Vandals target Captain Cook statue

[davidc4430]

Australia Day: Vandals target Captain Cook statue in Sydney, with 'change the date' message

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-08-26/australia-day-argument-intensifies-as-vandals-hit-captain-cook...

i heard stan grant interviewed yeterday on radio, i think he will be apalled by this vandalism.

not the way to get the public onside for any change.

[chameleon54]

I think the vandals are drawing a pretty long bow with the comment " no pride in genocide".  The Jews or modern Samolians know all about genocide. What happened in Australia was just basic, simple, good old fashioned colonialism. Sure it wasnt pretty and aborigines fighting to maintain control of their lands where at times killed............. But Genocide ????    .............Cmon..........Keep it real bros.

If the British or Australian governments had a policy of genocide, they would not have had a " protector of Aborigines" in each state, making reports to parliment each year on how many Aborigines there where, where they lived, how many "rations" where provided too them, what medical treatments and schooling they where recieving etc. If genocide was the governments aim, the stolen generation would not be here to tell their stories.

The governments policy was ( and probably still is ) one of paternalism and eventual intergration into main stream society.

The vandal would have been more accurate if he had written " No pride in colonialism and assimmilation policies ", but it probably doesnt have the same ring to it.......    

[viewmont1071]

IMO Colonial colonization moulded with indigenous culture has made Australia what it is today.

 The mixture of the two...... not one or the other exclusively......

The 26th January 1788 is but the day it all went into the mixing bowl.

along the way we added lots of "ingredients" from a multitude of other nationalities

.... and that 18th century Thermomix is still churning today.....

[imastawka]

I heard it bandied about that the date should be changed to May 8

How Aussie is Mate?

[davidc4430]

i dont get it, change the date?

isnt it what the date represents thats the issue to those wanting change?

so whatever the date it will still represent in the minds of those wanting change the celebration of genocide (their words not mine)?

BTW, how would it be seen if vandals did similar to a sacred site?

argue your point with words, not actions.

[imastawka]

David, they want to change the date because January 26th is the actual day

Captain Cook first set foot on Australian soil.

They don't want to 'celebrate' the date that white man took their land.

But celebrating as Australians should be on another date.

[the_great_she_elephant]

Actually it marks the anniversary of the 1788 arrival of the First Fleet of British Ships at Port Jackson, New South Wales, and the raising of the Flag of Great Britain at Sydney Cove by Governor Arthur Phillip.  Poor old Captain Cook may have 'discovered' Australia  (well the East coast anyway - the Dutch had been wrecking their ships up and down the West coast for a good century before that). He cant be blamed for what happened afterwards.

And there was no such place as Australia either on or for a long time after January 26 1788.  At that time obody even realised the East and West coasts were part of the same continent. Phillip only proclaimed the colony of NSW. 

[imastawka]

Takes a Pom to educate an Aussie  hahahahaha

OK even more reason to change the date, if it 'celebrates' the arrival of the

First Fleet.

And I never said good ol' Cap'n Cook 'discovered' Australia.   I knew the Dutch

were all over it before then.  I've visited the wreck of the Batavia at Geraldton.

A wonderful museum there.

[the_great_she_elephant]

I've visited that museum too, Stawka and also the Shipwreck museum in Fremantle which has a whole gallery devoted to the Batavia. It contains  part of the actual  hull of the ship and also the skeleton of one of the men killed by the mutineers. His name was probably Andreis de Vries and you can see the dent in his skull where he was whacked over the head with a cutlas. For me the most evocative piece in the Geraldton Museum is a large bowl belonging to the surgeon/barber. His murder is described in graphic detail in Pelsaert's journal.