Love them or leave them? AGM: “Hello Terry what have you been up to?”

TERRY: “Well I have been busy as usual, but things have got busier since I decided to join the reconciliation movement.”

AGM: “Mate, are you wasting your time in a big way! The whole problem is hopeless, we pour money into those folk and they just waste it on booze and drugs.”

TERRY: “Yes but I don’t feel the situation is hopeless and I think we have a moral obligation to assist these folk.”

AGM: “You don’t know what you are talking about, you never met these folk. Why when I lived at Humpeedoo for a year I saw every thing, I can tell you.”

TERRY: “Hang on, I am not denying that some aboriginals have problems. What I am saying is that we could do more to help them.”

AGM: “No mate they are way beyond any hope. I’ve seen them hanging about all the public places at Humpeedoo, all the time; they’re drunk and disgusting.”

TERRY: “But what about the kids who go to school and are not allowed to drink alcohol in public places, surely they need to given a chance to prove themselves in our society.”

AGM: “No way mate they are sniffing petrol all the time, mucking up at school and picking fights.”

TERRY: “You could be wrong, what if we went out to Humpeedoo and did a survey of the youngsters and that survey showed the petrol sniffers were a small minority.”

AGM: “What would that prove? You’re mad, why would you want to waste your time with a fancy survey that would prove nothing? What I saw every night was wives going off to the pub. to drag their drunken husbands home and then when they got them home those husbands would just beat the shit out of their wives; why there was a murder last week in Humpeedoo. It goes on all the time.”

TERRY: “But my wife mentioned the other day that there is a much higher percentage of teetotalers amongst the black community than there is amongst the white community and the difference in image is caused by the fact that the whites drink more at home or in the bars of the pubs.”

AGM: “You’re crazy, everyone knows that the blacks can’t hold their liquor. You can’t apply prohibition because that doesn’t work and besides it would be denying them their natural rights.”

TERRY: “Wrong again, the figures show that prohibition does work and many aboriginal communities have chosen to go dry.”

AGM: “I don’t see why you are hung up on surveys and figures, I’m telling you what I have seen. We can’t deny them access to alcohol, that would be like forcing them into a stolen generation again.”

TERRY: “The thinking behind the stolen generation, was to enable half caste children to be educated and trained as whites; it had nothing to do with alcohol or health problems.”

AGM: “Yeh, but what about that report from the Northern Territory the other day that says they are all into incest and sexual abuse.”

TERRY: “If you mean the confidential Roger’s report from Alice Springs, then we are talking about some specific cases of pedophilia that went unchecked, but more particularly the problem is the prevalence of violence in some Aboriginal communities and while incest is more common than we would like to believe in our own society, no cases of incest were mentioned. You should be aware that pedophilia is also a common problem in white society, the real problem hinges around one prominent pedophile who seems to be able to evade the law.”

AGM: “I don’t know why you always argue, I tell you I have seen it all. You just want to come up with smart academic arguments to help you avoid facing reality. The facts are that all the outback-aboriginal settlements are riddled with sex and violence and you don’t want to admit it. You must be in denial.”

TERRY: “Well I am concerned and I do want to do something about it and I thought that you were telling me not to bother.”

AGM: “Listen, those people may be hopeless but they aren’t stupid, what they are really after is money and land. What will a bleeding heart like you say when they knock on your door and claim your house and land?”

TERRY: “Well mining companies already have that right, so why should I worry about the aboriginals in particular. If the local aboriginal tribe has a claim on my land I would have to treat it seriously negotiate with the elders and claim compensation if the claim was a valid one.”

AGM “Look let’s not waste any more time with this stupid discussion, you are making me angry. I pay my taxes and the government is supposed to fix all that.”

Return to the index here.