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Australian aborigines have over 50000 years of culture behind them. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Indigenous_Australians https://en.wikipedia.org/wi

Australian aborigines have over 50000 years of culture behind them. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Indigenous_Australians https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Indigenous_Australi...

klibertp 5y ago
Very off-topic, but it's one of the most shameful episodes in Western, British, and Australian history. Almost 200 years of racism, persecution, forced assimilation, kidnapping children and putting them into religious institutions, and a lot more - and it was only in 2008 that the Australian govt cared to apologize. Incredible cultures, incredible wealth of lifestyles, ideas, beliefs - almost destroyed in the name of "making [Aboriginal people] more civilized and industrious". Yes, the glorious Western civilization did the same pretty much everywhere, but Australian Aboriginal people's culture is unique due to their very long period of isolation - it's a gem and wonder worth studying and learning from. Yet, the Western instinct was to trample on and destroy it, systematically, irreversibly, just for the sake of it. Reading the Wiki page you linked some time back literally left me in tears. How could we. I don't even.
- bigDinosaur 5y ago
  Even further off topic, but you may be surprised to learn how much culture the imperial powers erased within their own countries. Take a country like France: it's hard to believe that French wasn't the majority language until almost the 20th century. Now look at it - many of the regional languages are extinct or endangered with French overwhelmingly dominant. Think that this was a peaceful and consensual process? Think again!
  - alduin32 5y ago
    Yes, that's very true, thanks for making that point. I'd like to add that it's never too late to try to preserve these cultures, traditions and languages. Getting interested to the ones of your place of residence, even if you're not from there originally, can be a great experience. One of the best ways to do it is through singing and dancing (they go great together), and more generally, there are often chorals and various groups dedicated to these cultures, traditions and languages. And indeed when you get into this kind of thing, you realize how much culture has been erased (in my case, the Occitan culture), but also you can see how much is left, and how important it is to preserve it. It also helps a lot when reflecting on our own modern, imposed, culture, and realize that some of the things we think have always been there, have not.
- BlueMatter5 5y ago
  - aaronbeekay 5y ago
    Dude, your argument is “yeah, but what if the Aboriginal Australians actually deserved to be ground into dust”?? The hell?
    - BlueMatter5 5y ago
      My argument is that few people are aware of how barbaric many aspects of Aboriginal culture were. This was not some flawless society to be fawned over and emulated, as modern woke scholars might have you believe, this was a culture rife with violence, rape, torture and cannibalism. Only last week I read a primary account from a settler describing an Aboriginal practice where a stick would be tipped with a various makeshift hooks, attached with sap and string. A young girl from the tribe would be selected and restrained, and the stick used to penetrate her and render injuries to the point of sterilisation. She would then be used by the tribe's men at will, notably in ceremonies where she would be gang-raped, with the subsequent blood and semen collected to be consumed by the frail and weak to boost their vitality. And so I put the question to you: If you had the means and will to rescue a child from this fate, by taking her away to be homed and schooled in a facility for this purpose, would you still - in all your cultured wisdom - instead choose to sit idly by and "let nature take its course"?
      - moistly 5y ago
        Tell me you know nothing of colonization without telling me you know nothing about colonization. Massive massacres of unarmed people across the entire expanse of the empire, raping of children ‘round the world, deliberately slow torture as punishment before death, the whole gamut of sick and depraved actions, every bit as cruel and barbaric as anything you can claim against the aborigine, carried out by your “rescuing” white saviour-invaders. Your justification for destroying the aboriginal culture is built on a mountain of pain and torture and your own abysmal ignorance of history.

Australian aborigines have over 50000 years of culture behind them. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Indigenous_Australians https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Indigenous_Australi...

klibertp 5y ago

Very off-topic, but it's one of the most shameful episodes in Western, British, and Australian history. Almost 200 years of racism, persecution, forced assimilation, kidnapping children and putting them into religious institutions, and a lot more - and it was only in 2008 that the Australian govt cared to apologize. Incredible cultures, incredible wealth of lifestyles, ideas, beliefs - almost destroyed in the name of "making [Aboriginal people] more civilized and industrious". Yes, the glorious Western civilization did the same pretty much everywhere, but Australian Aboriginal people's culture is unique due to their very long period of isolation - it's a gem and wonder worth studying and learning from. Yet, the Western instinct was to trample on and destroy it, systematically, irreversibly, just for the sake of it. Reading the Wiki page you linked some time back literally left me in tears. How could we. I don't even.

bigDinosaur 5y ago
Even further off topic, but you may be surprised to learn how much culture the imperial powers erased within their own countries. Take a country like France: it's hard to believe that French wasn't the majority language until almost the 20th century. Now look at it - many of the regional languages are extinct or endangered with French overwhelmingly dominant. Think that this was a peaceful and consensual process? Think again!
- alduin32 5y ago
  Yes, that's very true, thanks for making that point. I'd like to add that it's never too late to try to preserve these cultures, traditions and languages. Getting interested to the ones of your place of residence, even if you're not from there originally, can be a great experience. One of the best ways to do it is through singing and dancing (they go great together), and more generally, there are often chorals and various groups dedicated to these cultures, traditions and languages. And indeed when you get into this kind of thing, you realize how much culture has been erased (in my case, the Occitan culture), but also you can see how much is left, and how important it is to preserve it. It also helps a lot when reflecting on our own modern, imposed, culture, and realize that some of the things we think have always been there, have not.
BlueMatter5 5y ago
- aaronbeekay 5y ago
  Dude, your argument is “yeah, but what if the Aboriginal Australians actually deserved to be ground into dust”?? The hell?
  - BlueMatter5 5y ago
    My argument is that few people are aware of how barbaric many aspects of Aboriginal culture were. This was not some flawless society to be fawned over and emulated, as modern woke scholars might have you believe, this was a culture rife with violence, rape, torture and cannibalism. Only last week I read a primary account from a settler describing an Aboriginal practice where a stick would be tipped with a various makeshift hooks, attached with sap and string. A young girl from the tribe would be selected and restrained, and the stick used to penetrate her and render injuries to the point of sterilisation. She would then be used by the tribe's men at will, notably in ceremonies where she would be gang-raped, with the subsequent blood and semen collected to be consumed by the frail and weak to boost their vitality. And so I put the question to you: If you had the means and will to rescue a child from this fate, by taking her away to be homed and schooled in a facility for this purpose, would you still - in all your cultured wisdom - instead choose to sit idly by and "let nature take its course"?
    - moistly 5y ago
      Tell me you know nothing of colonization without telling me you know nothing about colonization. Massive massacres of unarmed people across the entire expanse of the empire, raping of children ‘round the world, deliberately slow torture as punishment before death, the whole gamut of sick and depraved actions, every bit as cruel and barbaric as anything you can claim against the aborigine, carried out by your “rescuing” white saviour-invaders. Your justification for destroying the aboriginal culture is built on a mountain of pain and torture and your own abysmal ignorance of history.