THE STOLEN GENERATION
STOLEN OR RESCUED?
Copyright Dr. A. B. Kelly 27.12.10
As
a Northern Territory Police Officer in the 1950’s I was specifically charged by
law with the responsibility of removing children who were “at risk” from
Aboriginal camps.
The
law did not specify what constituted being “at risk” but every Police Officer
knew that the children at risk invariably had a light coloured skin, as the
offspring of a white father. These
children became “at risk” only when they reached puberty, which was the age of
initiation in the case of a male child and of marriageability in the case of a
female. If not removed from the tribe
before they reached puberty they would be quietly killed and the body disposed
of.
To
be initiated, or to marry, an Aboriginal child had to have an Aboriginal
“skin”. This “skin” was derived from,
but different from, the different “skins” of both parents. A child of mixed race could not have an Aboriginal
“skin”. The Aboriginal solution was
simply to kill such children when they reached puberty. This was what was meant by being “at risk” in
the politically correct phrase used in the law.
The
Aboriginal “skin” system was fundamental to the survival of Aborigines before
the arrival of Europeans. Europeans lost
in the Australian bush invariably die of hunger if not quickly found. Aboriginals survived in this sparse continent
for over 40,000 years because they divided into numerous small tribal groups,
each of which occupied a vast area of land.
Aborigines knew the food resources of their own tribal area
intimately.
The
major problem in any small tribal group is the possibility of inbreeding, which
can produce disabled children. The
Aboriginal “skin” system had the effect of reducing this possibility to the
minimum. Because a child’s “skin” was
derived from, but different from, his two parents’ different Aboriginal “skins”
the maximum possible outbreeding in each small tribal group was achieved.
No
full-blood Aboriginal child was ever stolen but many part Aboriginal children
were rescued by