By Mick Le Moignan
AFTER Australia voted no in the referendum, thereby refusing to recognise indigenous Australians in the constitution or to establish a voice to Parliament to express views on laws affecting them, many Aboriginal advocates observed a week of mourning and a self-imposed one-week vow of silence.
The reasoning was impeccable: ‘The majority of Australians have said they don’t want to acknowledge us or give us any say in the laws that bind us and continue to impose such heavy penalties and suffering on our people. Why speak, when they don’t want to listen?’
That is unfair on the six million Australians who voted yes (about 40%), who do value and respect Aboriginal culture and history and want them to tell us how we can make their lives more bearable and fruitful. But the outpouring of grief is understandable. The no vote was a brutal, needless blow below the belt, in response to a modest request.
ABC’s indigenous affairs editor Bridget Brennan writes: “In indigenous communities, hearts have broken and hopes have faded. A lot of Aboriginal people – especially in regional areas – have told me they don’t want to go outside. Their neighbours, their community members and their towns overwhelmingly voted no. In areas where Aboriginal people are highly visible in regional Australia, the referendum result feels terrifying.”
Non-indigenous Australians have much to learn from the descendants of those who lived joyful and fulfilled lives in this continent for 65,000 years before we ever set foot on it. Our forebears regarded them as ignorant savages and thought they knew better about everything. It is now evident that they did not and we still do not.
Aboriginal people survived for so long because they lived sustainably, with a respect, even reverence, for their environment and a profound sense of gratitude for the sustenance and opportunities it provided.
The 2019-20 bushfires burned more than 17 million hectares across Australia. In New South Wales, 6.7% of the state, including 37% of its national parks, was incinerated. Three billion native animals were killed.
Over 3,000 houses were lost, while 33 residents and nine firefighters died. The resulting smoke inflicted untold damage on the health of millions of city-dwellers living far from the conflagrations. For several days, we, too, were afraid to go outside.
All of this could have been avoided if governments had heeded the wisdom of indigenous Australians. They managed the land for millennia and prevented catastrophic fires by “cultural burning”. Captain Cook observed many fires on his first voyage up the east coast, because Aboriginal practice was to set light to the perennial grasses and scrub, so they would not inflame the mature trees and other dense vegetation of the rainforests.
Certainly, climate change has exacerbated the problem but our leaders’ disregard of this vital knowledge is reprehensible and incredibly foolish. And still, we refuse to listen. What hope now for reconciliation?
The Uluru Statement from the Heart requested a voice to Parliament, truth-telling and finally a treaty. It will be hard to negotiate a treaty with people who have no voice.
Truth-telling about the appalling history of the past is a vital part of the process of Makarrata – coming together after a struggle.
The true story of the colonisation of Australia is probably as unpalatable to the no voters as the proposed voice. They have said they do not want to hear about indigenous suffering and disadvantage today. They would probably prefer to avert their eyes from the attempted genocide, the massacres, murders and rapes, the children kidnapped from their parents and the land devastated and stolen from its inhabitants.
The euphemism for genocide was assimilation. White settlers hoped the Aboriginal race would largely die out, with the remnants being absorbed into the wider population. Indeed, the term settler is another euphemism, this time for one who appropriates land by occupying it, rather than paying for it.
If Hitler had won the war, how long would it have been before the German “occupiers” of Jersey became settlers? Even today, crimes against humanity are being committed in the name of settlement.
Truth is hard to pin down when victims and oppressors are all dead, but a major contribution to truth-telling about the “settlement” of eastern Australia in the 19th century has recently come from Australia’s leading non-fiction writer, journalist and editor, David Marr, in the shape of his remarkable new book, Killing for Country.
On looking into his family history, Marr was shocked to discover that several of his forebears had played shameful parts in the occupation of Aboriginal land and the uninvestigated, unpunished extermination of its rightful owners, men, women and children.
At the start of his research, Marr found a photograph of his great-great-grandfather, Reg Uhr, in the uniform of a sub-inspector of the notorious Native Police (another euphemism). This was a small, standing army of white officers who recruited Aboriginal troopers from far-distant areas.
Their job was to “disperse” Aboriginal communities from land where would-be “settlers” wanted to graze their vast flocks of sheep and cattle. The enforcers used rifles, swords, carbines and poisoned flour to ensure that dispersal was permanent.
Ably assisted by dozens of professional researchers and local historians, Marr traced the details of a hideous history of terrorist brutality, all designed to drive innocent people from their homes to facilitate the appropriation of their land.
Having learned from their experiences in America, the British authorities called Australia terra nullius (empty land), regarding the inhabitants as sub-human and therefore devoid of all human rights. The Native Police tried to empty the land completely.
To Marr’s credit, he decided to treat the story as a regular, professional assignment, whatever horrors he might uncover. He describes it as “an act of atonement, of penance by storytelling”. He adds: “But I wasn’t wallowing in my own shame. None of us are free of this past.”
No Australians will be free from this collective guilt until we face the truth about our past and agree a peace treaty with the descendants of those who were so brutally butchered. The naysayers at the referendum have postponed the process, but in this nation that prizes “a fair go” so highly, justice demands it.
