Society/Culture The Welcome/Acknowledgment of Country thread

[Bostonian]

A British colony in founded 1788 and all of its implications for the existing Indigenous population was, when they set off, intended for Botany Bay, precisely because that was the most important stop of Cook's expedition and members of Cook's expedition recommended it to the British as the location of where they should form a new colony largely due to the aftermath of losing the American colonies due to the American Revolution. One linked to the other. In terms of creating a British colony, Cook was clearly the most important single figure.

Going by some of the posts in this thread, people would have been fine if it Captain Cook was replaced with Governor Phillip, who was both head of the First Fleet expedition and the first Governer, because "Cook was just an explorer and had nothing to do with colonisiation", which is silly, because Phillip didn't make the decision to colonise, he was just attached to it as part of his job, unlike Cook's expedition. If you're going to name someone as the starting point, from an indigenous POV as to the colonisation process, of course it's clearly Cook. Without his expedition the British wouldn't have known that there was a Botany Bay in the first place to try to colonise (until they realised that Port Jackskon was a better harbour at the end of their trip just a bit north).

I hope the above wasn't political and is just a general retelling of Australian history, that, you know, I have read up on in the past because if I'm going to try to comment and understand the context of things like Welcome to Country (rather than just ignore or whatever and get on with my life, which is fine too), that it's my obligation to try and understand the context of history.

The starting point goes back a lot further than Cook.

 

[Osho]

Because the next day Murdoch media decided to make it into an issue to rile up their bogan base and get them outraged and clicking on the article.

Then Tony Shaw opened his mouth - the guy who bragged he loved using racism language on the field. Guess the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. Bogan media had their ‘hero’ who was ‘sick of wokeness’ so they keep pushing the story, and now Hanson has given her 0.000002 cents.

This is manufactured outrage to drive clicks and revenue

Indeed.
The other thought that crossed my mind after the WTC speech was that, once the AFL agree for such ceremonies to occur, can they pre-script the WTC content to suit their preferences?

Obviously no, but my thoughts were triggered by a poster who suggested that the AFL should "screen" the welcome speech in future. Which I thought was a 1984ish point of view from the Ministry of Correctness. Uncle Brendan strikes me as an independent fellow, I like his style and flair, his speech, and his willingness to explain. That he was controversial is quite a misreading of what was said.

 

[Aristotle Pickett]

AP's imagination on many topics is quite vast. He's on his 20 mins unsupervised laptop time for the day, just enjoy the entertainment

I just posted a quote from The Discovery’s master, Thomas Edgar and midshipman George Gilbert about what Cook did in Tonga and you still don't believe.
Open your eyes sleepy head.

 

[Dogs_R_Us]

I thought Uncle Brendan (I think that is his name) provided good info and perspective. I haven't unserstood how he offended, can anyone explain it to me?

The only part that raised my eye a tad was the 250k years comment. I may be out of date on the latest research, that date is much further back in history than what I had assumed (70 - 80k years).

Homo sapiens, the first modern humans, evolved from their early hominid predecessors between 200,000 and 300,000 years ago. They developed a capacity for language about 50,000 years ago. The first modern humans began moving outside of Africa starting about 70,000-100,000 years ago.

Molecular clock estimates, genetic studies and archaeological data all suggest the initial settlement of Sahul and Australia by modern humans occurred around 48,000–50,000 years ago. Over the last few decades, a significant number of archaeological sites dated at more than 30,000 years old have been discovered

People gradually found their way to this land from India, Indonesia, China, New Guinea and the Pacific Islands, and probably elsewhere. They have come and gone ever since, leaving their offspring. Like everyone else in the world, ancestry of modern Aboriginals is no doubt a mixture.

 

[South of the Yarra]

Yes it could have been much worse. MUCH worse.

The government supported murder, slaughter, dispossession of a people could STILL be happening today, like it is elsewhere.

As for criticising someone who reads and educated themselves, that is not a great argument.

Have your heard of the Uyghurs in northern China? Have a read on the link below.

China’s Repression of Uyghurs in Xinjiang

More than a million Muslims have been arbitrarily detained in China’s Xinjiang region. The reeducation camps are just one part of the government’s crackdown on Uyghurs.

www.cfr.org

Now I am not saying two wrongs make a right. However comparing how Australia has progressed in this space as opposed to China and others is a valid observation.

The old I am not a racist but .... Or I am not saying two wrongs make a right ............ but you are

 

[Roylion]

A British colony in founded 1788 and all of its implications for the existing Indigenous population was, when they set off, intended for Botany Bay, precisely because that was the most important stop of Cook's expedition and members of Cook's expedition recommended it to the British as the location of where they should form a new colony largely due to the aftermath of losing the American colonies due to the American Revolution.

That is true.

Joseph Banks testified before two House of Commons committees in 1779 and 1785 that Botany Bay would be an "advantageous" site for a new penal colony. James Matra – who had been a midshipman on Endeavour (under the name of 'Magra') and who later became a diplomat – proposed the idea of a colony in New South Wales in August 1783, with the support of Joseph Banks.

Cook himself , as far as we know, never proposed that a colony - be established on the continent. In his journal he wrote

"so far as we know [it] doth not produce any one thing that can become an Article in trade to invite Europeans to fix a settlement upon it’."

 

[skipper kelly]

I understand completely the desire to just get on with it. But to strip sport of politics would require you to stop playing it, because it - like all activites that involve more than one person - is inherently political.

We can still have sport without all the BS. And then a few beers at the end. Playing or supporting.

 

[Aristotle Pickett]

You claimed these things happened on the east coast of Australia to the indigenous people in 1770. They didn't.


You don't know what I learnt at school. Nor do you know what I teach.

The facts are:
Cook shot at two warriors before he got off the boat and according to his own quotes, shot him in the leg.

'On 29 April 1770, Cook and crew attempted their first landfall on the continent at a beach now known as Silver Beach at Botany Bay (Kamay). The older warrior, who some identify as Cooman, and another Gweagal man came down to the beach to fend off what they thought to be spirits of the dead. They shouted "warra warra wai" meaning 'you are all dead' and gestured with their spears.[3][4] Cook's party attempted to communicate their desire for water and threw gifts of beads and nails ashore. The two Aboriginal men continued to oppose the landing and Cook fired a warning shot. The older warrior responded by throwing a rock, and Cook shot him in the leg with small shot.[5][6] wikipedia with references.'

Whether it was just the leg or the warrior survived we don't know.

Cook did worse things in Tonga and Hawaii as shown by the quotes of his crew i posted above.

Plus there's all the stuff he did that he didn't put in his journal.

Plus he offered no treaty whatsoever which was the custom to offer one at the time.

 

[threenewpadlocks]

The starting point goes back a lot further than Cook.

But none of those earlier western expeditions to Australia had a direct resulting link to the subsequent colonisation of Australia. Cook's expedition did. That's the point.

 

[Roylion]

The facts are:
Cook shot at two warriors before he got off the boat and according to his own quotes, shot him in the leg.

You claimed "He shot dead someone when he first arrived."

You also made a claim about Cook spreading smallpox on the coast of Australia.

Whether it was just the leg or the warrior survived we don't know.

So you don't know. Yet you made a claim that "He shot dead someone when he first arrived" with no supporting evidence.

Plus there's all the stuff he did that he didn't put in his journal.

What "stuff"? Where's the supporting evidence for that "stuff"?

 

[My Tilly]

Cook did worse things in Tonga and Hawaii as shown by the quotes of his crew i posted above.

You do realize Polynesian people were quite barbaric in their own right?
It does not excuse what Cook and the people of his time did but let's not pretend there were innocents. Life was incomprehensible to what Westerners experience today.

 

[Dogs_R_Us]

In 1700s you’d still need a some of treaty for it not to be theft.

The leaders/governors of the early settlements were under instructions from the King to meet with the local people and make treaty with them. There were several things that made this impossible.
1. Communication. Obviously there was no common language.
2. Establishing who to make a treaty with. The tribes were separate entities, not a nation. Most of them were enemies with each other. Different groups appeared and disappeared.
3. In the rare circumstance of being able to communicate, getting across the concept of a treaty between peoples. The people had no idea what the British were even talking about and no interest.

 

[Bostonian]

But none of those earlier western expeditions to Australia had a direct resulting link to the subsequent colonisation of Australia. Cook's expedition did. That's the point.

The constant colonisation of the British isles is what lead to the mindset of moving into lands and usurping the existing culture as a thing.

It's what happened in the British isles multiple times so it bred that attitude on that isle.

By the time Cook came about it was well entrenched.

If the Celts had never been usurped and held sway since those times it might be a different world we know.

 

[Dogs_R_Us]

Judging the past through the lens of 2024 is ridiculous.

 

[Roylion]

But none of those earlier western expeditions to Australia had a direct resulting link to the subsequent colonisation of Australia. Cook's expedition did. That's the point.

The French claimed Western Australia a couple of years after Cook visited the east coast, but of course, for a number of reasons, it didn't lead to the establishment of a colony. In March 1772, Louis Aleno de St Aloüarn became the first European to claim possession of Western Australia.

 

[threenewpadlocks]

The constant colonisation of the British isles is what lead to the mindset of moving into lands and usurping the existing culture as a thing.

It's what happened in the British isles multiple times so it bred that attitude on that isle.

By the time Cook came about it was well entrenched.

If the Celts had never been usurped and held sway since those times it might be a different world we know.

It seems strange to consider the context of the British's colonisation of Australia as some sort of vague sense of national pysche, as opposed, to the more written, documented and obvious conclusions of it being a strategic geo-political advantage to have a colony in that location, for potential economic reasons (such as growing things in the colony), and to have a place where they could dump convicts that they were storing in overcrowded prisons, given they no longer had the American colonies to dump convicts in too. All of this is documented and researched, and the cause and effect is not that difficult to understand here? The British were able to establish the best global colonial setup in the 16th-19th century because they were an island nation that by its nature made them more seafearing than other similar economic powers in Europe, much like how Spain and Portugal were the first to colonise and discover outside Europe in the 15th century for no major reason than the geographic realities that they were the southern and westernmost European countries.

 

[threenewpadlocks]

The French claimed Western Australia a couple of years after Cook visited the east coast, but of course, for a number of reasons, it didn't lead to the establishment of a colony. In March 1772, Louis Aleno de St Aloüarn became the first European to claim possession of Western Australia.

The claiming of land isn't the physical act of establishing a colony, though. Indigenous history as it relates to things like the Welcome to Country is generally unconcerned by the fact that people on the other side of the world declared some things, but they are concerned with the fact that there was a new, and first, permanent settlement, of which the basis of establishing such a settlement was because of Cook's expedition.

 

[Gavin Excell]

The French claimed Western Australia a couple of years after Cook visited the east coast, but of course, for a number of reasons, it didn't lead to the establishment of a colony. In March 1772, Louis Aleno de St Aloüarn became the first European to claim possession of Western Australia.

Off topic but are the claims of the Portuguese visiting the East Coast 100 years prior the Dutch (as put forward by MacIntrye) largely dismissed/discredited?

 

[Carringbush2010]

So we've veered a bit into the politics in sport discussion.

I used to be a believer that the two could be separated, but now I believe there is, for want of a better term, organic overlap.

politics has overlap in any sphere really (or is enabled to).

As for wtc, that is proof that a 'social issue' or if you will a 'politicized subject' does have engagement in sport, so it can't really be avoided.

In saying all that I don't have an issue with wtc or acknowledgement of country.

As has been suggested earlier in the thread, we really need to embrace it like NZ have with the haka, and have pride in wtc. I'm not sure how that looks, others would have better suggestions than I.

But we could really reduce the stigma between first nation Australians and every other Australian and further boost relationships among all individuals if we all embraced it with pride.

Really is an opportunity imo.

 

[Chief]

Maybe go for a holiday to Northern China and talk with the locals, you may just start understanding how lucky we all are here.

Why bring up Chinese people?

 

[Roylion]

Off topic but are the claims of the Portuguese visiting the East Coast 100 years prior the Dutch (as put forward by MacIntrye) largely dismissed/discredited?

There isn't a great deal of evidence that confirms the Portuguese visiting the east coast in the 16th century, so the notion is still largely hypothetical. McIntyre's theory has been seriously challenged by other scholars as well. A relative of mine, Captain John Mills supposedly saw a shipwreck somewhere around 1843 in the dunes to the west of Warrnambool and south of Tower Hill that's since been dubbed the 'Mahogany Ship' and is often postulated as evidence for a possible Portuguese visit. He (and others who also saw it) seemed to imply that the wreck was of unknown identity and predated European colonization of Victoria, thought to begin with whalers in about 1828. So, as evidence to support the theory it's fairly poor, until at least the remains of the wreck are found and the wood scientifically analysed.

 

[evolved2]

Don't mind WTC when it's accurate. Might want to fact check Aboriginals being here for 250k years though.

The corporate bullshit is what I find annoying. I can't imagine why First Nations people need or want to be acknowledged before every meeting by corporate Australia.

 

[Drought Break]

The older generation are too easily offended.

To funny. Have a look at the age demographic of all the protesters such as the flogs at the weapons convention throwing acid and horse shit. Climate change protestors and virtually every protest is dominated by young naive uni fools and students.

 

[Chief]

I don't know why they take it out on Captain Cook so much.

I have no skin in the game of blaming Cook or protecting his reputation.

Conservatives often fixate on this sort of detail to minimise the message.

 

[RedWhite4Ever]

I have no skin in the game of blaming Cook or protecting his reputation.

Conservatives often fixate on this sort of detail to minimise the message.

What message?