I remember seeing a talk by Bruce Pascoe where he described how the published journals of the early white explorers had been censored to remove references to the extensive agriculture, grain silos and aquaculture except where they painted them in a negative light.
He also told off one journal entry where a cake given by a First Nation person was described as the softest, sweetest cake he had ever eaten. He made the point that this was a comment coming from an Englishman!
It’s much easier to be xenophobic when there are no rumours or evidence that a culture has worthwhile inventions and knowledge. It’s also easier to stamp out cultures which rely mostly on oral history and have a strong tradition of secrecy, even within immediate families. Even though Aboriginals didn’t have writing, many had detailed maps. It’s just that they were in a temporary medium like sand accompanied by stories that were memorised.
I only clued in maybe 6 years ago that it wasn’t just clueless arrogant colonialists killing people for their land and not knowing what indigenous farms looked like; and that the claims of deliberate cultural erasure had real weight. I was lucky enough to meet by chance some aboriginal educators who pointed me to actual physical evidence like the grinding stones. Had I never met them I may not have known.
I could not explain, without it being at least partially intentional, how we weren’t taught that we knew Australia’s native peoples baked bread 20k years before anywhere else in the world. And how we were even told they had no bread or buildings.
So when I see things like “they didn’t have fire”, especially a week before the referendum… I just can’t even. We’re asking a bunch of people who were taught lies and some who intentionally spread them to decide on the worthiness of a genocided minority group. It’s just tragic.
I remember seeing a talk by Bruce Pascoe where he described how the published journals of the early white explorers had been censored to remove references to the extensive agriculture, grain silos and aquaculture except where they painted them in a negative light.
He also told off one journal entry where a cake given by a First Nation person was described as the softest, sweetest cake he had ever eaten. He made the point that this was a comment coming from an Englishman!
It’s much easier to be xenophobic when there are no rumours or evidence that a culture has worthwhile inventions and knowledge. It’s also easier to stamp out cultures which rely mostly on oral history and have a strong tradition of secrecy, even within immediate families. Even though Aboriginals didn’t have writing, many had detailed maps. It’s just that they were in a temporary medium like sand accompanied by stories that were memorised.
I only clued in maybe 6 years ago that it wasn’t just clueless arrogant colonialists killing people for their land and not knowing what indigenous farms looked like; and that the claims of deliberate cultural erasure had real weight. I was lucky enough to meet by chance some aboriginal educators who pointed me to actual physical evidence like the grinding stones. Had I never met them I may not have known.
I could not explain, without it being at least partially intentional, how we weren’t taught that we knew Australia’s native peoples baked bread 20k years before anywhere else in the world. And how we were even told they had no bread or buildings.
So when I see things like “they didn’t have fire”, especially a week before the referendum… I just can’t even. We’re asking a bunch of people who were taught lies and some who intentionally spread them to decide on the worthiness of a genocided minority group. It’s just tragic.
History is written by the winners.
I’d imagine most of the history we know is incorrect due to the obvious bias in our sources.
I prefer to use the word ‘victor’ than ‘winner’. Only because winner feels like it implies a fair game.
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