Free Essay On The Stolen Generation

Good morning/afternoon, I will speak on the contentious and barbaric issue about the stolen generation. I call it barbaric with regard to the manner in which the practice was carried out by the regime of that period. Who were the stolen generation and why were they stolen?
The period between 1910 and 1970 saw hundreds of thousands of aborigine children being forcibly taken away from their families. These children who mostly below the age of five and as old as 14, were ferried away to distant lands, lands which they had no idea about and to cultures which were completely foreign to them. They were completely cut from their families and cultures and denied any form of communication. These children are the ones referred to as the stolen generation.
But why were they taken? According to the federal government of Australia, the aborigine community was at risk of extinction. The legislators at that time therefore passed forth a law that required aborigine children and all children of mixed descent to be collected and brought by the government. These children were taken to missionary and government institutions. There was absolutely no concrete reason as to why the people in government at that time thought that the aborigines and their children were at risk of extinction. One can easily say that it was just a malicious attempt by the government to maintain the white supremacy by curtailing the growth of the aborigine community. It is estimated that about 100,000 children were taken away from their families. This number though varies significantly in different reports.
The living conditions under which the stolen generation was put under was extremely poor. The children were poorly fed and lived in extremely poor settlements, kind of like the concentration camps. The children were denied any chance of communicating with their families. They suffered psychological torture by being told that they were orphans. They were even barred from speaking their own languages or practicing any of their cultural practices. No family member was allowed to visit these children and all letters sent to these institutions were destroyed. These children therefore grew with virtually no paternal or maternal care.
Molly and Daisy and their cousin Gracie for instance were taken 1500 miles away from their family. They were taken away from Jigalong to a missionary camp in Moore River in Western Australia. The children were stopped in their tracks by the Moodoo the tracker any time they tried to escape. The escapees would be thoroughly punished and threatened instilling fear so that they would not try to escape again.
This is what I would call torture beyond torture. Imagine small children, who at one time are with their parents and the next moment, they find themselves in a far off land never to see their parents again. Lack of parental love and identification led to depression and low self esteem in these children. They also suffered physical torture as they were forced to work and some were even sexually abused. Lack of quality education denied these children any chance of a meaningful employment and thus remained as society rejects.
I would say that this was a form of genocide without directly killing the people. Taking away the children of the aborigines was tantamount to discontinuing the race by just eliminating the proceeding generation. Nothing much has been done rather just the government giving some lame apologies. The harm has already been done. Though there are some of the aborigine communities who still exist, much of the aborigine culture has been done away with as most of them have been assimilated in to the white culture.