In 1788 Aboriginal society (for want of a more appropriate term) was probably the most misogynistic of the time and among the most misogynistic of all time.

In the Aboriginal world, women were slaves in all but name, able to be sold or gifted, and little more than property chattel.

I know that not all would agree, but I'm certainly in favour of adopting that culture. We would become the envy of the world. Only racists who want to denigrate the wonderful world of pre-Cook 'Australia' would dispute that.

This post coincides with a photograph and an article I saw today.

The photograph is of a group of Australian women of aboriginal descent holding up a placard saying: "STOP FAMILY VIOLENCE IT'S NOT IN OUR CULTURE".

But family violence, particularly against women, is part of Australian aboriginal culture.

"Virtually every white observer of aboriginal life in colonial Australia remarked on the shocking mistreatment of women almost invariably found in Aboriginal tribes throughout Australia", writes WD Rubenstein, ex Chair of History at Deakin University, in "The Mistreatment Of Women in Aboriginal Society". (References: George Chaplin, 'The Native Tribes of South Australia'; James Dawson, 'Australian Aborigines: The Languages and Customs of Several Tribes of Aborigines in the Western District of Victoria'; Tom Petrie, 'Reminiscences of Early Queensland'; George Taplin, 'The Narrinyeri: One Account of the Tribes of South Australian Aborigines'; H.E.A Myer, "Manners and Customs of the Aborigines Of the Encounter Bay Tribe, South Australia'.

Perhaps if the people at SBS did a bit more research - or any research - they might not have come up with such rot.

They might be right about the culture being unchanged for 60,000 years. We don't get too in the way of truth about aboriginal culture these days.

Dear Josephus,

There is much merit in your suggestion, but I rather take the best from both cultures and avoid the worsts.

One practical problem is, that aboriginal culture was only practiced with low-density population and has no chance of physically supporting the current population levels.

Western culture has made painful compromises just to allow a larger population to survive - while these ought to be undone, no sane culture can be achieved without first drastically lowering the population numbers.

" The first inhabitants of Australia were of course
the Aboriginal people who generations of Australians
remember from that one history class where the teacher
mentioned them."

"But the original inhabitants would not have thought
of themselves as "Australia," the 250 individual nations
that occupied the continent had yet to gain the wonderful
sense of national unity that white men brought to
Australia, along with other marvellous innovations such
as guns and smallpox."

"For many thousands of years, these people lived in
total ignorance of what they were missing out on, not
even knowing how deprived they were until their European
benefactors came along to teach and/ or kill them."

" When the First Fleet sailed into Sydney Cove in 1788,
... it was not Australia to which
they thought they had journeyed. It didn't much matter
what they called it, though, the Fleeters considered
themselves British, and the fact that they were on the
other side of the world would not stop them feeling that
way, or wearing completely inappropriate clothing for the
climate."

"In fact it took some time for the British and their
descendants in Australia to stop thinking of England as
"home." Some say the tendency only really died out when
Robert Menzies passed away in 1978 at the age of 6000."

"Australia - under any name - was viewed as an outpost of
the British Empire far beyond the point at which this
perception was literally true or even remotely reasonable."

"And yet somehow, the diverse peoples of the Indigenous
nations and the deluded white criminals of the
motherland ended up forming a single nation, this amazing
land we call Australia, which combines all the best of
its brutally cruel origins with the finest in
modern complacency and self-deception."

When did Australia truly begin and who
were the "first Australians?" - the people who invented
the idea of being Australian, and began the long, slow trek
towards discovering exactly what being an Australian means?
Get hold of the book - "Aussie Aussie Aussie" by Ben Pobjie.
It explains it all.

“Aussie Aussie Aussie”, one of Pobje’s funniest yet.

i had a few minutes this afternoon so decided to turn on NITV. There was a childrens program running, it presented aboriginal culture in shadows of spirits and sacred stones. I would denounce this as pagan superstition presented to children as normal aboriginal beliefs. Aboriginal cultural beliefs are based in superstition - and intelligent aboriginals would call them such. We are allowing superstition instead of fact to flow into the conciousness of children with such programs. Next we will be educating children that pointing the bone as a form of cursing someone we want to get rid of.

Our culture should teach "We forgive those that do evil to us; so that we might be forgiven. "