Page 11 - Indiginous Australians

Mary Alp
further images of ‘worthless’, ‘dirty’, ‘always needing government handouts’, ‘alcoholics’, ‘child abusers’ etc. If we look at the myth buster handout, we see that much of this is untrue, or indeed in some cases not so different from non- Indigenous Australian society.
( As discussed, some historiography, politicians (Hanson etc), & the media (Bolt etc) perpetuate these stereotypes *( also see myths handout).
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This ethnocentrism/racism marks much of Australian history still today. From reasons of superiority that sanctioned occupation/invasion & policies aimed at Europeanizing & Christianizing Indigenous Australians we seem unable to fully acknowledge/accept the ramifications/consequences of our history. Carrying on from the discrimination of contact history, our 1901 Federation process 34 further alienated the Indigenous People. While it unified the six colonies & its people into the one integrated system of government, it excluded the Aborigines by not including them in the census. They virtually didn’t exist – or were just seen as the ‘Aboriginal problem’. Any discussion around this issue was justified in terms of ‘race’, ‘blood’ or ‘caste’. This attitude of superiority wasn’t exclusive to Aborigines – for example - The White Australia policy 1901- 1973 while it excluded Indigenous people from the vote & pensions etc., it also excluded non-European migrants, in particular Asians, from living in Australia. This type of racism was worse for Indigenous Australians – the original inhabitants - & it became embedded - institutionalized -& echoed many times in Commonwealth & State Governments discriminative legislation by denying them equal citizenship rights & benefits. All these prejudices had/have detrimental effects on Aboriginal
* Creative Spirit, ‘Racism in Aboriginal Australia’, an overview of all levels of society, Hanson p8, Abbot,p13, Bolt,p21,
32 Wikipedia definition.
33 Oxford languages definition.
34 My grandfather Norman Kirkwood Ewing member for Swan in WA was a member of the first Federal Parliament held in Melbourne 1901.
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Ethnocentrism (believing that one’s culture is superior to all others) (prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism against someone of a different race based on the belief that one’s own race is superior)33
.Racism