From the late 1890's till the early 1970's the Australian government (through government agencies and church missions) allowed the (forced) removal of at least 100.000 children (most likely substantially more), usually from mixed descent, from Aboriginal and Torres Strair Islander families. Different sources tell us different reasons for this.
Some speak of popular belief (at least at the start of all this) that the Aboriginal population would be unable to sustain itself and therefore would become extinct. The mixed descent children were seen as a threat to the 'prevailing' Northern European civilization. The children were placed in internment camps, orphanages and other institutions. This is a rather apaling thought to say the least.
Others claim it was mainly an act to protect the mixed descent children from harm done to them by their family/community due to their mixed descent.
Removals were not always forced, there are also records of voluntary removal by parents thinking they were giving the children a better life.
One way or another, a lot was left to people knowing not much of the childrens people's backgrounds which led to wrong decisions. Also there was a lot of abuse in the children's new homes. And of course whole families were ripped apart this way.
During the past 12 years of liberal (Howard lead) government people started to get more informed about the mishaps of the earlier governments. Howard however, has always refused to make a formal apology.
As a first act of the new government elected in November 2007, today, the Australian Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, made a formal apology to all Stolen generation members. Something a lot of people have waited for for a very long time.
For more information about this, google for "Stolen generations".
Below are pictures of the live TV broadcast of this event:
PM Kevin Rudd starting his 30 minute speech.
Aboriginal- and Torres Strair Islander leaders and also a few "victims" of the stolen generation were invited to this "beginning of parliament" meeting.
The speech was also viewed on a big screen in Sydney by a lot of people.
Opposition leader Brendan Nelson listening carefully.
Rudd received a standing ovation after his speech.
Opposition leader Brendan Nelson also speeched for 30 minutes but certain parts of his speech called for angry responses.
After the speeches, Kevin Rudd and 2 other party leaders went up to the public tribunes to greet and shake hands with the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander leaders.
The government was presented a gift.
Other things that happened today:
The guy from Hewlett Packard phoned us today to help solving our problems with our networked printer (HP Photosmart C7280). He was very helpful but nevertheless was not able to fix anything. Eventually I got him to admit that the driver software for OS X is faulty as it will not detect the networked printer from OS X 10.4 AND 10.5, even with the printer connected via ethernet to either of our Mac'x directly. This last fact was important because it ruled out the router that sits in between usually.
So lets hope he follows his promise to have this checked on their test systems and that he'll get back to me.
The first 2 "Het Goede Doel" cd's arrived today. There are 2 more on the way here. Very happy with them.
And finally at the end of the afternoon I managed to finish my bed-side table.
In the afternoon we went to the pub to have lunch with Michelle and Ryan and some of her friends. It was her birthday this week.
Michelle and Ryan ordered a chicken schnitzel (top) and a beef schnitzel (bottom). This gives you a good idea why Nicole and I long for a restaurant that serves European size portions. With stuff like this there is no room for starters or deserts. Having a nice meal with with friends is over quickly coz you can only have 1 course.
Around 15:00 we had to leave coz it was getting really warm outside. Tomorrow is s'posed to be even worse...
I was making a little test-track for my modeltrains. I designed a tiny track using my DRail software but it didn't fit right. So I made the calculations myself. Nice way of putting all my highschool maths to work.
I worked it out and was able to make this.
While I could I thought I would try making some close-ups of some of my trains. This is an older NS 1100 loco.
The newer NS 1700.
2 old-style oil cars from "Bon Zaandam".
And a tiny locomotive from Bayern, Germany.
