Paul,

I concede that you better marksman than I am; you manage to hit the bull in very many of your posts.

Foxy,

A hunter-gatherer society that lives in non-permanent dwellings is about as primitive as one can get with these societies not even getting bows and arrows. Comparing this with agricultural societies is a joke.

While societal dynamics are always complicated this need to present pre-settlement aboriginal societies as more than they were is at best misguided and worst just plain dishonest.

Shadow Minister,

I shall repeat what I have posted earlier:

On the basis of long-term research and
observation Sutton and Walshe portray classical
Australian Aboriginal people as highly successful
hunter-gatherers and fishers. They strongly
repudiate racist notions of Aboriginal hunter-
gatherers as living in a primitive state.

In the book, they assert there was and is nothing
"simple" or "primitive" about hunter-gatherer fishers
labour practices. This complexity was and in many
cases still is, underpinned by high levels of
spiritual cultural belief.

Sutton and Walshe provide extensive evidence to
support their argument that classical Aboriginal society
was a hunter-gatherer society and as sophisticated as
the traditional European farming method.

The book asks Australians to develop a deeper understanding
and appreciation of Aboriginal society and culture.

Bruce Pascoe in his book (now in its 40th reprint) used
historical sources, including journals of explorers.
Pascoe is pleased that his book has shone a light on
further debate and appreciation of Aboriginal society,
their farming methods, and culture.

Sutton and Walshe's book will be available from all good
bookshops, and your local libraries on 16th June 2021.
Worth reading.

There is nothing wrong with being hunters and gatherers, particularly for people who were 40 or so thousand years without any outside influence until British settlement. Debunking Pascoe's lies are not in any way derogatory to natives. The villain is Pascoe, not them.

Foxy,

The Cambridge definition of primitive is:

"relating to human society at a very early stage of development, with people living in a simple way without machines or a writing system:"

If you can see how this definition of primitive does not apply to pre-settlement aboriginal societies then please point it out.

Note that other "primitive" societies i.e. the Zulus in Southern Africa were way ahead of aboriginal culture. This society while having no literature mined, smelted and forged iron, traded with overseas societies and had a sophisticated and disciplined military that even defeated the British colonial army and by definition was primitive.

Yes thinkabit, you're completely correct..."so every thing that they owned had to be carried."

They of course owned very little and therefore had to carry very little. All nomadic primitive societies operate like that. Whatismore, it was generally the women, who were little more than chattels in the highly misogynistic society that was aboriginal culture, who did the carrying. One of the earliest encounters with aboriginal 'culture' after Philip arrived was when an aboriginal man was found killing his 2 yr old daughter. Her mother had died (probably at the hands of that same man) and since there was no one left to carry the toddler, she was doomed.

Aboriginal society was a stone age culture. They knew nothing of metallurgy, animal husbandry and failed to develop any form of writing, even the most primitive cuneiform writing. They were constantly one draught away from disaster. They waged war on their neighbours in relative numbers that far exceed anything in 20th century Europe.

They were a cultural dead-end having changed almost not-at-all for the past 40000 years, other than changes forced by their extermination of Australia's mega-fauna.

In some parts of the land, these hunter-gathers lived a rather good life as the land provided all without effort. But most groups didn't have the advantage of a fruitful land and lived a miserable existence.

Those enthralled by aboriginal society were/are embarrassed by the sheer backwardness of these people. So they fell in love with Pascoe's rubbish and suspended all credulity.

Those dedicated to the truth have been pushing back ever since and now this new book puts one of the few remaining nails in the coffin that was Pascoe's lies.