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titleAboriginal
history and heritageAboriginal
identity and cultureaustralia's
human rights recordreconciliation,
social justice, the constitution and a treatythe
stolen generations |
| information| issues » Text(.txt)
version of this page The Stolen Generations | |
"Mr
Neville holds the view that within one hundred years the pure black will be extinct.
But the halfecaste problem was increasing every year. Therefore their idea was
to keep the pure blacks segregated and absorb the half-castes into the white population....The
pure black was not a quick breeder. On the other hand the half-caste was. In Western
Australia there were half-caste families of twenty and upwards. That showed the
magnitude of the problem In order to secure the complete segregation of the children..(they)
were left with their mothers (only) until they were two years old. After that
they were taken from their mothers and reared in accordance with white ideas." A.P.
Neville, Brisbane Telegraph, 1937.
| | | |
Restoring
Identity (703kb PDF) Final report of the Moving Forward consultation project.Restoring
identity - achieving justice for the stolen generations 27 September,
2002 - Media Release, Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission (HREOC); Media
Release, Public Interest Advocacy Centre. | | download
print out and hand out the
ENIAR Issues fact sheet (34kb
PDF) |
"What I'd hope [Rabbit-Proof Fence] might encourage is for all Australians
to understand the deeply felt emotions that have fuelled some of the debates on
the stolen generations issue and on reconciliation in general." Director
Phil Noyce.
| | external
links Bringing
them Home Report of the National Inquiry into the Separation of Aboriginal
and Torres Strait Islander Children from their Families. HREOC
Website: Bringing them home: Education Module The Bringing them home education
module provides an opportunity for students and teachers to research and consider
this history and to assess how far the nation has come in achieving a home coming
for those children.`Stolen
Children Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs')Stolen
Children Sermonjourneyofhealing.comFace
the Facts Excellent introductory guide to the issues, written by the
Federal Race Discrimination Commissioner Who is an Aboriginal or Torres
Strait Islander person? What is Reconciliation? What is self-determination? Where
do Indigenous people live today? ... You can also download
this file from the ENIAR site in PDF format (490kb file)
see the
stolen generations section of links in the
information pages of this website | the
Sorry Ribbon | |
Between 1910 and 1970 up to 100,000 Aboriginal children were taken
forcibly or under duress from their families by police or welfare officers . Most
were under 5 years old. There was rarely any judicial process. To be Aboriginal
was enough. They are known as the stolen generations. What
happened to them? - Most were raised in Church or state institutions.
Some were fostered or adopted by white parents.
- Many suffered physical
and sexual abuse. Food and living conditions were poor.
- They received
little education, and were expected to go into low
grade domestic and farming work.
Why were they taken? They
were taken because it was Federal and State Government policy that Aboriginal
children - especially those of mixed Aboriginal and European descent - should
be removed from their parents. Between 10 and 30% of all Aboriginal children
were removed, and in some places these policies continued into the 1970s. - The
main motive was to assimilate Aboriginal children into European society
over one or two generations by denying and destroying their Aboriginality.
- Speaking
their languages and practising their ceremonies was forbidden
- They were
taken miles from their country, some overseas
- Parents were not told where
their children were and could not trace them
- Children were told that they
were orphans
- Family visits were discouraged or forbidden; letters were
destroyed.
What were the results The physical and
emotional damage to those taken away was profound and lasting: - Most grew
up in a hostile environment without family ties or cultural identity.
- As
adults, many suffered insecurity, lack of self esteem, feelings of worthlessness,
depression, suicide, violence, delinquency, abuse of alcohol and drugs and inability
to trust.
- Lacking a parental model, many had difficulty bringing up their
own children.
- The scale of separation also had profound consequences for
the whole Aboriginal community - anger, powerlessness and lack of purpose as well
as an abiding distrust of Government, police and officials.
What
is being done? A National Inquiry was set up in 1995. Its 1997 Report
Bringing
them Home contained harrowing evidence. It found that forcible
removal of indigenous children was a gross violation of human rights which continued
well after Australia had undertaken international human rights commitments. - It
was racially discriminatory, because it only applied to Aboriginal children on
that scale, and
- It was an act of genocide contrary to the Convention
on Genocide, (which forbids forcibly transferring children of [a] group
to another group with the intention of destroying the group.)
The
Report made 54 recommendations, including opening of records, family tracing and
reunion services and the need for reparations (including acknowledgement
and apology by Governments and institutions concerned, restitution, rehabilitation
and compensation). The Government increased some funding but has refused
to apologise or offer compensation. A Senate committee has investigated
the Governments response to the Report. People of the stolen generation
have started legal actions for compensation against the Government . The
cases have been hard fought, as Government lawyers are arguing that removal of
children was done for their own good. A statement by the former Aboriginal
Affairs Minister John Herron which denyied existance of the stolen generations
caused distress and anger among those affected. Denial has marked much of the
commentary. 'Moving forward: achieving reparations' is a project conducted
in partnership with ATSIC, the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission,
the National Sorry Day Committee and Northern Territory stolen generation groups.
It's report 'Restoring identity',
proposing a reparations tribunal for the stolen generations, has widespread support
by Indigenous people. Ministers for Aboriginal Affairs in Victoria, Queensland,
South Australia and Western Australia issued public statements welcoming the report
and detailing their initiatives to implement the recommendations. Selected
further reading and links:
- Stolen Generations case may go before
UN
7 June, 2004 - Legal avenues are being explored to take the case of
the Stolen Generations to the United Nations Human Rights Commission.
- Finding home amid the stolen memories
May 8, 2004 - Larissa Behrendt greets me at her office in the University
of Technology, Sydney, carrying a bundle of legal documents. There's
no room on the desk and she sighs at the stacks of papers. Behrendt,
35, appears both confident (especially when discussing complex legal
arguments) and slightly guarded. She is nervous, she says, about how
her debut novel, Home, winner of the 2002 David Unaipon award, will
be received.
- Australian Journalist Questions Stolen
Generation
March 11, 2004 - Cultural Survival - In Australias Sunday
Mail on February 29, journalist Andrew Bolt, in what he claims is an
innocent attempt at finding the truth, denounces the existence of the
Stolen Generation, a group of 50,000-100,000 children taken
from their Aboriginal parents for racist purposes by racist governments
in the early years of the twentieth century, supposedly in the peoples
best interests. Claiming that not one person who was stolen
can be identified anywhere on the continent, Bolts naïve
and misguided attempt at objective reporting is causing an uproar, particularly
because Australian papers are prepared to print his inflammatory remarks.
- The art of saying sorry
April 3, 2004 - When we were growing up, my generation knew nothing
and cared less about Aboriginal culture. Indeed, those two words - Aboriginal
and culture - seemed a contradiction in terms, a classic oxymoron. The
view from the Melbourne suburbs? Aborigines were a dying people and
a dead issue.
- Urgent steps towards healing - the NSDC view
13 November 2002 - National Sorry Day Committee (NSDC) - Extract from
a paper presented at a seminar entitled "Are We Bringing Them Home?"
by Dr Peter O'Brien.
- Govt accused of short-changing stolen
generation
November 8, 2002 - The Central Australian Stolen Generation and
Families Corporation says it wants to know what has happened to $63
million earmarked for members of the stolen generation.
- Federal Government still needs to say
sorry
4 November 2002 - ATSIC NT Central Zone Commissioner, Ms Alison Anderson
- Speaking on CAAMA (Central Australian Aboriginal Media Association)
Radio in Alice Springs this morning, Mr Howard said he is "sorry
as an individual" but he again ruled out a formal apology from
his Federal CoalitionGovernment.
- First compensation win for the stolen generation
October 18 2002 - Sydney woman Valerie Linow was shaking and overwhelmed
yesterday after becoming the first member of the stolen generations
to win monetary compensation for her cruel treatment after authorities
removed her from her family.
- Stolen generations fury at memorial
`whitewash'
May 27 2002 - Representatives of the stolen generations will ask the
Federal Government for land in Canberra to build their own memorial
because they consider references to their history at the new Reconciliation
Place to be a whitewash.
- Genocide, Ethnocide, Or Hyperbole? Australia's
"Stolen Generation" and Canada's "Hidden Holocaust"
25 April, 2002 - Cultural Survival - A decade awash in genocide and
deadly conflict has passed since Jason Clay lamented that "it is impossible
for concerned activists and scholars to agree on which cases constitute
genocides, much less how interested people would go about documenting
them." The learning curve when it comes to genocide, however, is conspicuously
uneven. The challenge lies not in cultivating and maintaining an awareness
of the phenomenon -- a task the mass media has demonstrated itself more
than capable of handling -- but in recognizing its universal implications.
- Aborigines' international hero unites warring
parties
August 10, 2001 - "Jack Beetson fights for the stolen generations,"
says the TV clip to be shown around the world about the Aboriginal leader
the United Nations has named as one of only 12 Unsung Heroes.
- Victim of Australia’s ‘Stolen Generations’
appeals for reparations
May 18, 2001 - Minority Rights (UK) - The UN Working Group on Minorities
which is meeting in Geneva this week heard the testimony of Audrey Ngingali
Kinnear, an Indigenous woman from Australia...’.
- Right and wrong
March 31, 2001 - Conservative efforts to deny the existence of
the stolen generations are a sinister cultural development, argues Robert
Manne, and are designed to undermine the very notion of Aboriginal dispossession.
- Only understanding will bring down the
fence dividing a nation
March 21, 2002 - Organisations that support members of the stolen generations
are crying out for proper funding, writes Doris Pilkington Garimara.
- Where did all the children go?
July 5, 2000 - The Independent (UK) - Stolen, one of several Australian
plays about the abduction of Aboriginal children, has caused audience
members to have heart attacks. Why is it so powerful?
- First their children were stolen
now their land too?
November 1997 - The Independent (UK) - An open letter to the Her
Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, the Queen of Australia: 'We write to appeal
to you as Australia's constitutional Head of State. We do so as a matter
of some urgency and not without hope.
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