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Convict Said
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The Aborigines have now become the one major exception to notions of racial equality. However this is more of a recent creation rather than a relic of the past. In the days of the colony, the authorities were very intent on meeting and learning from the locals. A military officer, Watkin Tench, recounting:
"During the intervals of duty, our greatest source of entertainment now lay in cultivating the acquaintance of our new friends, the natives. "
Some of the Convicts seem to have initially thought of the Aborigines as a weak race who could be exploited. Watkin Tensch recorded a party of Convicts senting off to forcibly relieve Aborigines of their fishing tackle. But instead of being victimised, the Aborigines gave the Convicts an absolute thrashing. (This outcome was not surprising considering that Aborigines had been engaging in hand-to-hand combat for 50,000 years.) To rub salt into the wounds of the surviving Convicts, Governor Arthur Phillip had them flogged in order to teach them to be more respectful towards the locals.
As the colony expanded, Aborigines came into conflict with the authorities over land, or the Aborigines spearing livestock. However these conflicts were never on the same scale as those that American colonists had with the Indians. In America, when British colonists started pushing west, they found green fields and fertile soil. High density farming communities developed, and these communities rallied together to fight the Indians. When British colonists pushed west in Australia, they were quickly wiped out by droughts, kangaroos and bushfires. Only small density farming communities survived. Lone farmers realised it really wasn't in their interests to pick a fight with the Aborigines when they didn't have strong communities to back them up.
Nor were Australian landowners able to exploit Aborigines the way American landowners were able to exploit Negroes. If a landowner tried to make a slave out of an Aborigine, the Aborigine just walked off into the bush. Consequently, it was pacific islanders who were kidnapped to take the place of Convicts as the free labour source. It was Asian girls that were kidnapped to become the love slaves. Plain and simply, Aborigine's knowledge of the land, and numerical dominance in the bush, made them impossible to expoit.
As for Convicts, because they were less likely to be landowners, their relationship with the Aborigines was more on an equal footing. As they had a common enemy in the Exclusives, the Convicts felt a certain empathy for what the Aborigines were experiencing. One Sydney Convict writing:
"I sympathized with a few unfortunate aborigines, transported hither from New South Wales, for resenting the intrusion and aggression of the English, by some of whom they have been known to be shot as food for the dogs. Nothing but a mixture of prudence and quiet energy could enable me to steer a course offensive neither to the authorities nor to a clbutt of persons among whom fate had cast me on terms of equality - or rather inferiority- for these desperadoes looked with much contempt upon new-comers, who did indeed live far more wretchedly (unless mechanics or officers,) than men accustomed to existence in the bush."
Reflecting the generally respectful views towards Aborigines, the colonies of NSW, Tasmania, Victoria and South Australia gave them the vote when they framed their consbreastutions in the 1850s. Although Aborigines were excluded from the federal vote 50 years later, under section 41 of the consbreastution, anyone with a State vote also had the federal vote. Legally, Aborigines have been allowed to vote in all federal elections.
Today, mainstream atbreastudes towards Aborigines seem to be going backwards. Today's text books focus on their low life expectancy, over-representation in prison, high-level of unemployment and the low esteem they are held in society. The negative focus of the texts seems to be eroding the good will than once existed towards Aborigines and they are now being seen as bludgers or failures. On the other hand, the text-books of 50 years ago read far more favourably. They talked about Aborigine's skills as bushman and their sense of humour. At the time these books were written, such attributes were very widely admired.
The statistics of disadvantage can be partly attributed to do-gooders always focusing on negatives. For do-gooders, focussing on negatives allows them to see themselves as sympathetic peopl - thereby gaining moral status. However, for Aborigines, always hearing negative things about their race is quite a depressing experience.
But do-gooders are not entirely to blame. A more significant factor is the incompatibility between the communal focus of traditional Aboriginal cultures, with the individualistic focus of Australian laws. The incompatibility leads to an outcome that is dysfunctional to both cultures.
