Deadly Bunkum

Preamble: Have been mulling over this for sometime, observing from afar the lead up to the Australian referendum on the “Voice” for our indigenous peoples. Increasingly the No campaign has delved into lies, exaggeration and conspiracy that has fueled the gullible among white Australia to believe that somehow their rights are being taken away if they vote yes.

An alarming demographic is my age group being the ones that are turning to the No vote. My Boomer brethren continue to disappoint severely whether it is Global warming induced climate madness or this. You are turning into the conspirators. It is an irrational madness that grips many in my generation. A little over a week ago I read the news about the following and that set me on a course to write and write no holds barred.

There once was a Liberal National Party Politician who couldn’t help himself in spouting ridiculousisms laced with ignoramusisms and all the while dabbling in conspiracyisms.

He boldly proclaimed that “Bipeds had been in Australia for 60,000 years but no actual evidence of a race of people”. It mattered not to him that anthropologists and related experts had for some time known and publicised that the Australian Indigenous people had been in Aus for at least 60,000 years. But no, the all knowing Senator cast his expert gaze to proudly proclaim – No Blackfellas, just bipeds! Apart from the Emu, Kangaroo (and relatives), the only bipeds in Australia are the human variety, Senator. We have never been home to the Great Ape and it’s relatives.

In one fowl swoop you chose to de-humanise a race of people to the mere status of bipeds.

Where is your expertise or interests in this particular area Senator Gerard Rennick? Stuff all. Thanks to Wiki – growing up in rural Queensland, did well at Uni with Tax and Finance Masters degrees (well done), enters politics and some say in a slightly devious fashion, happy to be a human induced global warming denier, quite strong on anti-abortion, anti-covid vaccines and pro Russian/Putin.

All are deep dive rabbit holes much bigger than the ones on your rural property back in the day. Doubt that he ever engaged with any of our original inhabitants in all that time.

Just another chip off the conservative ‘born to rule’ white man block. Were your past relatives part of Captain Cook’s 1770 landing where he proudly proclaimed “Terra Nullias” (Nobody Land), to the scattering of scared but curious blackfellas on the shore? Funny (not) how these bipeds had language, culture, oral history and art for 60,000 years. Maybe the lie was carefully handed down over the generations and repeated often to the open minded youngins who turned into close minded adults.

But who am I to criticise? Am just another whitefella. What do I know? Those of the Conservative white and right would be happy to label me a blackfella apologist. I have no idea what I would be labelled by the blackfella, but in all sincerity trust it is not too derogatory.

Growing up in Tasmania, I learnt the magnificent history of how our Colonial fathers brought the Tasmanian Aboriginal to their knees. Grade 6 Primary School learning about the great line of troopers formed across the State who rounded up all the devil locals and shipped em off to nearby Bass Straight islands to solve the problem.

It was a lie propagated by those who needed Terra Nullias to stand. Tasmania’s geography of heavy forests and inaccessible mountain ranges made this lie impossible in reality. Reality was a few of pensioner age, some children and the partly infirmed were caught in the net. Full blood Tasmanian aboriginals were eventually wiped out with the death of the most famous Truganini.

Side fact of the same lie being taught at my International High school in Singapore during the 1970’s. Something I took to task with the History Master who wouldn’t budge from the official lying history.

The history in Grade 6 never made sense to me, with initial confusion and an evolving shame developing over the years as truth prevailed to paint a stark picture of Genocide towards the Tasmanian Aboriginal. ‘Superior’ whitefella was determined to write the history of the victor.

Bowen Cove was the first whitefella settlement attempt in Hobart. Local Blackfellas were massacred at this ill-fated settlement while hunting for kangaroo. Their hunting was deemed an attack and the guns were brought out to do their death dance. There was no attempt to understand the locals. The settlement was a failure after a few short years due to unreliable water source, but the damage and resultant fear for the locals was long remembered.

Massacres in NW Tasmania and all over Australia happened for the next 100 plus years. A surf spot deep in the Eyre Peninsular of South Australia is called “Blacks”. The local story goes that the locals used to get rounded up and tossed off the cliffs for the ‘Grey Nurses’ (sharks) to devour. Fact or not am not sure, but the facts are clear that the ‘Grey Nurses’ do like a taste of human as attested by the many surfer deaths over the years at this location.

Living at Normamby Terrace in Brisbane in Post grad years and afternoon study at my desk fronting the street. I could set my watch at 3pm every Friday to witness Queensland Police turn up in force to empty out the locals from their ten or so houses at the other end of the street. By the time I go and look, they would have everyone from grandma and grandpa to small kids lined up outside the front fences, legs splayed and being vigorously worked over if any so much as uttered a word. Turning over the inside of their houses was a particular speciality.

These humans were not allowed to have any voice, just mute witnesses to the violence perpetrated against them.

Most living there were peaceful people just trying to live their inner urban poor existence. There was one house that had a justified bad reputation. It never mattered to the coppers as all were lumped in the same basket. From that I ended up participating in the big land rights demonstrations during the Commonwealth Games in 1982. Had an awesome night at the New York Hotel in the middle of town with all Aboriginal Bands and was the first time I heard didgeridoo under amplification penetrating the body and soul.

Have been to the Rock (Uluru) and surrounding areas and could not avoid the overall ‘Spirit’ of the place. Was absorbed deep and forever into the psyche. Have read of the lost generations all done in the name of religion and the white man. Have observed the serious dysfunction in urban indigenous communities brought about by white man insisting that they must be just like us.

Well, they are not. They have been of this land for thousands of years before white man with his so called civilisation not even out of nappies. Yet in the 250 years since Captain Cook turned up, we insisted that we knew better than the locals in how their lives should be led. In the process all our white man health and social ills decimated them.

The Blackfella has barely had a voice in these 250 years, being always on the edge of existence to fight for scraps of their home, to be educated enough to take a stand. We admire their wonderful sporting skills but still abuse happens.

This is your fault Senator and all others of your ilk. Your core belief is that white man, especially of the conservative variety must lead, that only you know what is best for the rest of us white and black combined. Well you don’t and your blatant and willful ignorance with your biped reference and conspiracies are testament to that.

My preference is a Referendum with the aim to vote NO MORE to you and what you represent.

VOTE YES this Voice Referendum!