Truthtelling - abst1000 essay on truth telling PDF

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abst1000 essay on truth telling...

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What is truth-telling? Why is it important to the future of Indigenous and non-Indigenous people in Australia?

2 Word count: 1851 Truth telling is pivotal to the reconciliation and healing of Australia. Aboriginal peoples history, culture and tradition and their discrimination following imperialism has been falsely reported and remains unknown. However Australians have developed an increasing momentum to allow non-Indigenous people to be able to fully understand the history of Indigenous people. This increasing momentum is called truth telling. Truth telling was first addressed by the First Nations Regional Dialogues for being seen as crucial for the relationship between Indigenous and non-Indigenous people, and throughout its course has been supported strongly by stakeholders. Truth telling provides an opportunity for Indigenous Australians to document evidence about past injustice, discrimination and share their history and culture with the extensive community of non-Indigenous Australians. Truth telling also allows past history, massacres, dispossession and stolen wages to be documented. The importance of truth telling is that it not only acknowledges the discrimiation of the past, but also allows Indigenous Australians to share their stories and heritage with their communities so that non-Indigenous people can acknowledge the negative impact Australian history has had on Aboriginal peoples. In past history, Australia has shown to lack acknowledgement of the negative effects of colonisation and how it has impacted Aboriginal peoples across many generations. Trauma across generations was addressed as a serious problem among Indigenous Australians. This causes Aborigional peoples to not be able to fully or positively participate in their communities, leading to many future disadvantages. Furthermore, this essay will argue that through truth telling important benefits such as reconciliation, acknowledgement, sharing and preservation of culture and the ability to take control of their future become available for the future of Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians.

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Truth Telling is crucial to the future of Indigenous and non-Indigenous people in Australia as it aids the ongoing process of reconciliation in Australia. The process of reconciliation in Australia for the future provides potential to form restorative justice, and educate the Australian community. Mckenna (2018) states that reconciliation is a dual process in which Australians can establish “equitable sovereignty”, and ensures all Australians share “equal custodianship” of the environment and land. This actively demonstrates that by ensuring reconciliation in Australia through truth telling Indigenous peoples and individuals are allowed access to full human rights and freedoms recognised by law, whilst also allowing freedom from discrimination when exercising their rights. By aiding reconciliation through truth telling Aborigional peoples are able to be recognised as equal to non-Indigenous people whilst also having the right to be different and to be respected for their differences. The process of reconciliation can also provide education to the Australian community through many organisations which educate people to contribute to the reconciliation of Australia such as joining a local reconciliation group as an individual, supporting local healing services and celebrating National Reconciliation Week as a community and engaging with Reconciliation Australia’s free Narragunnawali: Reconciliation in Schools and Early learning program and develop an action plan, and access learning resources to support reconciliation as a school community. By doing this Australia is able to ensure a better education on Aborigional reconciliation for future generations. Thus, truth telling is important for the future of Indigenous and non-Indigenous people in Australia as it provides justice and education for the community through equal sovereignty and reconciliation organisations.

4 Truth telling is important as it allows Australia's historically negative impact to be acknowledged between the future generations of Indigenous and non-Indigenous people. By acknowledging the truth about Australia's history, truth telling is able to occur. Today's society sees disparity due to the remaining inequity of dispossession, colonisation and violence that began at the first point of contact between Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples. The inequitable behaviours displayed towards Indigenous Australians was justified by imperialists that did not respect or value Indigenous people. This disrespect even went as far as refusing acknowledgement of Indigenous Australians as humans. This can be shown by Harris’ (2013) book, One Blood, where Harris cited historical examples of imperialists disrespect and lack of acknowledgement towards Indigenous Australians. He states “I look on the blacks as a set of monkeys, and the earlier they are exterminated from the face of the earth the better. I would never consent to hang a white man for a black one. I knew well (the settlers) were guilty of the murder, but I for one would never see a white man suffer for shooting a black.” (p. 27). As a result of this negative behaviour a fracture has been left in the relationship between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians by not acknowledging historical acceptance. Historical acceptance is seen as the key to reconciliation in Australia. By acknowledging the true history of Australia, future non-Indigenous Australians will be able to acknowledge, understand and accept the crimes of the past and the major impact they had on Indigenous peoples and allow successful engagement with future Indigenous communities. For example Behrendt (2003) identifies engagement of Indigenous communities as a crucial goal for institutional reform. This statement means that by accepting historical wrongs done to Indigenous Australians can allow improvements regarding human rights, which leads to greater equality and equity. Thus, the evidence provided shows that through acknowledging the truth about Australia's history and the negative impact it left on

5 Indigenous Australians, truth telling is able to occur, which is important as it in turn allows for the future relationship between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians to be reformed.

Truth telling is important for the future of Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians as it allows Aboriginal peoples to share their culture with the Australian community and preserve their culture. Sharing culture is critical for the future of Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples as it allows Indigenous Australians to heal from the historical trauma they have faced as well as its consequences for example mental health problems, social and economic inequality, racism and ongoing grief. Sharing culture will also allow Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples to build understanding of the past and help preserve their culture and heritage through future generations. In order for Indigenous people to share their culture they must first become connected to their land, culture and community. To facilitate this process truth telling must be established first to allow the future for Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians to share their culture. Langton (2003) wrote that when Aboriginal people are able to share their culture, non-Indigenous people are able to have a more strengthened idea of the past which allows for the future of Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians to lay the foundation for a new story of the nation. This implies that truth telling is important for the future of Indigenous and non-Indigenous people as by working together to record and share past unrecognised fragments of their cultural history Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians are able to help future communities establish respect and understanding. Truth telling is crucial for the future of Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians as it allows preservation of Indigenous peoples culture and heritage to be passed down from one generation to the next. Traditional knowledge is presented at the core of Indigenous culture and heritage. Traditional knowledge is passed down

6 between generations through paintings, stories, songs, dances and performances. However, due to colonialism, dispossession and violence against Indigenous peoples have undermined these aspects of Indigenous culture to the point that many Indigenous youth are not taught their native languages. By strengthening Indigenous peoples' voices through truth telling they are able to connect future generations to past generations culture and heritage. For example, schweinfest (2019) stated that teaching Indigenous children their language and heritage as well as the traditional ways of their community culture has seen to reduce school drop-out rates which leads to growth in the economy for the future. Preserving Indigenous culture and heritage also strengthens linguistic diversity. Hence, the importance of truth telling for the future of Indigenous and non-Indigenous people is shown through the ability to share culture which in turn allows for healing from past trauma and preservation of culture and heritage which allows traditional knowledge to be passed down to future generations.

The importance of truth telling is shown through the empowerment given to future Indigenous people to have the ability to take control of their future; socially, financially and economically. Through truth telling there has been a shift in the discrimination of Aboriginal people being seen as disadvantaged, to being acknowledged as people who have potential to grow socially, financially and economically. Historically there has been a shift starting from the early ‘80s which focused on the education of aboriginal children, to later focusing on employing of Indigenous peoples, before shifting to justice for Aboriginal people. Today we see the focus is based on supporting Aboriginal people and communities to reach their goals socially, financially and economically through truth telling. Hudson (2014) states that Indigenous university graduates have increased to more than 25,000 in Australia. Hudson also suggests that by 2050

7 these numbers are expected to swell to more than 100,000. This suggests that by addressing truth telling future Indigenous Australians are being involved into the economy, by incorporating Indigenous people in the economy, they gain the opportunity to increase their income. Additionally future Indigenous people are given the opportunity to boost their wealth. This means that if Aboriginal people are given the opportunity to take control of their future, they are able to increase their average income, in return this allows Indigenous people to afford housing or sufficient rental housing. Future Indigenous Australians are then able to afford food for their family and send their children to good schools then suddenly, the future for Indigenous Australians have no social issues. Society will witness the reawakening of Indigenous culture and heritage. Thus, it is evident that the importance of truth telling is seen through the empowerment of Indigenous Australians to be able to take control of their future by increasing their economic income which helps future Indigenous people become acknowledged in the economy and not seen as disadvantaged.

To conclude, truth telling is a key theme for the future of Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians. Many of the benefits such as reconciliation, acknowledgement, sharing and preservation of culture and the ability to take control of their future allow a stable pathway for future generations of Indigenous Australians to flourish. However as revealed in this essay, truth telling must first be established and embraced by the wider community in order for the future of Indigenous and non-Indigenous to be beneficial. Failure to do this will only form a greater barrier in history for the future of Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples. Thus, truth telling shows great importance as it provides future benefits of reconciliation which allows restorative justice and education towards Australian communities to recognise Indigenous Australians as

8 equal, acknowledgment through historical acceptance and being able to understand and accept the discriminations of the past and the major impact it had on Indigenous peoples, sharing and preservation of culture and heritage which allows healing and traditional knowledge to be past down to future generations and empowerment for Indigenous Australians to be able to advance socially, economically and financially so that future Indigenous Australians can better provide for their families....