The Stolen Generation
The Stolen Generation started in the late 1890’s, early 1900’s and ended in the 1970’s. 100,000 Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders children were forcibly taken away from their families and either put into white people’s homes or institutions. It was a horrible thing to treat the children unfairly by taking them against their will. This also had a large effect on the families that lost their children. The Indigenous peoples were being treated differently because of their race and culture. They should have been treated equally and have had the same rights as a white person.
After the children were taken away, they may have been put into a white person’s home but most were sent to institutions. The children were mostly spilt up into girls and boys groups and sent to one of the numerous institutions around the country. The reason for the institutions was for the children to be removed from the knowledge of the aboriginal culture. If they were to speak in their native tongue, they would get punished. The children were treated poorly and a large number were physically and sexually abused. Some of the children were raped at a very young age and many died from the abuse.
At the age of 18, they were released into society and meant to be white like everyone else. Most of them would try and reach out to their real families afterwards, but some didn’t look for them because they were told that their parents were dead. The majority of the stolen generations failed and never got to even see their families again, or find out who they really were and where they came from.
It has been said that in the aboriginal’s culture, whoever was taken as part of the stolen generation is more likely to suffer from low self-esteem, depression and mental illness. They are also more vulnerable to physical, emotional and sexual abuse. The children are also likely to reject their aboriginality and can’t take a role in the culture and spiritual life of their formal ancestors.
White civilization thought it was a good idea to completely cut out the aboriginal race. They did this by attempting to put Aboriginals into the white society. The government also tried breeding out the Aboriginal blood so the children lost their colour and culture. The white people thought that the Aboriginals weren’t living good lives at their normal homes. White society took the children away because they thought they were making the children’s lives better by giving them an education and making them fit in a white society.
The laws were stopped as society changed their point of view and started to respect the aboriginal culture. They were in fact having an education, but it was their own education about their culture, but not the British education.