[Far-Right Sage]

I find this view of yours interesting, since back in the 80s and early 90s, it was the centre-left labor government that started going down this path of granting autonomy within the indigenous communities and promoting self sufficiency. Then it was the conservative, centre-right government - egged on in no small part by the far-right populist Pauline Hanson - who dismantled this system - arguing that we are one country, should abide by the same laws and no one should be treated differently etc.

And on a related note, you may have heard of the Mabo decision in 1992 - which was a High Court ruling that recognised native title for the first time. It pathed the way for granting areas of land that could be "owned" and managed by aborigines (though in reality it was more of an in principle thing). Again, it is interesting to note that this was fought tooth and nail by the centre-right conservative parties.

I feel that offers the perfect illustration of why the bourgeois nationalism espoused (at least, in theory espoused) by the centre-right, which extends to Hanson as you mention, is not only terribly ineffective but outright destructive. Even the majority of the Australian far-right are in actuality liberals according to the proper definition of the term, like the traditional right in much of the Western world.

The reason they opposed it I believe, and I was indeed aware of Mabo after the fact although I didn't follow Australian politics at the time to any degree, is because they believe in nonsense such as "one nation" comprised of distinct peoples which actually runs contrary to the definition of a legitimate nation. The thing is, that even if Aborigines who feel a sense of vanilla Australian patriotism are enticed by such an idea (liberal nationalism), the masses will either reject it outright or will grow in time to despise it, because it offers nothing to the actual flesh and blood Aborigine working class and in no way does justice to them as a society.

It's basically what you lot have now, except maybe the view of some of the Labor establishment will win out and Australia will abolish its links to the Windsors and become republican. Then the Union Jack can be airbrushed and replaced with a "less offensive" British symbol like a swan and a smattering of Aborigine art can be added to the meaningless flag. Big whoop. Subsequently the Australian media can celebrate the brave elites who have made a step forward and done "something" for the Aborigine as a people even though in reality they will have done nothing. Nothing to combat poverty. Nothing to extend opportunity. Nothing beyond a fiction; perhaps then in twenty years there can be a requirement that the second in command at the helm in Canberra under any acting Prime Minister ought to be an Aborigine, and he can have a big elaborate office from which to hold press conferences where he will discuss all the heavily indigenous areas he's visited and patted a child on the head while handing out bubblegum and trying to ignore the blinding signs of poverty and crumbling infrastructure in the background of the photograph.

After all, that is what the West needs, another Obama-esque Uncle Tom. No, I say the West needs recognition of economic and social realities that actually address the problems of distinct ethnic communities and support the creation of a medium for open discussion rather than just allowing both communities living alongside each other in disunity to stagnate and give way to another failed national experiment that becomes a blaring source of ethical and ideological rot.

[Figlio di Moros]

The solution to Africa is to keep shipping minorities over there- Aborignes, Indians, Mexicans, doesn't matter so long as they're not white. It'll work out, eventually.
You'd basically be sending them to their death as a population group, there's no way that any of them would survive there. It'd be similar to what the Europeans to the Taino and various other Amerindian groups, when they basically weakened those groups and then brought the Africans to their islands and caused population mixing and/or replacement.

It would be the same kind of wipe-out, just in reverse. It would just be bad, since it would be yet again a case of white people causing 'population death by proximity to Africans'.

I was being a bit fasicious, I don't really intend to send everyone to Africa. My point's just that we don't need to give a bunch more land to Indians, First-Nationers, Aborignes, Maori, etc or build up their infrastructure. If anything, New Zealand especially doesn't need to sign something like that to play into Sinospheric hands because they've had such a working relationship with Maori since they first arrived. How we work with pre-settled populations is our own issue, and noticably different than the context in China, Japan, or Taiwan.

[Rei Murasame]

How would any of this play into Sinospheric hands, though? Plus, I don't see why you think that those pre-settled groups don't need help, they look completely miserable to me.

[Far-Right Sage]

The problem I see, Figlio is that opposition to creating a separate national community, building up infrastructure, etc. is just an acceptance of the status quo, which is clearly unacceptable from the perspective of the Aborigine people inhabiting that land which is not sovereign. Of course how Western states tackle the issue will differ from the situation in East Asia, and that extends to indigenous communities both in North America and Oceania, but allowing the Aborigines to go into a death spiral while the rest of the nation undergoes severe friction is no way to set about resolving their plight or the question of Australian national identity.

[AVT]

I find some discussion here pure fantasy, Australia is a large country in land area but a very significant proportion of that is arid and semi-arid, apart from some potential irrigration areas in the north-west and north agriculture has pretty much taken over the rest of the productive land. The notion that Australia is empty and there is plenty of room to move people here and there is misleading and very naive.

Also when dealing with such issue one has to realise that aboriginals are a very heterogenous group in that when europeans arrived here there were hundreds, if not thousands of small tribes\family groups and that due to the vast distances and low population density they show a large variation in cultural tradition. Therefore lumping all aboriginal people together and putting them in their own state is a terrible idea as individual groups identities are tied to the land they and their ancestors have inhabited for generations, they have no cultural continuation without it.

Native title in Australia has to prove an undisturbed connection between an aboriginal group and the land they are claiming, due to colonisation most arable areas of the country have been altered drastically and so the idea that aboriginals area going to be granted areas of Melbourne or Sydney is again a fantasy.

[Swagman]

Therefore lumping all aboriginal people together and putting them in their own state is a terrible idea

Yes at the end of the day Aboriginals are just Australians like any other Australian citizens.

Anderson appears to be saying it's about time that aboriginal Australians progressed from the stone age and into the 21st century.

One of their biggest problems is banding together in their tribal communities where they get stuck in cycles of substance abuse, welfare dependency, domestic abuse and this sense that they are owed something from the rest of the citizens of the nation. A notion that is festered and promoted by stupid do-gooder activist groups.