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Show as many as half a million Aboriginals occupied the Australian continent. More than 600 scattered tribes lived in remarkable harmony with each other, despite significant language and cultural differences, for more than 40,000 years. They were a spiritual people, tied to the land by their own belief that they came from the land. Having been descended from a plant or an animal, they knew they would return to that state some day. And so they treated the land with the love and reverence they might give their mothers and fathers. Indeed, the land they nurtured and loved might well be their parents. Cook saw something in the lifestyle of the Aboriginal people that no one else even considered at the time. Reporting to the Queen, several months later, Cook made a remarkably progressive observation: The beer did its job. The conversation dwindled as the fading light of this beautiful night and the Toohy’s Old mellowed the mood. Finally, Ted announced it was time for the Little Men to head home. We stood to shake hands all around. Ted, Bobbie and Dougie had remained conspicuously quiet during the Larry Debate. But each of them nodded to us as we said our farewells and Ted said, "Don’t pay any mind to Larry. You made some good points.” Larry had wandered off to drain a few quarts of brew but wanted to bid us good luck as. well. : He took my hand and said, "Can I ask you one more question?" Good god, I thought. Now what? "Sure Larry. What’s on your mind?" "You and your friend, Reggie...are you a re of poofters?" "A couple of what?” I asked. "You know.. pootters” "Larry," I said, "I don’t even know what a poofter is.” Ted cringed. "He’s asking you if you two guys are homosexuals.” I shook my head slowly and tried to laugh. "No, Larry, we're not,’ I said, ‘but we're certainly willing to learn.” “They may appear to some to be the most wretched people upon the earth: but in reality they are far more happy than we Europeans: being wholly unacquainted not only with the superfluous but the necessary Conveniences so much sought after in Europe, they are happy in not knowing of them. They live in Tranquility which is not disturbed by the Inequality of Condition: The Earth and the sea of their own accord furn ishes them all the things necessary for life; they covet not Magnificent Houses, Housenold stuff, they live in a warm & fine climate and enjoy a very wholesome Air... In short seems to set not value upon anything we gave them nor would they ever part with any thing ‘ of their own for any article we could offer them. This in my opinion argues that they think themselves ‘provided with all the necessarys of Life and that they have no superfluities.” Cook’s comments were met with derision and ridicule by the British press. And the newly arrived white Australians regarded the Aboriginals with contempt. Considered lazy and shiftless by the British (somehow they had managed to survive quite nicely for the last 400 centuries), the whites set out to destroy the Aboriginal way of life, and did a pretty good job of it. By the last quarter of the 19th Century, barely a hundred years after Cook’s discovery, the Aboriginal population had been decimated by poverty, disease, disillusionment, and random acts of violence. From a stable population of almost half a million people, fewer than 20,000 Aboriginals still inhabited the Australian continent by 1860. Conditions remained deplorable. Aboriginals were confined to missions and reservations. Many were used for cheap labor. Still others clung to the edges of white society, with little or no hope of being assimilated into it. The Aboriginal people were only allowed to vote in federal elections in 1962 and it wasn’t until 1967 that they were included in the census. Until then, just 30 years ago, they were not even counted. . "So," Larry persisted, "Do you think they're a bunch of dole bludgers? It’s a fair question." "Larry," I said, "I’m new here and | don’t know this country’s history that well. But why do you think they’re a bunch of ‘dole bludgers’?" "You should see them. They lay around drunk all the time, on the government dole. Why. don’t they work like I do?" I thought about his complaint for a minute. I’m not a bleeding heart, really. And I can appreciate how annoying someone like me can be, a tourist of all things, lecturing to Larry about his morals and those of his countrymen. But I was not prepared to capitulate. Not yet. "OK, Larry. Think about this for a minute. Imagine that you and all the whites that came to Australia are horses. And all the Aboriginals are kangaroos." "What are you talkin’ about, mate? I ain’t no horse." ~ "No. I know that,” I said. "This is just an analogy. Bear with me.” Larry hunkered down in the sand and tried to understand. "Imagine that all the Aboriginals were kangaroos. For 40,000 years they had been living the life of kangaroos on the Australian continent and they were very good at it. Their culture flourished under those conditions. "Then the Whites came along and said, ‘Look. We're horses and that’s much better than being a kangaroo. From now on you must all give up your kangaroo ways and learn to live as horses.’ "Well, the Aboriginals were superb kangaroos but they made lousy horses. They couldn’t do it. That’s what the Whites have been demanding of the Aboriginals for more than 200 years. We did the same to our Native Americans. We invaded their country, destroyed their culture, took away their livelihood, and then told them they were worthless. Do you see what I’m trying to say?” Larry poked at the ground with a stick, stared off to sea for a moment... "Tt tell you what I think. If I’m a horse, you're a horse’s ass. I don’t have any idea what you're talking about.” "Well," I sighed, "then let’s have another beer." I gave up beating my head against walls several years ago. Larry, I concluded, was a hopeless case. NEXT TIME: Going to the Red Center...and Beyond. . 3 GRILL al Another Fake Endorsement: A Legendary Figure from the Old West: GABBY HAYES By golly, them thar steaks at Buck's j is so goldern tasty Yi n tender that | reckon a feller could kin eat ‘em ‘even if 'n he didn't have no teeth... 7 ARPT AX Ge FINE ART PHOTOGRAPHY 61 N. 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