An Indigenous reflection on 2008

Throwing millions of tax payers’ dollars at the problem without adequate consultation from those affected - money which is then administered by public servants from air-conditioned premises while displaying disregard for their clients living in abject poverty; within sight and presided over by the army - is not the answer. And sadly this will not deliver the outcomes residents in those communities desperately deserve.

Prime Minister Rudd’s other policy initiatives, although ambitious, will also be closely monitored by tax payers:

• to close the life-expectancy gap between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and other Australians within a generation;
• to halve the mortality gap between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children and other children under age five within a decade;
• to halve the gap in literacy and numeracy achievement between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students and other students within a decade;
• to halve the gap in employment outcomes for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people within a decade;
• to at least halve the gap in attainment at Year 12 schooling (or equivalent level) by 2020; and
• to provide all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander four-year-olds in remote communities with access to a quality preschool program within five years.

However, none of these goals will be achievable without a concerted effort on the part of government towards an inclusive Indigenous education campaign. The ignorance displayed by today’s politicians on the topic of Indigenous peoples is not an unexplainable Darwinian phenomenon, but rather the consequence of an education journey devoid of a genuine Indigenous perspective. How else can you explain successive farcical Indigenous social policy initiatives being instructed by politicians whose only knowledge of Indigenous issues is gained through the media? These overpaid and underperforming public figures, although enticingly ripe to proportion blame, are a mere product of intergenerational biased schooling.

The aptness of the old saying “History is written by the conquerors” can be viewed in its literal significance because Indigenous history has been calculatingly excluded from history text books. The federal government must make it conditional that on receiving education grants all public and private educational institutions; primary, secondary and tertiary, are required to deliver a term (minimum of 13 weeks) of compulsory Indigenous studies that cover pre and post contact years of British rule in Australia.

Change will take place when all Australians genuinely respect and value Indigenous peoples’ culture and aspirations. It is apparent that this is not a contemporary redeeming attribute of mainstream Australians. Ignorance breeds contempt and until the government of the day makes Indigenous studies mandatory in our schools, then we as a nation will have to face the consequence of derision from abroad and racial unrest from within.

The recent mixed reviews of the movie Australia perhaps reflect in part the broader community’s ignorance of Australia’s true history. Many Australians were genuinely shocked to learn of the stolen generation broadly and the ill treatment of Indigenous Australians specifically, in that era, as graphically depicted throughout the entire three-hour epic.

Luhrmann’s breathtakingly beautiful $160-million epic, set in the 1930s, is in many ways representative of a bygone era that mainstream Australia would much rather forget.

How ironic it is that movie critics constantly celebrate movies such as the 1939 classic Gone with the Wind where manipulative woman Scarlett O’Hara (Vivien Leigh) and roguish man Rhett Butler (Clark Gable) carry on a tumultuous love affair in America’s deep south during the Civil War.

Australia the movie, set in northern Australia before and during World War II, introduces an English aristocrat Lady Sarah Ashley (Nicole Kidman) and an Australian knock-about called Drover (Hugh Jackman). And guess what - they have a tumultuous love affair against the backdrop of black slavery. However, instead of African American slaves from the cotton plantation adding to the romantic intrigue, Luhrmann strategically introduces Indigenous Australians from a backdrop of wanton cruelty at the hands of courageous pioneers, attempting to tame Australia’s unforgiving interior.

What Luhrmann didn’t plan for with his audacious portrayal of Australia’s dark history, was the upstaging of renowned Hollywood A-listed actors, Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman, by a previously unknown, first time 13-year-old Indigenous actor, Brandon Walters. Walters’s role in the film as Nullah may well see him gain an academy nomination - not as best supporting actor but as lead actor.

However, now we are enjoying our Christmas holidays, let us all reflect on the year that was and try our best to place family above everything else. Indigenous people ought to heed the messages from their inner thoughts that represent their dreamtime stories: of a past that explained their place in the universe, and their cultural lores that provided sustenance and law and order - in particular their respectful relationships and obligations to others. Furthermore, let us not rely on government and our black knights on white horses to champion our cause into the future - but instead return to the ways of our ancestors where family was first, second and last in our universe.

Let the family be our prevailing source of happiness and inspiration for our future actions in much the same manner as Alexander Chalmers intended his famous message to be received when he said: "The grand essentials of happiness are: something to do, something to love, and something to hope for."