New book published in controversy over Australian Aboriginal history

[Aidoneus]

New book published in controversy over Australian Aboriginal history
By James Conachy
5 September 2003

A yearlong controversy over Australian Aboriginal history has entered a new stage with the launch in Melbourne and Sydney of a new book, Whitewash: On Keith Windschuttle's Fabrication of Aboriginal History (Black Inc, Melbourne, 2003, ISBN: 0975076906).

The book is a collection of essays written to refute the allegations made in a 2002 work The Fabrication of Aboriginal History by right-wing author Keith Windschuttle. Windschuttle has asserted that major Australian historians since the 1960s, to whom he refers as the “orthodox school”, have deliberately fabricated or exaggerated evidence of massacres and ill treatment of the indigenous people by the early British colonialists. His book—the first volume of an intended three—specifically attacks those historians who have written on the fate of the Aborigines on the island of Tasmania, off the southeast coast of mainland Australia. The island’s Aboriginal population of between 4,000 and 7,000 was virtually wiped out or relocated to the remote Flinders Island by 1835, just 32 years after the arrival of the first British settlers.

Damning the “orthodox history” as “white guilt for genocide”, Windschuttle argued that the destruction of Tasmania’s Aborigines could not be attributed to British colonial rule, but was the result of disease, and the savagery, ignorance and backwardness of the hunter-gatherer Aboriginal people themselves.

--snip--

Windschuttle’s work has gone far beyond the realms of an academic debate or discussion. He does not simply disagree with the interpretations of historians but accuses them of outright lies and deception. Moreover, he lauds the settlement of Tasmania as among the most benign in the history of colonialism and alleges that those historians who have documented the extermination of the Aboriginal people have promoted a false equation between Australia’s colonialisation and the Nazi Holocaust.

The main conduit for Windschuttle’s accusations has been the media, above all the Australian and other publications owned by Rupert Murdoch’s News Limited. Right-wing columnists and talk-show hosts have promoted his views and his book as a major contribution to an understanding of Australia’s past. Prime Minister John Howard made clear his sympathy for Windschuttle by awarding him a centenary medal for services to history.

--snip--

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2003/sep2003/book-s05_prn.shtml

seems to be a common tendency in the mainly white/western countries:--the reigns these states hold over the rest of the world are growing a bit slippery, so ramp up the ugly nationalist mythology (combined with subtle national/ethnic-supremacy myths) to bully domestic oppositions, and grip those reigns a bit tighter (the "war on terra") on the international scene.

[Violet_Crumble]

1. How does this moron think disease was introduced?

Damning the “orthodox history” as “white guilt for genocide”, Windschuttle argued that the destruction of Tasmania’s Aborigines could not be attributed to British colonial rule, but was the result of disease, and the savagery, ignorance and backwardness of the hunter-gatherer Aboriginal people themselves.

Disease and starvation can be traced directly to white settlement. This twit seems to think those diseases just appeared out of nowhere and had nothing to do with Aboriginals coming into contact with white settlers. As for 'savagery, ignorance and backwardness', the Aborigines of Tasmania had existed there for a hell of a long time before white settlement, yet in what was only a few years, all of them were wiped out totally....

Windschuttle has dismissed as ideologically-motivated exaggerations the accepted estimates of the number of Aborigines killed by settlers. Employing the narrowest standard possible, he only accepts as evidence of “deliberate killings” those cases that were publicly reported or recorded.

That's really using the narrowest standard possible as back in those days it was virtually impossible to convict a settler for killing an Aboriginal. Aboriginal evidence wasn't admissible in Tasmania (in other colonies the law was changed between the 1840's and 1880's, but it was never an issue in Tasmania because all the Aboriginals had been wiped out). There was brutality and a real racism towards Aboriginals and some of it was documented by the people carrying it out at the time because it wasn't something they were ashamed of doing or thought was wrong....

It's interesting that one of the historians pointed out the similarities between this Windschuttle's 'work' and that of David Irving. I was thinking the same thing myself as I was reading what he had to say. The whole idea of a benevolent and kind European settlement is an insult to everyone's intelligence. So is calling the Aboriginals backwards, ignorant and savage. No wonder John (I'll Never Say Sorry!!) Howard likes this guy...


Violet...

[Darranar]

2. Moron indeed...

yet another right-winger in denial. We have far too many here in the US.

[bemildred]

3. Indigenous people are always a problem.

They interfere with one's free title to the land.
In defense of Europeans, one can say that they did not exactly
invent extermination as a way to deal with this problem,
but they did apply themselves with more than usual efficiency.

The problem is that with modern communications and scientific
methods its much harder to sweep these things under the carpet,
and the indigenes commonly know the score and are aquainted with
modern technology too, and most have developed resistance to
European diseases.

It is fairly stunning to me to realize the change in the acceptance
of this sort of bigotry in my own country (USA) in my lifetime.
My father was bigoted against most everyone who was not a Scot
like he was, but he said unspeakable things about "people of color"
on occasion, although he was not a violent sort. He had minions at
work and I gather dealt with them paternalisticly. And he was
completely ordinary. There was literally a slang term for every
nationality or religion or ethnic group, some more perverse than
others, but all intended to diminish and make less threatening
those unlike oneself.

It appears to me Mr. Murdoch is fighting a rear-guard action, let us
hope I am correct.