Well with my new counter in place I am convinced that a few people are glancing over my blog. Even if they are not commenting.

Roland assures me that this is for a lack of controversial material and opinion. It is also fair to say that I don’t contribute as much as I would like.

Well today is Sorry Day. A week or two ago it was Mabo day. Neither have received much attention. Why not and are these days significant? And what about the whole ATSIC issue.

Sorry day marks the anniversary of the handing down of the stolen generation report: Bringing them Home. I don’t think that anyone could seriously deny the atrocities and genocidal policies that were forced onto our indigenous population. No doubt this plays a large part in the massive overrepresentation of indigenous Australia in all the horrible statistics. A recent report said that Australian Aborigines were the second most disadvantaged group in the world (possibly the OECD). The report recommended that the Australian government say ‘sorry’ for this. To the best of my knowledge every state government has done this but we are still waiting for the prime miniature.

But I think we’ve all moved on from an apology. Fuck it, it’s not worth the effort. Let’s move on to ‘practical reconciliation’. See problem here is that one of the better indigenous leaders (Mick Dodson for example) starts saying things like ‘practical reconciliation’ and has some great ideas around that. Then little Johnny picks up on it and starts throwing around. It is now a phrase devoid of meaning because it is now more about avoiding responsibility.

Then Mark Latham says (with what I am pretty sure are good intentions) that ATSIC should go. I don’t think that anyone other than Geoff Clark can seriously defend the actions of ATSIC in their later phase – however their call for a treaty some years back was great. So Johnny fuck wit goes ‘ah ha, a window of opportunity for my racist prejudices – now I can abolish ATSIC and further diminish my critics’. Now ATSIC was ineffectual and nepotistic. I support it’s dissolution but Indigenous Australia needs an indigenous voice, not the government ‘consulting’ indigenous communities and them fucking them in the arse again.

We need a new body with a new name run by indigenous Australians for indigenous Australia with a voting system vastly different to ATSIC’s and one that prevents nepotism. This new body should help fund and finance native title claims.

If the government was serious about reconciliation it would abolish the Wik Act – the high court decision did not need to be legislated on and the legislation that Howard introduced was racist, pandered to mining interests and effectively overturned what should have been a more important decision than Mabo. Self determination is inseparable from land rights. Land rights are the only true way to reconciliation and emancipation. Land not money is what is needed.

Germaine Greer was spot on in her recent quarterly essay saying that non-indigenous Australia can learn a lot from indigenous Australia in terms of a method of organising (similar to a cacophonous democracy) and in terms of their understanding and relationship with the land. By that I do not mean that we all have to become a ‘gatherer – hunter’ society but understand our connection to the land, or perhaps more accurately that we are part of the land.

I think Mabo day should be a national holiday – replace Australia day with it if you’d like.