Settle down - it's our defining day
Illustration: John Shakespeare
As the events of yesterday demonstrated, Australia Day is becoming increasingly popular - most notably among the young. This is evident not only at attendances at public functions but also by the amount of flag-waving and flag-wearing which occurs on January 26 each year. This expression of patriotism accelerated two decades ago during the bicentennial celebrations and took a more emotive form after the terrorist murders in Bali in 2002.
Yet, according to Mick Dodson, Australia has the wrong date for its birthday party. The 2009 Australian of the Year used the occasion of the announcement of his award to lend support to the campaign that Australia Day should be moved to an unspecified date. According to Dodson, the anniversary of European settlement is regarded by "many indigenous Australians" as the day their "world came crashing down". He added: "Many of our people call it Invasion Day but I think Australia is mature enough now to have a conversation about that "
If Australia is going to have a conversation, it may as well be a frank one - in the typical Australian way. No honest person would deny the suffering experienced by indigenous Australians in 1788 and after as European settlement took place. Likewise, no truthful person would deny the disadvantage suffered by the descendants of those who were here in 1788 when Governor Arthur Phillip arrived.
Certainly some Aborigines, particularly those in the Northern Territory and northern Western Australia and northern Queensland, can trace their ancestry back to those living here in 1788. However, the same cannot be said for many Aborigines in the capital cities, country towns and communities which are not remote.
In 2003, Aboriginal Studies Press published Kevin Keefe's biography of Patrick Dodson titled Paddy's Road. Patrick Dodson is Mick Dodson's older brother. Keefe's book documented the hard but successful life of Patrick. It also provided some details of the Dodson family's Irish ancestors, who arrived in the (then) colony of Victoria in the mid-19th century.
Writing in The Australian in August 2003, after the publication of Paddy's Road, journalist Stuart Rintoul revealed that the book had led the Dodsons to the discovery of an extended non-Aboriginal family. This is not an uncommon story in Australia as the study of genealogy leads many Australians, indigenous and non-indigenous alike, to discover family members they never knew existed. Most immigrant nations have a similar experience.
Any frank conversation about the appropriate date for Australia Day would have to take account of the fact that, in Mick Dodson's terminology, many indigenous Australians have ancestors who were both invaders and the invaded. Such a discussion would also have to record that, far from leading their world to come crashing down, many indigenous Australians would not be around today but for their non-indigenous ancestors.
It is increasingly fashionable in the early years of this century for official functions to contain a "welcome to country" by an indigenous Australian, who invariably makes a short inclusive statement. No problem here. However, it is noticeable that, particularly in southern parts of Australia, the speaker is sometimes relatively fair-skinned. Again, there is no problem here. Yet, on occasions, it would be appropriate for such speakers to acknowledge their Anglo-Irish, or other, heritage in addition to their Aboriginal one. Such a move would make the "welcome to country" even more inclusive.
Mick Dodson sees his Australian of the Year award as an opportunity for continuing his advocacy of reconciliation. The increasingly patriotic vibes which are now part of Australia Day should give support to such an agenda.
The fact is that European settlement took place in 1788 and what was originally a British possession soon became an immigrant society.
Nearly all the 21 million people who live in Australia are descendants, in whole or part, of the early settlers or of those who migrated to Australia after 1788 or are migrants themselves. Only a miniscule number have been untouched by the immigrant experience. Australia Day is an appropriate day to celebrate this reality.
Dodson's Australia Day award has not been welcomed by some indigenous Australians who have been more focused on obtaining real benefits for our most deprived minority rather than on the rights agenda advocated by the Dodson brothers. The former ALP national president Warren Mundine was reported in yesterday's Herald as stating that Mick Dodson has no "practicality whatsoever". And Lew Griffiths, a long-time associate of the Cape York Aboriginal leader Noel Pearson, commented: "I've known Mick for 30 years and I've never known Mick not to be at loggerheads with every government."
Mundine, Pearson and some other indigenous leaders such as Marcia Langton have focused on relieving the plight of Aboriginal women and children who live within isolated indigenous communities. For his part, Mick Dodson is on record as describing the Howard government's intervention in the Northern Territory, which was broadly supported by Kevin Rudd at the time, as "storm-trooper diplomacy". In other words, according to Dodson's hyperbole, there is some comparison to be made with attempts to provide adequate health and police services in remote Aboriginal communities with the excesses of Nazi Germany.
Successful reconciliation is most likely to be advanced by latching on to the inclusive patriotism of Australia Day rather than by moving the date away from January 26. The focus of reconciliation should be on improving the plight of Aborigines along the lines of those who are more interested in practical outcomes than theoretical rights.
Gerard Henderson is the executive director ofthe Sydney Institute.
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