19 Feb 2014. ATROCITIES.

Scanning the Daily Telegraph online newspaper this morning I read that an Australian judge has sent a letter to the North Korea despot Kim Jong-un criticising his country’s crimes against humanity. I read the article and then moved onto the comments, which in my experience are usually more enlightening and rewarding than the article that inspired them. I was not disappointed.

One of the first comments, from someone with the pen name thisday, was -

Meanwhile a European version of Tiananmen Square erupts. Interestingly just as Chancellor Merkel is talking with the opposition. The forces of the States (Ukraine and Russia) are clearly scathing of the oxymoron that is European hard power. The West dared not intervene in Georgia. Will not in Ukraine and will not in the DPRK. People simply don’t understand how militarily impotent is the non US West, both in terms of will and capability when faced with serious armed forces.

I like this Aussie guy, he’s got it just right.

 

I could see thisday’s point. However, perhaps he has forgotten that Australia itself hasn’t exactly covered itself in glory in the past when it comes to human rights, in particular with its treatment of its aborigine population. This numbered somewhere between 250,000 and 750,000 in 1788 according to my encyclopaedia, a figure that had decreased by 1911 to 31,000. And it wasn’t because they’d gone on their holidays. Between 1824 and 1908 alone approximately 10,000 Aborigines were murdered in the colony of Queensland. Considered ‘wild animals’, ‘vermin’, ‘scarcely human’, ‘hideous to humanity’, ‘loathsome’ and a ‘nuisance’, they were fair game for white ‘sportsmen’.

 

(Before I go any further I would like to make clear that I have nothing against Australia or Australians. No nation has a worse record than Britain when it comes to atrocities, of which it committed hundreds, if not thousands, during the building of the British Empire. Not to mention our involvement in the slave trade. The United States too, in addition to its wholesale embracing of slavery, was as bad as Australia with its treatment of the indigenous population. And even in the supposedly enlightened times of 2014 there are always at least two or three African countries being run under the rule of machete.

It was ever thus, and always will be. Just because it happened two hundred years ago doesn’t mean to say it didn’t happen.

I posted the following reply to thisday’s comment  -

Maybe you should ask this Aussie guy, who ‘got it just right’, about the disgraceful way his country treated their aborigine population? And do to this day to some extent.

My word. What a hornet’s nest I disturbed!

Someone using the pen name Libertarius replied-

I’m sure he has an informed opinion on the subject, and can probably express it without departing into irrelevance and non-sequitur.

Well I wasn’t using a non sequitur of course; a non sequitur refers to a conclusion that is not aligned with previous premises or evidence; a statement that is not logical. And my reasoning was entirely logical. (I noticed that Libertarius had also used the expression non sequitur in a previous comment so I suppose it is his new buzzword, even though he doesn’t seem to know what it means.)

In the meantime Ando had added his two pennyworth -

The indigenous (this term is preferable over aboriginal, but you would know that with your incredible knowledge) population in Australia was treated horribly for a long period of time, by people who were by and large British it should be said. And repairing those inequalities is taking a long time, and still will, but to say they are still treated terribly by the government is uninformed and idiotic. Sacred sites are protected by law, a huge number of scholarships and funds are directed specifically towards indigenous education and support, and on every form you fill out, there is a section to define yourself as an indigenous Australian. They do alright these days, so learn the facts.

Then thisday, in answer to my original comment, posted -

Why? It’s got nothing to do with the thread.

To which I replied -

Because people who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones.

To which thisday wrote -

I was complimenting Mr Kirby (the judge in question), who happens to be Australian. Australian government policy towards Aboriginals is a completely separate matter. By your logic, since Fred West was a British citizen, no UK person should comment on anything. Oh I see, that is your message.

I couldn’t quite work that one out. So I replied –

No it isn’t my ‘message’. My message is that you should ensure your own house is in order before criticising others who are guilty of similar crimes.

To which si_ed commented -

So you’ll be supporting the claim for an apology and financial retribution recently laid by descendants of African slaves residing in the Caribbean against the English?

And I replied -

Now that really would be in non sequitur country.

thisday hadn’t finished  yet -

I am sure Mr Kirby’s house is in very good order. See above (Ando’s comments). I have nothing more to say about Australian domestic policy.

Thank Christ for that, I said to myself, and signed off there before I got myself in any more trouble.

 

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