Hi Luciferase,

One problem with your is that Australia doesn't belong only to Whites, but to everybody living here, at least all citizens, including Indigenous people. So one problem may be how a nation might organise a treaty with a sub-set, or sub-section, of itself, and still avoid the implication that that sub-section - of people, citizens, after all - doesn't belong, or no longer belongs, within that nation.

Certainly the legal status of the occupants of that sub-set may drastically change - or at least, those within that sub-set who wish to be party to such a fundamental document as a Treaty, which presumably will set out their rights within - and outside of - the purview of the overall nation.

With such a high proportion of the entire Indigenous population now living in cities and larger towns, a population which increasingly has been born and bred in those urban environments, and will seek to remain there, any clause in a Treaty which impinges on their rights would be fraught with difficulties, even if it is couched in terms of advantage. And what if many Indigenous people want nothing to do with a Treaty ? If they perceive that, as with so many other brilliant initiatives, nothing good will come out of it for them ? Will they have any choices ? Or will some hot-shot 'leaders' 'speak' for them, like it or bloody not ?

And, to drag out the old chestnut, what the hell will be in a Treaty that is realistic and beneficial to anybody but those on the innumerable committees which will no doubt be set up ? And the hierarchy of committees which will be built on them, across regions, States and federally, right up to some Advisory Committee to the PM ? A wancker's picnic, if that image is not too strong for you :)

Cheers,

Joe

Steele,

Aborigines who see it as invasion may yet apply under native title legislation, albeit based on Australia being settled, to regain their land. How does this align with your view of conquest? If policy was genocidal (wiping out a race) invasion, it appears to have been poorly implemented, both in killing and land ownership. Was it as black and white as you assert?

Whatever, settlement with violence, or conquest, as a fifth generation Australian I hold no shame, nor guilt, as a recipient of these actions.

Ultimately, we only possess that which can defend (behold China in the SCS setting a base for invading our north). That is why we have alliances and defense forces. It's no use bleating to an invading power about how you're feeling, or relying on an umpire (UN) to save you, as Tibetans and Crimeans will tell you.

Aborigines have no appeal under UN law on sovereignty. Nevertheless, some want a return of sovereignty to them. Many stridently defend the date of AD because they see it as a step towards this return, symbolically or otherwise. That is why Greens have taken the underhanded approach in Yarra, Darebin and Fremantle, failing to announce their allegiances or intentions until in power. Staying shtum was working a treat for them and Di Natale may have blown the whistle on his own mob, but perhaps relying on enough Australians not giving a rats rather than needing convincing.

I really don't get it - why is Australia the only
Commonwealth country that does not have a treaty
with it's Indigenous people? Is it too difficult
foe us? Why are there always excuses being made and
reasons found not to do something? Why did our federal
government reject the proposals of the ULURU Meeting
of Aboriginal Elders when the Government had initially
asked them to make a proposal?

Why can New Zealand do it and we can't?

It somehow just seems not good enough.

And it's also not true that the majority don't want a treaty.
As Stan Grant attests - that's bollocks.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-12-14/creation-of-indigenous-treaties-being-led-by-states/8119488

http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/why-new-zealands-maori-got-a-treaty-and-australias-indigenous-peoples-didnt-20170601-gwhysd.html

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-40024622

Hi Jayb,

Indigenous-controlled land now covers perhaps a third of the continent. If anybody wanted to live the sort of lives you are envisaging, with all the consequent restrictions on movement in and out that you are proposing, perhaps you may well need "helpless Blackfellas" in order to put your Grand Plan into action. But as it happens, Indigenous people are Australians, active citizens, and nobody can tell them where they can or can't live or how they may live, not even their 'leaders'. Your notion is nothing more than the digging-up of an old racist idea from the twenties.

Sorry to go on about the need to investigate massacre sites, but I'm puzzled why nobody much wants to do that. In a murder case just resolved in Perth, the mother of a young girl, [see: https://www.perthnow.com.au/news/crime/emotional-scenes-as-francis-john-wark-found-guilty-of-hayley-dodd-murder-ng-b88721234z] her mother explained, quite reasonably, that. " .... there's no body, we need a body for some closure ...... We want to know what happened, to try to figure out why, try figure out if there's any clues as to why he did it."

That's one lovely young girl taken violently, needlessly. Aren't the living relations of the sixty or eighty thousand Indigenous people rumoured to have been killed in Queensland entitled to have closure too ? After all, we're talking about thousands of Martin Bryants, Ivan Milats. And the thousands of descendants of the victims. We should just let it all rest ? Let it go ? Too painful. But would you, if one of your loved ones had been killed by Bryant or Milat ?

So, why the reluctance ?

Joe

Dear Joe,

There's actually no reluctance. The University of Newcastle
is doing precisely that - a map of the massacres of
indigenous people that reveals the untold history of
Australia painted in blood. The following links explain:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-07-05/news-map-plots-massacres-of-aboriginal-people-in-frontier-wars/8678466

http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2017/jul/05/map-of-massacres-of-indigenous-people-reveal-untold-history-of-australia-painted-in-blood

Dearest Foxy,l

No, dear, that's exactly what is NOT being done: anyone can draw up any sort of maps they like, but without any investigations, they are nothing more than 'Maps of Rumoured Massacre Sites' or 'Maps of Atrocities Reported by Bar-Flies'. But for many people, that's as far as they dare to go. Easy-peasy.

So yes, there IS reluctance to carry out genuine, thorough, forensic investigations. Imagine, as I've tried vainly several times to suggest, that one of your loved ones had been brutally murdered - would you be content with a vague map of where he or the may have been buried - oh, I dunno, somewhere in the Belanglo Forest, near enough, let's not bother. Only one person after all.

I'm sure that there have been massacres across Australia, but having studied the documentation here in SA, I was surprised (and still uneasy) that there seemed not to have been ANY unprovoked killings - I still find that hard to believe.

So why not elsewhere ? Certainly in Queensland, where so many people are supposed to have been killed ? Why not ?

Love,

Joe