Hi Issy,

You don't have a clue, you admit you haven't read the book, yet try and pontificate from your position of ignorance. If I was in your situation I'd be totally embarrassed. No one denies Aboriginal people were not successful hunter/gathers, they could not have survived on the Australian continent for over 60,000 years if they were not. What Pascoe offers is a different perspective, something you don't understand. Your reasons are possibly based on the fact you have a certain racial slant concerning Aboriginal people, and anything that would elevate our indigenous brother and sisters is seen as a threat to your white privileged position.

Paul,
Perhaps you would care to tell us all how Pascoe is being hard done by, by those ignorant people who allege that he trimmed quotes to suit his own purposes?

You seem to forget that I’ve posted abou,t my experiences with Aboriginal people and for some of whom I was the first European that they had ever seen.

You migh also recall that I posted about my Aboriginal relatives on more than one occasion.

Your post above does shew your usual marksmanship, you’ve hit the ‘bull’.

Foxy

The article was 1000s of words I can only "cherry-pick" 300 odd for a post. However, it does conclusively show that much of Dank Emu is conjecture and not fact.

If there were permanent structures build pre-settlement, there would still be traces. The aboriginals were nomadic hunter-gathers and primitive.

Hi Issy,

I've never considered you a Forum racists, and my above post does to a degree convey that notion. For making such an imputation I withdraw the comment.

However, we do tend to judge indigenous people, and other groups, "not like us" from our position of white privilege, you do it, I do it, its just natural (one day I will tell you about my feelings when I first encountered 500 "warlike" Maori in the hills of NZ).

I read Pascoe's book, did it change my belief that Aboriginal people were predominantly hunter/gathers, no it did not. More importantly it challenged the belief that Aboriginals lived within a simple society eking out a very primitive existence. I think Aboriginal society was more complex than we want to give it credit for. Could the early inhabitants of Australia have engaged in some form of agriculture, long before the Egyptians had even thought of the pyramids, yes Pascoe does offer evidence for that. Is this a big deal, not really, only to those who feel it threatens their position of white privilege and challenges the Europeans narrative that the continent was "empty" of useful people, and ripe for the taking. It also challenges the belief that Aboriginal people were suffering within their existence, and were fortunate that the white man turned up to relieve them of that terrible existence.

Shadow Minister,

Try to get hold of Sutton and Walshe's book and
read it. Then make up your mind. Stop espousing
the pursuit of righteous ideological rigidity
and the echo chamber of people like Andrew Bolt.
Who's on a permanent seek and destroy mission.

I know it's hard for public debate in the age
of Sky News, Fox News, and the Murdoch newspaper
stables - but give it a try.

Is Mise,

You ask about my being put in a corner?

No. I like to move around.

You never know what's around the corner.