After Queen Elizabeth II's death, Indigenous Australia can't be expected to shut up. Our sorry business is without end

[dimsum]

Many points that could be swapped between Canada and Australia.

As my colleagues have worn black in mourning for the Queen, I've wrestled with asphyxiating anger — and I'm not alone

We aren't supposed to talk about these things this week. We aren't supposed to talk about colonisation, empire, violence about Aboriginal sovereignty, not even about the republic, writes Stan Grant.

www.abc.net.au

 

[FSTO]

Many points that could be swapped between Canada and Australia.

As my colleagues have worn black in mourning for the Queen, I've wrestled with asphyxiating anger — and I'm not alone

We aren't supposed to talk about these things this week. We aren't supposed to talk about colonisation, empire, violence about Aboriginal sovereignty, not even about the republic, writes Stan Grant.

www.abc.net.au

My question always is: we become a republic and then what? All the restrains foisted on us by the British Monarchy have magically disappeared? Have we forgot the Statute of Westminster that basically cut the Royal umbilical cord way back in 1932? So we’ve (and Aus and Kiwiland) have had close to a 100 years to right the wrongs. It ain’t the crown, look in the mirror, it’s us. It’s the people we elected and the faceless public service that for a 100 years have done SFA to address the harm done to First Nations. Becoming a republic will change nothing.

 

[rmc_wannabe]

Many points that could be swapped between Canada and Australia.

As my colleagues have worn black in mourning for the Queen, I've wrestled with asphyxiating anger — and I'm not alone

We aren't supposed to talk about these things this week. We aren't supposed to talk about colonisation, empire, violence about Aboriginal sovereignty, not even about the republic, writes Stan Grant.

www.abc.net.au

A very well written article, with many parallels for us here in Canada.

A problem I brought forward when we were having discussions on Truth and Reconciliation last year was the popularity of those both in government and in activism of going after people who were long dead instead of trying to right the wrongs of last week.

Her Late Majesty wielded zero power within Canada or Australia to directly influence policies toward First Nations. The Statue of Westminster solidified our independence, much like the BNA and Australia Act did in 1867 and 1901 respectively. The Crown is a culprit in name only for things that occurred past those dates.

Colonialism is a brutal and savage enterprise; but just ask the Koreans and Vietnamese how hospitable the Japanese were to them. Ask the former Soviet Bloc what joys were experienced under the wonders of Russian influence. Hell look to Africa of 2022 and see how the Belt and Road initiative is much better and stable than European influence in the 19th and 20th centuries.

We have to reconcile that those we have to hold accountable are the ones who currently have the power to fix things and refuse to. Her Late Majesty couldn't stop the Residential School system in 1952 any more than she could have mandated clean drinking water on every FN reservation and territory; the 12 PMs and governments voted in by Canadians on the other hand....

As a final thought, France colonized swaths of Africa, the Caribbean, South America, and Asia as a Republic that espoused the values of "Liberté, Fraternité, Égalité" ... only if you were à white Frenchman. The U.S. did the same for Puerto Rico, the Philippines, and the many Banana Republics it claimed it had interests in. They don't have a now dead imperial monarchist "boogeyman" to post blame to and nor should we.

If the Empire was racist, we retain that racism of our own volition or indifference; not because of a now dead ceremonial Head of State.

 

[dimsum]

If the Empire was racist, we retain that racism of our own volition or indifference; not because of a now dead ceremonial Head of State.

 

[Blackadder1916]

I had also posted this earlier in another thread.

'You just get on with it', Queen told Jacinda Ardern about life as new mother

It's interesting how the focus and attention (clickbait) of the same news piece (whether presented by video or text, it's the same interview) can change significantly by the use of a different headline.

I had earlier watched PM Ardern's interview on the BBC's YouTube feed. There, they titled it "New Zealand PM Jacinda Ardern says country will become republic ‘in her lifetime’ - BBC News". While that response was only a small portion of Ardern's comments, taken along with comments about the historically poor treatment of NZ's indigenous population by the Crown (government), it does portend that a move to a NZ republic is something to be taken seriously.

I had been planning on adding the PM's comments to the discussion started in another thread "After Queen Elizabeth II's death, Indigenous Australia can't be expected to shut up." However, I was waiting (out of respect) till after the late Queen was interred before engaging in discussion about the future of the monarchy in Canada as well as the other Commonwealth realms.

---

There have been a number of threads over the years on these means that have to varying degrees discussed the possibility of moving away from the monarchy, however (to my limited recollection) the aspect of indigenous abuse had not been discussed much.

 

[Colin Parkinson]

Here in North America, most of the indigenous way of life involved slavery, funny how people gloss over that part.

 

[Weinie]

Here in North America, most of the indigenous way of life involved slavery, funny how people gloss over that part.

Because it doesn't fit the narrative.

 

[Spencer100]

Here in North America, most of the indigenous way of life involved slavery, funny how people gloss over that part.

Shhh.....we don't talk about that.


But if you look around the world today........Indigenous populations that were part of the British Empire fair much better than neighbors who were not. This is an almost 100% true everywhere.

 

[Brad Sallows]

We can do better in the present.

There isn't really a counterfactual history in which colonialism never happens, though.

 

[YZT580]

We can do better in the present.

There isn't really a counterfactual history in which colonialism never happens, though.

you could even include the Battle of Hastings as being nothing more than colonialism. Treatment of indigenous people, consider the treatment given by the normans to the Saxons after 1066, or the celts in Wales.

 

[Spencer100]

We can do better in the present.

There isn't really a counterfactual history in which colonialism never happens, though.

Can we do better? Not with any of the current ideas.

Colonialism has happened for over 6000 years......If The European's had not colonialize someone else would have in most cases. Japan would have or China or Ottoman etc.

North America you could maybe make a case for some of the cultures in South America and Mexico areas moving up into current US and Canada areas. Africa would have seen movement of the Arab or Muslim empires down in sub Sahara. Movement of a powerful Japanese or Muslim Java Empires into the very lightly populated Australia. Who knows but their would have been colonialism and conquest. Europeans and especially the British did not have a monopoly on it. They are were just good at it at the right time. The British with a confluence of culture, technology and will just hit a sweet spot in world history.

 

[rmc_wannabe]

I think part of the problem is that we demonize one culture over another when there is a "sour grapes" situation.

The Jews felt the same way about the Romans, the Romans felt the same about the Gaels/Visogoths, The Celts about the Norman's, hell I'm sure the Sikh/Mughal/Arab/Hindu friction was about as colonial as you can get.

We are a species that competes amongst ourselves for land, resources, prestige and power. The fact that some view this as barbaric is naivety. Until there is an external threat that causes us to unite against our collective enemy, we will be colonizing, competing, and fighting one another until we cease to exist.

 

[FSTO]

The CBC is seized with this “British Crown is the sole purveyor of Colonialism and Slavery”. There is no nuance, no knowledge of world and ancient history in their opinion pieces. It’s all rather sad.

 

[rmc_wannabe]

The CBC is seized with this “British Crown is the sole purveyor of Colonialism and Slavery”. There is no nuance, no knowledge of world and ancient history in their opinion pieces. It’s all rather sad.

Man they're going to have a heck of a time if they crack open a history book and see the French Jesuits, Jacques Cartier, Etienne Brule, and Samuel de Champlain weren't here just convening with the locals.

 

[dimsum]

Man they're going to have a heck of a time if they crack open a history book and see the French Jesuits, Jacques Cartier, Etienne Brule, and Samuel de Champlain weren't here just convening with the locals.

Except I bet a non-zero portion of French Canada would be up in arms if CBC or Radio-Canada started calling their ancestors that.

 

[lenaitch]

I think the issues felt by Aboriginal peoples in Canada, Australia and elsewhere has more to do with humanity itself rather than any one particular nation; although I admit that doesn't absolve any of them. People have been wandering beyond their ancestral lands, and maltreating other people they came across, for pretty much ever, but advances in shipbuilding and navigation during the Age of Discovery really kick-started it allowing people to not only find other lands and peoples, but maintain their presence and exploit what and whom they encountered.

Across contiguous lands like Europe, Asia and Africa, civilizations tended to be fairly equal in their chronologic development but, in terms of Europe encountering the new world, there were differences of multi hundreds of years. Emerging industrial societies were meeting societies that were mostly still agricultural or hunter-gatherer; societies that by-and-large had not even learned to smelt metal, let alone using gunpowder, making for a somewhat unbalanced relationship to say the least. In Canadian terms, if it wasn't Britain or France, it would have been Spain, the Netherlands, Germany, Portugal, Belgium or any of the other nations that were in empire-building mode, and perhaps Japan, Russia or China from the west; but it was inevitable that it was going to happen.

I agree with an upthread comment that republicanism is no guarantee that a solution will be magically at hand, any more than it would have prevented exploitation in the first place. The US is a prime, example of that. We might have used instruments of the State against Aboriginal peoples but we didn't have an equivalent of their Indian Wars. Perhaps that just means we were more subtle. The Spanish, as I understand it a pure Monarchy at the time, pretty much wiped out a civilization or two.

Let's not even talk about how institutions, like the church, have subjugated and exploited its own people as well as others.

The has been a flurry of articles and opinions in the past couple of weeks regarding the future of our Monarchy. I have read several scholars, historians, academics, etc. who have eloquently expounded on the history and advantages, as well as some of the drawbacks of a Constitutional Monarchy, much more eloquently than I ever could. On the other side, it seems the primary arguments of the pro-republic crowd seems to revolve around topics such as a foreign head of state, the anachronism of a hereditarian system, and becoming truly independent and 'all grow'd up'. On the contrary, I think there is much strength in being aligned with a system that is the result of over 1000 years of continuous evolution. I'm not sure any current republic can claim that.

In terms of independence, I recall that when I left home in my early 20s to strike out on my own, I didn't feel the need to renounce my parents.

 

[daftandbarmy]

Can we do better? Not with any of the current ideas.

Colonialism has happened for over 6000 years......If The European's had not colonialize someone else would have in most cases. Japan would have or China or Ottoman etc.

North America you could maybe make a case for some of the cultures in South America and Mexico areas moving up into current US and Canada areas. Africa would have seen movement of the Arab or Muslim empires down in sub Sahara. Movement of a powerful Japanese or Muslim Java Empires into the very lightly populated Australia. Who knows but their would have been colonialism and conquest. Europeans and especially the British did not have a monopoly on it. They are were just good at it at the right time. The British with a confluence of culture, technology and will just hit a sweet spot in world history.

Ellis Ross has nailed it:

 

[OldSolduer]

Man they're going to have a heck of a time if they crack open a history book and see the French Jesuits, Jacques Cartier, Etienne Brule, and Samuel de Champlain weren't here just convening with the locals.

Along with Bishop Grandin here in Winnipeg who was one of the architects of the residential school system. About a year ago this was brought to light and Bishop Grandin Boulevard is still Bishop Grandin Boulevard.

 

[RangerRay]

l… Bishop Grandin Boulevard.

Do you mean Bishop Grandin Parking Lot?