I wish I had a dollar for every time these words (or similar words to the same effect) have been posted -

Dear __ _ _ _ _ _ _ ,

The following two websites may clarify things
for you:

Foxy

Hi Paul,

You put your finger on the key issue:

"Like these people our indigenous are no different, they can, and do, achieve much for themselves through their own efforts, combined with a helping hand from the rest of Australia. It is a long row to hoe but I am optimistic that we will get there some day."

Yes, exactly, more or less. I used to rave about self-determination and what could be done in communities and a friend, more sensible than me, used to say, "Yes, just add the miracle ingredient - effort."

But since 1990, around 120,000 Indigenous people have enrolled at universities. Nearly forty thousand have graduated - that's one in every six women aged 25 to 50, one in every twelve men. In the cities, the proportion would be much better. Yes, people are making the effort.

Meanwhile, out in rural and remote communities, I'm sure there are some people trying to make an effort. But strangely, across Australia you would be hard-pressed to find a single vegetable garden or orchard in any Aboriginal community - and yes, they do have running water. How much effort would that take ? So, instead, we have grandiose schemes with little Aboriginal labour input such as the Uluru tourist resort, now costing hundreds of millions. Land rights seems to have turned into merely a vehicle to gain mineral royalties while people sit around, although I would be happy if someone could prove me wrong.

Effort - the miracle ingredient !

Joe

Paul1405 wrote; "I also strongly believe, and I have seen this myself, there is an imperative for indigenous people to maintain their customs, traditions and language, fostered through strong community involvement."

Dear Paul1405,

The only way in which indigenous people can maintain their customs, traditions and language, fostered through strong community involvement is by isolation from the rest of Australian society. I would not want that, and I doubt that many indigenous people want that. A balance has to be struck between giving the indigenous people the opportunities open to any Australian and the choice to keep what traditions of their own they want to keep. This is the same balance that any group not in the mainstream of Australian society has.

As time goes by members of minority groups change the rest of Australian society and are changed by the rest of Australian society.

Indigenous people should have the same choices available to them that other Australians have. This is not compatible with their interactions confined to those of their own community.

Dear ConservativeHippie,

Don't be jealous.

You obviously don't know how to Google.

However, you can go into your local library
and be taught how to research the evidence
and facts of any issue. Then you too will be
able to present them on this forum. And if its dollars
you're after - acquiring some skills may help.

Paul1405, "Self determination can only come from within, it cannot be imposed from outside"

Greens have the memory of a gnat and they are mischief making.

How do you expect the public, especially taxpayers, to forget the shocking abuse of women and children, the violence and fraud and wastage of billions of taxpayers' money that went on behind the black curtain that rapidly descended after that well-meaning but easily-led gull of activists, Gough Whitlam gave Aborigines self-determination?

Whitlam and governments after stand condemned for allowing the self-imposed black apartheid and the black curtain that prevented the media and the public from seeing the thuggery, fraud and wastage that were rife and are still being overcome. Taking one aspect alone, education, there are hundreds of now adult Aborigines who did not receive adequate education and are functionally illiterate and innumerate. They cannot even fill out a simple form. They are forever hampered in the ordinary life of mainstream Australia and the world.

That was a direct negative consequence of the combination of Whitlam's self-determination and the extreme multiculturalism introduced by Whitlam and the dubious Al Grassby and furthered by that ignorant, syschophantic, ingratiating creep Mal Fraser who wanted to strut the world stage as an 'anti-racist'. Fraser gained well-deserved notoriety for aloofness and refusal to take advice and it showed in his poor decisions.

The evidence of the abuses, crime and waste of the self-imposed black apartheid days and the domination of indigenous communities by thugs and the stacking of intended indigenous representational bodies is there in reports of the government's own auditor the ANAO, which regrettably was never allowed to perform comprehensive audits of indigenous policy and multicultural policy either.

To that should be added the unprincipled, unethical and almost criminal behaviour of the legions of professionals and bureaucrats, the self-claimed experts and 'do gooders' (as in do good for themselves!) who annually siphoned off millions of taxpayers money in the process.

A return to those days? NO! Many of the leeches are still sucking away. Little improvement is possible with those self-interested log-jams in the way and fomenting strife.

otb,

Kindly supply us with facts and evidence to prove your
sweeping generalisations. It would help your
credibility. Otherwise you posts simply amount
to your own biases.