My father told me stories about how his white father had abandoned them, and how he was sent to live with his grandfather who was a farmer near Lakes Entrance in Victoria. A bit more research revealed that his grandfather was in fact Indian, and had married an aboriginal woman. My dark skinned nanna resulted from that union, and eventually my father.

Now, 60 years later, I have witnessed a potentially beautiful Indian heritage overwhelmed as all my great grandfather’s descendants choose to “identify” as aboriginal in order to claim special benefits. I grew up and played with many of these cousins, and know that they had no special affinity with the land, nor did they have any lore or folk tales drummed into them. But now they find it convenient to put out their hands for special consideration. They all know how to work the system.

When my father’s brother died, a lot of aborigines sorted out his funeral, and arranged appropriate ceremonies that pleased them. Now I know he wouldn’t have gone along with all that, because I knew him all his life. The most disturbing thing for me was that nothing of his Indian heritage was acknowledged, yet he was as much Indian as aboriginal.

My main point, as someone else commented, is that most modern people who identify as aboriginal are in fact genetic mixes. The big problem from my point of view, is that typically, any other genetic origin is totally ignored as if it didn’t exist. The psychological stance of “identifying as aboriginal” just doesn’t wash with me. On that basis, with my proven DNA origins, I could identify as an Orkney Islander. It’s not good enough to just ignore your true biological make up. You might have been brought up being indoctrinated with aboriginal culture, so feel comfortable in identifying. I have used the example of my own cousins, who were not brought up this way, yet still claim to be “brothers” and “sisters” because it benefits them. They are all just as much Indian as aboriginal, and even more European. Aboriginals need to seriously think about acknowledging that they have evolved, and that they are just as much European now, possibly more so even than many freshly arrived families in multi-cultural Australia. We can all assimilate some of the traditional aboriginal culture if it comes to that. I am about 4th generation English, but definitely have an affinity for the land around the Murray River where I went camping with my father. Incidentally, he also showed me how to tie a turban.

Aboriginality is more than a mere genetic code; it is more complex than that. Aboriginality is more to do with a spiritual connection with country, cultural traditions that is passed down generation-to-generation, it is the Dreaming and all it represents.
As far as you comment about historically inaccurate, what history books have you been reading? Past government assimilation policies attempted to strip us of our identity, traditions, languages, culture and our countries of which included policies of removal, segregation, oppression which is tantamount to genocide. What rock have you been living under Jack that you must not have access to books, television or media that you do not know that ‘White Australia has a BLACK History’?