I can't believe we are still here, TWO HUNDRED PLUS YEARS LATER still going on about this.

Time to move on.

All indigenous folk are welcome in my eyes, so long as they contribute, just like myself and my family do and have done for the few generations i can remember.

Reconciliation works both ways.

"Is M, I understand what you are saying. Using European standards there was no empire building in Australia. But what makes those criteria the benchmark for nationhood?

Nationhood is about the collective, the people. They must identify with each other and have a social tenure passed down generationally. Our indigenous have a national pedigree of collectivism that dates back 60,000 years......unbroken, unadulterated...................unlike we Europeans who had 100’s of nations come and go in the past 1000 years."
Posted by sonofgloin,

Nationhood, as we use the term is a European concept therefore European benchmarks must be used for the term, which in this instance was initially used by VfA.
Our indigenous were a big collection of tribes, speaking hundreds of mutually unintelligible languages, often at war with each other, in short a very primitive people who had no sense of any national identity.
Furthermore to speak of 60,000 years of anything more than the barest existence as nationhood is nothing more than wishful thinking.
If you wish to have a bit of experience of the real Aboriginal world then arm yourself wit their weapons and tools and try to live in the bush for a month without any of that inferior European technology.
Pick somewhere in the tropics, it's easier where it's warm and there is plenty of water.

Individual,
Well at some point we have to listen to someone, there aren't really that many Aboriginal activists or pro active sympathisers, we can't be completely cynical about every point of view.
Aboriginals have legal ownership of 20% of the continent but something like 70% of them live in the Eastern cities, there's no case for separatism and "reconciliation" is irrelevant, Aboriginals (being free agents and not mere objects) have made their choices.
Whatever the middle class bleeding hearts are doing they're doing for themselves, it's got nothing to do with reality.

Indy, sorry I was not ignoring you.
Re the numbers, I didn’t comment because it is plausible, I buy it.........but the numbers do not tell the tale. When we discuss infrastructure in these “settlements” we are talking 8 square Housing Commission dwellings along with some community buildings and a patch of bitumen here and there.

I agree with you that startling amounts of money go into the communities......but they still look like third world towns......why? As I said to whoever started this thread the community is lucky to receive one fifth of the tax moneys allocated. When a white board of protection held the purse strings they stole most of it. When the indigenous were given self management, they stole from it.....Indy I agree with your thoughts on Langton and Sutton.

Jay Of Melbourne >> Did you pick up on Peter Sutton's comments on the classical world?.
The point is that's all well and good but those enthusiasts put the costumes away, jump back into their VW Golf and check the messages on their iPhone before driving back to suburbia.
Why would modern Aboriginals think any differently about their culture?<<

Jay they do “think” differently, the settlement communities are still 60,000 years behind the society of VW Golfs and iPhones. They may well possess these things but the society that engenders the technology is alien to many indigenous communities. The only possession these people care about is their history and culture, one alien to Europeans, so we deem it worthless.

The destruction of community infrastructure is common in low socio economic communities, black and white, even the destruction of the government supplied housing. But how do you value material possessions when you know that your society is deemed worthless by the wider society.

Lester,

Failed physics at school did you?

WHITE is the presence of all colour.

Nice try for a diatribe though.

What's your ancestry, no negro blood?

Lester>> Jay nailed it. Like Jay said, the abos have made their choices and reconciliation is irrelevant. If they want their uncivilised, tribal, black nation they can go and invade some island somewhere and set it up , but keep that primitive rubbish OUT of Australia. Australia is a WHITE culture, and if any of the brown skins whether they be abos or Middle East Muslims/terrorists don't like that, they can GET OUT<<

So our indigenous should do what the British did to them.....invade an island........”keep the primitive rubbish out of Australia"
...that’s a laugh .........Lester they were here first. What is apparent is that these Stone Age peoples are dramatically more cultured than you Lester.

Is M>> in short a very primitive people who had no sense of any national identity.<<

Is M, I will tell you what was shared amongst them the “Dreamtime,” they had a collective animist religion, with the same core deities...there were up to a million of them worshiping the same story line. Regarding the myriad of languages, look at Britain...the only reason they all speak English is they had the technology to re educate millions.

Is M>> Furthermore
If you wish to have a bit of experience of the real Aboriginal world then arm yourself wit their weapons and tools and try to live in the bush for a month without any of that inferior European technology.<<

Furthermore is it Is M?........... “arm yourself with their weapons”.... what s that about?.........I am not indigenous, I don’t share their culture, I don’t share their third world living standard...but I do share their struggle for competent management of the States ongoing tax payer support to the communities. Noel Pearson is my Great Black Hope.