Aborignial literacy in NT improved: still sucks

[Stark]

UK-style farming was a fuckup in both NZ and AU. Poor old colonials. So conservative.

[mr friendly guy]

Has Australia tried "hazard pay" for rural doctors? Isn't your health system subsidized/controlled by your government?

The 'control by the government' part is subject to ongoing debate; healthcare organization happens at a state level, and then all the states beg for federal funding. The individual regions within states are inconsitently managed. My father now does nothing but locum work, and there are some places(such as NSW Central West) that he doesn't go because they don't bother paying the staff half the time. Friendly Happy Guy has endured this brand of bullshit over in W.A, he can probably elaborate more on it.

Rant on, or not.

Any way, I have had to deal with problems with people not paying you and thats in the metropolitan area. One of my colleagues from the UK initially worked in a rural area (when she initially migrated) and they refused to pay overtime. What the number crunchers don't understand is that, shock, horror, some patients actually get sick (their condition worsens) at inappropriate times (ie just before office hours finish). This means that the doctors must stay back to try and sort them out.

If they are forced to stay back for a significant length of time, they should get overtime. The problem is that this overtime is unrostered and usually claimed by having your boss sign the relevant form. Problem is when they refuse and make up excuses that you are inefficient etc.

One could make the morally hazardous argument that you should just hand over to the doctor covering after hours, but a) it smacks to me of irresponsibility especially when YOU know the patient condition better and they are really sick such that they need action now b) there most probably isn't an after hours doctor specifically rostered in rural areas, ie they just call the team's doctors if something happens.

Can't speak so much for the eastern states, however one Indian doctor I talked to who worked in Melbourne (we were at a lecture course) reports similar problems by bloody number crunchers.

Oh, and locuming if pretty lucrative business. I can't of course, since I am in a training course and they won't recognise locum jobs. The problem with locuming is, that because they don't pay doctors enough to hire as regulars, they rely on high amounts of locums. These guys are paid at great rates better than regulars. It becomes a problem for morale when locums (who are like resident level) has to ask more senior doctors (who are being paid less) for advise (not uncommon, one should always seek help from colleagues if you need advise). Of course if they just paid doctors better and with better conditions, they might not need to hire so many locums at high rates. But what would I know. I only understand high level maths (which apparently is better than the maths at payroll since they can't do simple calculations without their precious computer).

snip for convenience.

Back to some of your points, I think there may something with financial incentives. As explained, debt cannot be leveraged very well. Lets face it. Doctors coming out now are from the gen Y generation. Well I don't like to generalise (since I apparently am an exception) they are already in debt the moment they graduate. This debt is not from paying off uni fees (where they just take extra tax out), its from personal debts accrued. Maybe because I was from a poorer family, or we just have an "Asian" attitude to such things, but I find it difficult to cope with having so much debt (personal debt, debts for investment is another matter which I consider good). Chances are if they were willing to accumulate so much debt before even having a full time job, it most probably won't faze them too much.

Thus I think the way to attract them is with a) a rotating doctor system b) higher pay. As to how much, I wouldn't know, but considering locum rates to rural areas are already lucrative as they are, the pay must be good.

In the long term I think these communities simply need to merge, so logistically its easier to manage. IIRC this has been considered before, but presumably it was rejected as nothing has been done.

I wouldn't know about getting medicans sans frontieres though, and I donate to them monthly. I personally don't have a problem with it, but I think a lot of Australians would see that as a humiliation. Racist crackpots already bitch when UN officials complain about us, this would be another reason for them to get up in arms. I remember when Mary Robinson acting as United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights criticised us for the stolen generation and treatment of Aborigines people told her to get her own house in order because of terrorist attacks in Northern Ireland. Which just proves how dumb writers to the West Australian are as they can't tell the difference between the Republic of Ireland (where she is from) and Northern Ireland.

[tim31]

Paying regulars doesn't always solve the locum problem. Dad got sick of only being home for about 1/5 of the time, so last year he got himself a staff position in a Sydney district hospital. Within a year they had bumped him up to director of female health services, and there he remembered why he got out of the public sector in the first place: you can't change the system unless you become the system, and to become the system you must tow the party line. He's back doing locum work now, but he's a few years from retirement, at which point he'd like to devote a few years to Médecins Sans Frontières, but that doesn't help healthcare in Australia.

[Broomstick]

Not an acceptable excuse. Sorry. Well, not - those places are fucked up because of longstanding racist attitudes that treat some human beings as trash. It's the fault of your government and your society those places are such a mess.

Like JSF says, some communities are just fucked. But the people can't leave, nobody and no business wants to go there, so you end up with islands where the entire population is a felon, where alcohol is banned entirely and the mayor runs a pub that is the biggest contributor to council funding. What can those people do? What can people do for them, besides forced relocation? I honestly don't think it reflects society at all that hicks in the middle of nowhere are fucked up and raise fucked up children; I just wish there was something that could be done.

OK, let's try this one more time:

Prior to the Europeans showing up the ancestors of those hellhole locations were self-supporting human beings. They were feeding themselves, raising their children, and not spending all day getting high or killing themselves. Got that? They were functional human beings.

Now they're not.

How do you think that happened?

The US admits they treated their native peoples like shit for a couple centuries and our guys are STILL better off than yours. Sure, we have shitholes, but apparently our worst shitholes are not as bad as your worst shitholes. Don't give me an excuse about it being the desert or inhospitable or remote - we have folks living in remote, inhospitable desert locations, too.

I'll remember next time I see some kid huffing paint in the gutter that it's my fault.

Not your fault personally, of course, but your nation's fault for putting those people in a hopeless position. As I said, you took away their land, their livelihood, and even their children. You expect happiness and success from all that?

At this point I don't know if there a solution or not. Not all problems can be fixed.

I wouldn't know about getting medicans sans frontieres though, and I donate to them monthly. I personally don't have a problem with it, but I think a lot of Australians would see that as a humiliation. Racist crackpots already bitch when UN officials complain about us, this would be another reason for them to get up in arms.

Yes, I understand some Australians would take MSF as a personal insult. You know, there should be shame about how the aborigines have been treated. But, as you point out, Australia has its share of "racist crackpots" who'd much rather blame the victim than even attempt to fix the problems or admit past wrongs contributed to present problems.

[Stark]

Broomstick, are you claiming towns primarily composed of aborigines are traditional tribal settlements? Look up 'nomadic' in the dictionary. Hell, many of these places wouldn't even have water if white man hadn't spiked an artesian.

As Lus said, their culture is totally unable to deal with substance abuse and is socially backward. Lack of education doesn't help the situation.

That you compare native Americans (with government, sohpisticated politics, technology, etc) to native Australians is utterly laughable. That's like saying Australia should have had an equivalent to the treaty of Waitangi in NZ... except the Maori fought the Empire to a standstill and got a negotiated peace, and the Aboriginies didn't. Turns out simplistic comparisons are stupid? All native societies might actually be different; something people have tried to explain to you regarding scale. Yes, there are entire isolated native cultures of a few hundred people, in the middle of the desert, living on reclaimed tribal land, THAT SUCK.

You simply have no idea what you're talking about. Do I need to explain the whole tribal land + corrupt tribal leaders = destitute horrible settlements + rich leaders? Uh oh, it's not simple anymore! Complex social and cultural problems might be difficult to resolve.

[Broomstick]

Broomstick, are you claiming towns primarily composed of aborigines are traditional tribal settlements?

Hell no! - but those nomadic hunter gatherers did not themselves decide to form towns. They were forced/pressured/induced to settle.

Did or did not the Europeans forcibly evicted aborigines from various locations in order to plant crops, graze animals, and control water supplies? You think that wasn't devastating to the nomads? Where did you think the natives who once lived in, say, the Syndey area went? They were either killed or forcibly relocated.

Look up 'nomadic' in the dictionary. Hell, many of these places wouldn't even have water if white man hadn't spiked an artesian.

Yet the natives managed to survive there without wells. Usually by moving with the seasons, of course, and utilizing non-artesian sources and maintaining a VERY low population.

If the Europeans had left the continent alone those people who still be living a hunter-gatherer lifestyle. It wouldn't be a great lifestyle by our standards, but almost certainly better than what they currently have. Of course, that wasn't going to happen.

The only thing the Europeans gave most aborigines is death, disease, and misery.

That you compare native Americans (with government, sohpisticated politics, technology, etc) to native Australians is utterly laughable.

Oh, please - I only gave the example of our surviving tribes that are doing comparatively well. We also had hunter-gathers such as the Yahi, the last member of the tribe having died in 1916 they are extinct. A LOT of native American tribes were obliterated, for much the same reason a lot of native Australian groups went extinct. Unlike Australia, North America had agriculturalists in addition to pure hunter-gatherers.

For that matter, the hunter-gatherers of the Kalahari in Africa had a society with only marginally greater material technology than the native Australians and, while they have problems, they haven't descended into the despair and bullshit the native Australians have.

Why are YOUR former hunter-gatherers doing so much worse than anyone else's?

You simply have no idea what you're talking about. Do I need to explain the whole tribal land + corrupt tribal leaders = destitute horrible settlements + rich leaders?

Hey, we get that here - there's at least one Indian tribe where half the members are trying to drag the chiefs into Federal courts (which arguably don't have jurisdiction) over corruption. Think it doesn't happen here. As I have said all along, we have "cesspits", too, and corruption and substance abuse and educational and medical problems among our North American aborigines as well - but why are YOUR aborigines so much worse off than anyone elses?

Or are you claiming Australia is "exceptional" in the way some Americans try to excuse bullshit here by claiming we're oh-so-fundamentally different from everyone else? In North America we came to realize that forcible relocation, stealing children, and deliberately destroying cultures lead to many of the lamentable problems our natives were experiencing. When will Australia be able to admit the same?

[Stark]

Hell no! - but those nomadic hunter gatherers did not themselves decide to form towns. They were forced/pressured/induced to settle.

Did or did not the Europeans forcibly evicted aborigines from various locations in order to plant crops, graze animals, and control water supplies? You think that wasn't devastating to the nomads? Where did you think the natives who once lived in, say, the Syndey area went? They were either killed or forcibly relocated.

So... bringing improved infrastructure to support sedentary civilisation = horrible because their culture has a drug problem? O... K...

PS, talking about Sydney relocations (for which you provide no evidence) is laughable given your claims that the US has a better example. How many hundred millions of natives were killed in the US again?

Yet the natives managed to survive there without wells. Usually by moving with the seasons, of course, and utilizing non-artesian sources and maintaining a VERY low population.

If the Europeans had left the continent alone those people who still be living a hunter-gatherer lifestyle. It wouldn't be a great lifestyle by our standards, but almost certainly better than what they currently have. Of course, that wasn't going to happen.

The only thing the Europeans gave most aborigines is death, disease, and misery.

And wells, and technology, and the ability to have larger populations, etc.

Prove wandering around the desert is better than living in Woodridge (ps, it isn't) and then prove that social problems like drugs or violence are somehow the fault of long-dead colonists and not the unfortunate interaction between cultures that society deals with all over the world.

Oh, please - I only gave the example of our surviving tribes that are doing comparatively well. We also had hunter-gathers such as the Yahi, the last member of the tribe having died in 1916 they are extinct. A LOT of native American tribes were obliterated, for much the same reason a lot of native Australian groups went extinct. Unlike Australia, North America had agriculturalists in addition to pure hunter-gatherers.

For that matter, the hunter-gatherers of the Kalahari in Africa had a society with only marginally greater material technology than the native Australians and, while they have problems, they haven't descended into the despair and bullshit the native Australians have.

Why are YOUR former hunter-gatherers doing so much worse than anyone else's?

If you had a fucking brain you might pick up on the very subtle hint that the Australians had a) lower population b) less organisation c) far lower technology. That might have something to do with their response to colonisation, maybe? MAYBE? Turns out you don't know what you're talking about! If only complex cultural problems were really this simple!

Hey, we get that here - there's at least one Indian tribe where half the members are trying to drag the chiefs into Federal courts (which arguably don't have jurisdiction) over corruption. Think it doesn't happen here. As I have said all along, we have "cesspits", too, and corruption and substance abuse and educational and medical problems among our North American aborigines as well - but why are YOUR aborigines so much worse off than anyone elses?

So it's a social problem the government should solve except when it shouldn't? It's not a problem because it happens int he US too? Why is anything the US does or did even fucking relevant aside from it being the only goddamn thing you know jack shit about?

Turns out people are people no matter their skin colour, and people in charge fucking over their people isn't unusual. So... should we disband the tribal coucils? Great idea! How will we fill that void? Direct government intervention? Cut them loose? Oh wow, turns out it's a pretty complex issue huh?

Or are you claiming Australia is "exceptional" in the way some Americans try to excuse bullshit here by claiming we're oh-so-fundamentally different from everyone else? In North America we came to realize that forcible relocation, stealing children, and deliberately destroying cultures lead to many of the lamentable problems our natives were experiencing. When will Australia be able to admit the same?

Fuck off idiot. Don't try this butthurt bullshit with me you fucking coward. I said the native Australians were MASSIVELY DIFFERENT TO THE NATIVE AMERICANS. This isn't exceptionalism, you little shit, it's a goddamn motherfucking indisputable fact. Now fuck off and die and take your worthless soundbytes with you.

We should have exterminated our native population, just like you guys. LOL!

In case anyone with a fucking brain reads this, the political scene in AU makes it very difficult to do anythign in regional areas. Most people don't give a shit, and those that do - while probably well-meaning - are simply fixed on 'protecting culture' and 'traditional lifestyles' etc, which is part of the fucking problem. The government is extremely unwilling to stir up these issues further, so everyone suffers.

[Broomstick]

So... bringing improved infrastructure to support sedentary civilisation = horrible because their culture has a drug problem? O... K...

Their culture didn't have a drug problem before the Europeans showed up with alcohol and other chemicals.

Also, most hunter-gatherers do not want "sedentary civilization", they want to continue living the way they have been. Sure, they'll happily adopt metal knives and firearms and such, although there are instances from all other the world of hunter-gatherers continuing to use traditional weapons as well if they aren't forced off their land, confined against their will, decimated by disease, and, oh yes, not having their children stolen.

PS, talking about Sydney relocations (for which you provide no evidence)

So, the Sydney area was sooooo terribly inhospitable no one lived there before the European colonists? How fucking stupid are YOU? Those lands weren't empty. The people who used to live there went somewhere - either relocated or killed.

You know what? We actually know there the Chicago Potawatomie went (a bunch of them are still living in Chicago, in fact, mostly in Uptown) - where are your Sydney aborigines? The ones who used to live in Melbourne and Brisbane and all the other locations now occupied by major cities? Those lands weren't empty. Where did the natives go?

How many hundred millions of natives were killed in the US again?

I never denied that genocide was committed against the North American natives. That is not news, it's even taught in US history classes in public schools.

Yet the natives managed to survive there without wells. Usually by moving with the seasons, of course, and utilizing non-artesian sources and maintaining a VERY low population.

If the Europeans had left the continent alone those people who still be living a hunter-gatherer lifestyle. It wouldn't be a great lifestyle by our standards, but almost certainly better than what they currently have. Of course, that wasn't going to happen.

The only thing the Europeans gave most aborigines is death, disease, and misery.

And wells, and technology, and the ability to have larger populations, etc.

You still don't get it - they survived just fine without wells. The didn't need them. No doubt, in a better world, they might well have adapted the technology because water sources in deserts are definitely an asset. But lets get real - those wells weren't dug to benefit the natives, they were dug to benefit colonists, farmers, and sheepherders.

Why are larger populations inherently better? Don't we have too many people in the world already? Isn't maintaining a population low enough for the land to carry the load indefinitely better than simply continuing to produce more and more people?

What benefit do your aborigines get from technology? A better way to kill themselves? Do they have access to transportation? Communication? Medicine? The entire gist of this thread is that they largely don't have any of that technology. They have shitty little places to live with no hope of a better future. Oh, yes, that was a fair trade.

Prove wandering around the desert is better than living in Woodridge (ps, it isn't)

Not being familiar with Woodridge I have no way to evaluate that statement. But yes, I would argue that living in an environment where you are capable of obtaining food and water for your family and can easily move away from trouble is preferable to living in abject squalor unable to leave for a better place. Hunter-gatherer lives are hard, but they aren't necessarily unhappy.

and then prove that social problems like drugs or violence are somehow the fault of long-dead colonists and not the unfortunate interaction between cultures that society deals with all over the world.

Can't admit your society might be at least partly at fault?

Cultures clash all the time. MOST of the time the "losers" don't end up quite as bad as yours did. Why is that? Couldn't possibly be racism, could it? Ugly word, but of course that evil doesn't happen Australia, only evil places like South Africa and the US.

Hunter-gatherers have violence, of course, but being spread out all over the landscape mitigates it because potential aggressors and potential victims are separated by physical space most of the time. Prior to the arrival of colonists the aborigines simply did not have alcohol or the other substances they are currently abusing. And, oh yes, no one was systematically stealing their children before the colonists arrived. Man up and admit to at least that much happening - Australia stealing children and giving the natives such wonderful technological wonders as alcohol to drink and petrol to sniff.

Why are YOUR former hunter-gatherers doing so much worse than anyone else's?

If you had a fucking brain you might pick up on the very subtle hint that the Australians had a) lower population

In some places, yes. But not all of Australia is a desert (just most of it). Areas with greater vegetation and water had more population. I believe the Murray River Basin had the densest pre-colonial populations. Where are your Murray River aborigines today? How many are left?

b) less organisation

So... that made it OK for them to be killed, their land taken, their children stolen?

c) far lower technology.

The Kalahari tribes used metal, but still made stone and bone tools into the 20th Century. The New Guinea Highlanders were entirely neolithic through the early part of the 20th Century. Both those groups are doing MUCH better (although still having major problems) than so many Australian Aborigines, with the same technology and the same problem of encountering outsiders with vastly superior technology. Again, why was Australia different?

That might have something to do with their response to colonisation, maybe? MAYBE?

I think it was more likely a problem with the colonizers. Hell, it's no secret that a lot of the initial "colonists" were actually convicted criminals - you seriously think that those folks would be examples of enlightenment and tolerance? You think someone transported from England for stealing from his fellow English would hesitate to steal from a native? You think men transported for assault or murder would hesitate to beat or kill and aborigine? You think men transported for rape would suddenly reform and never touch a native woman? Not only were criminals dumped on the aborigines' shores, the criminals were vastly better armed and carrying disease they had no resistance to.

Think about what the English did in North America with its better organized natives, and consider what happened when those same English landed in Australia with its lower populations and it's even lower tech natives. Response to colonization? What response could the aborigines have to invading aliens with mysterious and powerful weapons who had little compunction against shoving them off ancestral lands, harming them, their women, and their children? What the fuck could they have done? Those who resisted were slaughtered. Those who submitted had their children stolen. Those who ran could only flee to the most inhospitable lands on the continent.

"Response to colonization" my ass - you're still blaming the victims.

Turns out you don't know what you're talking about! If only complex cultural problems were really this simple!

What is particularly complex about "invade, steal, kill, rape, and destroy families"?

Hey, we get that here - there's at least one Indian tribe where half the members are trying to drag the chiefs into Federal courts (which arguably don't have jurisdiction) over corruption. Think it doesn't happen here. As I have said all along, we have "cesspits", too, and corruption and substance abuse and educational and medical problems among our North American aborigines as well - but why are YOUR aborigines so much worse off than anyone elses?

So it's a social problem the government should solve except when it shouldn't?

In the US native tribes are, at least on paper, sovereign or semi-sovereign entities. Some of them issue their own passports instead of using US ones. They have their own laws, their own police. In other words, they are allowed self-governance. Oddly enough, this often makes people give a damn as opposed to when they're treated as eternal infants.

Native Americans do have the option of entering mainstream society - claiming US citizenship is a non-issue.

It's not a problem because it happens int he US too? Why is anything the US does or did even fucking relevant aside from it being the only goddamn thing you know jack shit about?

As I point out, some of our native groups are doing much better than some of your native groups. Gee, maybe Australia should take a look at how things are done elsewhere to maybe learn something - oh, wait, you're all Special Snowflakes and what works elsewhere couldn't possibly work in Australia.

Turns out people are people no matter their skin colour, and people in charge fucking over their people isn't unusual. So... should we disband the tribal coucils? Great idea! How will we fill that void? Direct government intervention? Cut them loose? Oh wow, turns out it's a pretty complex issue huh?

Well, it would have better had they never been fucked over in the first place.

If people are people regardless of skin color (which we all hold to be true here) how come YOUR dark skinned people seem so much worse off than dark skinned people in North America? I have never seen anything that indicates Australian Aborigines are inherently any less intelligent and capable human beings than any other, so why do you have such collections of human misery and incapability?

Or are you claiming Australia is "exceptional" in the way some Americans try to excuse bullshit here by claiming we're oh-so-fundamentally different from everyone else? In North America we came to realize that forcible relocation, stealing children, and deliberately destroying cultures lead to many of the lamentable problems our natives were experiencing. When will Australia be able to admit the same?

Fuck off idiot. Don't try this butthurt bullshit with me you fucking coward.

Coward? My country at least admits we were a MAJOR contributor to the on-going problems are natives are having today. Does yours?

Am I touching a nerve here?

Or are you saying that White Australia is completely innocent of all wrong-doing in this matter?

I said the native Australians were MASSIVELY DIFFERENT TO THE NATIVE AMERICANS.

How so?

Seriously, how is it "massively" different? Our natives were decimated by disease (some of it delibrately spread), they were forced off their lands, yes, we even stole some of their children and tried to forcibly make them adopt white culture. We had hunter-gatherers. We gave them alcohol and alcoholism is a terrible problem still. Remember those Uptown, Chicago Potawatomie I mentioned? "Huffing" is a problem with them, too, and yes, they also use petrol (we call is gasoline here). North American tribes had nothing beyond stone age material technology. Hell the English even transported their criminals over here before they lost their North American colonies.

You ARE arguing exceptionalism.

This isn't exceptionalism, you little shit, it's a goddamn motherfucking indisputable fact. Now fuck off and die and take your worthless soundbytes with you.

It's a FACT that European colonists fucked over the natives wherever they went in the world including Australia. The only major difference I can see is that many (though not all) Australians still haven't come to terms with the FACT that their ancestors and society triggered most of the current problems the aborigines are facing.

We should have exterminated our native population, just like you guys. LOL!

We didn't exterminate them all. In fact, I suspect we have quite a bit more of ours left than you have of yours.

In case anyone with a fucking brain reads this, the political scene in AU makes it very difficult to do anythign in regional areas.

So fix your fucking politics. And admit it's not just politics, it's also fucking ugly racism, both in the past and continuing in the present, that feeds into the politics that are contributing to the bullshit.

[Stark]

Their culture didn't have a drug problem before the Europeans showed up with alcohol and other chemicals.

Uh... that's WHY their culture can't deal with drugs, dumbass. Can you not connect the dots? PS, that was 200 years ago. Oops.

Also, most hunter-gatherers do not want "sedentary civilization", they want to continue living the way they have been. Sure, they'll happily adopt metal knives and firearms and such, although there are instances from all other the world of hunter-gatherers continuing to use traditional weapons as well if they aren't forced off their land, confined against their will, decimated by disease, and, oh yes, not having their children stolen.

So you think native Australians DECIDED what they WANT? You're a complete idiot. There was nothing even remotely resembling central government. Oops.

PS, hunter gatherers don't want tech, luxuries and advancement which is why none of them have ever adopted... it... oh wait!

If you think being a hunter-gatherer in the Simpson desert is better than living in a housing commission flat with plenty of food, you're a total moron. Dump the 'noble savage' 'white man's burden' at the door, please, we're talking about actual social issues here.

So, the Sydney area was sooooo terribly inhospitable no one lived there before the European colonists? How fucking stupid are YOU? Those lands weren't empty. The people who used to live there went somewhere - either relocated or killed.

Here you admit you have no evidence and proceed based on assumptions. What a break against type! I love the application of American history to Australian, BTW.

You know what? We actually know there the Chicago Potawatomie went (a bunch of them are still living in Chicago, in fact, mostly in Uptown) - where are your Sydney aborigines? The ones who used to live in Melbourne and Brisbane and all the other locations now occupied by major cities? Those lands weren't empty. Where did the natives go?

Wow, let's beg some more questions. HOw is this relevant to cultural and social issues in regional Australia?

OH RIGHT IT ISN'T LOL.

I never denied that genocide was committed against the North American natives. That is not news, it's even taught in US history classes in public schools.

Wow, how enlightened of you.

Oh wait, you think it's not taught in 'public schools' here? Grow the fuck up, you stupid cretin. Where do you think a generation of rights activists came from?

You still don't get it - they survived just fine without wells. The didn't need them. No doubt, in a better world, they might well have adapted the technology because water sources in deserts are definitely an asset. But lets get real - those wells weren't dug to benefit the natives, they were dug to benefit colonists, farmers, and sheepherders.

Man, you really need to start proving scrabbling for survival out in the bush is better than living in a house with electricity and sewerage and plumbing and cable TV, because I'm really not seeing it.

Why are larger populations inherently better? Don't we have too many people in the world already? Isn't maintaining a population low enough for the land to carry the load indefinitely better than simply continuing to produce more and more people?

Larger sustainable populations is a result of better quality of life. Oops, turns out it's not all doom and gloom, and there are just social problems complicated by politics and guilt? WHO KNEW?

Oh yeah, not you.

What benefit do your aborigines get from technology? A better way to kill themselves? Do they have access to transportation? Communication? Medicine? The entire gist of this thread is that they largely don't have any of that technology. They have shitty little places to live with no hope of a better future. Oh, yes, that was a fair trade.

You are the dumbest person I've ever met. 'What benefit do aborigines get from technology'? How about I call up my friend Leah and ask her? OH RIGHT BOONGS DON'T WANT MOBILE PHONES LOL. Jesus fucking christ. Stone age = better than information age because some people use drugs. What. The. Fuck.

The worst part is you seem to think that native Australians 'largely don't have that technology', which is the dumbest thing I've ever heard. If someone chooses to live in the middle of the desert and huff paint, that's not really my problem. The cultural and economic issues need to be addressed, and Lus already spelt some of those out for you, which you totally ignored.

NOBLE SAVAGE!!!

Serious question - do you think the large majority of native Australians live in 'reservations' like the US? Do you think they're a rare sight in cities? Do you think they largely live in the traditional manner?

Not being familiar with Woodridge I have no way to evaluate that statement. But yes, I would argue that living in an environment where you are capable of obtaining food and water for your family and can easily move away from trouble is preferable to living in abject squalor unable to leave for a better place. Hunter-gatherer lives are hard, but they aren't necessarily unhappy.

Oh man.

You just said living in the middle of the desert is better than living in a Western city, because some people aren't necessarily happy. Are you listening to yourself?

Can't admit your society might be at least partly at fault?

Can you admit you have no goddamn idea what you're talking about and are talking a complete load of shit?

Cultures clash all the time. MOST of the time the "losers" don't end up quite as bad as yours did. Why is that? Couldn't possibly be racism, could it? Ugly word, but of course that evil doesn't happen Australia, only evil places like South Africa and the US.

Okay, you inhale some paint. If you think I'm afraid of using the term 'racist' to describe Australians, you're stupid, ugly AND illiterate. Oh wait, was that your big rhetorical flourish? Sorry. Australians are massively racist and as a whole don't give a shit about the plight of natives. So... how's that help them?

Hunter-gatherers have violence, of course, but being spread out all over the landscape mitigates it because potential aggressors and potential victims are separated by physical space most of the time. Prior to the arrival of colonists the aborigines simply did not have alcohol or the other substances they are currently abusing. And, oh yes, no one was systematically stealing their children before the colonists arrived. Man up and admit to at least that much happening - Australia stealing children and giving the natives such wonderful technological wonders as alcohol to drink and petrol to sniff.

Y'know, I'm sure someone will show up with statistics on this, but native settlements were given 'tribal law' business. Y'know what? Turns out their culture is so socially backward and stupid that things like alcoholism and domestic violence AREN'T REALLY CONSIDERED CRIMES. Throw them up in front of the tribal coucil, oh look nothing happened, problem continues. Amazing what those noble savages get up to isn't it?

In some places, yes. But not all of Australia is a desert (just most of it). Areas with greater vegetation and water had more population. I believe the Murray River Basin had the densest pre-colonial populations. Where are your Murray River aborigines today? How many are left?

I love how you turn things YOU DON'T KNOW into a damning indictment of... something. I'm not seeing how you venting your (ignorant) spleen over OH NOES TEH COLONIALZ is really contributing to the discussion of present-day issues and solutions. Indeed, this kind of pointless guilt-tripping is exactly why it takes so much political capital to do anything about this shit.

So... that made it OK for them to be killed, their land taken, their children stolen?

The Kalahari tribes used metal, but still made stone and bone tools into the 20th Century. The New Guinea Highlanders were entirely neolithic through the early part of the 20th Century. Both those groups are doing MUCH better (although still having major problems) than so many Australian Aborigines, with the same technology and the same problem of encountering outsiders with vastly superior technology. Again, why was Australia different?

You're going to have to a) learn to read and b) put up some evidence that they're doing 'much better' here, because it looks like you just can't read.

I think it was more likely a problem with the colonizers. Hell, it's no secret that a lot of the initial "colonists" were actually convicted criminals - you seriously think that those folks would be examples of enlightenment and tolerance? You think someone transported from England for stealing from his fellow English would hesitate to steal from a native? You think men transported for assault or murder would hesitate to beat or kill and aborigine? You think men transported for rape would suddenly reform and never touch a native woman? Not only were criminals dumped on the aborigines' shores, the criminals were vastly better armed and carrying disease they had no resistance to.

Think about what the English did in North America with its better organized natives, and consider what happened when those same English landed in Australia with its lower populations and it's even lower tech natives. Response to colonization? What response could the aborigines have to invading aliens with mysterious and powerful weapons who had little compunction against shoving them off ancestral lands, harming them, their women, and their children? What the fuck could they have done? Those who resisted were slaughtered. Those who submitted had their children stolen. Those who ran could only flee to the most inhospitable lands on the continent.

I'm really reeling under the impact of so much irrelevant bullshit. You do know this is about illiteracy and the need for social change in native populations, right? Not a thread about the evils of imperialism?

PS, please start adding some references to your constant non-specific allusions to events during the early colonial period. Not that I think you're talking out your ass or antyhign but... no, actually I do.

"Response to colonization" my ass - you're still blaming the victims.

Another soundbyte! Pointing out culture was unable to deal with new pressures or challenges = BLAMING THE VICTIMS! We should just let them go look after themselves in traditional... oh ... wait we did and it went to shit. Oops.

What is particularly complex about "invade, steal, kill, rape, and destroy families"?

No, you know the problems we're actually talking about, not the 200-year old bullshit you're dredging up because you're an idiot.

In the US native tribes are, at least on paper, sovereign or semi-sovereign entities. Some of them issue their own passports instead of using US ones. They have their own laws, their own police. In other words, they are allowed self-governance. Oddly enough, this often makes people give a damn as opposed to when they're treated as eternal infants.

Native Americans do have the option of entering mainstream society - claiming US citizenship is a non-issue.

Amazing piece of totally irrelevant trivia. I hear all problems are solvable the same way as in America. Otherwise that's 'exceptionalism' right? Oh... wait. Oops.

As I point out, some of our native groups are doing much better than some of your native groups. Gee, maybe Australia should take a look at how things are done elsewhere to maybe learn something - oh, wait, you're all Special Snowflakes and what works elsewhere couldn't possibly work in Australia.

Yeah and as I said the colonial experience for settlers and natives in Australia was TOTALLY FUCKING DIFFERENT. You broke this down into a bunch of crybaby bullshit, but I'm going to keep saying it. If you seriously make statements like 'why aren't native Australians as well off as out genocide survivors - I mean native Americans', you are hopelessly ignorant or stupid.

Well, it would have better had they never been fucked over in the first place.

Totally useless non-solution from crybaby Bwaaaastick #2172. Thanks for not helping!

If people are people regardless of skin color (which we all hold to be true here) how come YOUR dark skinned people seem so much worse off than dark skinned people in North America? I have never seen anything that indicates Australian Aborigines are inherently any less intelligent and capable human beings than any other, so why do you have such collections of human misery and incapability?

Yeah and as I said the colonial experience for settlers and natives in Australia was TOTALLY FUCKING DIFFERENT. You broke this down into a bunch of crybaby bullshit, but I'm going to keep saying it. If you seriously make statements like 'why aren't native Australians as well off as out genocide survivors - I mean native Americans', you are hopelessly ignorant or stupid.

Coward? My country at least admits we were a MAJOR contributor to the on-going problems are natives are having today. Does yours?

I know I keep saying 'ignorant', but your ignorance is truly staggering. It literally stuns me - stuns me nearly beyond the capacity for rational thought - that someone like you, with obviously zero idea what the fuck they're talking about, projects American denial of genocide to Australian mistreatment of the native population. I simply cannot process the myopic arrogance and stupidity required to make the statements you are making.

You just asked the question 'does your country admit they are a major contributor to the problems of the poor natives'. How about I grab a primary schooler?

They know a fuck more about it than idiots like you.

Am I touching a nerve here?

Yeah, I fucking hate stupid people. I hate ugly people. I hate idiot Americans lecturing Australians from a position of apparently near-total ignorance about conditions in their country and contributing nothing to a discussion of actual practical steps that might actually benefit actual disadvanaged people, preferring to point fingers and attribute blame instead of search for resolutions to endemic social and cultural problems.

Or are you saying that White Australia is completely innocent of all wrong-doing in this matter?

Why the flying fuck would I say that, you stupid cunt? Ps, you know White Australia generally refers to a series of laws and shit, and isn't just a buzzword from TV for 'lol white people', right?

How so?

Okay, I can't do this anymore. You're right, they're not different at all. You win. Let's apply your social solutions to ongoing problems in regional Australia.

Oh wait, you don't have any.

You ARE arguing exceptionalism.

Protip - 'exceptionalism' does not mean 'these things are different'.

And I can't finish your post. My shit filters are totally blown. Your ability to spew irrelevant shit out a keyboard has defeated me.

Go play WoW.

[Lusankya]

Broomstick: one thing you may not be aware of is that most Aboriginal tribes had no concept of land ownership before Europeans arrived. That had an enormous effect on European-Aboriginal contact early on, because it took a long time for the aborigines to even cotton onto the fact that these funny looking people weren't going to just move on.

The colony of South Australia (which administered the lower Murray) was actually incredibly liberal in its dealings with the local aborigines. In general, they tried to grant them autonomy, and the government only attempted to interfere with their affairs in relation to things like murder. One of the earliest laws passed in the colony was a law stating that a native providing testimony at a trial did not need to be sworn in, because obviously they wouldn't be Christian. This was later extended to the translator of a native as well, because the translator was also often a (non-Christian) aborigine. The end result of giving a fair trial: aborigines thought that English justice was a bit of a joke, because a suspect would be taken to Adelaide (free trip!) and fed at the local courthouse (free food!) and would then more often and not be acquitted due to lack of evidence (no punishment!). It was pretty much impossible to explain all of these laws and procedures to the aborigines, because they had nothing even vaguely equivalent to any of them in their culture.

Seriously. The South Australian colonists tried damn hard to treat the aborigines fairly. The problem was, they lost 90% of their population early on through disease, and it took a while for them to get used to the cultural differences. The cultural differences were even more severe for the central Australian tribes who, coincidentally enough, are also doing the worst at the moment.

I'm well aware that Native American Tribes were hit hard by disease too. What were (for example) Cherokee numbers like after the initial waves of disease for the Kaurna people, European-spread diseases reduced their numbers to 500. For the record, the Kaurna were quite densely populated for an aboriginal tribe, and the initial waves of disease were things like smallpox which spread from the eastern colonies rather than being diseases brought over only because of the local colonists.

Also, most hunter-gatherers do not want "sedentary civilization", they want to continue living the way they have been. Sure, they'll happily adopt metal knives and firearms and such, although there are instances from all other the world of hunter-gatherers continuing to use traditional weapons as well if they aren't forced off their land, confined against their will, decimated by disease, and, oh yes, not having their children stolen.

Yeah, because people who don't have any education can totally make the choice between what they know and what they have never been taught, am I right? And of course, they never stay in these places for other reasons such as a lack of funds. Nope. It's all choice. Totally their choice.

PS. Why aren't you moving to Canada? I hear that they have a fantastic healthcare system over there that could help your disabled husband. Or maybe you could move interstate to find better work opportunities, because I hear that's not expensive at all and is totally within your budget.

In the US native tribes are, at least on paper, sovereign or semi-sovereign entities. Some of them issue their own passports instead of using US ones. They have their own laws, their own police. In other words, they are allowed self-governance. Oddly enough, this often makes people give a damn as opposed to when they're treated as eternal infants

2. Nobody ever goes into the desert and in fact, access is often restricted into those areas to the extent that even government officials need to get a "visa", and as such, it's very easy to ignore.

Plenty of aboriginal communities are more or less self-governing. They also often don't work, because of the level of corruption. What should the Australian government do in these cases? And it's all very well to say "don't treat them like infants", but when you have situations like the one described in this thread, what the fuck are we supposed to do? We're talking about communities where there is a huge prevalence of preventable blindness which is caused by them not washing their faces. How can you deal with that kind of issue without treating someone like an infant?

So fix your fucking politics. And admit it's not just politics, it's also fucking ugly racism, both in the past and continuing in the present, that feeds into the politics that are contributing to the bullshit.

Well, if you're so smart, tell us how we should begin to fix the issues faced, then? Tell us how to encourage doctors and teachers to go and live and work in an area often hundreds of km from the nearest anything with an average yearly maximum temperature higher than that of Death Valley, California. Nobody is denying that racism and politics are problems. What we're saying is that even if we ignore those problems, nobody has a fucking idea where to start.

But you obviously know more about the aboriginal situation than all of the Australians on this board put together, so maybe you can tell us what to do.

[Flash]

Out of curiosity, how much are rural shitholes depressing the stats? Do statistics exist for aboriginals living in actual towns and cities?

Yeah, the stats are there. Surprise surprise, if you live in a remote community YOU LOSE!

From here:

For Australians living in remote areas, distance can be a barrier to accessing services. While an estimated one-third of Indigenous Australians (32%) were living in major cities and a further 43% were living in regional areas at 30 June 2006, a much larger proportion of the Indigenous than non-Indigenous population were living in remote or very remote areas (25% compared with 2%).

Levels of educational attainment among Indigenous people aged 15 years and over (excluding those still at school) were lower in geographically remote areas. In 2006, almost one-third (31%) of those living in major cities had completed Year 12 compared with 22% of Indigenous people living in regional areas and 14% in remote areas (table 2.5)...

Indigenous males and females had similar rates of Year 12 attainment (22% compared with 24%). In comparison, almost half (49%) of non-Indigenous Australians had completed Year 12 in 2006.

So a relatively large percentage of Aboriginal Australians live in isolated communities, and with that comes the associated lack of services. Problem is, no-one wants to go to these communities to provide said services for a variety of reasons, such as remoteness, environmental conditions, language barriers, substance abuse and violence.

My country at least admits we were a MAJOR contributor to the on-going problems are natives are having today. Does yours?

Short answer? YES. Now, as much fun as making snide comments about the closet racism of Australians is (even though most are really quite open about it), it doesn't actually go anywhere in proposing a solution, does it? How would you propose actually fixing these problems?

[JointStrikeFighter]

So a relatively large percentage of Aboriginal Australians live in isolated communities, and with that comes the associated lack of services. Problem is, no-one wants to go to these communities to provide said services for a variety of reasons, such as remoteness, environmental conditions, language barriers, substance abuse and violence.

Turns out we said that on the last page and broomstick is just a fucking retard. Would it be exceptionalism if I pointed out that the Australian Aboriginees are much more isolated, with much less intrinsic land, labour and capital wealth available to them than the American Natives?

PS. Pitcairn Island is populated by white people and their descendants. It's more or less completely economically useless for everything; thousands of miles from market, tiny; uneducated population, no mineral wealth. TURNS OUT ITS A SHITHOLE! It may not be a shithole because of racism because the population ARE WHITE!

The simple truth is these communities are not economically viable period. It's not because of racism, its because of simple geographic truth. THE DESERT IS A SHITHOLE

[loomer]

To repeat, Broomstick, no Australian (except the completely batshit lunatics) will deny that we fucked the aborigines up pretty damn good when we moved on in. Yes, we gutted them via disease, ethnic cleansing, slavery, and rape. This is what colonials DO. Now cease demanding we admit our fault in these issues, because as a nation and as individuals we admitted them a long time ago.

[JointStrikeFighter]

It's not like the Aborigines were even noble savages anyway.

Turns out that they burnt the entire country down and hunted to extinction all the animals larger than a kangaroo. It frankly would't have surprised me if they had been on the path to extinction in the next few thousand years anyway.

[Stark]

That's nothing; the Maori drove species to extinction way faster. Nowhere to run, no natural predators you see.

[Lusankya]

To be fair to the aborigines, the country wanted to burn down, and their regular burn-offs were much better than Victoria's policy of "let all of the leaf litter pile up until there's enough to turn the state into a smelting furnace".

[tim31]

Hell, I remember walking over a bridge(oh, the symbolism) in support of reconciliation.

Who else remembers seeing the calls by Community Leaders for fiscal compensation to back up Rudd's 'sorry'?

[Broomstick]

Also, most hunter-gatherers do not want "sedentary civilization", they want to continue living the way they have been. Sure, they'll happily adopt metal knives and firearms and such, although there are instances from all other the world of hunter-gatherers continuing to use traditional weapons as well if they aren't forced off their land, confined against their will, decimated by disease, and, oh yes, not having their children stolen.

So you think native Australians DECIDED what they WANT? You're a complete idiot. There was nothing even remotely resembling central government. Oops.

PS, hunter gatherers don't want tech, luxuries and advancement which is why none of them have ever adopted... it... oh wait!

Hunter gatherers and nomads do adopt new tech, but what they want from new tech isn't always what urban people expect them to want. Think of a Mongolian herdsman still living in a yurt, which is just a sort of tent, but possessing a portable TV. H-G's universally want to adopt metal knives because, you know, flint knapping is a sort of pain in the ass, and firearms, because they do make very nice hunting weapons (when you can get or make ammo) but they don't necessarily want to live in a fixed place or a brick house that turns into an oven in a desert climate.

Of course, there is a always enormous friction between those who wander and those who don't regardless of the tech level of the two parties involved. Settled government always want the wanderers to stop moving around and also settle down, whether it's native in Australia, natives on the American Great Plains, or Romani in Europe. When there's a massive disparity between the technology of the two groups the situation gets even worse.

If you think being a hunter-gatherer in the Simpson desert is better than living in a housing commission flat with plenty of food, you're a total moron. Dump the 'noble savage' 'white man's burden' at the door, please, we're talking about actual social issues here.

I have already stated that I have no illusions an H-G lifestyle is paradise. It's not. While a few live into old age the line about life being nasty, brutish, and short can certainly be applied in other cases. But it's not so simple as living naked under the sky and eating lizards vs. little house full of soda and crisps. As pointed out, the current communities have high rates of violence and while H-G's have their share of person-on-person violence the rate is much lower due to lower population densities and sheer distance. So... would you prefer living out in the bush or next to a neighbor who is drunk/high most of the time and prone to violence?

So, the Sydney area was sooooo terribly inhospitable no one lived there before the European colonists? How fucking stupid are YOU? Those lands weren't empty. The people who used to live there went somewhere - either relocated or killed.

Here you admit you have no evidence and proceed based on assumptions. What a break against type! I love the application of American history to Australian, BTW.

I asked you a question: where did the natives go? I'm serious, I am asking you that. Ask me where Native Americans went I can usually tell you. Most of the Cherokee, for example, were forcibly relocated from the southeastern United States to Oklahoma. The Iroquois are living on a reduced amount of land but in roughly the same location. The Cahokia were extinct before the Europeans showed up, possibly from European disease but it's hard to know for certain given the distance in time. The Plains Tribes were relocated from the choice areas of the Great Plains to the worst lands in those areas, often hundreds of miles from their traditional territory leaving them entirely lost in the landscape. The Pueblo peoples are still living in their cities that they built before the Europeans arrived. The Yahi of California are extinct.

So I am asking you - where did YOUR native peoples go? I'm not dictating or making assumptions, I am asking a simple fucking question to seek further information in what should be a discussion. What actually happened to the people who used to live where Sydney is now? Or maybe I should go look it up on Wikipedia and wonder how reliable the source is.

You know what? We actually know there the Chicago Potawatomie went (a bunch of them are still living in Chicago, in fact, mostly in Uptown) - where are your Sydney aborigines? The ones who used to live in Melbourne and Brisbane and all the other locations now occupied by major cities? Those lands weren't empty. Where did the natives go?

Wow, let's beg some more questions. HOw is this relevant to cultural and social issues in regional Australia?

You don't think it makes a difference if people disappeared due to epidemic diseases, or remained in place despite an invasion, or were hunted down like animals? You don't think that a 50% loss of a culture to disease or, at least in some places in the US, 90% loss doesn't have a huge impact on the culture and its descendants? Seems to make a difference here in North America and, under the assumption we're all the same species, I thought it might make a difference over there.

I never denied that genocide was committed against the North American natives. That is not news, it's even taught in US history classes in public schools.

Wow, how enlightened of you.

Didn't use to be taught, even in my parents' generation. That's something we've changed in a recent lifetime. If the lives of natives are going to get better then the dominating culture around them has to make some changes from the colonial era. How enlightened is Australia? That's not an accusation, that's a question. I don't know because I've never been there and information on this side of the Pacific is a bit sketchy and contradictory.

Oh wait, you think it's not taught in 'public schools' here? Grow the fuck up, you stupid cretin. Where do you think a generation of rights activists came from?

Here in North America it was the other way around - it didn't get taught in schools until after our Civil Rights movement.

You still don't get it - they survived just fine without wells. The didn't need them. No doubt, in a better world, they might well have adapted the technology because water sources in deserts are definitely an asset. But lets get real - those wells weren't dug to benefit the natives, they were dug to benefit colonists, farmers, and sheepherders.

Man, you really need to start proving scrabbling for survival out in the bush is better than living in a house with electricity and sewerage and plumbing and cable TV, because I'm really not seeing it.

But do they actually have reliable electricity, sewers, plumbing, and TV? Because I'm getting conflicting information from my other sources that seem to indicate that the remote bush communities don't always have those things.

Why are larger populations inherently better? Don't we have too many people in the world already? Isn't maintaining a population low enough for the land to carry the load indefinitely better than simply continuing to produce more and more people?

Larger sustainable populations is a result of better quality of life. Oops, turns out it's not all doom and gloom, and there are just social problems complicated by politics and guilt? WHO KNEW?

Better quality of life? But your aborigines have a shorter life expectancy than other Australians, don't they? Can you describe as "sustainable" a population plagued by early death from disease, drug abuse, and violence? Looking in from the outside it seems to me those communities only continue to exist due to outside intervention - haven't you mentioned their sustained by welfare? - and if it were withdrawn they would die out or collapse even further into shittiness. They aren't self sustaining, unlike the prior, lower populations. Population density isn't the only factor, but just as the aboriginal culture had no tools to deal with alcohol it had no tools to deal with crowding, either.

What benefit do your aborigines get from technology? A better way to kill themselves? Do they have access to transportation? Communication? Medicine? The entire gist of this thread is that they largely don't have any of that technology. They have shitty little places to live with no hope of a better future. Oh, yes, that was a fair trade.

You are the dumbest person I've ever met. 'What benefit do aborigines get from technology'? How about I call up my friend Leah and ask her? OH RIGHT BOONGS DON'T WANT MOBILE PHONES LOL. Jesus fucking christ. Stone age = better than information age because some people use drugs. What. The. Fuck.

I never said the aborigines would remain stone age - no other H-G group did once exposed to worked metal it would be ludicrous to assume they would be that sort of exception. But there's a difference between choosing to adopt technology and having it forced down your throat. My spouse has enough Native American background and documentation on his Native grandparents that he could claim tribal membership if he wanted to, the fact he chooses to remain in mainstream America and not claim such membership does not erase the fact that some of his somewhat distant cousins live in squalor on a reservation. His college degree does not erase the fact that Native Americans as a whole are less educated than non-indigenous Americans. Anecdote is not data.

The worst part is you seem to think that native Australians 'largely don't have that technology', which is the dumbest thing I've ever heard. If someone chooses to live in the middle of the desert and huff paint, that's not really my problem.

Right. We have already established that if you see 3,000 people dying horribly you won't stop your blowjob long enough to give a damn about it. We know you don't give a fuck about anyone else but Stark.

Clearly, though, some of your fellow countrymen do give a damn because even if their numbers are low there are, apparently, some who do try to go out to those communities and provide services.

Of course, maybe I'm just biased because I spent four years of my life working at a clinic trying to help people with addictions. I actually AM aware of the difficulties involved in trying to fix these problems

The cultural and economic issues need to be addressed, and Lus already spelt some of those out for you, which you totally ignored.

No, I didn't - I actually had a discussion with Lus. At least when I asked her a question she didn't take it as a personal attack. If even asking a sincere question gets you this riled up I have to wonder what the fuck YOUR personal problems are.

Serious question - do you think the large majority of native Australians live in 'reservations' like the US? Do you think they're a rare sight in cities? Do you think they largely live in the traditional manner?

I expect almost none of them live in the traditional manner as it is incompatible with the culture imposed by the colonial invaders. The only American Natives living anywhere near their traditional manner are those that were also settled agriculturalists like the Hopi and Zuni - which Australia never had among its natives. And a few Inuit up in Alaska, which were in a remote and inhospitable location where the farmers never arrived.

Most people with Native American ancestry don't live on reservations, but they're so thorough integrated into the mainstream culture you can't pick them out by sight. That doesn't mean horrific reservation situations don't exist here.

Was obvious to ME that this thread was talking about reservation squalor and remote, isolated communities, not aborigines who are mainstreamed into the dominant culture whether or not they hold on to any of their ancestors' customs and traditions.

Not being familiar with Woodridge I have no way to evaluate that statement. But yes, I would argue that living in an environment where you are capable of obtaining food and water for your family and can easily move away from trouble is preferable to living in abject squalor unable to leave for a better place. Hunter-gatherer lives are hard, but they aren't necessarily unhappy.

Oh man.

You just said living in the middle of the desert is better than living in a Western city, because some people aren't necessarily happy. Are you listening to yourself?

No, I said living where you can support yourself and your family is better than living where you can't. Location doesn't matter as much as being able to make a living and have some self-respect. Yes, a hunter gatherer out in the bush hunting and gathering enough to support himself/herself and family IS better off than someone living in a shithole box dependent on government handouts and slowly killing themselves with drugs and alcohol and violence. Giving people houses, clothes, and TV's does not automatically mean they will have happy lives. Now, if those aborigines who were given houses, etc. where living sober lives with decent jobs in peaceful little villages I'd say you have a leg to stand on, that the Great Australian Benevolence had done them some good but that's not always what happened, was it?

Sorry. Australians are massively racist and as a whole don't give a shit about the plight of natives. So... how's that help them?

It doesn't, which is the point, isn't it?

Y'know, I'm sure someone will show up with statistics on this, but native settlements were given 'tribal law' business. Y'know what? Turns out their culture is so socially backward and stupid that things like alcoholism and domestic violence AREN'T REALLY CONSIDERED CRIMES.

Um... alcoholism isn't a crime in the US, either. Seriously, are you telling me that it's illegal to be an alcoholic in Australia? That sure contradicts the information I've gotten, but you can't trust that whacky, liberal media, can you?

Up until the 20th Century what we call "domestic violence" wasn't a crime in the US, either. Why would you expect Australian Aborigines to be more enlightened than Europeans?

In some places, yes. But not all of Australia is a desert (just most of it). Areas with greater vegetation and water had more population. I believe the Murray River Basin had the densest pre-colonial populations. Where are your Murray River aborigines today? How many are left?

I love how you turn things YOU DON'T KNOW into a damning indictment of... something.

No, you fucking retard, I asked you a question: where the Murray River aborigines, how many are left, and how are they doing? That's not an accusation, that's a question. I don't know so rather than dig through potentially biased on-line sources I am asking you, an Australian, what happened to them. Holy fuck, what sort of guilt load are you carrying that you take a genuine question as a personal attack? What the fuck is wrong with you?

If you ask me what happened to a particular tribe in North America I usually either know the answer, or I can get a reliable answer in a very short period of time. I assumed - erroneously, I see - that you would be capable of the same for your Australian aborigines. The response "I don't know" is also legitimate. I don't assume you to be omniscient.

I'm not seeing how you venting your (ignorant) spleen over OH NOES TEH COLONIALZ is really contributing to the discussion of present-day issues and solutions. Indeed, this kind of pointless guilt-tripping is exactly why it takes so much political capital to do anything about this shit.

Asking you what happened to an indigenous population is suddenly "guilt-tripping" you? Amazing.

You're going to have to a) learn to read and b) put up some evidence that they're doing 'much better' here, because it looks like you just can't read.

Well, the New Guinea highlanders are still living on their traditional lands with their traditional cultures largely intact. They haven't been forcibly relocated somewhere else, and no one stole their children. I don't have any statistics on literacy rates and substances abuse for them, but the mere fact they are providing for themselves rather than being dependent on welfare handouts would seem to indicate they're "doing better".

The Kalahari peoples are having problems, but in 2003 they obtain and agreement to get royalities from the patenting of Hoodia gordonii and the p57 glycoside component used as an appetite suppressant on the basis that it was their cultural knowledge that lead to Phytopharm becoming interested in its properties. Gee, wouldn't it have been nice if the aborigines had gotten a royalty from all the didgeridus and boomerangs made over the years? There's also a group of them who are lobbying to be allowed to return to the Central Kalahari Game Reserve and resume their traditional way of life, despite being provided with modern housing, etc. So yes, amazingly, there ARE some people who have experienced both H-G living and modern living and actually do prefer the former to the latter. Not the choice I'd make, but I acknowledge that other people have other preferences than mine.

Hell, I live down the road from a group of European origins who have been rejecting most modern technology for generations - they don't have electricity, cars, TVs, or even zippers. About 3/4 of their children choose their lifestyle over the mainstream despite being exposed to all the wonders of the 21st Century on a regular basis.

You do know this is about illiteracy and the need for social change in native populations, right? Not a thread about the evils of imperialism?

What makes you think they're unrelated? Do you think the Australian aborigines herded themselves into little shitholes and decided of their own accord that a life of welfare dependence, drug addiction, and violence was a great idea? How ludicrous.

"Response to colonization" my ass - you're still blaming the victims.

Another soundbyte! Pointing out culture was unable to deal with new pressures or challenges = BLAMING THE VICTIMS! We should just let them go look after themselves in traditional... oh ... wait we did and it went to shit. Oops.

No, they weren't permitted to look after themselves in the traditional manner. They were forced off the most hospitable lands. When the big sheep ranches and farms were set up they were barred from hunting in those areas. Their children were literally stolen from them. And you're shocked that they were "unable to deal with new pressures"? What civilization is going to deal well with forced dislocation, deprivation of their means of making a living, and having their children snatched?

What is particularly complex about "invade, steal, kill, rape, and destroy families"?

No, you know the problems we're actually talking about, not the 200-year old bullshit you're dredging up because you're an idiot.

The current aborigine problems are a direct result of that "200 year old bullshit". And it's not 200 years old - the Australian government continued to steal aborigine children through the 1960's, that's a mere 40 years ago, well within the lifetime of many still alive. The abuses aren't just ancient history.

In the US native tribes are, at least on paper, sovereign or semi-sovereign entities. Some of them issue their own passports instead of using US ones. They have their own laws, their own police. In other words, they are allowed self-governance. Oddly enough, this often makes people give a damn as opposed to when they're treated as eternal infants.

Native Americans do have the option of entering mainstream society - claiming US citizenship is a non-issue.

Amazing piece of totally irrelevant trivia. I hear all problems are solvable the same way as in America. Otherwise that's 'exceptionalism' right? Oh... wait. Oops.

You keep distorting what I say. Frankly, the US is not a sterling example. I'd say look at Canada for some answers, in some cases they've done a better job. Obviously, entering mainstream society is easier when you can actually physically get there and from others have said in this thread lack of transportation is a true and significant barrier in Australia, more so than in the US.

As I point out, some of our native groups are doing much better than some of your native groups. Gee, maybe Australia should take a look at how things are done elsewhere to maybe learn something - oh, wait, you're all Special Snowflakes and what works elsewhere couldn't possibly work in Australia.

Yeah and as I said the colonial experience for settlers and natives in Australia was TOTALLY FUCKING DIFFERENT.

No, it wasn't. There are some differences, yes, but not "totally fucking different". My husband's first Scottish ancestor arrive in the American colonies in chains, transported after a criminal conviction and sentenced to a life of labor in the colonies. You know, like how a lot of other people from the British Isles arrived in Australia. The American natives got to deal with European diseases just as Australian natives did. In the America Europeans settled, fenced off, and took over "empty" lands without understanding that the nomadic natives were very much using those territories, just like in Australia. There were all sorts of cultural clashes, including things being crimes on one side of the fence that weren't crimes on the other. It does seem that fewer Europeans ran off to join the natives in Australia than in the US (that's what husband's said ancestor did, he escaped the British controlled areas, married into a native tribe, and lived out his life away from the British controlled areas), and you don't seem to have the icon of the Australian settler adopting natives' dress (or lack of it) and lifestyle as in the US with buckskin-wearing frontiersmen. And the American natives did have a greater range of lifestyles, not just hunter-gatherer. But the two continents didn't have as different an experience as you imply.

You broke this down into a bunch of crybaby bullshit, but I'm going to keep saying it. If you seriously make statements like 'why aren't native Australians as well off as out genocide survivors - I mean native Americans', you are hopelessly ignorant or stupid.

No, really - why aren't they at least as well off? You've stated that they're human beings just like the rest of us, just as intelligent, same needs, wants, and desires. They, too, are survivors of genocide. Yes, there are individual aborigines who have done well in life, but why no successful groups of them? Or are people outside Australia just not hearing about them? The Cherokee, Hopi, Zuni, and Navajo all maintain order on their reservations. The Cherokee have a literacy rate comparable to mainstream America, with the difference being that quite a few of them are literate in two languages. The Navajo have distinguished themselves in the US military, including play a key role in coded messages in WWII. The Iroquois helped build New York City. Maybe you're just not getting your more successful tribes in the news, so tell me, what are the native Australian groups who are doing better than the petrol-huffing cesspits? That's not an attack, that's a question: tell me about the aborigine groups who are doing better than the ones mentioned in the OP. Then ask yourself why they're doing better.

Yeah and as I said the colonial experience for settlers and natives in Australia was TOTALLY FUCKING DIFFERENT.

No, it wasn't. If you continue to maintain that provide some proof.

If you seriously make statements like 'why aren't native Australians as well off as out genocide survivors - I mean native Americans', you are hopelessly ignorant or stupid.

That's not a statement you moron, it's a question - WHY are your natives (apparently) so much worse off than natives elsewhere? Including former hunter-gatherer who were also limited to stone age technology?

Coward? My country at least admits we were a MAJOR contributor to the on-going problems are natives are having today. Does yours?

I know I keep saying 'ignorant', but your ignorance is truly staggering. It literally stuns me - stuns me nearly beyond the capacity for rational thought - that someone like you, with obviously zero idea what the fuck they're talking about, projects American denial of genocide to Australian mistreatment of the native population.

How in the hell do you go from "my county admits mistreatment, forced relocation, stealing of children, and deliberate elimination of natives from regions" to "denies genocide"? Or are you so enraged that you've lost all ability to read for comprehension. No, America doesn't deny killing off large numbers of its natives. I never said that. In fact, I've several times stated the opposite.

Am I touching a nerve here?

Yeah, I fucking hate stupid people. I hate ugly people.

As you have never seen me I am baffled how you can come to conclusion I am "ugly". Certainly there is that possibility but you express it as a definitive statement. Could you... possibly... >gasp!< be making a personal attack because you have no logical argument here?

I hate idiot Americans lecturing Australians from a position of apparently near-total ignorance about conditions in their country and contributing nothing to a discussion of actual practical steps that might actually benefit actual disadvanaged people, preferring to point fingers and attribute blame instead of search for resolutions to endemic social and cultural problems.

I'm sorry - I'm supposed to solve YOUR problems for you? In actual fact, I HAVE made some suggestions in this thread, which you conveniently chose to ignore completely, such as increasing salary and incentives for people who do go into those areas with all those horrible problems and do their best to provide services. I suggest an international organization with extensive experience in helping people in absolutely horrific circumstances. But of course, that's meddling, can't have that - damned if I do, damned if I don't.

Fact is, you can't solve the problems if you haven't a clue where they came from. It's not finger pointing, it's fact: a lot of the current problems stem from past mistreatment. If you can't admit that you won't get anywhere. It's not your personal fault, but it is the fault of your society and culture. Nor is it a unique situation in history, this shit comes up again and again around the world whenever one group invades another with disparate levels of technology involved. Why are you threatened by the suggestion that Australia look at how other places have dealt with these problems? No, not all of it will apply but you reject the idea of even looking at how other people have dealt with these problems.

Or are you saying that White Australia is completely innocent of all wrong-doing in this matter?

Why the flying fuck would I say that, you stupid cunt? Ps, you know White Australia generally refers to a series of laws and shit, and isn't just a buzzword from TV for 'lol white people', right?

Yes, I do.

In fact, given the proximity to Asia, I expect "white Australia" has quite a bit of "yellow" in it these days, along with fully assimilated natives and quite a few people of mixed descent. I just get tired of typing out things like "the European-derived dominant culture".

Okay, I can't do this anymore. You're right, they're not different at all. You win. Let's apply your social solutions to ongoing problems in regional Australia.

Oh wait, you don't have any.

Sure I do. Increase wages and incentives to those who go to those areas to provide services. Want some more? If transportation is a problem them subsidize transportation to those areas. Airplanes and airstrips might be more effective than roads in these days and times - in Alaska a lot of remote communities receive or obtain services via air. I'd recommend banning alcohol from areas it's a problem, but in fact that's already been tried and, honestly, here in the US it hasn't' been particularly successful - perhaps because transportation isn't such an issue here and it's all too easy to go elsewhere to get it. In reading up recently on Australian Aborigines since this thread started I've found that in some areas it's been tried to replace alcohol with kava kava which is less likely to result in violence when consume sufficiently to alter consciousness, which is an intriguing idea though I gather that whether or not it's been successful is still not determined. Domestic violence is a thorny problem, one "first world" societies haven't solved either. If ya'll come up with a solution to that one please share it, will you? Here in the US there has been some recent success with Native American reservations providing calling center services or other services that can be provided via the internet that don't require people to move away from their communities, but that is, of course, contingent upon reliable electricity, phone connections, and people being functional enough to operate a computer or telephone and some of your aboriginal communities just can't supply that at this time. However, under the assumption that there are some remote locations that are doing better than the worst cases that's an idea that might benefit not just remotely located aborigines but remotely located people of European descent as well.

Go play WoW.

But arguing with you is so much more entertaining than ganking lowbies and griefing school children.

[loomer]

Most of the natives - and there were less than a million - wound up dying. We took out a good number with smallpox and then finished everyone else off with rifles, clubs, and axes. Specifically, we left about 1/10th of the population alive. So where did they go? Pretty simply, they went into the ground or they went into the towns we founded as a lower class. A good few got shipped out to the missions too, where we didn't want to live.

[Lusankya]

Aborigines only make up about 2.2% of the population. When you take into consideration that aboriginal tribes were a lot more evenly distributed around the country than Europeans are (91% of Australia's population is urban and about 60% live in our five largest cities), that means that aborigines make up an insignificant percentage of our urban demographics.

Then we have places like Kalgoorie, which is 50% larger again than Alaska and has a population of 76000.

[Broomstick]

Broomstick: one thing you may not be aware of is that most Aboriginal tribes had no concept of land ownership before Europeans arrived.

That was true of a quite a few American groups as well. Some had strong notions of land ownership, but others felt the land belonged to everyone or no one (big surprise, the former were agriculturalist and the latter nomads).

That had an enormous effect on European-Aboriginal contact early on, because it took a long time for the aborigines to even cotton onto the fact that these funny looking people weren't going to just move on.

I think over here it was more a matter of being dumbfounded the newcomers were unable to share with others, but while the problem may have been much more extreme in that regard in Australia it was certainly not unknown in North America.

The colony of South Australia (which administered the lower Murray) was actually incredibly liberal in its dealings with the local aborigines. In general, they tried to grant them autonomy, and the government only attempted to interfere with their affairs in relation to things like murder. One of the earliest laws passed in the colony was a law stating that a native providing testimony at a trial did not need to be sworn in, because obviously they wouldn't be Christian. This was later extended to the translator of a native as well, because the translator was also often a (non-Christian) aborigine. The end result of giving a fair trial: aborigines thought that English justice was a bit of a joke, because a suspect would be taken to Adelaide (free trip!) and fed at the local courthouse (free food!) and would then more often and not be acquitted due to lack of evidence (no punishment!). It was pretty much impossible to explain all of these laws and procedures to the aborigines, because they had nothing even vaguely equivalent to any of them in their culture.

I wonder what the flip side of that was - how did the Europeans regard aboriginal notions of justice and how they maintained "law and order" in their society? I know that in Africa there were constant problems between the H-G's and the settled peoples due to how justice was defined and meted out in the two communities. As the H-G's had no jails nor means of confining dangerous people the result was typically killing the problem person in order to protect other people from them. Can't imagine this went over well if an agriculturalist was deemed dangerous by H-G's, can you?

Seriously. The South Australian colonists tried damn hard to treat the aborigines fairly. The problem was, they lost 90% of their population early on through disease, and it took a while for them to get used to the cultural differences. The cultural differences were even more severe for the central Australian tribes who, coincidentally enough, are also doing the worst at the moment.

And that makes perfect sense to me.

I'm well aware that Native American Tribes were hit hard by disease too. What were (for example) Cherokee numbers like after the initial waves of disease for the Kaurna people, European-spread diseases reduced their numbers to 500.

As early contact was some time ago the records are spotty, and the Cherokee were relatively numerous, but indications are that overall they lost at least 50% of their population and in some areas up to 90 or 94%, usually to outbreaks of smallpox or measles.

The Cherokee were actually more open than many groups to having outsiders marry into their tribe, as a result, quite a few Cherokee today look as much European as a native and no doubt acquiring genetic resistance to some disease became a long term advantage.

For example, this woman, Wilma Mankiller

would probably be taken for a white person of European descent if you encountered her on the street. In fact, her mother was of Dutch and Irish background and had no Cherokee or other Native American ancestry at all. Yet Ms. Mankiller served ten years as Paramount Chief of the Cherokee Nation, from 1985 to 1995 and is considered to be as Cherokee as anyone else in the world. Fact is, most of the current Cherokee Nation (and the other two recognized Cherokee groups) are of mixed descent. One of the strengths of the Cherokee is their adaptability. Why did they succeed where others have failed? That's an intriguing question, isn't it? Certainly, in part it's a cultural willingness to adopt new things from outside their culture

For the record, the Kaurna were quite densely populated for an aboriginal tribe, and the initial waves of disease were things like smallpox which spread from the eastern colonies rather than being diseases brought over only because of the local colonists.

Same problems over here. One of the reasons Cortez and his men conquered the Aztecs was smallpox decimating the population. By the time the marched on Tenochtitlan (which later was renamed Mexico City) most of the population was already sick or dying or dead. Disease spread in all directions from that point, so by the time the Europeans landed in New England and started heading west they encountered ghost towns that had been wiped out by disease that proceeded the colonists. I already mentioned the Cahokia, which lived in dense populations and, according to oral accounts from surviving neighbors, were devastated by disease they had never seen before.

The densest populations got hit with disease. The scattered populations got steamrolled by colonists. North America lost between 2/3 and 90% of its pre-European contact population due to those two influences. If we wound up with greater numbers of natives it's probably because we started off with more, having a larger land area, more areas of abundant fertility as opposed to scrub and desert, and some of our natives having better technology and organization than native Australians did.

Also, most hunter-gatherers do not want "sedentary civilization", they want to continue living the way they have been. Sure, they'll happily adopt metal knives and firearms and such, although there are instances from all other the world of hunter-gatherers continuing to use traditional weapons as well if they aren't forced off their land, confined against their will, decimated by disease, and, oh yes, not having their children stolen.

Yeah, because people who don't have any education can totally make the choice between what they know and what they have never been taught, am I right? And of course, they never stay in these places for other reasons such as a lack of funds. Nope. It's all choice. Totally their choice.

I wasn't clear on that - people who have been living as H-G's and nomads all their lives, educated within those lifestyles (which doesn't mean literacy but rather how to survive and support oneself in such circumstances) do not always want to settle down. Some do, and there are historical examples of people who thought houses and fresh baked bread were so wonderful they consciously made the choice to assimilate. Others, however, fought to the death to resist having their lifestyle taken from them, over here we call that the "Indian Wars", and after the natives got horses and firearms it took an organized military years to defeat them.

The problem is, there descendants in many cases really don't have a choice. Certainly there are natives who get educated, leave, even get advanced training, and choose to go back and try to make things better, just as there are those who leave and never look back. I do know that after the Indian Wars people belong to Plains Tribes were forcibly confined to reservations and not permitted to travel freely, even those who were born after the relocations. If there had been true choice many more natives might have adopted European ways, we just don't know and never will know but for quite a long while there was an aspect of extermination to how natives were dealt with, rather than "civilizing" them. Certainly, there were some people determined to make the natives over into a dark-skinned version of their European selves, who met with mixed success.

Absolutely, barriers to movement are a significant problem in the current situation.

In the US native tribes are, at least on paper, sovereign or semi-sovereign entities. Some of them issue their own passports instead of using US ones. They have their own laws, their own police. In other words, they are allowed self-governance. Oddly enough, this often makes people give a damn as opposed to when they're treated as eternal infants

2. Nobody ever goes into the desert and in fact, access is often restricted into those areas to the extent that even government officials need to get a "visa", and as such, it's very easy to ignore.

By "nobody" do you mean the natives don't go there either, or do they restrict access by outsiders?

There has, at times, been a problem in the US with criminals taking refuge on native-controlled lands. On the other hand, there is also some cooperation, as there has equally been a problem with reservation criminals fleeing to the outside as well. Extradition does occur, as does mutual cooperation between enforcement agencies. Of course, having some mutual respect and trust between the two parties goes a long way to enabling cross-jurisdiction cooperation. As I am not privy to the details of how these things are run in Australia I can't really speak much more about the subject.

Plenty of aboriginal communities are more or less self-governing. They also often don't work, because of the level of corruption. What should the Australian government do in these cases?

Hell, have you looked at the corruption in Illinois? Four of the five or six most recent governors are either in jail or have served time for corruption. What's the difference between those aborigine communities that function at all and those that don't? Until you can sort that out somewhat I'm not sure you can even start to work on the problem.

Here in the US the problems of remote communities weren't limited to just the native populations, it was a problem for remote communities of European origin as well, though usually not to the same degree. In many cases it took government subsidized services to start to improve things, such as the rural electrification programs and subsidized construction of roads and airports. Hell, we still have some communities that don't have modern water and sewer supplies, particularly in Alaska.

And it's all very well to say "don't treat them like infants", but when you have situations like the one described in this thread, what the fuck are we supposed to do? We're talking about communities where there is a huge prevalence of preventable blindness which is caused by them not washing their faces. How can you deal with that kind of issue without treating someone like an infant?

Um... seems to me that in that article it was members of the community who were trying to come up with solutions. Clearly, they have some appalling problems but one of the points was that responsible members of the community were trying to come up with solutions and telling the government what they wanted and needed. I can see where the "wash in exchange for petrol" seem patronizing, but if the idea came from the community itself it's not.

Well, if you're so smart, tell us how we should begin to fix the issues faced, then? Tell us how to encourage doctors and teachers to go and live and work in an area often hundreds of km from the nearest anything with an average yearly maximum temperature higher than that of Death Valley, California.

More money would be a good start. If debt/loan forgiveness won't work for lack of debt just offer more money. Get reliable power to those communities so they can have things like air conditioning that make the climate more bearable and reduce the physical discomfort. Teach people to fly airplanes (it's not that difficult) so they can get into and out of those remote areas themselves in a decent amount of time. It's going to cost some money to do these things, yes, but that's a minimal start.

[CJvR]

It's not like the Aborigines were even noble savages anyway.

The "noble savage" is a myth only civilized man could come up with. The difference between a native living serenely in harmony with nature and the evil ruthless exploiter from the west is only means, not morals. Every where humans have turned up in enviroments previously spared from their precense it has turned into an ecological disaster.

[Broomstick]

Aborigines only make up about 2.2% of the population.

In the US, native peoples are only 1.37% of our population. I was a bit surprised by that, proportionally your natives are a greater slice of your overall population than ours are.

aborigines make up an insignificant percentage of our urban demographics.

Ditto

[Broomstick]

To repeat, Broomstick, no Australian (except the completely batshit lunatics) will deny that we fucked the aborigines up pretty damn good when we moved on in. Yes, we gutted them via disease, ethnic cleansing, slavery, and rape. This is what colonials DO. Now cease demanding we admit our fault in these issues, because as a nation and as individuals we admitted them a long time ago.

Actually, I want Stark to admit it - the rest of Australia I think has a firmer grasp on reality.

[Broomstick]

It's not like the Aborigines were even noble savages anyway.

"Noble savages" was a myth dreamed up after most of the natives were gone.

Turns out that they burnt the entire country down and hunted to extinction all the animals larger than a kangaroo. It frankly would't have surprised me if they had been on the path to extinction in the next few thousand years anyway.

Humans did that everywhere outside of Africa we went, including the oceans. It is unlikely that native Australians would have died out if left alone as they had achieved an equilibrium of sorts that had been maintained for thousand, if not tens of thousands, of years.

"Hobbes Savages" - lives nasty, brutish, and short - are just as much a myth as "Noble Savages". The truth lies somewhere in between, and it's a bit of a moving target.