Hi Joe,

Experts estimate the number of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders at more than 770,000 at the time of the invasion in 1788. [2] It fell to its low of around 117,000 people in 1900, a decrease by 84%.

Source: Aboriginal population in Australia - Creative Spirits,

That estimate may be unacceptable to some people. Its impossible to tell exactly, but most defiantly there was a huge decline in aboriginal numbers over the first 112 years of European settlement.

That people want to live in a historical past when all the people are dead, does not reflect the present. There were injustices and these are not present now. We have laws to deal with such.

On the subject of America's implosion the Democratic States are in real trouble. Just watch this police rally reporting on the riot situation.
http://www.facebook.com/thehodgetwins/videos/555050645169997/

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Dear Loudmouth 2,

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You wrote :

« You may have to clarify your claims that 75 % of the Aboriginal population were exterminated, and that Aboriginal people were treated as slaves »

I don’t know if I should take you seriously or not with that question, Joe. I suspect you know the answer better than I do.

Presuming that you do, I feel, nevertheless, obliged to reply, if only for the gallery – which seems to me to be a possible explanation as to why you felt like flying that balloon.

Regarding the first part of the question, the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) indicates :

« There are no accurate estimates of the population of Australia before European settlement … Recent archaeological evidence suggests that a population of 750,000 Indigenous peoples could have been sustained. (Year Book Australia 2008).

In the years following colonisation the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander population declined to around 60,000 by the 1920s (Year Book Australia 1994). »

From 750,000 down to 60,000, that’s a reduction of 92%.

Whatever it was, the consensus among experts is that there was a “dramatic decline” in the Indigenous population “under the impact of new diseases, repressive and often brutal treatment, dispossession, and social and cultural disruption and disintegration”. However, in view of the wishy-washy nature of the population estimates, the utmost prudence applies.

Hence, my figure of 75% which I consider sufficiently indicative of a dramatic reduction – whatever the size of the Indigenous population before European settlement.

Regarding the second part of your question, I refer you to an article titled “Was there slavery in Australia? Yes. It shouldn’t even be up for debate”, in "The Conversation" dated 12 June, 2020 :

http://theconversation.com/was-there-slavery-in-australia-yes-it-shouldnt-even-be-up-for-debate-140544

In 2006, the federal senate’s Standing Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs conducted an investigation entitled “Unfinished business: Indigenous stolen wages” which sheds some light on the reality of government condoned slavery of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples (either willingly or through negligence, indifference or poor organisation) under cover of assuring them official protection as State wards :

http://www.aph.gov.au/parliamentary_business/committees/senate/legal_and_constitutional_affairs/completed_inquiries/2004-07/stolen_wages/report/index

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Banjo,

In Australia, droughts have been the limiting factor in relation to Indigenous population. In times of long drought, populations could have been hugely diminished - old people (especially women), children under three or four, perhaps many mothers, would have been at grave risk. Births would have been postponed until well after the breaking of one drought before the onset of the next.

Droughts commonly lasted eight or ten years, leaving a twelve- to fourteen-year hole in the demographics. Building up populations after a drought would have taken far longer than it took to cut them back.

Yes, in the best of circumstances, and assuming that the good times lasted for decades, populations could have risen slowly. It's conceivable that total population could have exceeded half a million, but I'd suggest that it averaged much less over, say, a century.

Joe

Some photos here - obviously faked - of the vast crowds at Trumpf's rally in Tulsa:

http://twitter.com/abbydphillip/status/1274461483062222850

It looked a lot more crowded during the TV coverage on the ABC. So which is fake, which is real ?

Joe

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Dear Josephus,

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You wrote :

« That people want to live in a historical past when all the people are dead, does not reflect the present. There were injustices and these are not present now. We have laws to deal with such »
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There are billions of people who live, not just « in a “historical” past », but in a “pre-historical past”, Joseph.

The Afro-Americans are far less numerous and suffer racial discrimination and segregation resulting from slavery only since the early 1500s. That's a comparatively recent event. Slavery lasted 365 years and ended just 155 years ago.

Whereas the billions of people who « live in a “pre-historical” past » are the large majority of mankind who continue to speak to a God or Gods almost every day of their lives, in their prayers – some, even several times a day.

The fact that they believe their God or Gods existed well before the beginning of slavery in the US, going back even before the “creation” of the universe, does not worry them at all. The pre-historical past is an important element of their daily lives. It guides and protects them.

It is constantly present in their minds and psyche. It inspires their worldview and determines their daily behaviour (including eating habits, dress attire, moral codes, etc.). They regularly consult what they consider to be sacred scriptures composed in the far-distant past.

Many scholars agree, for example, that Job is the oldest book in the Bible, written by an unknown Israelite about 1500 B.C. Others hold that the Pentateuch (the first five books of the Bible) are the oldest books, written between 1446 and 1406 B.C.

The Vedas of Indian Hinduism are four texts compiled between the 15th and 5th centuries BC. The Indo-Iranian religion of Zoroastrianism from the 10th – 5th century BC. Judaism (9th – 5th century BC). Jainism (8th – 2nd century BC). Confucianism (6th – 5th century BC). Buddhism (6th – 5th century BC). Taoism (6th – 4th century BC). Shintoism (3rd century BC – 8th century AD).

Nostalgia ?

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