Slogans need unpacking. Often, we must unpack them for ourselves and, in so doing, help ensure that action follows.
In Perth on 29 October 2024, the Honourable Kim Beazley AC moved the Vote of Thanks for Professor Clare Wright's John Curtin Memorial Lecture (Mr Beazley from mark 1:1:12). Mr Beazley is Chair of the Council of the Australian War Memorial.
Professor Wright OAM wrote the recently published and highly acclaimed Naku Dharuk The Bark Petitions: How the People of Yirrkala Changed the Course of Australian Democracy. She is Chair of the Council of the National Museum of Australia and one of Defending Country's distinguished Patrons.
Mr Beazley said this (Mark 1:19:00):
They [Aboriginal people] were very difficult to get on top of and that's something that I will make sure the war memorial makes all of us understand exactly what that means, because they're entitled to the dignity of resistance. That is a status that is very important when one looks at one's history. (Strong emphasis in original.)
What did Mr Beazley mean by 'the dignity of resistance'? He had used the phrase a number of times since taking up his Council Chair duties early in 2023. He meant then that we should recognise and commemorate not only massacres of First Nations people by settlers, military and police but also the occasions when First Nations people resisted - fought back. (A partial list of massacres and resistance.)
In July 2024, a letter from the Memorial to a correspondent repeated that key phrase:
In September 2022 [sic, actually August 2022], the Memorial’s Council committed to providing a broader and deeper depiction of the violence perpetrated against Indigenous Australians. Chair of Council, The Hon Kim Beazley AC has also spoken publicly of that presentation showcasing "the dignity of resistance".
That letter, however, left out two key points made by Mr Beazley about how the Memorial should properly recognise and commemorate the Australian (Frontier) Wars. We at Defending Country refer to 'the Beazley trifecta': picking up the Chair's own words, we say the Memorial's coverage should be 'substantial', in a 'special section' or 'separate section' - as well as giving First Nations people 'the dignity of resistance'.
Chair Beazley's Perth reiteration of the dignity of resistance is welcome. Defending Country contends, however, that the dignity of resistance cannot be achieved without the other two legs of the trifecta coming in also. Where does the Memorial stand in that regard?
'Substantial'? Not so. The Memorial's own figures show that the Australian (Frontier) Wars will take up part of just 1.1 per cent of total gallery space after the current redevelopment.
'Special section'? Another fail. That 1.1 per cent (198 square metres) will be shared between the Australian (Frontier) Wars and the expeditions to the New Zealand Wars 1845-62 and the Sudan 1885.
One measure of the incongruity of the current arrangements is the deaths involved: the Australian (Frontier) Wars, somewhere between 20 000 and 100 000 deaths; New Zealand, no deaths in Australian contingents; Sudan, nine deaths from illness, none from fighting.
'The dignity of resistance' is a nice phrase but it is hollow without the Memorial changing its position on 'substantial' and 'special section'. Its current position on those two legs distinctly lacks dignity. It reduces the treatment of the Australian (Frontier) Wars to a token.
Cramming the Australian (Frontier) Wars into a sliver of floor space alongside expeditionary forces on behalf of Queen Victoria, and labelling it all, 'Pre-1914', is crass and ludicrous, not just because of the huge disparity in deaths, but also because the Australian (Frontier) Wars continued after 1914.
What are the prospects for improvement? The composition of the Memorial Council changed recently and the first meeting of the refreshed Council was held on 13 November. The Memorial's current policy is found in the Council decision of August 2022, garbled in the Memorial letter quoted above, but with crucial qualifications about the link between massacre victimhood and uniformed service and about the other institutions that would tell the 'full story' about the Frontier Wars.
Here's the full decision, with the key words in bold:
It was agreed that Frontier Violence perpetrated against Aboriginal Australians would, as in the previous Colonial Galleries, continue to be presented in the new Pre-1914 galleries.
It would provide a broader and deeper depiction and presentation of the violence perpetrated against Indigenous Australians.
Wherever possible it would relate to and inform, subsequent Indigenous military service to Australia, providing a context for that service.
The gallery will inform visitors of the significant institutions whose charter it is to tell the full story of Frontier Violence.
The gallery will be developed in full consultation with the Council throughout its development.
Defending Country has argued publicly, to Mr Beazley, and in letters to Council members (the three new appointees and two of the three reappointed), that the Council's policy decision of August 2022 should be rescinded and replaced with one that incorporates the Beazley trifecta. In our 26 September 2024 post, we called the August 2022 decision 'dissembling waffle', 'ambiguous' and 'prevaricating'.
Defending Country believes that the refreshed Council should punt the August 2022 decision into the dustbin of history. Then the Memorial can move beyond worthy rhetoric - and beyond practice that jars with that rhetoric - to properly address the Australian (Frontier) Wars.
We welcome a response from the Memorial and, as is our practice, will publish it without amendment, taking account of our Moderation Policy.
Picture credit: Massacre at Skull Hole, Mistake Creek, Queensland (Carl Lumholtz, 1888/Wikimedia Commons). This was the site of the alleged Bladensburg massacre, in which around 200 Aboriginal people were killed in c.1872.
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