Reflective Journal Week 2

Christine McFarlane

 Reflective Journal: Week Two

Indigenous Rights has always been an issue that has interested me, and as a freelance writer for First Nations newspapers in Canada, I have often had the opportunity to cover issues such as human rights and injustices that have been imposed upon my people by the hands of the Canadian government.

 As an example I covered an event that was protesting the ability of the Canadian child welfare system to go into First Nations communities and apprehend children they felt were being abused or neglected. This protest was to let the government know that First Nations communities would no longer allow government officials to come in and take our children because it was reminiscent of when the Residential School system was implemented and our children were stolen and taken away from their families and communities.

The Human Rights and injustices that I have learned about in regards to Indigenous Australians, though named and dated at different times are very similar to the human rights and injustices that were and are still being committed against First Nations people of Canada. As an example, the issue in regards to the implementation of the Protection Acts imposed upon Indigenous Australians, is similar in Canada, however for First Nations people in Canada, it is called the Indian Act.

The Indian Act in Canada, much like the Protection Act imposed upon Indigenous Australians introduced a system of indirect rule where First Nations people could not hold land, controlled people by how they took part in ceremony, banned languages and inferred upon First Nations people the distinction of being different from the rest of society.

I found that in the past week I really enjoyed learning more about the policies that govern the Indigenous communities of Australia. In particular, I really liked when Lecturer Peter Minter asked us to write individually what we believed human rights meant and how it could pertain to Indigenous land rights. The definition that I wrote was as follows “Human rights is the ability for all races in society to co exist harmoniously without one race being put above another and seen as being superior, and despite differences in cultures, traditions and languages-everyone and everything deserves the right to be respected and treated equally.”

 In reflecting upon my definition and how it correlates with the lectures this week on Indigenous Australian land rights and human rights, I refer now to our first reading of Module 2- the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.’ The UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples states that in Article 1:

“Indigenous peoples have the right to the full enjoyment, as a collective or as individuals, of all human rights and fundamental freedoms as recognized in the Charter of the United Nations, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and international human rights law.” (United Nations, 2007)

The Human Rights as stated in the United Nations Declaration is contradictory to not only how Indigenous Australians are treated but also how First Nations people in Canada are treated as well. Indigenous people of Australia were not included in the Federation or the Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act.  Without the acceptance of being recognized in these two very important documents in Australia’s history, Indigenous Australians were ostracized because it did not give them the recognition of being ‘citizens’ that could enjoy the rights that non Indigenous Australians had-which involved ownership of land and the ability to have universal freedoms.

Works Cited:

United Nations (2007) “Declaration on the Rights of Aboriginal Peoples”, United Nations