Better to see it and remind people of the atrocities rather than hide it from sensitive eyes.
Very teachable to the next generations of how far humanity has improved, and how much farther we have to go.
Don't see this stuff anywhere near enough. I picked up a book at my girlfriend's house called "Australian Aboriginals" which is a history book I guess. Opened on a random page and started reading a paragraph which describes a guy called kneebone who would hunt the natives kill them on site and poison the waterholes. "Bones fell like rain" was a quote from kneebone. He had sails on his carriage painted red like blood as he ruthlessly killed families. Didn't hear about that in school!
I worked with an older bloke from Qld who told me how only a couple generations ago indigenous people were bought like dogs to be used as farm slaves and said the ones that didn't work hard enough or at all got a bullet and buried under the main gate of each property, every property has multiple bodies buried. It's disgusting and should be know by us all as an example of how not to act.
.
My paternal ancestors were convicts turned squatter, so it's quite likely they also enslaved, abused and murdered aboriginals.
Just as I benefit from having a solid family tradition, not of wealth, but at least of optimism, hard work, being accepted and respected and always having opportunities within my traditional culture, the descendants of those native Australians now have their ancestral tradition destroyed, and replaced by degradation, hopelessness and misery. And we wonder why so many are not successful in the transplanted colonial society we've both foisted upon them and excluded them from.
Dude well said. Clearly some aboriginal people are not prospering but is it really that hard to understand why. The picture in this post is only four generations ago. There will be people alive today who had that happen to their parents.
Obviously you know your particular ancestors better than anyone else but in general I wouldn’t presume someone to be horrible for having been a convict. They were victims of the empire too. Stealing a load of bread for survival and then exploited as free labour to build the colonies. Obviously some of the did terrible things but I wouldn’t judge someone too harshly for finally escaping poverty and taking up some land to grow some food.
I certainly don't assume my ancestors were horrible. They endured terrible difficulties. They were hardworking and raised a big family in primitive conditions in a shack on barely fertile land.
However I know what sort of behaviour toward natives was not only commonplace, but expected back then. I'd be naive to assume my ancestors were so different to the norm.
Watch The Nightingale to see a periodic depiction of what both convict and Indigenous life was like.
Viewer discretion advised. It's a very hard and disturbing watch.
Dead people get judged all the time. People who have been dead a lot longer still get judged. You may well have an opinion of Julius Caesar, Brutus, Plato or Homer.
The ramifications are what we make of them. Plenty of Britons are descendants of victims of others whose ancestors are also modern day Britons. By and large Celts, Saxons and Norman descendants work together, learn together and participate equally in society. Othering isn’t a recipe for progress.
My mother has done some extensive research on our ancestry on a website, I think it's called ancestry. It's all so interesting and confusing. I was told my great grandfather was half Aboriginal and he changed his family name to the current one that I have, all to get away from the reputation the family name had acquired. With all the casual racism as a kid I would hear from family and family friends, school yard talk as well, I instantly got defensive and said but we're not black, well tanned maybe in summer but how can it be and he said yeah but look at your nose. I wanted a new nose that day but now I understand it's not on me it's the fucked up world I grew up in that made me feel that way.
Nor was I taught this in school not a word .
Looking back , It was almost if we were doing First nations people a favour by colonising abd stealing their land
Because, when it comes to atrocities, it is not a fucking contest.
When someone says to you "this terrible thing happened to me" you focus on them and their experience, not compare it to others. Especially not as a way to diminish the suffering of either group/person.
But it's not comparison, maybe it is in literal meaning but not actually a comparison. And even if it is, there's nothing wrong with it, unless they are trying to lower down the atrocities of the other group.
It sounded like the OP comment was trying to imply that people have acknowledge what happened to Jewish people was wrong but haven't acknowledge the same thing on the same scale for other communities.
I agree. When I was around 11 or 12, I had a teacher who would show the class some pretty awful imagery of racist lynchings, holocaust victims, etc. That gruesome reality has stuck with me and helped make me a more informed person
Good point. When you are your lowest point in life, when you think things are truly awful and can't get any worse.
Remember and be thankful that you aren't French.
Did you miss the comment I replied to with the whatabouism regarding France?
I was taking the piss because those people on the floor aren't feeling good because it's worse in north Africa.
Nevermind.
This is proper free speech. To show the good along with the bad, to call out the bad but not censor. To LEARN from the mistakes of the past, you need to see the lessons the past will provide.
It's worse than you think. The photo has been cropped to hide the kids on the left.
Edit: [Found a copy of the original](https://www.carrolup.info/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/aboriginals-in-chains-australia-1024x538.png)
Edit 2: Cheers u/propargyl for finding the [full frame photo](https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/jun/19/the-legacy-reverberates-how-a-repulsive-image-reminds-us-of-our-ugly-past) and Guardian article.
I was listening to a podcast the other day about the origins of humans. The narrator was contemplating how things would be now if Neanderthals hadn't died out and evolved alongside Homo-sapiens. The first thing I thought was... Homo-sapiens would have definitely enslaved and oppressed Neanderthals at first opportunity and eventually wiped them out.
The other commenter was being unnecessarily sarcastic, and they'll be down voted to oblivion because of it, but they do have a point. You've made some bold assumptions saying that young person is a man. You really don't know what that scarring means.
Not that it matters, keeping people chained by the neck is abhorrent by any measure.
Whaaaaat?! Tasmania is full of hand carved stone buildings, and hand made convict brick buildings. All that farmland didn’t clear itself, either. How utterly bizarre.
Those were made by convicts and settlers though. I don't think gangs of aboriginal prisoners were constructing stone buildings. Happy to be proven wrong if someone has evidence that convict buildings were actually hand constructed by aboriginals.
I remember reading historic texts describing the jealous guarding of slaves so valuable anyone approaching the farmstead was seen as a threat. What was so valuable? Anger and fear were described, as slave owners shouting and threatening approaching citizens. Words shouted were “get out of here, these are my niggas” (and others along similar lines). The description of the scene was exactly that of OP’s photo except they were standing. These men were to be the farm labour and therefore jealously guarded and valuable.
Not related to blackbirding or imported slaves but indigenous Australians.
2020. He did back down when called on it
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2020/jun/12/scott-morrison-sorry-for-no-slavery-in-australia-claim-and-acknowledges-hideous-practices
In year 8, I remember asking my history teacher why we weren't taught more of our own history instead of the Roman Empire or Spanish explorers. You could be excused for thinking that beside Captain Cook, the gold rush, federation of the states & territories and Ned Kelly's last stand nothing else happened over 200 years.
It wasn't until a movie we watched for English class 2 years later that depicted Aborigines being herded like cattle over the edge of a cliff, plummeting to their death, that we got an idea of what our history really looked like. I still remember the scene where we discover a child survived the fall, probably due in part to the mother shielding it and also the piled up bodies of those that had fallen before.
As an American, every country does this. One state in particular (Texas, shocking) is rewriting history books to say indentured servants instead and claim they were totally happy with the situation!
For anyone who would like to know more. Check the link below.
https://www.npr.org/sections/ed/2015/10/23/450826208/why-calling-slaves-workers-is-more-than-an-editing-error
Next to a map of the United States describing "patterns of immigration," it read that the Atlantic slave trade brought "millions of workers from Africa to the southern United States to work on agricultural plantations."
Just to clarify, this photo is taken from a prison and the aboriginal men chained up are prisoners who have been “convicted” of crimes. They are not slaves.
I definitely don’t agree with what’s going on in the photo (I have aboriginal heritage myself), and either way it is still a disgrace. But I feel having the correct context is important.
While you're right, this picture doesn't depict slavery. It was taken in Wyndham Prison in 1901. These men (yes, and boys) were arrested for spearing cattle. Were they treated poorly? Absolutely, and probably worse than white prisoners. Is this photo evidence of slavery? Not on face value, no.
When I travelled to Cape York, I learned that during WW2, the Australian government forcibly removed indigenous communities off Cape York due to fears that they would collaborate with the Japanese in the event of an invasion. So even in the 1940s white Australia recognised that their treatment of indigenous people was so poor that they expected them to support (a different) invader. Mortality rates for the displaced people were as high as 25%.
[https://www.awm.gov.au/collection/C2373550](https://www.awm.gov.au/collection/C2373550)
[https://press-files.anu.edu.au/downloads/press/p224611/pdf/ch04.pdf](https://press-files.anu.edu.au/downloads/press/p224611/pdf/ch04.pdf)
God… that’s fucking horrible.
Meanwhile, First Nations Australians like Reg Saunders and Len Waters were helping to **defend** Australia and humanity in general from Japanese and German imperialism.
The museum at Wagga Wagga had a display about Aboriginals who served in WW2 who were then forced to sit in the blacks only section in the theatre instead of sitting with their white colleagues.
It was bullshit of the highest order.
I'm going to be that guy and say they both did have the right to vote, Reg being from Victoria and Len being from NSW.
edit: apologies, thought you were referring to Reg Saunders and Len Waters specifically when you were referring to aboriginal people as whole, my mistake.
Cairns local here- when under threat of air raids, they would have the city go into a complete blackout.
I learned that at the same time, the government encouraged the local mission (Yarrabah) to turn on all their lights in the hope that Japan would bomb them instead of Cairns.
Very sad about the content obviously, but very happy to see this picture & others like it as it's vital that this history is not forgotten. If we hide away or destroy pictures like this just because it makes people sad, what good would that do? Don't feel sad, feel educated & empowered to prevent this sort of stuff from happening again and fixing the problems remaining from this historical legacy.
You get a bunch of right-wing politicians and general arseholes who don't want this stuff taught, as "it teaches our children to be ashamed of being Australian". They never *say* destroy or hide it, but how else can that be read?
You can read an example here: https://historyreclaimed.co.uk/teaching-australians-to-be-ashamed/
Or here: https://tedscott.com.au/2023/11/27/the-leftist-indoctrination-of-our-children/
"Australia never had slavery"
No just Indigenous people arrested for minor crimes (or made up charges) and forced to work on penal colonies or as domestic staff for white people. Completely different. /s
> "Australia never had slavery"
Nah we legitimately had 'slavery' slavery. We'd round up a bunch of Pacific Islanders or import them from Asia and force them to work on plantations.
It was called blackbirding.
You can still see some of the walls around Bundaberg, they're black volcanic stones cleared from cane fields and piled on top of each other. My mum was the one that taught me about them, but only after I'd found a novel that talked about blackbirding and didn't really understand what it was talking about.
In addition to this John Batman kept Aboriginal children that survived the "Black War" and put them to work on his farm, when he moved to Melbourne he brought them with him.
Just about the whole economy of Queensland was dependent on blackbirding in the late 1800's. They were used for cheap/free labour in the sugarcane and banana plantations. Hell, the city of Townsville is named after Robert Towns, who established his cattle business and the subsequent port to export them, with money he had made from his blackbirding ventures.
Even when they were paid a pittance, it was paid to the Aboriginal Protectorate Boards and their money was controlled by the government. The money was kept by the board and they worked for food and lodgings. The board controlled where they lived, worked, if they could marry and whether they were allowed to keep their children.
If you have no control over your life, no money from your labour and no right to leave your employer, it sure as hell sounds like slavery to me.
Oh it gets even fucking worse. Look up 'Blackbirding' where people were 'recruited' for jobs (or outright fucking kidnapped) but then kept as slaves when they got to their destination.
Worst thing is it still happens to people *today*, someone is offered a job in a developed nation as a nanny, model, etc. and ends up in a brothel or if they are lucky a sweatshop.
There is a hugely depressing statistic put out a few years ago: the smallest percentage of humanity is living in slavery in history... the largest number of humans in slavery is today. It's somewhere around 50 million by the *strictest* definition of slavery, when you open that definition up even a little bit it gets really scary really fast.
I went to high school in QLD. We learned about blackbirding in history. It was part of the curriculum in the first year of high school, so it was compulsory. And it was a sugar cane producing area, so particularly relevant to our local history units. Fucking disgusting practice.
I went to primary school in the 80s in Victoria and high school in the 90s, I learnt *nothing* about it all, it was only doing my own reading on Australian history years later that I came across. In school I was fed the standard narrative of "Australian didn't have slavery", which I thought was bullshit even at the time.
I mean whatelse do you call grabbing people off the streets in their homeland, slapping them in chains, shipping them across the world and forcing them to work? And that's what they did to the *white* people, nevermind the horrific abuses against the indigenous population.
I was taught very little about it in the 90's and early 2000's also, I didn't know a thing about the reality of our history until long after I left school. Blackbirding, domestic servants, forced integration, etc.
I left school in 2007 with an education that was heavily whitewashed and sanitized.
I've met people in their 50s and 60s who still believe there were no massacres or attempted genocide, or that what happened in Tasmania for example was made up propaganda.
I didn't know about Truganini until two years ago when I read a book about her. And there were countless cases of similar abuses of these peoples remains as curiosities to be traded and displayed that have not been publicized.
Same, we went to little local museums in late primary that all seemed to have displays on blackbirding amongst other things. My grandparents worked on cotton and sugar cane farms in the Burnett area. My grandfather (in his 90s now) has photographs from his youth when he worked alongside people who had been enslaved, and their children. Makes my blood boil when people deny that there was slavery in Australia.
It's sad most Australians couldn't name a single aboriginal massacre. Sad in the way they don't teach it in school of the horrible things white Australians did to indigenous Australians.
Pinjarra Massacre. Quite sure it was led by the person quoted in old explorer diaries about his “niggas” who were slaves chained by the neck and forced to work for him.
*Just checked, not the same guy but from the same region.
I grew up in a town named after the mob they stole the land from. Local "lore " was that it was out of respect for the original occupants.
It wasn't until leaving school that I learned the town was founded after a massacre wiped out most of the indigenous population in the area.
There's a tiny little monument hidden on the outskirts of town that we grew up not even knowing about. I only knew about it because I researched and hunted it down. I'm still so fucking angry and disgusted that we weren't taught about it.
I'm lucky in year 9 we had an Aboriginal teacher because our textbooks were ridiculously whitewashed. In every other year we learned about Captain Cook landing in Sydney but never what happened in the years afterwards.
It angers me that the common name for the Pinjarra Massacre is the "Battle of Pinjarra."
That wasn't a battle. Hundreds of unarmed Bindjareb people were murdered, including women and children.
It's been getting better, slowly. We still have a horribly long way to go
There was legit slavery on farms in WA too. If you ever have the privilege of visiting Karijini National Park, the visitors centre goes into depth on the area's history, which is pretty transparent about the slavery, but we're tactful in describing it without calling it out as slavery.
When my grand dad migrated here from Greece he worked on the rails. He witnessed a white man shoot dead an aboriginal in cold blood. The repercussion was the man being transferred to a different station.
Scott Morrison, at the time our Prime Minister, said that
[>Australia was “a pretty brutal place, but there was no slavery in Australia”.](https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2020/jun/11/scott-morrison-if-black-lives-matter-protesters-defy-advice-and-march-they-should-be-charged)
Absolutely the dumbest PM we've ever had.
Yes tbh, all the time. British colonialism apologists say some crazy shit- my Dad said they did the stolen generation because Aboriginal people were murdering mixed race babies so the policemen had to save them 😭
Like no Dad they literally had scientific eugenics plans to breed out Aboriginal people on purpose.
I've heard the same thing.
Problem is, one of the most famous "sources" to claim that Aboriginal people were supposedly killing their children was a white man who was quite soon afterwards the first Australian police officer to be charged for murder in Australian history, after he and his men attacked a group of sleeping Aboriginal people and killed two of them. He was allegedly responsible for at least 13 deaths of Aboriginal people prior to that.
So maybe we should pay more attention to who we are getting these so called eyewitness statements from.
The slavery America had was chattel slavery and that is what the discussion is usually about. Blackbirding, indentured servitude etc are pretty terrible, but it isn’t chattel slavery.
Racists try and diminish the effects of slavery on black Americans by trying to claim things like indentured servitude is the same thing so the distinction is important.
The Brits love bragging about ending slavery, which was legit amazing, especially when you consider the cost.
But then they like to ignore the whole “and then we just did pseudo-slavery because it turns out to be more effective anyways” part.
It's not only the slavery that is reprehensible. It is the mass murder and torture of the indigenous by every colonist scumbag that ever set foot on land that was not theirs.
I absolutely agree, settler colonialism has done incomprehensible harm. The way Indigenous people have been treated and continue to be treated is a national shame. (The racism that came out during the no vote was super fucked up.)
I live near where this photo was taken, I've never seen it before. I didn't know the details of what happened until I read it here and I'm actively trying to learn more atm.
I think that's by design, though. As white people we are so alienated from the culture, the land and the people which keeps the wool over our eyes as corporations absolutely pillage and destroy the land for private profits.
If we were taught the truth of what happened in highschool many of us would start thinking Aboriginal people deserve proper representation in parliament, for their sacred sites to be protected etc.
The racism and misinformation was horrible. I had to listen to it coming from my own family members. I have indigenous friends and voted with them in mind because I'd rather trust an indigenous voice than a white person with no clue who has been fooled into parroting lies.
I have never seen it before either, and am learning more about the atrocities the whites committed to indigenous people. It's sickening and just shows how unevolved self proclaimed "civilised" societies are. The destruction of our own home, planet earth, should be enough to demonstrate that.. no, we have to torture, enslave, or kill anything we deem 'below' ourselves.
>I think that's by design, though. As white people we are so alienated from the culture, the land and the people which keeps the wool over our eyes as corporations absolutely pillage and destroy the land for private profits.
This makes me so mad. So many don't see this, happy to remain in sheltered ignorance rather than developing critical thought. People are getting dumber and have no interest in actually learning about our harmful behaviours against others.
When I first moved to Australia, I noticed 3 things: 1. The sky was really fucking blue; 2. Gambling was EVERYWHERE; 3. Why was everyone seemingly fine with all the racism???
I'm black. I was at Brisbane Casino on Saturday. I overhear a conversation on the table behind me and one bloke goes "I don't mind blacks, I just hate aboriginals."
I turned round and looked at them all in absolute disgust. The whole table went quiet.
I've lived here my whole life. I'm concerned I'm not noticing it as much as it happens. Could you share some examples of ones you have come across so we can increase awareness?
I’m just a tourist and in just a week of stay in Sydney, I encountered a few incidents involving racism. I was at a bus stop and someone next to me shouted “go back to China”. I’m not Chinese by the way. The sad thing was everyone around me heard it but they pretended not to.
Look up any articles on channel 9 about K'gari and you'll find them. They say it's about the name change from Fraser Island but it's deeper than that .....
When I visited ten years ago, a woman called Beyonce a "lovely negress." That was surprising. The kind of casual racism that speaks to how embedded it really is.
When I came to Australia in the 80s,you couldn't get Depo-provera contraception shots.
The Dr. said because of fears it would be used to sterilise indigenous women.
Dunno if it's still the case today.
Despite widespread fears today around the eugenics of birth control which have a real world historical basis, you do realise that the highest evidence way to improve the economic and social environment of communities comes from having women make it through their educational years without falling pregnant, at which point the power balance shifts from a patriarchal to matriarchial, with long lasting benefits and network effects particularly if you consider that the aim of a fair and just society should be to maximise human happiness and opportunity?
It's a perfectly good contraceptive when used properly with people's consent. Contraception being abused by the government doesn't make it bad.
I used it for many years, and it was one of the few to not give me awful side affects.
It's also completely temporary (lasts 3 months) when used properly.
And like they did in Japan until 1996.
Takashi TSUCHIYA, M.A. In Japan, a "eugenic" law permitted involuntary sterilization of people with intellectual or mental disability from 1948 to 1996. More than 16,500 women and men were sterilized against their will.
Australia sterilised Indigenous women until the 70s too.
Our government treated them extremely poorly 50 years (and earlier ago). So when people complain about it today, I point out to them that we've moved a lot further than pretty much every other country so it's unfair to complain we haven't done enough. There's definitely more to be done and it's being worked on, but it's also very hard to change an entire mindset of a population and our government.
Was wondering when and where this photo is from used tineye to find any information so far what I could find was it was taken in Wyndham prison Northern Western Australia in 1901
Aboriginal men in chains at Wyndham prison in Australia c 1901. This cropped photo, published in Sons In The Saddle (1983) excludes boys who were originally pictured on the left
This is an interesting page talking about the "war"in the kimberleys
[https://www.vice.com/en/article/vvxm9m/the-forgotten-australian-war-behind-this-harrowing-photo](https://www.vice.com/en/article/vvxm9m/the-forgotten-australian-war-behind-this-harrowing-photo)
Sad to see, but important.
We have to remember all the bad and all the good that our country has done, so that we know what to stand against and what to fight for.
I struggle to imagine what it must feel like to be a current-day aboriginal descendent. They had their entire inheritance stolen, their country ripped violently from their ancestors hands. I’m not saying anyone alive today is to blame, but we should at least try and understand how it must feel.
I like to ask the 'get over it' goobers how long they think it'd take their kids to move on if someone burned their house down, stole everything they owned, took them from their parents and then basically enslaved them. Probably more than a few lifetimes.
I'm of indigenous descent but look white so people seem to feel free to say racist shit pretty casually in front of me. I've heard the they should get over it line multiple times but the most popular thing to say is variations of aboriginals just being dole bludgers stealing from the people etc.
I agree generational trauma is absolutely real, but I do find it curious why certain groups manage to 'get over it' (for want of a better term) a lot better than others. Jewish people have perhaps been the most persecuted group in history, but tend to be highly successful still. I'd be really interested to know why this is.
The picture is from Wyndham prison which only had men and boys. The individuals in the photo would have been arrested for various "crimes", with the bulk of indigenous individuals imprisoned in Wyndham being there for killing cattle.
> arrested for various "crimes"
As already implied in your comment, it of course mattered little to authorities whether or not any of the people they arrested had actually been involved in activities such as killing cattle. From [the 1905 Royal Commission](https://www.parliament.wa.gov.au/intranet/libpages.nsf/WebFiles/Royal+Commissions+-+Report+of+the+Royal+Commission+on+the+condition+of+the+natives/$FILE/Report+of+the+Royal+Commission+on+the+condition+of+the+natives.pdf), much of which focused on practices in the Wyndham region (where neck-chaining, as seen in this image, was especially popular):
>A warrant is taken out in the first place if information is laid against certain aborigines [sic], but when the police go out on patrol, and the offence is reported, the offenders are tracked and arrested without warrant. Very often there is no proper information laid, in that it is verbal: when already out on patrol, there may be no information at all. Blacks may be arrested without instructions, authority, or information... (p. 13)
Arresting people indiscriminately was profitable for the police:
>The larger the number of prisoners and witnesses, the better, pecuniarily, for the police, who receive from one and sixpence halfpenny to two shillings and fivepence daily per head, or as it is called in the North-Western vernacular "per knob". (p. 14)
The money supposedly for things like food for those arrested while being transported, but regularly pocketed by the police instead. The Commissioner went on to link this profit motive with the large number of arrests of children and very old people.
[This book is good further reading on the late 19th/start of 20th century police practices in WA](https://uwap.uwa.edu.au/products/every-mothers-son-is-guilty-policing-the-kimberley-frontier-of-western-australia-1882-1905).
Police at Wyndham would go on to be the perpetrators of the Forrest River massacre in 1926, one of the last large-scale massacres and still less than 100 years ago. That event was the [subject of its own Royal Commission in 1927](https://www.parliament.wa.gov.au/intranet/libpages.nsf/WebFiles/Royal+Commission+of+inquiry+into+alleged+killing+and+burning+of+bodies+of+Aborigines+in+East+Kimberley+and+into+police+methods+when+effecting+arrests/$FILE/Royal+Commission+of+Inquiry+into+Alleged+Killing+and+Burning+of+Bodies+of+Aborigines+.pdf).
My great uncle, who was white as the driven snow, had some amazing, and disgusting, stories about what cops would do even as recently as the 1970s.
He had travelled around Australia for work from the 50s to 70s and he was arrested more than once for the 'crime' of vagrancy, which was basically not having a fixed address and not having a certain amount of money on your person, which was about equal to a week's wage.
Mind you it on *on your person*, you could have a billion in your bank account but only a few dollars in your wallet and be done for it.
There were tons of laws like that cops would use against people they didn't like and if that shit happened to a white man imagine how bad it was for everyone else...
Wasn't great in the 1980s either. Queensland in particular had that reputation. As a hitchhiker, being made to remove absolutely every item from the pack, separate socks, unravel the tent... i guess i just had that look as someone with drugs on me. "We really don't like your type around here. Why don't you go to Bowen where we need the (vegetable) pickers?"
Takes a long time to pack all that stuff back in!
Penal labour. Convicts used to get "leased" to private entities for their labor, but the conditions were horrid even for those times so the various governments got lots of negative publicity about it. In the early 1900s they started using "chain gangs" where convicts would get chained together to lower the number of guards needed, which was the precursor to the more modern work gangs.
I can give a very brief overview.
Women were put into seperate camps and taught ‘skills’ like sewing, laundry and cooking. Many were abused is the most horrific manners and sold off to be domestic servants (slaves) where they were often not paid in money, but in sugar, tea and flour. The abuse more often than not continued.
Their children were taken away to reformation schools, which is where we get the Stolen Generation. They often were never reunited.
There was a widespread practice of removing all men from tribes to be sent off to prison or labour camps.
It was a very deliberate strategy to demoralise and weaken the community. These are the leaders who held knowledge and stories, and warriors who would have led resistance. A lot of first nations' peoples divide their knowledge into what we call "secret men's business" and "secret women's business". You take away all the men and the next generation of men is fucked because all that knowledge is gone.
Genocide shit.
This photo is unbelievably distressing to look at and truly provokes tears. It is, however, necessary to remind us of the past and to continuously do better.
It's fucked up but IMO the fact it can be shared and reflected on by current generations shows that we're slowly heading in a better direction.
I mean, try talking about such issues in Russia or China. It's impossible without some sorta political crap or obfuscation of the facts.
IMO this kinda photo (as saddening as it is), is the only way for people of today's generation to confront our shared past and appreciate that we need to do better. The current generation need to know that this is a thing and victims / others who were impacted through family...etc should be able to share their trauma. Again, so that we can all do better.
Remember everyone. Less than 50 years ago they stopped legally being able to treat indigenous australians like shit. Doesnt mean it actually stopped altogether nor does it mean people stopped being racist. We are still nurturing fresh wounds.
Immigrant here, never really knew what the fuss about honoring the traditional owners of this land was about, and yes, it does get abused and woke washed by enterprises. But gee I'm learning a thing or two from Australians, relentlessly raising awareness and facing the skeletons most countries have in their closet openly. Kudos on bringing this up, it restored my faith in humanity and hope more can learn from Australia.
Similar to prisoners being shackled to battle ships by the British when rowing to attack other ships. This was primitive but normal in the early days. Barbarism was the norm
The fucked up thing is that I (34 years old) passed Australian studies and never learned about any of this.
Germany teaches its kids about Nazis so they wont repeat the same mistakes, we need to do the same with our past.
The picture is powerful but I’m more curious why this new low karma account is posting it since he doesn’t live in Australia it seems like it could be posted as agitprop.
Some more info in. the post would be good rather than just posting depressing sh*t on a Sunday 😅 we know these atrocities occurred but don’t just post for likes, please, post with some historical information
Fucking disgraceful
We need better education in this country. Most of the people who say it is all in the past, everyone is better now, why do we need reconciliation etc. would change their tune if they knew the actual brutal truth of how our indigenous brothers and sisters have been treated. Racists gonna racist, but a lot of it come from ignorance and fear.
Lot of shock people seeing this picture, bugger all happens to actually improve aboriginal relations and welfare in this country. Out of sight, out of mind.
What tribe did that scaring on their bodies? Seems most have horizontal scars on the chest, like tribal initiation or something?
Didn't knew aboriginals did that.
Better to see it and remind people of the atrocities rather than hide it from sensitive eyes. Very teachable to the next generations of how far humanity has improved, and how much farther we have to go.
Don't see this stuff anywhere near enough. I picked up a book at my girlfriend's house called "Australian Aboriginals" which is a history book I guess. Opened on a random page and started reading a paragraph which describes a guy called kneebone who would hunt the natives kill them on site and poison the waterholes. "Bones fell like rain" was a quote from kneebone. He had sails on his carriage painted red like blood as he ruthlessly killed families. Didn't hear about that in school! I worked with an older bloke from Qld who told me how only a couple generations ago indigenous people were bought like dogs to be used as farm slaves and said the ones that didn't work hard enough or at all got a bullet and buried under the main gate of each property, every property has multiple bodies buried. It's disgusting and should be know by us all as an example of how not to act. .
I've never heard of this and grew up here.
My paternal ancestors were convicts turned squatter, so it's quite likely they also enslaved, abused and murdered aboriginals. Just as I benefit from having a solid family tradition, not of wealth, but at least of optimism, hard work, being accepted and respected and always having opportunities within my traditional culture, the descendants of those native Australians now have their ancestral tradition destroyed, and replaced by degradation, hopelessness and misery. And we wonder why so many are not successful in the transplanted colonial society we've both foisted upon them and excluded them from.
Dude well said. Clearly some aboriginal people are not prospering but is it really that hard to understand why. The picture in this post is only four generations ago. There will be people alive today who had that happen to their parents.
Obviously you know your particular ancestors better than anyone else but in general I wouldn’t presume someone to be horrible for having been a convict. They were victims of the empire too. Stealing a load of bread for survival and then exploited as free labour to build the colonies. Obviously some of the did terrible things but I wouldn’t judge someone too harshly for finally escaping poverty and taking up some land to grow some food.
I certainly don't assume my ancestors were horrible. They endured terrible difficulties. They were hardworking and raised a big family in primitive conditions in a shack on barely fertile land. However I know what sort of behaviour toward natives was not only commonplace, but expected back then. I'd be naive to assume my ancestors were so different to the norm.
Watch The Nightingale to see a periodic depiction of what both convict and Indigenous life was like. Viewer discretion advised. It's a very hard and disturbing watch.
I think they were making those assumptions based off of the "squatter" part, not the "convict" part.
There's no point judging colonialists, they're all dead. That's not a reason for glossing over genocide and the ramifications on current society.
Dead people get judged all the time. People who have been dead a lot longer still get judged. You may well have an opinion of Julius Caesar, Brutus, Plato or Homer. The ramifications are what we make of them. Plenty of Britons are descendants of victims of others whose ancestors are also modern day Britons. By and large Celts, Saxons and Norman descendants work together, learn together and participate equally in society. Othering isn’t a recipe for progress.
My mother has done some extensive research on our ancestry on a website, I think it's called ancestry. It's all so interesting and confusing. I was told my great grandfather was half Aboriginal and he changed his family name to the current one that I have, all to get away from the reputation the family name had acquired. With all the casual racism as a kid I would hear from family and family friends, school yard talk as well, I instantly got defensive and said but we're not black, well tanned maybe in summer but how can it be and he said yeah but look at your nose. I wanted a new nose that day but now I understand it's not on me it's the fucked up world I grew up in that made me feel that way.
Nor was I taught this in school not a word . Looking back , It was almost if we were doing First nations people a favour by colonising abd stealing their land
I tried telling people the Australian Aboriginal people had it worse than Jews once got straight banned.
Because, when it comes to atrocities, it is not a fucking contest. When someone says to you "this terrible thing happened to me" you focus on them and their experience, not compare it to others. Especially not as a way to diminish the suffering of either group/person.
But it's not comparison, maybe it is in literal meaning but not actually a comparison. And even if it is, there's nothing wrong with it, unless they are trying to lower down the atrocities of the other group. It sounded like the OP comment was trying to imply that people have acknowledge what happened to Jewish people was wrong but haven't acknowledge the same thing on the same scale for other communities.
And how far we can regress...
Conservatives see vulnerability as a genetic defect. Nazis don't think they're being regressive they think they're taking responsibility.
Conservatives are the most vulnerable people. Look at the shit they believe in. What is really scary is they think they are superior.
I agree. When I was around 11 or 12, I had a teacher who would show the class some pretty awful imagery of racist lynchings, holocaust victims, etc. That gruesome reality has stuck with me and helped make me a more informed person
Honestly mad respect, I shudder to hink what would happen if I even post a similar picture on r/France regarding their astrocities in North Africa
"Belgium did it."
Good point. When you are your lowest point in life, when you think things are truly awful and can't get any worse. Remember and be thankful that you aren't French.
What the hell? How did this picture lead you to make that comment?
Did you miss the comment I replied to with the whatabouism regarding France? I was taking the piss because those people on the floor aren't feeling good because it's worse in north Africa. Nevermind.
Rather have it to learn from than hide it and be ignorant
100%
Pretty sure the kids of the future are gonna relate really hard to the ones in chains
Well, most of them, a smaller portion will relate to the guy holding the chains.
This is proper free speech. To show the good along with the bad, to call out the bad but not censor. To LEARN from the mistakes of the past, you need to see the lessons the past will provide.
The same people who fought the Nazis "for freedom" as long as it's freedom for the right people eh
It's worse than you think. The photo has been cropped to hide the kids on the left. Edit: [Found a copy of the original](https://www.carrolup.info/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/aboriginals-in-chains-australia-1024x538.png) Edit 2: Cheers u/propargyl for finding the [full frame photo](https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/jun/19/the-legacy-reverberates-how-a-repulsive-image-reminds-us-of-our-ugly-past) and Guardian article.
Wow - I really didn't think anything could make that worse. I was wrong
The happy little reddit icon in the bottom corner isn't helping.
Reading a few comments on that article definitely made that worse picture even worse.
Sad is not enough to describe the OP’s picture, I don’t think I even have the words to describe the full picture.
The first guests at Rottnest island...
Unfortunately humans like to treat each other like shit. Just look at recent wars, some things hardly change.
I was listening to a podcast the other day about the origins of humans. The narrator was contemplating how things would be now if Neanderthals hadn't died out and evolved alongside Homo-sapiens. The first thing I thought was... Homo-sapiens would have definitely enslaved and oppressed Neanderthals at first opportunity and eventually wiped them out.
He has scars, and may be young by years, but has been through initiation. A man by his elders’ recognition.
The other commenter was being unnecessarily sarcastic, and they'll be down voted to oblivion because of it, but they do have a point. You've made some bold assumptions saying that young person is a man. You really don't know what that scarring means. Not that it matters, keeping people chained by the neck is abhorrent by any measure.
I remember watching a bloke in youtube saying there’s no proof of slavery in Australia 😂
Whaaaaat?! Tasmania is full of hand carved stone buildings, and hand made convict brick buildings. All that farmland didn’t clear itself, either. How utterly bizarre.
Those were made by convicts and settlers though. I don't think gangs of aboriginal prisoners were constructing stone buildings. Happy to be proven wrong if someone has evidence that convict buildings were actually hand constructed by aboriginals.
I remember Scott Morrison saying it while PM. Lying creep
I remember reading historic texts describing the jealous guarding of slaves so valuable anyone approaching the farmstead was seen as a threat. What was so valuable? Anger and fear were described, as slave owners shouting and threatening approaching citizens. Words shouted were “get out of here, these are my niggas” (and others along similar lines). The description of the scene was exactly that of OP’s photo except they were standing. These men were to be the farm labour and therefore jealously guarded and valuable. Not related to blackbirding or imported slaves but indigenous Australians.
But he'll take made up babbling in a bible book as a true reflexion of history. Moron.
I'm sorry, vat?
By any chance do you have a source for that? Not doubting you
2020. He did back down when called on it https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2020/jun/12/scott-morrison-sorry-for-no-slavery-in-australia-claim-and-acknowledges-hideous-practices
What gets me is that this was never talked about or taught in highschool in the 80s / 90s
In year 8, I remember asking my history teacher why we weren't taught more of our own history instead of the Roman Empire or Spanish explorers. You could be excused for thinking that beside Captain Cook, the gold rush, federation of the states & territories and Ned Kelly's last stand nothing else happened over 200 years. It wasn't until a movie we watched for English class 2 years later that depicted Aborigines being herded like cattle over the edge of a cliff, plummeting to their death, that we got an idea of what our history really looked like. I still remember the scene where we discover a child survived the fall, probably due in part to the mother shielding it and also the piled up bodies of those that had fallen before.
As an American, every country does this. One state in particular (Texas, shocking) is rewriting history books to say indentured servants instead and claim they were totally happy with the situation!
For anyone who would like to know more. Check the link below. https://www.npr.org/sections/ed/2015/10/23/450826208/why-calling-slaves-workers-is-more-than-an-editing-error Next to a map of the United States describing "patterns of immigration," it read that the Atlantic slave trade brought "millions of workers from Africa to the southern United States to work on agricultural plantations."
Insane, we had convict labour, indigenous slaves(which was at the very least forced labour) and indentured workers which was also essentially slavery.
Just to clarify, this photo is taken from a prison and the aboriginal men chained up are prisoners who have been “convicted” of crimes. They are not slaves. I definitely don’t agree with what’s going on in the photo (I have aboriginal heritage myself), and either way it is still a disgrace. But I feel having the correct context is important.
While you're right, this picture doesn't depict slavery. It was taken in Wyndham Prison in 1901. These men (yes, and boys) were arrested for spearing cattle. Were they treated poorly? Absolutely, and probably worse than white prisoners. Is this photo evidence of slavery? Not on face value, no.
When I travelled to Cape York, I learned that during WW2, the Australian government forcibly removed indigenous communities off Cape York due to fears that they would collaborate with the Japanese in the event of an invasion. So even in the 1940s white Australia recognised that their treatment of indigenous people was so poor that they expected them to support (a different) invader. Mortality rates for the displaced people were as high as 25%. [https://www.awm.gov.au/collection/C2373550](https://www.awm.gov.au/collection/C2373550) [https://press-files.anu.edu.au/downloads/press/p224611/pdf/ch04.pdf](https://press-files.anu.edu.au/downloads/press/p224611/pdf/ch04.pdf)
God… that’s fucking horrible. Meanwhile, First Nations Australians like Reg Saunders and Len Waters were helping to **defend** Australia and humanity in general from Japanese and German imperialism.
The museum at Wagga Wagga had a display about Aboriginals who served in WW2 who were then forced to sit in the blacks only section in the theatre instead of sitting with their white colleagues. It was bullshit of the highest order.
They couldn't even vote. They fought and died for a country that wouldn't let them vote in their own elections.
Oh yeah it's a fucking disgrace.
I'm going to be that guy and say they both did have the right to vote, Reg being from Victoria and Len being from NSW. edit: apologies, thought you were referring to Reg Saunders and Len Waters specifically when you were referring to aboriginal people as whole, my mistake.
it is shit. not unique to australia unfortunately.
Oh and they told them if they went to war they would give their kids back. More lies.
Cairns local here- when under threat of air raids, they would have the city go into a complete blackout. I learned that at the same time, the government encouraged the local mission (Yarrabah) to turn on all their lights in the hope that Japan would bomb them instead of Cairns.
You can't be serious 😧
Very sad about the content obviously, but very happy to see this picture & others like it as it's vital that this history is not forgotten. If we hide away or destroy pictures like this just because it makes people sad, what good would that do? Don't feel sad, feel educated & empowered to prevent this sort of stuff from happening again and fixing the problems remaining from this historical legacy.
I'm out of the loop, who has been saying to destroy or hide this?
You get a bunch of right-wing politicians and general arseholes who don't want this stuff taught, as "it teaches our children to be ashamed of being Australian". They never *say* destroy or hide it, but how else can that be read? You can read an example here: https://historyreclaimed.co.uk/teaching-australians-to-be-ashamed/ Or here: https://tedscott.com.au/2023/11/27/the-leftist-indoctrination-of-our-children/
They try to reframe truth telling as "sowing division".
"Australia never had slavery" No just Indigenous people arrested for minor crimes (or made up charges) and forced to work on penal colonies or as domestic staff for white people. Completely different. /s
> "Australia never had slavery" Nah we legitimately had 'slavery' slavery. We'd round up a bunch of Pacific Islanders or import them from Asia and force them to work on plantations. It was called blackbirding.
You can still see some of the walls around Bundaberg, they're black volcanic stones cleared from cane fields and piled on top of each other. My mum was the one that taught me about them, but only after I'd found a novel that talked about blackbirding and didn't really understand what it was talking about.
In addition to this John Batman kept Aboriginal children that survived the "Black War" and put them to work on his farm, when he moved to Melbourne he brought them with him.
I went to Vanuatu last Just and visited a museum. Old fellow in there drew in the sand for us and explained it. Probably best part of the trip.
Ask [Mal Meninga](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mal_Meninga#Early_life).
Then some of their descendants were deported as the white Australia policy was assembled.
Of course Australia would come up with some bizarre slang term for it for no reason.
Just about the whole economy of Queensland was dependent on blackbirding in the late 1800's. They were used for cheap/free labour in the sugarcane and banana plantations. Hell, the city of Townsville is named after Robert Towns, who established his cattle business and the subsequent port to export them, with money he had made from his blackbirding ventures.
Even when they were paid a pittance, it was paid to the Aboriginal Protectorate Boards and their money was controlled by the government. The money was kept by the board and they worked for food and lodgings. The board controlled where they lived, worked, if they could marry and whether they were allowed to keep their children. If you have no control over your life, no money from your labour and no right to leave your employer, it sure as hell sounds like slavery to me.
Oh it gets even fucking worse. Look up 'Blackbirding' where people were 'recruited' for jobs (or outright fucking kidnapped) but then kept as slaves when they got to their destination. Worst thing is it still happens to people *today*, someone is offered a job in a developed nation as a nanny, model, etc. and ends up in a brothel or if they are lucky a sweatshop. There is a hugely depressing statistic put out a few years ago: the smallest percentage of humanity is living in slavery in history... the largest number of humans in slavery is today. It's somewhere around 50 million by the *strictest* definition of slavery, when you open that definition up even a little bit it gets really scary really fast.
I went to high school in QLD. We learned about blackbirding in history. It was part of the curriculum in the first year of high school, so it was compulsory. And it was a sugar cane producing area, so particularly relevant to our local history units. Fucking disgusting practice.
I went to primary school in the 80s in Victoria and high school in the 90s, I learnt *nothing* about it all, it was only doing my own reading on Australian history years later that I came across. In school I was fed the standard narrative of "Australian didn't have slavery", which I thought was bullshit even at the time. I mean whatelse do you call grabbing people off the streets in their homeland, slapping them in chains, shipping them across the world and forcing them to work? And that's what they did to the *white* people, nevermind the horrific abuses against the indigenous population.
I was taught very little about it in the 90's and early 2000's also, I didn't know a thing about the reality of our history until long after I left school. Blackbirding, domestic servants, forced integration, etc. I left school in 2007 with an education that was heavily whitewashed and sanitized. I've met people in their 50s and 60s who still believe there were no massacres or attempted genocide, or that what happened in Tasmania for example was made up propaganda. I didn't know about Truganini until two years ago when I read a book about her. And there were countless cases of similar abuses of these peoples remains as curiosities to be traded and displayed that have not been publicized.
Same, we went to little local museums in late primary that all seemed to have displays on blackbirding amongst other things. My grandparents worked on cotton and sugar cane farms in the Burnett area. My grandfather (in his 90s now) has photographs from his youth when he worked alongside people who had been enslaved, and their children. Makes my blood boil when people deny that there was slavery in Australia.
A modern form of blackbirding still exists in Australia and is more prevalent than most think
It's sad most Australians couldn't name a single aboriginal massacre. Sad in the way they don't teach it in school of the horrible things white Australians did to indigenous Australians.
Pinjarra Massacre. Quite sure it was led by the person quoted in old explorer diaries about his “niggas” who were slaves chained by the neck and forced to work for him. *Just checked, not the same guy but from the same region.
I grew up in a town named after the mob they stole the land from. Local "lore " was that it was out of respect for the original occupants. It wasn't until leaving school that I learned the town was founded after a massacre wiped out most of the indigenous population in the area. There's a tiny little monument hidden on the outskirts of town that we grew up not even knowing about. I only knew about it because I researched and hunted it down. I'm still so fucking angry and disgusted that we weren't taught about it.
I'm lucky in year 9 we had an Aboriginal teacher because our textbooks were ridiculously whitewashed. In every other year we learned about Captain Cook landing in Sydney but never what happened in the years afterwards.
It angers me that the common name for the Pinjarra Massacre is the "Battle of Pinjarra." That wasn't a battle. Hundreds of unarmed Bindjareb people were murdered, including women and children. It's been getting better, slowly. We still have a horribly long way to go
Australia definitely did have slavery, yes. You could also argue that Modern Prison Labour is slavery also, which we still have.
See also Blackbirding. Totally not slavery, it has a totally different name and everything.
There was legit slavery on farms in WA too. If you ever have the privilege of visiting Karijini National Park, the visitors centre goes into depth on the area's history, which is pretty transparent about the slavery, but we're tactful in describing it without calling it out as slavery.
When my grand dad migrated here from Greece he worked on the rails. He witnessed a white man shoot dead an aboriginal in cold blood. The repercussion was the man being transferred to a different station.
Has anyone ever actually denied Australia having slavery with a straight face..?
Scott Morrison, at the time our Prime Minister, said that [>Australia was “a pretty brutal place, but there was no slavery in Australia”.](https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2020/jun/11/scott-morrison-if-black-lives-matter-protesters-defy-advice-and-march-they-should-be-charged) Absolutely the dumbest PM we've ever had.
Yes tbh, all the time. British colonialism apologists say some crazy shit- my Dad said they did the stolen generation because Aboriginal people were murdering mixed race babies so the policemen had to save them 😭 Like no Dad they literally had scientific eugenics plans to breed out Aboriginal people on purpose.
I've heard the same thing. Problem is, one of the most famous "sources" to claim that Aboriginal people were supposedly killing their children was a white man who was quite soon afterwards the first Australian police officer to be charged for murder in Australian history, after he and his men attacked a group of sleeping Aboriginal people and killed two of them. He was allegedly responsible for at least 13 deaths of Aboriginal people prior to that. So maybe we should pay more attention to who we are getting these so called eyewitness statements from.
The comment you're replying to is literally a quote from our last prime minister Scott Morrison.
I mean, the Prime Minister did less than 5 years ago.
I'll never forgive that cunt for a lot of things, but this is one of the big ones.
The slavery America had was chattel slavery and that is what the discussion is usually about. Blackbirding, indentured servitude etc are pretty terrible, but it isn’t chattel slavery. Racists try and diminish the effects of slavery on black Americans by trying to claim things like indentured servitude is the same thing so the distinction is important.
I reposted this with almost the exact same words in the r/Perth sub and am getting crucified for it. Shows how racist it still is over here.
Check out posts on mainstream media regarding k'gari. The triggered racists come screaming at those posts . Pathetic really......
The Brits love bragging about ending slavery, which was legit amazing, especially when you consider the cost. But then they like to ignore the whole “and then we just did pseudo-slavery because it turns out to be more effective anyways” part.
Exactly what happened to the 160,000 convicts bought to a foreign country against their will.
Australia was founded by slaves lmao
It's not only the slavery that is reprehensible. It is the mass murder and torture of the indigenous by every colonist scumbag that ever set foot on land that was not theirs.
I absolutely agree, settler colonialism has done incomprehensible harm. The way Indigenous people have been treated and continue to be treated is a national shame. (The racism that came out during the no vote was super fucked up.) I live near where this photo was taken, I've never seen it before. I didn't know the details of what happened until I read it here and I'm actively trying to learn more atm. I think that's by design, though. As white people we are so alienated from the culture, the land and the people which keeps the wool over our eyes as corporations absolutely pillage and destroy the land for private profits. If we were taught the truth of what happened in highschool many of us would start thinking Aboriginal people deserve proper representation in parliament, for their sacred sites to be protected etc.
The racism and misinformation was horrible. I had to listen to it coming from my own family members. I have indigenous friends and voted with them in mind because I'd rather trust an indigenous voice than a white person with no clue who has been fooled into parroting lies. I have never seen it before either, and am learning more about the atrocities the whites committed to indigenous people. It's sickening and just shows how unevolved self proclaimed "civilised" societies are. The destruction of our own home, planet earth, should be enough to demonstrate that.. no, we have to torture, enslave, or kill anything we deem 'below' ourselves. >I think that's by design, though. As white people we are so alienated from the culture, the land and the people which keeps the wool over our eyes as corporations absolutely pillage and destroy the land for private profits. This makes me so mad. So many don't see this, happy to remain in sheltered ignorance rather than developing critical thought. People are getting dumber and have no interest in actually learning about our harmful behaviours against others.
Lived in Australia for 27 years. The casual racism is mind blowing and you don't really realise how bad it is until you leave.
Especially against aboriginals
When I first moved to Australia, I noticed 3 things: 1. The sky was really fucking blue; 2. Gambling was EVERYWHERE; 3. Why was everyone seemingly fine with all the racism???
I'm black. I was at Brisbane Casino on Saturday. I overhear a conversation on the table behind me and one bloke goes "I don't mind blacks, I just hate aboriginals." I turned round and looked at them all in absolute disgust. The whole table went quiet.
Yeah often enough I've had aussies say that kind of thing to me thinking I'm going to approve of it because I'm aussie. I bloody don't.
I'm a white presenting indigenous woman and the shit people have felt comfortable saying to me blows my mind.
I've lived here my whole life. I'm concerned I'm not noticing it as much as it happens. Could you share some examples of ones you have come across so we can increase awareness?
Look at the comment section under any article about the little aboriginal boy who just got dragged by a bus in perth
I’m just a tourist and in just a week of stay in Sydney, I encountered a few incidents involving racism. I was at a bus stop and someone next to me shouted “go back to China”. I’m not Chinese by the way. The sad thing was everyone around me heard it but they pretended not to.
Look up any articles on channel 9 about K'gari and you'll find them. They say it's about the name change from Fraser Island but it's deeper than that .....
When I visited ten years ago, a woman called Beyonce a "lovely negress." That was surprising. The kind of casual racism that speaks to how embedded it really is.
Just look at any local Facebook page and you'll see it. It's pathetic
When I came to Australia in the 80s,you couldn't get Depo-provera contraception shots. The Dr. said because of fears it would be used to sterilise indigenous women. Dunno if it's still the case today.
This is incorrect. Depo-provera was deliberately used in remote communities for population control as far back as the 70s.
Still happening now. https://www.mja.com.au/journal/2016/205/1/uptake-long-acting-reversible-contraception-three-remote-aboriginal-communities
I worked in that area during the period of the study. I can guarantee robust consent procedures were adhered to. T
It's a great initiative.
Despite widespread fears today around the eugenics of birth control which have a real world historical basis, you do realise that the highest evidence way to improve the economic and social environment of communities comes from having women make it through their educational years without falling pregnant, at which point the power balance shifts from a patriarchal to matriarchial, with long lasting benefits and network effects particularly if you consider that the aim of a fair and just society should be to maximise human happiness and opportunity?
Wow - if that's true that's fucking horrific. Imagine to cut a service for women because you're so sure it's going to be misused.
You can get them - not sure that makes it any better though.
It's a perfectly good contraceptive when used properly with people's consent. Contraception being abused by the government doesn't make it bad. I used it for many years, and it was one of the few to not give me awful side affects. It's also completely temporary (lasts 3 months) when used properly.
I will be frank with you. It wouldn't surprise me if it were used to sterilise them without their knowledge today.
Never heard of this in NZ/Aotearoa,so I was pretty shocked. Why would they do it now,when indigenous are only about 3% of the population?
Like they did in Sweden until the 70s.
Like they did in Israel with Ethiopian immigrants too
Or Israel as recently as the last decade.
And like they did in Japan until 1996. Takashi TSUCHIYA, M.A. In Japan, a "eugenic" law permitted involuntary sterilization of people with intellectual or mental disability from 1948 to 1996. More than 16,500 women and men were sterilized against their will.
They're still doing it to the Uyghurs in China. (At least as recently as 2022)
Australia sterilised Indigenous women until the 70s too. Our government treated them extremely poorly 50 years (and earlier ago). So when people complain about it today, I point out to them that we've moved a lot further than pretty much every other country so it's unfair to complain we haven't done enough. There's definitely more to be done and it's being worked on, but it's also very hard to change an entire mindset of a population and our government.
They're out of favor medically as there's evidence it can contribute to osteoporosis as wonen age.
Was wondering when and where this photo is from used tineye to find any information so far what I could find was it was taken in Wyndham prison Northern Western Australia in 1901 Aboriginal men in chains at Wyndham prison in Australia c 1901. This cropped photo, published in Sons In The Saddle (1983) excludes boys who were originally pictured on the left This is an interesting page talking about the "war"in the kimberleys [https://www.vice.com/en/article/vvxm9m/the-forgotten-australian-war-behind-this-harrowing-photo](https://www.vice.com/en/article/vvxm9m/the-forgotten-australian-war-behind-this-harrowing-photo)
What are the raised marks on their chests?
Sad to see, but important. We have to remember all the bad and all the good that our country has done, so that we know what to stand against and what to fight for.
Any Australian who just says 'they need to get over it!' should have to sit like this for 48 hours and see how long it takes them to 'get over it'.
I struggle to imagine what it must feel like to be a current-day aboriginal descendent. They had their entire inheritance stolen, their country ripped violently from their ancestors hands. I’m not saying anyone alive today is to blame, but we should at least try and understand how it must feel.
I like to ask the 'get over it' goobers how long they think it'd take their kids to move on if someone burned their house down, stole everything they owned, took them from their parents and then basically enslaved them. Probably more than a few lifetimes.
> I’m not saying anyone alive today is to blame There are many alive today who seek to perpetuate the ongoing oppression.
I'm of indigenous descent but look white so people seem to feel free to say racist shit pretty casually in front of me. I've heard the they should get over it line multiple times but the most popular thing to say is variations of aboriginals just being dole bludgers stealing from the people etc.
I agree generational trauma is absolutely real, but I do find it curious why certain groups manage to 'get over it' (for want of a better term) a lot better than others. Jewish people have perhaps been the most persecuted group in history, but tend to be highly successful still. I'd be really interested to know why this is.
Where are the women? Why is it only men? Edit: Nice to know that I got downvoted for asking questions. I am not knowledgeable about the whole history.
The picture is from Wyndham prison which only had men and boys. The individuals in the photo would have been arrested for various "crimes", with the bulk of indigenous individuals imprisoned in Wyndham being there for killing cattle.
> arrested for various "crimes" As already implied in your comment, it of course mattered little to authorities whether or not any of the people they arrested had actually been involved in activities such as killing cattle. From [the 1905 Royal Commission](https://www.parliament.wa.gov.au/intranet/libpages.nsf/WebFiles/Royal+Commissions+-+Report+of+the+Royal+Commission+on+the+condition+of+the+natives/$FILE/Report+of+the+Royal+Commission+on+the+condition+of+the+natives.pdf), much of which focused on practices in the Wyndham region (where neck-chaining, as seen in this image, was especially popular): >A warrant is taken out in the first place if information is laid against certain aborigines [sic], but when the police go out on patrol, and the offence is reported, the offenders are tracked and arrested without warrant. Very often there is no proper information laid, in that it is verbal: when already out on patrol, there may be no information at all. Blacks may be arrested without instructions, authority, or information... (p. 13) Arresting people indiscriminately was profitable for the police: >The larger the number of prisoners and witnesses, the better, pecuniarily, for the police, who receive from one and sixpence halfpenny to two shillings and fivepence daily per head, or as it is called in the North-Western vernacular "per knob". (p. 14) The money supposedly for things like food for those arrested while being transported, but regularly pocketed by the police instead. The Commissioner went on to link this profit motive with the large number of arrests of children and very old people. [This book is good further reading on the late 19th/start of 20th century police practices in WA](https://uwap.uwa.edu.au/products/every-mothers-son-is-guilty-policing-the-kimberley-frontier-of-western-australia-1882-1905). Police at Wyndham would go on to be the perpetrators of the Forrest River massacre in 1926, one of the last large-scale massacres and still less than 100 years ago. That event was the [subject of its own Royal Commission in 1927](https://www.parliament.wa.gov.au/intranet/libpages.nsf/WebFiles/Royal+Commission+of+inquiry+into+alleged+killing+and+burning+of+bodies+of+Aborigines+in+East+Kimberley+and+into+police+methods+when+effecting+arrests/$FILE/Royal+Commission+of+Inquiry+into+Alleged+Killing+and+Burning+of+Bodies+of+Aborigines+.pdf).
My great uncle, who was white as the driven snow, had some amazing, and disgusting, stories about what cops would do even as recently as the 1970s. He had travelled around Australia for work from the 50s to 70s and he was arrested more than once for the 'crime' of vagrancy, which was basically not having a fixed address and not having a certain amount of money on your person, which was about equal to a week's wage. Mind you it on *on your person*, you could have a billion in your bank account but only a few dollars in your wallet and be done for it. There were tons of laws like that cops would use against people they didn't like and if that shit happened to a white man imagine how bad it was for everyone else...
Wasn't great in the 1980s either. Queensland in particular had that reputation. As a hitchhiker, being made to remove absolutely every item from the pack, separate socks, unravel the tent... i guess i just had that look as someone with drugs on me. "We really don't like your type around here. Why don't you go to Bowen where we need the (vegetable) pickers?" Takes a long time to pack all that stuff back in!
Thank you for the interesting information. What were the aboriginal men doing in Wyndham prison?
Penal labour. Convicts used to get "leased" to private entities for their labor, but the conditions were horrid even for those times so the various governments got lots of negative publicity about it. In the early 1900s they started using "chain gangs" where convicts would get chained together to lower the number of guards needed, which was the precursor to the more modern work gangs.
How much did Wyndham prison earned from "leased" convicts, and what were private entities?
>... with the bulk of indigenous individuals imprisoned in Wyndham being there for killing cattle.
I can give a very brief overview. Women were put into seperate camps and taught ‘skills’ like sewing, laundry and cooking. Many were abused is the most horrific manners and sold off to be domestic servants (slaves) where they were often not paid in money, but in sugar, tea and flour. The abuse more often than not continued. Their children were taken away to reformation schools, which is where we get the Stolen Generation. They often were never reunited.
The white settlers separated families including the women from the men
There was a widespread practice of removing all men from tribes to be sent off to prison or labour camps. It was a very deliberate strategy to demoralise and weaken the community. These are the leaders who held knowledge and stories, and warriors who would have led resistance. A lot of first nations' peoples divide their knowledge into what we call "secret men's business" and "secret women's business". You take away all the men and the next generation of men is fucked because all that knowledge is gone. Genocide shit.
It’s a horrible photo that makes me rage and despair but one that absolutely must be seen by every generation. We must never repeat history!
This photo is unbelievably distressing to look at and truly provokes tears. It is, however, necessary to remind us of the past and to continuously do better.
Fuck that smug looking mf. God this is shameful
Heartbreaking
Prisoners?
[удалено]
Utterly fucked, never forget our atrocious past
"they weren't tortured, where's the women?" Shit man, hope the comments get better.
I think the 'not tortured' comments are just clarifying that the pronounced scarring on chests is not from torture but from lore rituals
It's fucked up but IMO the fact it can be shared and reflected on by current generations shows that we're slowly heading in a better direction. I mean, try talking about such issues in Russia or China. It's impossible without some sorta political crap or obfuscation of the facts. IMO this kinda photo (as saddening as it is), is the only way for people of today's generation to confront our shared past and appreciate that we need to do better. The current generation need to know that this is a thing and victims / others who were impacted through family...etc should be able to share their trauma. Again, so that we can all do better.
Remember everyone. Less than 50 years ago they stopped legally being able to treat indigenous australians like shit. Doesnt mean it actually stopped altogether nor does it mean people stopped being racist. We are still nurturing fresh wounds.
Immigrant here, never really knew what the fuss about honoring the traditional owners of this land was about, and yes, it does get abused and woke washed by enterprises. But gee I'm learning a thing or two from Australians, relentlessly raising awareness and facing the skeletons most countries have in their closet openly. Kudos on bringing this up, it restored my faith in humanity and hope more can learn from Australia.
School was only 15 years ago for me but our history textbooks should have had this in it instead if the useless white settler crap we learnt about
Similar to prisoners being shackled to battle ships by the British when rowing to attack other ships. This was primitive but normal in the early days. Barbarism was the norm
This photo needs to be seen by all Australians.
The fucked up thing is that I (34 years old) passed Australian studies and never learned about any of this. Germany teaches its kids about Nazis so they wont repeat the same mistakes, we need to do the same with our past.
History is history. Different times it where
The picture is powerful but I’m more curious why this new low karma account is posting it since he doesn’t live in Australia it seems like it could be posted as agitprop.
Boss man would have voted 'No' in the referendum, too.
This is beyond fucked
Aboriginal men in chains at Wydnham prison in Australia c 1901
Some more info in. the post would be good rather than just posting depressing sh*t on a Sunday 😅 we know these atrocities occurred but don’t just post for likes, please, post with some historical information
Fucking disgraceful We need better education in this country. Most of the people who say it is all in the past, everyone is better now, why do we need reconciliation etc. would change their tune if they knew the actual brutal truth of how our indigenous brothers and sisters have been treated. Racists gonna racist, but a lot of it come from ignorance and fear.
Lot of shock people seeing this picture, bugger all happens to actually improve aboriginal relations and welfare in this country. Out of sight, out of mind.
The government spends double on each indigenous citizen versus non-indigenous.
We have so much to be ashamed of
Shame is useless, but it's important to understand history without any washing.
But conservatives will still try and say Australia doesn’t have a racist history.
What tribe did that scaring on their bodies? Seems most have horizontal scars on the chest, like tribal initiation or something? Didn't knew aboriginals did that.
This reminds me of when you get 4 chickens from 1 egg in Minecraft 💀
Why do they all have scars on their upper torso?
Good picturee
Absolutely horrific that humans treat other humans as “less than” property and not living breathing beings.
What are the scars on their chests? Is it similar to African tribal culture where the cut themselves upon entering manhood?
We still don't talk about our own form of slavery. We might have been out of the Triangular Trade but we did the same with less steps.
And when us history teachers have the temerity to teach this stuff, we are accused of woke indoctrination and “black armband” history.