Australiëdag or invasiedag?

Today is the Australian national public holiday and for the first time there were more tegenbetogers than celebrants in Melbourne. “I would never be a day of horror and mourning for the Aborigines celebrate. We call that: decency.’

On 26 January 1788 captures a British fleet in a cove in Sydney. They hoist the Union Jack: a whole country is in British hands and became known as ‘Australia’. Today is the national …

On 26 January 1788 captures a British fleet in a cove in Sydney. They hoist the Union Jack: a whole country is in British hands and became known as ‘Australia’. Today is the national holiday, but that collective party is no longer obvious down under.

‘Not so many people since the seventies’

For the Aborigines, that there at least 40,000 years earlier arrived, that day is the start of a catastrophe. ‘Invasiedag’ they call him sometimes. The original inhabitants were themselves and their land, not to defend against the European farmers – and particularly against the diseases that they brought. Between 1877 and 1920 was the Aboriginalbevolking decimated to just 24 percent of the number that there ever lived.

The protest against Australia’s national holiday started a few years ago. It remained long limited to a few Aboriginal activists. That seems to be turned. In Melbourne was the tegenbetoging of today is greater than the actual parade. There were an estimated 60,000 demonstrators. Police officers and participants reacted surprised, revelers were somewhat uneasy with their vlagjes to look at the mars. In seven other big cities, there were also large demonstrations.

A scapegoat was not only the holiday, but a government policy that still Aboriginal disadvantage. “So many people I have not seen since the seventies’, says Aboriginal activist and historian Gary Foley against The Guardian. “If we continue to mobilize on this scale, the government can no longer ignore.’ The demonstrators ask for another date to their country in the flowers.

Breaking down barriers

A poll by the Australia Institute (2018) indicates that 56 percent of Australians, not much importance attaches to the exact date of the national holiday. As long as there is a public holiday. Somewhere is this logical: 26 January, ‘Australia day’ in 1935, after a variety of regional ‘landingsdagingen’ in oblivion were hit. Only in 1994 were the Australians is also an official free day.

Now says at least 49 percent of them that the national holiday cannot fall on a day which Aboriginal people hurt. White Australians are more than ever sensitive to Aboriginal protestslogans as ‘no pride in genocide’. ‘Let’s make a date that we can all embrace’, tweette actor Russell Crowe. Adam Houda, a key lawyer in Sydney, said that he ” never had a day of horror and mourning for Aboriginal people would celebrate. We call that: decency.’

Aboriginal leader Tauto Sansbury has an answer for people who find that there are still other problems with more priority. ‘That is not so, he told the news website Asiancorrespondent. “This is the first step that limit. Then we can move on to all the other things that are not just right for Aboriginal people.’

Waitangi day

The two largest parties (Conservatives and Labour) don’t want to know of a new day. But the Australian greens (the third largest party in the parliament) to launch a national campaign on changing the date. Also the social society has many proponents of a change. Thus, the most popular jeugdzender of Australia annual chart moved to a different day. And the conversation about the past is in any case open, which for some Aborigines are still the most important. “This gives us a chance to learn from each other, even though we may never have to a consensus,” says anthropologist Amanda Kearny (New South Wales) against the Huffington Post.

That Australia is so far no day has for its indigenous population, also contributes to the great controversy. Neighbouring New Zealand celebrates every year on 6 February Waitangi Day, a day of remembrance for the Maori culture and the Maori leaders that a treaty closed with the British crown. In Canada there is a National Indigenous Peoples Day. Also in the United States, there are some cities that the controversial Columbus day (Columbus landed nota bene never in North America) was replaced by Native American Day. In South America named several countries the day of their so-called ‘discoverer’ to ‘Day of indigenous resistance (Venezuela), Day of respect for cultural diversity (Argentina), Dekolonisatiedag (Bolivia), Inter-day (Ecuador) and the Day of the two worlds (Chile).