The Killing Times

[icyfroth]

Massacres of Aboriginal People Australians Must Confront:

The truth of Australia’s history has long been hiding in plain sight.

The stories of “the killing times” are the ones we have heard in secret, or told in hushed tones. They are not the stories that appear in our history books yet they refuse to go away.

The colonial journalist and barrister Richard Windeyer called it “the whispering in the bottom of our hearts”. The anthropologist William Stanner described a national “cult of forgetfulness”. A 1927 royal commission lamented our “conspiracy of silence”.

"Starting in 1794, mass killings were first carried out by British soldiers, then by police and settlers – often acting together – and later by native police, working under the command of white officers, in militia-style forces supported by colonial governments.

These tactics were employed, without formal repercussions, as late as 1926."

"The written records don’t always indicate intention. Sometimes they do, in chilling detail, as described in this letter from a Gippsland squatter, Henry Meyrick, to his family in England in 1846:

"The blacks are very quiet here now, poor wretches. No wild beast of the forest was ever hunted down with such unsparing perseverance as they are. Men, women and children are shot whenever they can be met with … I have protested against it at every station I have been in Gippsland, in the strongest language, but these things are kept very secret as the penalty would certainly be hanging."

"Learning about this history will come as a shock to some. But Australians trying to move past blame or guilt are coming forward now in greater numbers, and their voices are only growing louder."

https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/australia/the-killing-times-the-massacres-of-aboriginal-people-austra...

Ok. But surely the British must take some of  the blame here. I mean, the white population of the continent was largely British, descended from convicts and free settlers of the British Isles until at least 1986.

Why blame their Aussie descendants?

I mean, the convicts didn't ask to come here either.

[zanadoo_56]

Lots of truths in Oz were hiding when I was at school...and later.

The precise details of the killings weren't taught at school but they were acknowledged.

What I found shocking (and wasn't told about these at school) were the taking of aboriginal children from their families (the stolen generation) and until there was a referendum, Aboriginal people were not citizens and couldn't vote. I thought it was some kind of sick joke - how could Aboriginal people NOT be citizens????

I can't take responsibility for these disgusting past practices.  My ancestors weren't British, they came from Europe and not until the mid 1800s.  All I can do is make sure I personally as an Aussie behave better than people have historically.  It's all we can do really to redress what happened before.  You can't change the past,

[davidc4430]

its pretty normal to not admit to past bad deeds by governments.

germans dont know much about the shyte their country did in WW1 & WW2

japanese kids born after WW2 have little or no knowledge of what japan did during that war.

most japanese people have no idea they are killing whales.

[not_for_sale2024]

I have a six volume History of Australia written in the 1920s. It contains facsimiles

of records from the 1800s that clearly state the soldiers would head off into the bush

to hunt and shoot Aboriginals when they were bored.

Bill Shorten made it clear in January that he was "fed up" with and "over" the 

Australia Day debate. He vowed to keep Australia Day as is. I assume he made this

promise because he is confident that most Australians feel as he does. This man is

very likely to be our next Prime Minister.

If Shorten is correct, then the Australian people will confront nothing. Some Aborigines

who are troubled by the treatment their ancestor's received are referred to as 'activists'.

There appears to be little compassion or understanding. More importantly, a lot of

Australians just don't want to know about the truth. After all, they were not involved

and have done nothing wrong!

[springyzone]

It's perfectly true that some whites hunted down aborigine people and killing them was, for the first 50 years or so of settlement, not even treated as a crime. It continued past that but not quite as openly.

And I think that is the key to it.

When behaviour goes unpunished or has no consequences, then what happens is it falls back on individual integrity and not everyone has it. That applies across the board, regardless of race or colour (or so i believe).

The reports of aboriginal killings are sickening.

British/European people as whole went through a period a few centuries back where they were debating whether black people had a soul. In other words, whether they were human or not.

If you believe that someone is sub-human in some way, then it isn't a hard job to kill them or disregard others killing them-witness Nazis & current ISIS thugs. 

You are right-it was British settlers who were responsible & they did not ever think of themselevs as Australian. The guilt rests with those who did it & the governments of the day that allowed it. It doesn't rest on present day Australians or british for that matter.

I think there is a lot more known about past atrocities than there used to be. lots more reports more readily available too.

I'm interested in genealogy & what astounds me sometimes is just how harsh & cruel conditions were in the 18th/19th century.

I've a distant ancestor who was flogged to the point he ended up in hospital, plus jailed. He was 12 years old.

There were over 200 crimes in England for which a person could be hanged, some of them absurdly minor.

People in the workhouses were deliverately separated from their children once the children were over 7.

Massive numbers of irish died during the potato blight famine & it wasn't because there was a lack of food in the country it was because they couldn't afford it and merchants could get a better price exporting it. The government did nothing.

If they could do all this to their own people-people they KNEW had souls, why should we be surprised at how they treated aborigines, whom most of them considered lesser beings?

A lot of people these days aren't interested in history, full stop. There's plenty of info out there for those interested but seriously, a lot of people's eyes glaze over at anything past about 1980.

[chameleon54]

Blame - Everyone wants to blame some-one in todays society. I didnt do it, you didnt do it , my ancestors didnt do it and even current British citizens and the current British Government didnt do it, All we can do is acknowledge the attrocities occured, which I think has already well and truly been done. So why are we still going over and over and over all of this ? What is it achieving ? 

Is it helping to drive down current indiginous poverty or adding to their feelings of disenfrachisment from modern society. ? It is helping young indiginous Australians to improve literacy and numeracy or adding to thier feelings of anger and resentment towards the multi cultural fabric of Modern Australia ? 

We have recognised that indiginous Australians where treated very poorly by colonists, as was the case with most races who underwent colonisation. It happened two hundred years ago, It was a reflection of the times and attitudes that existed in the past and should be judged by the standards of the day.

Its time for indiginous Australians to move on. Sure take pride in indiginous history and culture, but embrace the world that we live in today, rather than harping back to some idylic utopia that can never return. 

[springyzone]

Absolutely true, chameleon.

I think while we have to acknowledge the horrors of the past (and they are in the history of every nation and every era as no humans are perfect), our main focus today should be on sorting out the problems in present day society.

With the aborigines, I am afraid the problems aren't primarily prejudice (though that exists), they aren't even the injustices of the past (though they contributed), they are the pervading culture and mind set of poverty. Until that is addressed, you can throw a bucket of money into it (well, we have, haven't we!) and it won't get you very far at all because what we are doing is we're expecting middle class behaviour. That is, people who will value education, seek and understand how to keep a steady job, want to own a home, live a  sober, industrious & law abiding life.

Those are the skills that help to lift a person out of poverty but people have to be taught them and helped and I am not so sure aboriginal groups today are getting the right sort of help.