This article from 2002
gives an account of what happened to the Tasmanian Aborigines but more
importantly it deals with how their descendants are living today. Due to the
genocide that happened on Tasmania in the 19th century, the descendants
of the aborigines were treated as ordinary black citizens. If they tried to say
they were aborigines they would simply be told that Tasmanian aborigines no
longer existed. It would be extremely disheartening to be told that your
ethnicity no longer exists. That is what descendants were told until the 1970s.
For the last thirty years, they have been fighting to get their heritage and
their identities back. The Tasmanian Aboriginal Centre’s corrupt policies
hindered the uniting of the aborigines. The TAC was broken up in the 1990s
because of their corrupt nature and replaced by the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission
(Atsic). Atsic had a different approach to finding the true descendants of the
Aborigines. They made it so the only way someone could vote in the Atsic
elections was if they had exact documentation tracing their lineage back to the
aborigines. The aborigines from the mainland did not have a lot of written
documentation so they could not vote in Atsic elections and they would not be
recognized as Tasmanian Aborigines. It is awful that the mainland descendants
were at a disadvantage. The number of voters in Atsic elections decreased
dramatically. Now the question is who is actually a Tasmanian Aborigine?
Source:
Flanagan, Richard
2002. The Lost Tribe. The Guardian. October 12.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2002/oct/14/australia.features11
Overall, I was pleased to learn that there are descendants of the Tasmanian Aborigines, but the fact that they have to explicitly prove their heritage is unfair to certain groups of descendants. They will have to fight for their rights but they have come a long way since being told they don’t exist just a few decades ago. It is sad to see that a community that was so united at one point at time fell to corruption. The actions of the TAC helped divide the entire population of Tasmanian Aborigines and also helped create the current identity crisis. Atsic’s policies are also outrageous. They should realize that almost everything from the original mainland aborigines is completely wiped out. All they have are stories passed down from generation to generation. If Atsic truly cared about uniting the Tasmanian Aborigine community, they would have more open and accepting policies. Instead, they are creating a giant division and causing people to lose their identity and heritage. Hopefully, in the last 10 years, the Tasmanian Aborigine Community has been united and living peacefully.
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