Month: December 2002

Lyndall Ryan: No historian enjoys a monopoly over the truth. In answer to some serious questioning of her scholarship by Keith Windschuttle she says;

“Attempts to undermine the essential validity of the past 30 years of historical scholarship on the fate of the Tasmanian Aborigines by discrediting the initial work needs to be answered. Windschuttle points to some factual errors in the footnoting of my original work. There are, indeed, a few minor errors that can easily be rectified. But these rectifications do not alter the book’s fundamental proposition nor in any way support his assertion that the errors were deliberate and used to create imaginary events”.

As I noted last week Keith Windschuttle has released a book questioning the accuracy of Lyndall Ryan’s book The Aboriginal Tasmanians. Windschuttle states that he has gone back to the sources and references she quoted and found a host of inaccuracies. Some newspapers she quoted hadn’t even started publication in the years concerned and some people she referred to weren’t even in Tasmania when the were said to have been involved in the “Massacres”.

As noted above she replies.

“There are, indeed, a few minor errors that can easily be rectified. But these rectifications do not alter the book’s fundamental proposition nor in any way support his assertion that the errors were deliberate and used to create imaginary events,”

I beg to differ. They do alter the fundamental proposition. If you state categorically that a certain person witnessed an event, as reported in a newspaper of the time that dealt with Aborigines, sheep and slaughter/massacre; and Windschuttle’s research shows that at the time the person wasn’t in Tasmania , there were no sheep there and the Newspaper didn’t even exist, then you have either based your book on false premises, or you are simply distorting the truth to fit in with the “black armband” theory of genocide.

Answer the bloody question Lyndall.

The “Did we massacre the aboriginals or not” debate continues.

I have travelled extensively throughout Australia and have yet to notice a groundswell of opinion that agrees with the “black arm” view of white Australians massacring the blacks. I am gregarious and a sociable person and consequently talk to people from all walks of life. I can only conclude that it didn’t happen to the extent that the crazy ‘Left’ would have us believe. The same goes for “racism”. By and large Australians are NOT racist. It is true we don’t like bludgers, wife beaters, alcoholic maniacs, drug users and other peripheral beings but that is only prejudice, not racism.

In the press this week Keith Windschuttle released a book questioning the accuracy of Lyndall Ryan’s book The Aboriginal Tasmanians. Windschuttle states that he has gone back to the sources and references she quoted and found a host of inaccuracies. Some newspapers she quoted hadn’t even started publication in the years concerned, some people she referred to weren’t even in Tasmania when the were said to have been involved in the “Massacres”.

In answers to these points a pontification of professors wrote to The Australian newspaper and although lengthy in words, the letters were very short on fact. No counter to what could be only classified as serious objections to Ryan’s scholarship. Not one fact verified, no counter argument to Windschuttle writings, simply words along the lines that we, “the uneducated underclass” shouldn’t even listen to Windschuttle as he isn’t a true historian and, worse, The Australian definitely shouldn’t publish articles about or by Windschuttle for the same reasons. This arrogance so prevalent in academia takes my breath away.

All this could be just a ripple in the day-to-day life in Australia and I may well have just waited for the debate to die a natural death. This was until I read, in an article by Michael Duffy, that the same Lyndall Ryan was once a research assistant of Manning Clark. Alarm bells are deafening. Dear old Manning never wrote a kind word about Australia and its conservatism. He tried to beatify Lenin, saw all things rosy in Communist Russia and in the end was just a tired grumpy old left wing fool that went out of his way to denigrate the Australian society that had failed to recognize his greatness. Any disciple of Manning Clark is definitely not on my Christmas card list. I conclude that Ryan has too much left wing baggage to be taken seriously. Meanwhile the debate will continue and I look forward to someone from academia coming forward and debating the matter with undeniable facts. Until they do they are just radio static – way off frequency.

Earlier this week I mentioned Phillip Noyce and his receiving an award for his movie “The Rabbit-Proof Fence” Well, it appears I’m not alone in my doubting the veracity of the story line of the film. Andrew Bolt writes on the matter as does Tim Blair. These writings will automatically be labelled “right wing” by those who live in hope that one day the UN will take over Australia and run it according to the “enlightened way” Me. I’d just as soon people read all that was available before they made up their minds.
Posted 1600 Saturday, 14 December 2002

Robert Hogg of Ashgrove, Qld tries to rebut Wednesdays article in the Australian where claimed figures quoted by academic left wing “Black Band” historians are exaggerated. One of the main points of Windschuttle’s argument was;

“Lloyd Robson claims that settler James Hobbs in 1815 witnessed Aborigines killing 300 sheep at Oyster Bay and the next day the 48th Regiment killed 22 aborigines in retribution. However, between 1809 and 1822 Hobbs was living in India, the first sheep did not arrive in Tasmania until 1821 and in 1815 the 48th Regiment never went near Oyster Bay”

Other points were in similar vein.

Robert Hogg replies;

IT’S a pity Keith Windschuttle didn’t spend more time in state archives and less time at the weather bureau. If he had he might have unearthed more relevant evidence as to the nature of relations between white settlers and Aborigines, which he then could have passed on to Emeritus Professor Claudio Veliz (10/12).

The Queensland State Archives, for example, contain a wealth of evidence as to the violent nature of frontier settlement. This takes the form of correspondence between the Colonial Secretary and the Mounted Native Police, the reports of commissioners for Crown Lands, and requests from settlers for protection from Aborigines seeking to drive the whites from their land.

If the settlement process was as benign as Windschuttle and Veliz would have it, why are there so many requests on file from station owners asking for detachments of native police to rid their properties of blacks?

Windschuttle didn’t say “settlement was benign” he just said it wasn’t as bad as some historians are trying to make out. Last years case of Professor Reynolds admitting that his 20 000 blacks killed was based on “so many whites killed times a factor (unspecified) and then doubled – robs him of any credit. Hope Reynolds doesn’t teach Stats 101.

Robert wanders on.

“William Hunter of Mt Abundance (Roma) wrote on 15 December, 1863, regarding the planned removal of native police from the eastern Maranoa that: “The consequences are likely to be very serious. There is a large number of blacks in this part of the country . . . and they need the presence and the dread of the native police force to keep them in check.” And Bernard Lane’s reproduction of Windschuttle’s weak scholarship is poor service to readers who rely on newspapers for their understanding of events.”

Ashgrove, Qld

Robert, no one doubts aboriginals were killed during the early years of white settlement however what some are doubting is the number killed. The greater the number the better the “Black Armband” historians like it. The rest of us are a little bemused by the argument. It was 200 plus years ago at a time when indigenous people were really being slaughtered by Colonialist other than the Brits. What they did here was reasonable for the times.

Jack Frawley from Coogee, NSW writes to the Australian Newspaper

I LIVED on Bathurst Island for five years and drank at the Nguiu Social Club many times. I now live in Coogee, NSW. This is what I’ve seen and heard: binge drinking, violent brawls, shouts and screams all night long, vomit and piss in the streets, and even murder.

Nguiu? No, Coogee! Grog problems are not just confined to Aboriginal Australia. Fair go, Paul Toohey, how about a good news Aboriginal story for once?

Jack,

I’ve been to Aboriginal places/towns/camps too and have a different perspective. The greatest damage to the aboriginal community over the years has been from people like yourself saying there isn’t a problem. There is. The problem will exist while PC people refuse to allow discussion of the subject. I agree grog problems are not confined to Aboriginals, they have just perfected the tragedy. For your analogy to be relevant I would expect 80% of the people in my Brisbane suburb of Taigum to be drunk at any given time. This clearly is not the case. Let ATSIC etc develop their laws themselves because self recognition is the first answer and let us help where we can and when we are invited.