply choose not to.

....Their children and babies are far more likely to die before the age of five than any other group, and their elders die much younger too.

Again, often by choice as the assistance is there, but, if one chooses to redirect the child's welfare into the bottle shop, that's their choice because after all, you can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink.

.....They are far less likely to be employed, usually just because they are Indigenous.

Crap! Unless of cause they chose to live in some remote area with no transport and no prospect of work.

While on that subject, they (those living in isolation) would be the only group in this country where being out of work, and on life time welfare support is acceptable.

But, as I said earlier, indigenous is the key word, not aboriginal, as to me, an aboriginal is just that, not a half, quarter, eighth, sixteenth, or even a one thirty second version.

After all, this is why the word indigenous is so widely used these days, so these so called aborigines can keep holding on.

Finally, before judging me as racist, just remember, there's racist and there's truth, often separated by a very fine line.
Posted by rehctub, Sunday, 18 August 2013 6:35:59 AM
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Poirot, There are still a few on here with a social conscience, few and far between, but here. Take the platypus1900 post, well yes we did a wrong or two in the past but the government has apologised about those infractions, so lets give it a miss and all's forgiven, plus the poster adds the bad luck line of we win you loose, that's the natural way of things.
The last thing Ozzie wants to be seen as is raciest.
"If their children are sick then they should be treated just like any other sick child, if their elders are ill then they also should be treated just like any other person who is ill. Their is no excuse for singling a group of people out based on racial grouping and giving special treatment, that is simple racist."
Yes Ozzie we give Aboriginal people "special treatment" we have been singling them out for (mostly negative) "special treatment" for over 200 years. The facts are Aboriginal people are socially and economically disadvantaged and have been since 1788, all part of the "special treatment". I wont bore you with facts but a little reading will soon show how well off Aboriginal people are in society.
I see no logic in applying the line "its raciest" when trying to help Aboriginal people in a positive ways through education, health, employment, housing etc, to do nothing is "raciest" in my view.
Posted by Paul1405, Sunday, 18 August 2013 7:03:34 AM
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I hate to say it but I must agree to some extent. I have tacked on a few definitions to back me up. I have absolutely NOTHING against helping out any who need help and nothing against the proposed funding, although I must say I am sick and tired of having to answer "Are you an Aboriginal or Torres Straight Islander?" in government questionnaires. It shouldn't make a difference. If I or someone else should need help and assistance it should not make a difference who or what we are.

dis•crim•i•na•tion
1. The act of discriminating.
2. The ability or power to see or make fine distinctions; discernment.
3. Treatment or consideration based on class or category rather than individual merit; partiality or prejudice: racial discrimination; discrimination against foreigners.

dis•crim•i•na•tion
1. an act or instance of discriminating.
2. action or policies based on prejudice or partiality: racial discrimination.
3. the power of making fine distinctions; discriminating judgment.

ra•cial•ism (rsh-lzm)
1. a. An emphasis on race or racial considerations, as in determining policy or interpreting events.
b. Policy or practice based on racial considerations
Posted by Bec_young mum of 2, Sunday, 18 August 2013 10:50:07 AM
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Where to start ......

Poverty: we lived in an Aboriginal community across the mid-seventies, before going off to uni as mature students. I came back in the early eighties to do some economic development research there and, as a sort of after-thought, did an income study, house by house. I expected, of course, to find dire poverty, since after all, the yards and houses looked pretty shabby. I was appalled to find that the average weekly income at that place was equal to the Australian median weekly income at the time. Basically, only the single unemployed people were living below the poverty line. Hint, hint.

This was so traumatic that I contemplated suicide, but instead I chucked in the study and applied for a taxi licence. My supervisor persuaded me to return, saying that what I had found was pretty general across all communities.

In S.A's North-West, people pay forty dollars or less per week in rent (when they pay it). Money slops around. At one NT community recently, their ATM paid out one hundred thousand dollars over a weekend, three-quarters of which went on grog. So please.

Paul: As for neglect etc., in the nineteenth century, here in SA (I don't know about elsewhere), the Protector sanctioned the appointment of Medical Officers to provide free medical attendance for Aboriginal people, paying around a dozen doctors an annual stipend. For those who needed hospital treatment, free travel by rail or steamer or horse-and-cart was provided to get people to the nearest major Hospital. So the Protector's correspondence would indicate.

I'm not saying it's all, and always been, sweetness and light, but let's recognise what did and didn't happen, let's not just pluck assumptions out of the air.

And as for a 'stolen generation', or the assertion that a higher proportion of Indigenous people were taken into care, for the usual host of reasons, than occurred for non-Indigenous people, prove it. When ? Where they they taken ? Missions ? No, not from the Mission school enrolment figures. The major orphanages ? No, certainly not in Adelaide.

Joe
www.firstsources.info
Posted by Loudmouth, Sunday, 18 August 2013 11:28:16 AM
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I am glad to see Joe enter this debate as I know he has experience in aboriginal living.

Last I heard 90% of people of aboriginal heritage lived in urban situations, so therefore they have the same medical/educational and community facilities that are available to everyone else.

So why is there a discrepancy in health and age of deaths?

The remaining people of aboriginal heritage live in remote areas. So comparisons should be made to those of other heritage, living in remote areas. So is there a discrepancy in health and age of deaths?

If there is a discrepancy, it has to be because of lifestyle.

Do the urban aboriginals seek proper medical help, and live a reasonable lifestyle? Or should we compare them to of other non-aboriginal people that live similar lifestyles? Do the remote aboriginals live the same lifestyle as the non-aboriginal remote living people?

In the past there has simply been a comparison between aboriginal and non-aboriginals in general, which does not give a clear picture and we have just tended to throw money at the issue. Based on race.

Do urban based aboriginals need assistance?

Do not the non-aboriginal remote living people have to relocate for health, work and educational reasons?
Posted by Banjo, Sunday, 18 August 2013 1:01:36 PM
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Loudmouth, "And as for a 'stolen generation', or the assertion that a higher proportion of Indigenous people were taken into care, for the usual host of reasons, than occurred for non-Indigenous people, prove it. When ? Where they they taken ? Missions ? No, not from the Mission school enrolment figures. The major orphanages ? No, certainly not in Adelaide."

Agree.

Whereas there is a wealth of independent evidence of forced adoptions affecting women in the mainstream population. Those who drive the victim industry in Australia are not interested because there is no money in it for them.

http://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/Senate_Committees?url=clac_ctte/completed_inquiries/2010-13/comm_contrib_former_forced_adoption/report/index.htm
Posted by onthebeach, Sunday, 18 August 2013 1:46:38 PM
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Paul 1405,
Not so fast Pal. There is no "We", saying that White Australians are collectively guilty of maltreatment and marginalisation of Aboriginals is racial discrimination, what's more it's a lie. The Commonwealth and only the Commonwealth are responsible for the care of Aborigines, no individual White Australian has ever had legal custody of any Aboriginal person nor any legal right or responsibility to either hold back or to supply them with any material aid.
The state is responsible for meeting the needs of Aboriginals should they need it, just as they are responsible for the welfare of any other Australians in need.
That said, you're not 100% wrong either, see below.

rechtub,
White men are in no way comparable to Aboriginals and your complaint is based on a theory of racial equality, such a belief is insulting to me as a White man and probably deeply offensive to Aboriginal men.
There can be no progress on race relations whatsoever until everyone accepts racial differences and stops trying to close this imaginary gap between White and Indigenous people. There is no "gap", only biological differences, formal equality under the law does not equate to substantive equality in society and it never will.
Aboriginals need special treatment if people want to employ them, they can't be treated just like Whites, if an employer wishes to take Aborigines on good for them but they'll need support and probably subsidies from the state to be able to retain Aboriginal workers.
Posted by Jay Of Melbourne, Sunday, 18 August 2013 3:28:36 PM
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JayoM,

Difference doesn't necessarily mean inequality. The feminists went through this false dilemma (difference = inequality since =equality = sameness) back in the late eighties (cf. Joan Scott).

In fact, equality MUST presuppose diversity and difference, otherwise it would mean nothing but 'sameness' and no two people in the world are the 'same'. And by the way, no two people in the world are utterly, fundamentally 'different', either: we are all of one species, we can inter-marry, but we are all individuals. Even identical twins are often quite different - but two people from completely different 'cultures', backgrounds, histories, places, can be quite similar.

But to get back to topic, across Australia, Aboriginal people since the War have chosen- very broadly speaking - two paths: either to get the hell away from missions and stations and get into the mainstream economy and society, where their children could have better opportunities than they did, OR stay in a welfare-bolstered and -cocooned environment and keep putting their hands out.

So maybe the persistent high-unemployment groups in rural and remote Australia are in a sense, the residual populations from that time when some made the leap and some didn't.

When people rack their brains and furrow their brows about how to get rural and remote Aboriginal people into employment, I'm reminded of that joke about 'How many psychologists does it take to change a light-bulb ? X, but the light-bulb has to want to change first.'

Twiggy Forrest's project has accrued more than fifty thousand committed jobs for Aboriginal people. Far fewer people have come forward to grab those jobs. That alone has exposed the sham of Aboriginal unemployment in one fell swoop.

I certainly wish Warren Mundine well in his push for community employment programs, etc., because the resources that many communities have already make such schemes eminently viable, but I get this deja vu feeling of Groundhog Day all over again. What's the bet that someone will come up with yet another excuse why people can't get into work ?

Joe
www.firstsources.info

[TBC]
Posted by Loudmouth, Sunday, 18 August 2013 4:04:01 PM
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[continued]

Ten years ago, my wife and I stayed at the community where she was born, trying to encourage people there to enrol in serious study and set up a Study Centre there, in a community with 12,000 acres of good land, a brand-new dairy (run by her brother), and equipment and plant galore.

We used to joke (or maybe it was just me) that if a thousand Vietnamese took over this place, they would have the lot under cultivation, or fitted out with fish-farms, orchards, etc., within a year. Probably a bit racist, but there you go.

Three years later, not a single new job had been actually created: the Council and CDEP people there congratulated themselves at their AGM that they still had almost everyone on CDEP (= unemployment benefits) as they had had, the year before.

My brother-in-law had trouble getting any of the young blokes out to work at 5.00 in the morning in the dairy, so eventually it was just me and him, a couple of middle-aged graduates.

So employment schemes ? Cut the welfare schemes first and see how that goes.

Joe
www.firstsources.info
Posted by Loudmouth, Sunday, 18 August 2013 4:06:16 PM
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My point is, why do the indigenous get a guaranteed job, while we do the training, only to be often told, sorry, you don't have enough experience.

This is where the discrimination comes into it.
Posted by rehctub, Monday, 19 August 2013 6:49:56 AM
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finally platypus1900 has said something that makes sense although I can't see the reason why I should contribute one dollar to their welfare while the offer hate in return.
Posted by chrisgaff1000, Monday, 19 August 2013 3:52:06 PM
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Poirot
So you think a black man deserves what I have worked for and fought three wars for just because he is black [or part thereof]. Let them rot in their own bigoted racial ingratitude.
Posted by chrisgaff1000, Monday, 19 August 2013 3:55:59 PM
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" Let them rot in their own bigoted racial ingratitude."

Got that - Mr Superior White Man.
Posted by Poirot, Monday, 19 August 2013 4:44:31 PM
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Poirot,
Maybe you missed something somewhere but the white man us superior in every physical, intellectual and psychological way.
Posted by chrisgaff1000, Monday, 19 August 2013 5:00:18 PM
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@chrisgaff1000
That is just discusting. The only thing that makes a man or woman a lesser person then anyone else is if they let rubbish like that out into the world. It is a persons actions that make them good or bad, more or less, not their color, religion or country of origin. For example Hitlar wasn't considered a bad person because he was Polish, but because he was a racist, sadistic horrible dictator.
Posted by Bec_young mum of 2, Monday, 19 August 2013 11:03:22 PM
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Hi Bec,

Yes, you're right, that "It is a person's actions that make them good or bad, more or less, not their color, religion or country of origin."

And neither does anybody carry any guilt from the supposed evils that their ancestors are supposed to have perpetrated. That was then, this is now, as they say.

But Poles may dispute your assertion: that particular person was Austrian, and his attachment to Poland was by way of invasion, rather than birth. Sunday week will be the 74th anniversary of that 'attachment'.

Nobody is born good or bad, as you suggest, by virtue of their color or 'race', although they may become 'bad' by virtue of their religion or ideology. Your point is, if I may interpret it, that nobody is born good or bad, stupid or bright, racist/sexist or otherwise - it depends on how they are raised, and how they interpret the world as they grow up.

So our responsibility to the next generations is to be as honest as possible, to encourage them to see the beauty and goodness around them in all people, and not to be too quick to label. But also not to be taken in by victim-stories, but to expect that everybody can, and should, contribute more or less equally.

Yes, it's a pretty fine wire we all have to walk on :)

Joe
www.firstsources.info
Posted by Loudmouth, Monday, 19 August 2013 11:53:29 PM
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I don't know how the lefties live with themselves.
Half the time their beating us over the head with "There's no such thing as race/Discrimination is evil".
Then they turn around and want special programs and constitutional recognition for a *racial* group!

Banjo, is right. Most Aborigines live in the same cities/towns as everyone else, so are hardly deprived of necessary public facilities.
There are schools, but do they attend? Do they study?
There are hospitals and bulk-billing doctors. Do they seek treatment?

Those in remote areas are choosing to live where few facilities could ever be offered.
That is *their* choice.
You have to live with the consequences of your own choices, and most of the bad stuff happening to Aborigines *today* is their own responsibility.

No amount of money can help people bent on self-destruction.
Look at all those rock stars and Hollywood actors who've drunk or drugged themselves to death, despite having millions in the bank.
Posted by Shockadelic, Tuesday, 20 August 2013 5:36:50 AM
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chrisgaff1000, with all your individualism, no compassion for anyone else, I see why "fought three wars" must be shell-shocked. Why would you go off and fight to protect the interests of some money bagged capitalist.
Posted by Paul1405, Tuesday, 20 August 2013 7:36:40 AM
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Paul1405
Without capitalism,conservatism and individualism mate you would be starving. Who the hell do you think pays your wages or your social security? The socialists?, The Greens, The unionists? No pal the money bagged capitalists of this world.
Who do you think volunteered to protect your right to these privileges? The socialists?, The Greens, The unionists? No pal check out your local RSL next ANZAC Day and you might learn something or perhaps you think they did it for the pay and the fun.
Posted by chrisgaff1000, Tuesday, 20 August 2013 8:23:53 AM
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Loudmouth, Thank you very much for that correction! That just goes to show I shouldn't try to be smart right before bed! Thank you thank you thank you. The worst part about that is that I know that, horrible slip of the mind.
Posted by Bec_young mum of 2, Tuesday, 20 August 2013 8:38:01 AM
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Chrisgaff,

"Who the hell do you think pays your wages or your social security? The socialists?, The Greens, The unionists? No pal the money bagged capitalists of this world."

I think you'll find that it's the common indentured worker who funds all these goodies....and it's the money bag capitalist kings who got themselves nicely bailed out during the GFC by worker's taxes.

Not to mention Georgie Bush and Co funnelling taxpayers money into his wars and over to private "contractors" to hold up the circus tent.
Posted by Poirot, Tuesday, 20 August 2013 8:53:45 AM
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Joe,
Notice you did not mention culture that is handed down to each generation, in your last post. Not all cultural aspects are good, like we generally seem to have developed a binge drinking culture in our youth which does not have good results.

I would like to see your comments on the points I raised in my first post here.
Posted by Banjo, Tuesday, 20 August 2013 9:11:39 AM
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Hi Bec, yes, we all have those :)

Banjo, I don't carry any torch for 'culture', which seems to reflect the power-structure within a group, which usually means, male dominance, cloaked (after all, that's what 'culture' does) in obscurity, but there nevertheless.

' Cultures' change, usually with pressure from social and economic changes. Nick Cater writes very intelligently about the current transformation of what used to be called working-class culture, especially as they have occurred in Australia over the last fifty years.

So it has been for Aboriginal people across Australia - since the War, a massive shift from rural to urban environments, with roughly a quarter left behind (usually by choice) in rural and remote areas.

University participation is now around 65 - 70 % of that of non-Aboriginal Australians', about what on would expect from a class-oriented analysis. In fact, Indigenous women are commencing university study at a slightly higher rate than that of NON-Indigenous Australian men.

From barely three thousand university graduates back in 1990, there are now more than thirty three thousand Indigenous university graduates. Not too many victims there.

The great majority of Indigenous people are standing up and getting on with life. They may not forget the past, but they are not letting it hold them back either.

Joe
www.firstsources.info
Posted by Loudmouth, Tuesday, 20 August 2013 9:35:30 AM
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And who paid for their education...Not them.. the taxpayer did and still does and they suck it up like ink on a blotter.
Can't you see that the Australian taxpayer is funding the very force that wants to destroy the hand that feeds them.
Most of these people are quarter and eighth caste with plenty just a splash of aboriginal heritage but they still claim the full rights of the full bloods.
We need to have a measure of blood to filter the hanger ons out
Posted by chrisgaff1000, Tuesday, 20 August 2013 6:20:56 PM
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Hi Chris,

Any Australian who goes to university is funded, to one extent or another, by the taxpayer. Then, if they get a job, they pay it back in tax. I have no quarrels whatsoever with that.

The argument about part-this or -that has been around since the very earliest days. These days it may be getting a bit tenuous, and perhaps, as Noel Pearson and others have suggested, provision of services should be on the basis of need, not 'race' or place or culture or anything else.

Neither should such provision be endless, serial, going on forever on the grounds that the recipient is, after all, a victim.

So yes, services should be provided for all who need them, without any discrimination, and on the basis that they are not infinite, and that recipients owe society back. No free rides.

Joe
www.firstsources.info
Posted by Loudmouth, Tuesday, 20 August 2013 6:45:20 PM
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Loudmouth
I beg to differ. Over five billion dollars in Hecs (now Help) loans are outstanding and will never be recovered. They are interest free and only repayable when a certain level of income is reached. The problem is that like Ian Thorpe most professional have tax schemes in place like family trusts that maintain their income below the recovery level or the never reach them.
It cost my Grandmother $120,000 for my sisters degree in OT and $100,000 for mine in Commerce/Law. The was no Hecs then and I personally believe that only those who can afford higher education should have it. They seem to appreciate it more than the free loaders who seek to destroy the society that supports them.
As far as Noel Pearson is concerned I can assure you he is just as much a social parasite and any other of his culture.
I had the misfortune to actually write the protocols for a program called the "The Peninsular Partnership" only to have him pass the implementation over to his brother Gerhardt who called it Balkanu Cape York Development Corporation and ignored me the author.
The Pearson's are nothing more than white trained white haters
basking in the limelight of white mans sophistication.
Posted by chrisgaff1000, Tuesday, 20 August 2013 8:18:41 PM
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Joe,
If you discount cultural factors then what do you see as the cause of the difference in aboriginal health and age of deaths.

Do you think that aboriginals living in urban areas continue to require special benefits simply because they are aboriginal. Then what about the non-aboriginals that live in remote areas. Should they get special benefits as do aboriginals in the same areas.

we all saw the NT report of 'little children are angels' and was horrorfied. There were also disclosures by the crown prosecutor at Alice Springs and cases like this in the link below. Regularly we see TV reports and footage of drunken behaviour and communities that look like garbage dumps and kids with all sorts of infections and not going to school.

All the above must have an impact on health and life expectancy.

Why is it that many aboriginals do not seem able to integrate into our society?

http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/opinion/official-heads-in-the-sand-over-depravity-and-dysfunction/story-fni0cwl5-1226699499138
Posted by Banjo, Tuesday, 20 August 2013 8:34:27 PM
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Hi Banjo,

If you think of any population as differentiated by class and by aspirations, then the Aboriginal population is not all that different from any other - perhaps a higher proportion who want to stay on welfare and away from opportunity and work, hence a higher proportion of Aboriginal people living in rural and remote areas, from which the more enterprising have got up and gone a long time ago.

But we may have reached a stage when, yes, Aboriginal people in the cities don't need any more benefits than anybody else gets. This may have occurred, not through any deliberate government policy (which very rarely happens), but simply through sheer social change over the past two or three generations since the War, mainly through the social changes of moving to the cities, accessing far better educational and work opportunities, mixing with other working people, and building self-reliance generation by generation.

Hence, a massive increase in the number of Aboriginal kids finishing Year 12 since about 1999-2000. Hence a massive (50 %) increase in enrolments in degree-level courses at unis in the past six years.

Many Aboriginal people, in rural and remote areas, have missed the boat. Many owe that circumstance to their own choices, to avoid study, to avoid work. They made choices. In my view, they chose wrong and they and their kids are paying for it. They frittered away a vast range of opportunities, in community self-management, in developing an economic base, in corrupting program after program, like CDEP. They could have been on a pig's back, but no, that's all buggered now.

Now they will have to put up with the consequences of their own choices, in very different condition, over the next ten an twenty years. Pity the children.

Meanwhile, in the cities, another population is rapidly moving ahead.

Joe
www.firstsources.info
Posted by Loudmouth, Tuesday, 20 August 2013 11:04:43 PM
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Banjo, when Indigenous Australians are born and live as long as other Australians, and have the same employment opportunities, and the same living standards as other Australians...then we can can start treating them the same as other Australians

As it is now...they aren't the same, are they?.
Posted by Suseonline, Wednesday, 21 August 2013 1:47:25 AM
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Suseonline, what a pointless "contribution".
Have you even read the thread so far?

Having "the same" opportunities and facilities available doesn't mean you'll ever get statistically equal outcomes.

This is a commonly used red herring of the Left (e.g. comparing average annual incomes of men and women, ignoring the differences in industries, hours, etc.)

"Whitey" is not making Aborigines live in remote areas, take drugs, drink a carton every day, bash their wives, commit crimes at a higher rate then the general community, etc.

Nobody is imposing this, these are choices Aborigines are making.
No amount of money will stop this.
Money can't buy self-respect.

People like you simply perpetuate the notion that it's all Whitey's fault and therefore Whitey's responsibility to fix everything.
That attitude won't solve anything.
They have to fix their own lives.
Posted by Shockadelic, Wednesday, 21 August 2013 2:57:46 AM
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Susie,
If 75% of people with aboriginal heritage live in urban areas, they have the same opportunities as any other people and therefore do not require any special assistance. Accordingly their health and life expectancy would be the same as the general population.

I take heart from Joes info that more and more aboriginals are becoming better educated and thus into better paid jobs. That is good.

So what about the other 25% that live in rural and remote areas.

Doctors, nurses and teachers must despair when they work in the remote communities, and I have no doubt they do the best they can.

This is the group we need to focus on. It has to be that efforts are put into where the most need is and not approach it from the point of view of 'race'.
Posted by Banjo, Wednesday, 21 August 2013 8:08:41 AM
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Banjo, whether they live in cities or rural areas doesn't matter.
They are still disadvantaged.
So obviously something needs to change.

I am not saying anyone is to blame, just that whatever is happening now is not working.
I am one of those nurses who has worked both in rural and urban Aboriginal communities, so I have seen how it really is...
Posted by Suseonline, Wednesday, 21 August 2013 8:38:44 AM
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Suseonline.
I have policed in most of the communities north of Cairns and I have also seen what you call disentanglement. Until they get up off their arses and contribute to the social equation they will remain disadvantaged.
They get the same disposable income as any other social security recipient and in their multi family home structures from Grand parents down to babies born to babies there is a huge amount of disposable income available.
Most of it is spent on grog and grass.
Posted by chrisgaff1000, Wednesday, 21 August 2013 8:51:41 AM
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Suseonline could you please explain how Aboriginals are disadvantaged? What advantages do you and I have access to but Aboriginals do not?
Posted by Bec_young mum of 2, Wednesday, 21 August 2013 4:02:54 PM
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Sure Bec....if you or I went for a job, we might have a chance of getting it, but just by looking Aboriginal , they won't.
Some families haven't had a real job or education for several generations, so they don't know how to hope any more.

They are considered thieves or thugs before they do anything wrong in shopping centers etc. how many times can they be shunned before they fight back?
Their culture is one of sharing...so if they have money, they give it to others.

Their children and elders die much younger and European introduced diseases like diabetes affect them at much greater rates than the rest of the community.
Need I go on?

I don't know the answers Bec, I just know we can't go on as it is now.
Posted by Suseonline, Wednesday, 21 August 2013 8:11:29 PM
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Suseonline,
Most of them won't work because they can't work. The don't know how and they don't want to learn. Working is not in their genetic makeup. They come from a 'hunter/gatherer' tribal makeup. They wandered the land, ate an area out and moved on to the next. Don't believe that 21st century created culture the 'smarties' are throwing up as being a reason for their existence
Their are thieves and thugs and encouraged by their families and peers to hunt the white man. Sure we ruined their patch, took away their lifestyle and introduced them to the evils of our society but that was because they were a conquered race in complete disarray as far as an economic future in a moderns society was concerned.
The men hunt whites at night and the girls start having babies at 12/13 for the cash handouts we give them.
They live for the drugs, grog and sex that their lifestyle affords them and we condone.
One thing you are right about and that is that it can't keep going on.
We have to stop the clock. Strip away the layers of social security and support and really take stock. If they want the benefits of white society then work for it otherwise go back to the bush and see how long they can survive.
Come and live where I live and see for yourself. They are laying around everywhere. Drunk, drugged, abusive and abrasive in the streets and gardens of this town.
Sure there plenty of their culture living off their woes and the government cash that they manage to secure in grants and program funding but after they have got themselves a new 4x4 and a residence in the best part of town there is not much left to help their fellow man.
I could go on all night but that is pointless just go look for yourself.
Posted by chrisgaff1000, Wednesday, 21 August 2013 10:26:56 PM
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Chris,

Around 60 or 70 % of Indigenous people have moved to the cities and are in mainstream education or employment. More than 33,000 have graduated from universities -about one in every nine adults, one in every six women. Indigenous women are commencing university study at a slightly greater rate than NON-Indigenous Australian men. Urban, working Indigenous stats are not that different from those of other Australians.

The drop-kick population is not all that significant, 30-40 % of the total. It tends to have such dreadful rates of poor health, high incarceration etc., that it knocks the daylights out of the overall Indigenous statistics. But it's a minority, mainly in rural and remote areas, mainly male-dominated. So we know its characteristics - it's not 'Indigenous people' overall.

So culture, race, inheritance etc., don't really count for much. Sure, family culture, the passing-down from generation to generation of drop-kick culture, can be clearly seen in genealogies, but there is always a proportion which escapes and gets into mainstream education and employment. And they're who we have to place our expectations in. It's the dropkicks, the bludgers, the loafers, the skivers, who we have to focus policy on (and their kids), not the entire population.

Joe
Posted by Loudmouth, Wednesday, 21 August 2013 10:48:46 PM
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Suseonline, Depends where they go looking for work, a lot of the mines have programs set up for untrained Indigenous people, there are a lot of health groups and aid organisations offering funding to the Indigenous so they can work within their own community's, a lot of stations find Aboriginals to be very good stockmen, not only that I think you are been a little harsh on the population over all. There are laws that protect people from racial discrimination, I am not however that naïve that I think it doesn't happen. It also happens to a lot of other ethnic, Asian and even Caucasian groups.
I can only say that when I see an Aboriginal in a shopping mall I see them as just another person, I can see your point, but again I think you are selling a lot of people short. (I hope!)
I don't see how coming from a culture that cares and shares with each other is a disadvantage. I think we have something to learn from that.
As to the mortality rates and statistical age at death, I wonder if that is because some of them refused to be force fed and kept alive in Nursing homes until they forget who they are and where they come from? Getting some of the more remote and reserved groups to accept health care seems to be a problem, if they wish to live as they are who are we to say Nay? If however there are groups or individuals that need and what help then by all means we should help, any way we can! Not because they are Indigenous but because they are human.
I think what I am trying to say is that if ANYONE should need help they should be able to get it, why should it make a difference who they are?
Posted by Bec_young mum of 2, Wednesday, 21 August 2013 11:09:35 PM
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Joe, (Loudmouth)
Thank you for your inputs, I have found them very informative.
Your point about minority's is a good one, minority's bringing down the group. Don't we see that just about everywhere these days! I suppose we have to find a balance of allowing them to make choices for themselves and making sure that innocents or people wanting to remove themselves from those choices aren't held back. I think we could focus policy's on a lot of "drop kicks" and their future generations, of all backgrounds. I can see however that 36% of Indigenous Australians are under the age of 15. So it does make sense to focus on that middle aged generation now to try and get a change for the better made now. Your point that there are a higher rate of female Indigenous Australians attending University then Non Indigenous males in my opinion show that the funding been offered for Indigenous Australians is a little unfair. Maybe it could be changed to remote and rural Australians? Or all Australians that are showing "Drop Kick" status on their parents Centrelink records.
Posted by Bec_young mum of 2, Wednesday, 21 August 2013 11:28:42 PM
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Thank you Bec,

I don't think that Government policy makes all that much difference to things like university participation, it's much more fluid, more a matter of social change over a generation or more, and the resultant expansion of choice, and Indigenous women have been, up to now, always more likely to choose university study, and at more rigorous levels, than men, that's simply how it's been.

On the other hand, a relatively higher proportion of Indigenous men go on to post-graduate study. Make what you like of that.

In a sense, there seem to be three Indigenous populations emerging - a persistent class of unemployed/unemployable, welfare-oriented people, mainly in rural and remote areas; a growing middle-class of working, educated people; and an elite upper-middle class, almost invariably employed on public funds, in bureaucracies, universities, government departments and organisations.

Whether or not there is some sort of parasitic relationship between the welfare-oriented population and the bureaucratic population, covering for each other under the rubrics of 'consultation' and 'self-determination', I couldn't possibly comment.

Joe
www.firstsources.info
Posted by Loudmouth, Thursday, 22 August 2013 12:17:15 AM
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Susie has not answered Bec's question regarding exactly what advantages white Australians have over Aboriginals. Susie has mostly given examples of different outcomes, but not differences of opportunity or advantage.
Not everyone with the same opportunity attains the same outcome. Many children from the same family given essentially the same oppotunities don't attain the same degree of success.
Susie gives the very vague example of applying for a job, yet I know of no examples of a white officially being given preference over an Aborigine. Yet there are clear examples of the opposite as mentioned above. Andrew Forrest has a scheme to give racial prefernce to Aborigines (yes you can be as racist as you like as long as the person being discriminated against is white).
Susie talks about them being labelled as thugs and thieves but maybe that is from experience. The only time my wife was ever robbed was by a group of Aboringines in a shopping mall. So maybe there is good reason they are labelled such. The crime stats also point out the much higher rate of aboringinal crime. Anyway this is not an example of disadvantage of opportunity.
Susuie also points out diabetes as a European introduced disease. As far as I know that is totally false.
Susie has failed to give examples of advantage given to whites but not aborigines
Posted by ozzie, Thursday, 22 August 2013 12:36:43 PM
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Loudmouth,
I feel you have fallen for the political spin. The ones you talk about who "have come to the cities" are not indigenous caste aboriginals. They are Octoroons, Quadroons and quintroons who feed on the indigenous hand outs. In many case thay are more white then you and I.
Half the population of indigenous here where i live come here because we stopped the grog in their communities.
Those that are studying are the castes that have the benefit of white genes in their breeding. They take the best of both worlds.
Mate you need to come with me to communities where sticking a star picket with barb wire attached through the stomach of your neighbors pregnant 13 year old daughter is not only considered appropriate for "payback" but is seen as cultural behavior by the authorities.
Come and see the three Flying Doctor planes lined up on the airstrip waiting for the causalities that flow from the weekly tolerated street war outside the council chambers between 7 mutually hatting clans.
Mate you have been conned.
Posted by chrisgaff1000, Thursday, 22 August 2013 3:20:09 PM
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Chris,

And don't you think that many people would want to get the hell away from those communities, where someone can be stabbed in the guts or beaten to death with a star picket ? Isn't it their right to get away and into the cities ?

And no, in my working experience, Aboriginal people in the cities don't necessarily get any more than other people, they don't all put their hand out.

Joe
www.firstsources.info
Posted by Loudmouth, Thursday, 22 August 2013 4:03:07 PM
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Government policy now recognizes and celebrates our cultural diversity. It accepts and respects the right of all Australians to express and share their individual cultural heritage within an overriding commitment to Australia and the basic structures and values of Australian democracy. It makes our administrative, social and <a href="https://personalmoneynetwork.com/">economic</a> infrastructure more responsive to the rights, obligations and needs of our culturally diverse population, promote social harmony in our society and optimize the economic and social benefits of our cultural diversity for all Australians.
Posted by Marth, Monday, 9 September 2013 6:27:13 PM
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Thank you, Marth,

But with respect, what you write sounds like it's looking down at Australia from a very great height, an eagle's view if you like, while the real, day-to-day work goes on, on the ground.

Generation One and Twiggy Forrest's projects identify what companies can commit jobs and earmark them for Indigenous people, AND then identify Indigenous people to take up those jobs, or to do the specific training to do those jobs, and then take them up. At any time, close to fifteen thousand Indigenous people are now at Universities - perhaps 120,000 have been to university at some time. 33,000 have graduated. Yes, things are moving.

Come down to Earth - it's much more exciting than way up there :)

Cheers,

Joe
Posted by Loudmouth, Monday, 9 September 2013 6:41:02 PM
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You keep referring to these people as indigenous. I fear you mean Australians with a percentage of indigenous blood in their veins which greatly improves their capacity to absorb and retain information, an asset well directed at higher education.
Please do not call them indigenous the4y are generational aborigines reaping the benefits of a white society guilt complex.
This e4ducation will come back to bite us in the bum mark my words.
Posted by chrisgaff1000, Monday, 9 September 2013 7:39:27 PM
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Hi Chris,

The older I get, the less I understand what people are trying to say. So I don't get what you are writing.

I don't think anybody, any group, has any particular ability to 'absorb and retain information', any more than any other group. And certainly not material in contemporary higher education. Neither has any group any lesser ability, I hasten to add.

I don't know what you mean by 'generational aborigines', but certainly there is a lot of trading on supposed white guilt. I've been working on old letters and documents from the nineteenth century, and it it pretty clear, for example that people weren't 'herded onto missions', at least in South Australia, and maybe everywhere else too: my position is that unless something can be shown to have happened, it didn't happen. If it did, prove it.

Today, I was just reading about one bloke expelled from one mission and another who desperately wanted to find work and accommodation on another mission, and a couple wanting to move from one mission to another. All from about 1872.

I don't think that people were 'driven from their lands', at least not in South Australia. Able-bodied people were expected to 'occupy and enjoy', to make use of their lands, to live off the 'natural foods' of their country as they had done for fifty thousand years, and for this purpose were given boas, fishing gear and guns.

I don't think that 'countless thousands of children were taken from their parents', at least not in South Australia. There's really not the slightest evidence of this.

I'm not convinced that Aboriginal people were paid less, taking rations for old people and families into account - at least, not in south Australia.

I'm not convinced any more that many massacres occurred, at least not in South Australia. Apart from some Aboriginal massacres of whites, on the Coorong and around Port Lincoln.

[TBC]
Posted by Loudmouth, Monday, 9 September 2013 8:55:07 PM
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[congtinued]

One crime that I think was committed against Aboriginal people was, from about 1908, to dumb down the education system, so that nobody could finish primary schooling and go on to secondary and higher education until the fifties and beyond - at least, on South Australia. Ghat would have condemned people to remain in rural employment, on lousy pay, and cut out - and their children - from better sorts of employment, and from working in the cities. It would have led to relatively higher levels of economic destitution -and hence children being taken into care - and far less employment opportunities for women. Hence the long struggle, two or three generations, to get back into the game.

And yes, to come back to the present, I would assert that many non-Aboriginal people have pushed themselves forward and claimed many of the benefits earmarked for Aboriginal people. But that's white fellas for you. Is that what you are getting at ?

Cheers,

Joe
Posted by Loudmouth, Monday, 9 September 2013 8:59:07 PM
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Marth "Government policy now recognizes and celebrates our cultural diversity. It accepts and respects the right of all Australians to express and share their individual cultural heritage"

Australians already had the right to express themselves and live any way they want within the law.

It's called "liberty", a fundamental concept within the modern Western world.
No need for special policies.

The government should be defending our liberty, not impinging on it with ridiculous laws like anti-discrimination/vilification.

Citizens should be free to associate or *not* associate with other people as each sees fit, and should be able to express negative/critical opinions about anyone.
Posted by Shockadelic, Tuesday, 10 September 2013 12:44:20 AM
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Shockadelic,

Yes, that's one reason I'm very worried about changing the Constitution to recognise any particular cultural assemblage, especially if it mandates a separate and different education imposed on Indigenous people, and if it shuts people out from standard education.

Yes, it might be great for the careers of a few academics and teachers, but we only have to look at the mess that education for indigenous people is in, in remote areas, particularly in relation to what language education is taught in, to realise what a disaster that would be.

I certainly hope that no restrictions are ever again placed on Indigenous people to choose what school, and what sort of curriculum, and in what language, they wish.

Here in Adelaide, a separate Aboriginal School was set up in 1985, supposedly to provide a better way for Aboriginal kids to finish secondary school successfully, but I don't know that any Aboriginal student has done all their schooling there AND completed Year 12. I think it was yet another scam. I hope I'm wrong, because there have been some good people working there.

Standard, mainstream schooling, on the other hand, seems to work as well for Aboriginal kids as for anybody else. Leave it alone.

Joe
Posted by Loudmouth, Tuesday, 10 September 2013 9:23:15 AM
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