Persuading the White Australians

The Aboriginal Australians deserve an apology regarding the white Australians' treatment of them as a racial group, from as early as the colonization of Australia to as recently as 1970. It may not be people from the current generation who were sending Aboriginals to camps and trying to "breed out" the Aboriginals, but nonetheless the shame emulates to the Australians as a race. While the white Australians believed that what they were doing was the right thing to do, that they were saving the Aboriginals from themselves and that by breeding out the Aboriginal in people they were doing a service to mankind. Evidence of this viewpoint can be seen in the film Rabbit-Proof Fence, based on the true story of Molly Craig, a half-caste in Australia who, at 14, was captured and taken to the Moore River gulag with her sister and cousin and manages to escape. The main antagonist, A. O. Neville, was the legal guardian of every half-caste in Australia and believed that he should send all of them to camps, where they learned to sew and cook and would eventually breed with white Australians. Although this may sound like horrible behaviour now, this was accepted by all whites and known by all half-castes in the 1930's, when the film was set. While it was intended to be for the greater good, this plan forcably seperated many children from their parents, most of whom never got to see eachother again. Some children were as young as a few months old. This cannot possibly be seen as beneficial to the country; how can teaching the young white Australians that stealing children is perfectly acceptable and causing Aboriginals so much distress possibly lead to a good outcome? Another point in the film was the white Australians using deception to re-capture Grace, who eventually dies of an unknown cause. When has it ever been right to trick a 10-year-old girl into being at a station at a certain time to be re-captured, under the belief that she would be seeing her mother? This surely cannot have been seen as a show of good citizenship, even in the 1930's where out-breeding was deemed correct. A final point of remorse can be seen when the maid takes in the young girls so they can have somewhere to sleep for the night. We don't see the maid's master, but from the dialogue and sound we can tell that he is beating her for letting in the children and threatening her by telling her she will be beaten again if she lets them go. He wants to keep them so he can claim a monetary award from the government; the girls are wanted, after all. The man obviously has more money than most people, showing that he is motivated not by the belief that the girls' futures will be brighter in the camp, but by greed. An even subtler indication of his character is seen when he discoveres the girls; he just barges straight in to the maid's room, not knocking or showing any respect for her personal privacy. He obviously views half-castes as inferior, as animals. While he is only one man, we can infer that he is the majority of white Australians, due to seeing how the government is educating most white Australian children and adults. We only see one kind white Australian household in the entire movie, a representation of how few white Australians view Aboriginals as people. Discrimination has never been right and never will be. Today, few people would believe that the past actions of white Australia were correct and just. Many would experience feelings of horror, disgust and remorse. These feelings are ordinarily followed by an apology. The white Australians generalized all Aboriginals, therefore the Aboriginals generalized all the white Australians based on the few white Australians they knew of. If both groups ultimately have the same negative view of each other, peace, harmony and unity will not be possible in Australia; to improve relations, an apology to all Aboriginals is in order.