"Truth telling about our history"

is always going to be a contentious issue.  Proust, among others, recognised this when he said, "Remembrance of things past is not necessarily the remembrance of things as they were". 

I thought of this yesterday when someone said, "But we rounded up all the aborigines in Tasmania and killed them". 

No, we did not. Actual documents show we did not. If we look at the recorded deaths of aboriginal people in Tasmania between 1803-1847 there are around 118 of these which can be associated with violence between aborigines and the colonists. The number of deaths by violence among colonists is much higher.  

There was an active policy of good intent and good will by the government of the day. One of the three main causes of death in the aboriginal population were the diseases brought in by colonists.  There was nothing "intentional" about this. The idea that aboriginals were deliberately given "measles infested blankets" is simply not true.  They simply did not have the immunity against those diseases that many colonists had. 

The other two main causes of death was aboriginal violence against their own women and inter-tribal violence.  It is of course much more pleasant to think of aboriginal people as treating women with respect and enjoying peaceful relations with neighbouring tribes. The reality is otherwise but it is much more convenient to forget any sort of violence unless it occurred between aborigines and colonists. 

There has recently been a television series about "the frontier wars". It tried to talk about "massacres" and "wars" and "genocide". While the past may not be anything to be proud of there is no evidence of these things. Yes, people were killed but there is no evidence to suggest that colonists were "hunting" aboriginals and laying themselves open to charges of murder.  Words like "massacre", "war" and "genocide" are emotive words being used for other purposes. The idea that teaching this as some sort of accurate history which will bring people together is something I find difficult to accept. It seems much more likely to cause division.  

The idea that there are many direct descendants of the original inhabitants of Tasmania still "fighting" colonists for the return of land they once owned is equally false.   Nevertheless this is the way in which these issues are portrayed, not just by those demanding a "Voice" to parliament but by the media.  What they claim to be a means of "coming together" and "understanding" is actually a means of division. Similar claims are being made all over the country. These claims are about power and politics rather than people.

Of course whatever past we acknowledge won't be the actual past but we can come closer to the truth than many people want to recognise. The past can be inconvenient, especially when it is being used to try and shape the present.