In his email to supporters this week, Senator Cory Bernadi refers to the information broadcast since the Recognition get together at Uluru, which has exposed some alarming information for people concerned about possible race-based changes to our Constitution.

He believes that Australian politicians who said that they 'would sweat blood' to make the referendum succeed should now be eating their words, as should corporate backers like the AFL.

“No one should write a blank cheque for anything. No one should endorse constitutional change without knowing exactly what we are agreeing to”. And as “Even the parliamentary committee looking into the matter couldn't agree on the path forward....what chance do the general public have of achieving consensus”.

The Uluru meeting “demanded treaties and what is effectively an aboriginal-only parliament".

The Senator said of that: “It is as if the people behind this process actually want any referendum to fail so that they can continue guilt-tripping non-indigenous people over Indigenous welfare”.

“What has happened in the past is not our responsibility”, he writes. What is our responsibility is to question the “tens of billions of taxpayer dollars spent on aboriginal communities with “virtually nil effect on health, domestic violence, education and wellbeing outcomes”.

Senator Bernardi believes that we “need to deal with the issues of today, not continually revisit the problems of the past”.....”a forward-focused, unified nation will reject any division of our society according to race, creed or colour”.

EXACTLY!
”.....”a forward-focused, unified nation will reject any division of our society according to race, creed or colour”.

Otherwise we have a government divided, focused on race and culture

What is there in 'Recognition' for non-elite indigenous Australians?

Question asked by Julia Patrick in The Spectator of 11/5/17 - “...what do activists, both white and indigenous, want 'recognition' to do for them?”

We all know what the elites want; power, privilege and land. But what about your average Australian with indigenous ancestory: the 80% living lives pretty similar to those the rest of us live in cities and towns? Not the ones who the Big Men in camps speak for. We'll never know what they think – they don't get a look in, and probably don't understand or care what is going on.

Patrick has come up with one 'reason' for changing our perfectly adequate Constitution: a need for a “clear statement” (in the Constitution) “that indigenous people can share in every opportunity (on offer)”.

She naturally responds to that one with, “What opportunities are they missing out on now”?
I cannot think of any. Perhaps the 'recognisers' among us could come up with answer?

I will be voting NO to this racist BS, and I hope the silent majority will do the same.

Hi Ttbn,

I suppose the question is: do we want one inclusive, integrating society, or should we support some open-ended process of disintegration, exclusion and separatism ? Didn't they try that in South Africa ? Gosh, I wonder if the Indigenous elites are dimly aware of how that turned out. Nah.

Sooner or later, we're going to have to deal with the issue of 'sovereignty': what does it mean ? More pointedly, what does it mean for Indigenous people who have been living off the labour of others now for more than two hundred years, and for those Indigenous working people who have been dipping in and out of 'western' society for as long ?

In the olden days, if somebody took something, food, money, etc., from a 'sovereign', by doing so they acknowledged that sovereignty, and surrendered any of their own. In India, they used to talk about 'taking the King's shilling' or 'taking the King's salt', i.e. ceding sovereignty.

So what on earth do 'radicals' mean by 'sovereignty' ? That, regardless of how much some people have been taking from the Australian taxpayer - thirty billion a year can buy quite a bit of 'salt' - somehow, 'something' (they call it 'sovereignty' but a better term might be simply 'identity') will, remain undiminished.

I think they are on one of those idiotic logical loops which get people further and further up the creek: i.e. if your initial assumptions are off-track, then all your conclusions are going to be even more so. They can lead to complete and crazy dead-ends. If the notion of 'sovereignty' is pushed to its ultimate, it clearly leads through Treaty and a separate Indigenous-controlled State, to pushing for a separate country. [See ref. to South Africa, above].

As pointed out above, what rights DON'T Indigenous people have now ? Come to think of it, nobody, no 'special group', no 'nation' per se, is mentioned in the Constitution as far as I know. To that extent, it's a completely non-racial, non-racist, document already.

Cheers,

Joe

Dear ttbn,

The following link is worth a read:

http://www.creativespirits.info/aboriginalculture/selfdetermination/aboriginal-sovereignty-in-australia#axzz4icknZz3f

Thanks, Foxy. Sorry, which end does one suck at again ?

It should be remembered that people identifying as 'indigenous' NOW - in the 21st Century - are no more indigenous than any other Australian born here.

We are all Australians: not first Australians and second Australians.

Joe: Taking the king's shilling was a slang term for joining (or being impressed into) the army. Later it became used in the same sense as 'he who pays the piper calls the tune', in other words if you get paid, you do what you're told.

As you note, taking or eating the king's salt has a similar meaning, and a longer history (remember that 'salary' come from the Latin word for salt.) From Wikipedia: The Book of Ezra (550 BC to 450 BC) associated accepting salt from a person with being in that person's service. In Ezra 4:14, the adversaries of Ezra and company, in their letter of complaint to Artaxerxes I of Persia explain their loyalty to the King. When translated, it is either stated literally as "because we have eaten the salt of the palace" or more figuratively as "because we have maintenance from the king".

Basically, the terms are about loyalty to you employer, which for soldiers was the sovereign. It doesn't necessarily imply ceding sovereignty of your land.

Of course, maybe you were just being devious: if you argue that taking the king's 'shilling' or 'salt' does mean ceding sovereignty, then it provides an argument for compensation for this 'because we have maintenance from the king', one sanctioned by the Bible no less.

Joe: 'To that extent, it's [The Constitution] a completely non-racial, non-racist, document already'.

Just to clarify: Clause 51 of the Constitution originally said: 'The Parliament shall, subject to this Constitution, have power to make laws for the peace, order, and good government of the Commonwealth with respect to:
clause (xxvi) the people of any race , other than the aboriginal race in any State, for whom it is deemed necessary to make special laws';

The 1967 Referendum deleted the words 'other than the aboriginal race in any State', so that clause (xxxvi) now says:
'the people of any race for whom it is deemed necessary to make special laws'.

The clause is still 'racist' in that it still allows the Commonwealth to make laws on the basis of 'race' - it can still make 'special laws' for any race, for the Aboriginal race, the Chinese race, the European race etc.
(See discussion http://www.alrc.gov.au/publications/38.%20Federal-State%20Issues/scope-and-limits-constitutional-power).

One of the reasons for the 1967 change was that Aboriginal people were at the mercy of individual state legislation, and the Commonwealth was powerless to prevent injustice, or inconsistencies between states (for example situations where Aboriginal children could be banned from state schools in one state, but allowed to attend in the neighbouring state).

Joe,

You asked me in this discussion
- "which end does one suck at again?"

And in a previous discussion you called me a
"lickspittle?"

What a change that is from "Dearest Foxy" and
"Love always Joe?"

But to answer your question as to "which end does
one suck at again?" I would suggest either one.
I'm sure you'd do well at both ends.

Hi Cossomby,

Would $ 30 billion p.a. be enough ?

So what if pretty much everybody in a group took the 'sovereign's salt', and did so all their lives ? i.e. relied on that 'sovereign's support rather than generated their own support ?

Ironically, at least in South Australia, any able-bodied Indigenous person was refused rations (at least officially) since they had the legal right to go out hunting, fishing and gathering, and were provided with boats, fishing gear and guns to do so. So, if anything, the 'sovereign' refused to give out 'salt' to precisely the most able.

The ration system may have had unpredicted effects: in traditional times, when a drought hit (and as we all know, they hit often), young children would die, old people, especially women, would die, the groups would scatter, perhaps for years, the women would be married off quickly to men in better-favoured, neighbouring groups, and land would be massively depopulated, perhaps for decades, until the group could return and slowly, with fewer women and (for a generation) a shorter child-bearing period (since women would not be giving birth during the long years of a drought), build up its numbers again.

BUT

With the ration system, especially during droughts, ALL members of a group would be assured of food; all the young men could come in; cultural activities could be carried out with much more regularity and continuity; no kids would die of starvation, nor old women. Probably, with a ration system, populations could stabilise, if not increase.

So one could say that the 'king's salt' maintained the Indigenous population through good times and bad. But don't expect anybody to say so.

Joe

.

Cossomby,

Oy. Then change those bits - OF COURSE ! Surely all this farting around for a decade has been about more than changing a couple of bits in the constitution ? Or are you complaining about the bits that were changed fifty years ago ? Yes, it's great fun flogging a dead horse, she won't get up now, this'll show him, kick me, would you, you bastard ?!

Anyway, if you're really interested in the deliberations between the federal and state governments in the lead-up to the 1967 Referendum, you could have a look at the Conference transcripts that are on my web-site: www.firstsources.info, on the 'Conferences' Page. I was surprised to notice how enthusiastic pretty much all state governments were to get shot of Indigenous affairs.

So, we inevitably come back to it: if there is to be a treaty that we have to vote on, what should be in it ?

Joe

Joe: I wasn't stating an opinion on whether any amount was 'enough', or complaining about what should or should not be changed. I was just providing factual clarification.

I have seen you website, very interesting. I've been thinking of setting one up myself. My main concern is giving up anonymity with the risk (inevitability?) of hate mail, rape and death threats that women's opinions on controversial matters tend to attract. (An article at random from the internet: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/having-an-opinion-while-female-youll-need-a-thick-skin/article33054436/).

Hi Cossomby,

That could be a bloke's name, of course - if you set up a web-site and simply didn't use your full name (there's no reason to) then you won't have anything to worry about. I've never received any hate mail (maybe tepid disagreement mail) or death threats, and unfortunately no rape threats yet but I live in hope. And on the plus side, you get some terrifically encouraging emails in support.

Give it ago ! What's your field of interest ? If you're typing up documents, allow about two hours per page, all up.

Cheers,

Joe

I’ve got a very ill feeling about this referendum to include aboriginal people in the preamble of the Commonwealth Constitution of Australia.

Not because of recognition itself, I have no issue with that, but because I suspect the government is going to try and word the change to the preamble and perhaps even the referendum question, in such a way that they can then use it to overcome something else in the constitution that is a thorn in the side of all Australian commonwealth governments.

While I have no proof of this at all, I suspect this ‘thorn’ is something that makes it harder to move forward with the implementation of the global agenda.

I constantly ask myself why does government want a referendum? I think only ‘we the people’ should have the constitutional power to call a referendum. I always feel uneasy for the constitution when governments want a referendum.

Already the COMMONWEALTH OF AUSTRALIA and the AUSTRAILIAN GOVERNMENT are private companies registered on the New York stock exchange and no legislation at either the Commonwealth or state level has received royal assent as per the constitution since the 1970’s

Dont beleive me?

Bring up any Act passed in the last 20 years and see if its royal asseent and procllamation complies with (Section 58 of the constition, Royal assent to Bills.)

God knows what will happen to our constitution should we become a republic.