Recognition

The momentum is apparently there. The risk is staying on message and keeping it simple. There is sufficient public support for Constitutional recognition to avoid the Conservative watered down version of a separate document apart from the constitution. There are also those who want to go beyond removing race from the constitution and inserting a prohibition against racism, but that is going too far and specifying one "ism" in the constitution will be taken by the High Court to be the first in a list of "isms" that includes everything possible. We must find ways to move on and live together and remember the past without being captive to it and locked into ancient animosities. The Australian Constitution should start with Aboriginal ownership of Country before referring to the Crown and our national sovereignty.

Mining giant backs recognition of indigenous in Constitution

BHP Billiton will today join the campaign to include indigenous Australians in the Constitution, as Tony Abbott announces a long-awaited meeting on recognition…

theaustralian.com.au

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Murray Woolnough Isn't "ownership" a Western concept foreign to Aboriginal conceptions of their relationship with land and country?

Like · Reply · Message · 28 May at 11:49

New Whig Isn't "ownership" what the High Court said aboriginal people did have in the Mabo case? Perhaps it could be more accurate within Aboriginal Cultures to say the people are owned by Country, rather than the other way round. It is a symbiotic relationship that goes much further than what you call a "Western concept". Some concepts are universal.

Like · Reply · 28 May at 11:53

Murray Woolnough Mmm - completely agree that "We must find ways to move on and live together and remember the past without being captive to it and locked into ancient animosities." My concern was that in trying to "keep it simple" we would be pulled towards being simplistic in specifying how all the different Aboriginal tribes related to the lands that held some kind of custodianship of.

Like · Reply · Message · 28 May at 11:56

New Whig You are right, Murray. There is always a conflict between going too far or not far enough, and trying to satisfy everyone sometimes leads to making no one happy.

Like · Reply · 28 May at 18:15

Murray Woolnough Such an important issue, though. I really hope we can make good progress on this and work to heal the wounds of the past.

Unlike · Reply · Message · 1 · 28 May at 19:24