One of the biggest cases that relates to this is the world famous case of Maher Arar. The story of Maher Arar is a terrible one, and is surrounded by controversy. Arar was born in Syria in 1970, he immigrated to Canada with his family in 1987 and became a Canadian citizen in 1991. Things were going good in his life: he had a job as a telecommunications engineer in Ottawa after earning his bachelors and masters degree in the field of computer engineering and he was also happily married to his wife, Monia Mazigh. On September 26th, 2002, Arar was on the way back from a vacation; he was making a connecting flight at JFK International Airport when he was detained by U.S. officials and interrogated about alleged links to Al-Qaeda.[12] After 12 days of confinement in the U.S., Arar was shackled and handcuffed and flown to Syria where he was confined in a “grave-like” cell for 10 months before being transferred to a cell with better living conditions.…
As you are reading this article today, remember that although Aboriginal people make up only 3% of Australia’s total population, they represent over 28% (9,940 adult prisoners) of Australia’s prison population in 2015 and this number is rising. To combat this issue, the Murri Court was established. The Murri Court was founded in Queensland in 2002 in response to the increasing representation of Indigenous Australian people in prison. This court sentences Indigenous offenders who plead guilty to offences which fall within the jurisdiction of the Magistrates Court, for example assault or theft.…
The Federation of Australia positively impacted immigration laws and restrictions. Before 1901, each colony had different restrictions regarding immigrants, although there wasn’t any action taken to prevent the large numbers. The colony in Queensland had seen the arrival of 60,000 Pacific Island people which hugely affected the Australian’s living there. The number of immigrants entering Australia were spiralling out of control and it became hard for each of the separate colonies to document. In March 1898, Alfred Deakin said that he wanted to speak “to Australians simply as an Australian” which showed Victoria’s support of the idea of restricting the immigration laws.…
World War II immensely changed society every country in the world. This was especially evident in Australia, where women began to have increasing social responsibilities and where women working became more acceptable due to their roles in the war. As well as this , Indigenous soldiers’ involvement in WWII changed the attitudes of other people in society towards them, and contributed to them gaining rights later in history. Finally, WWII lead to a higher level of migration by refugees displaced or discriminated against during the war.…
The Act enables the suspension of the passports of ASIO suspects as well as the detaining of suspects upon reasonable grounds by Customs officers. Furthermore, the Act makes it illegal to travel to designated ‘no – go zones’ without a legitimate purpose, as well as outlining penalties and controls towards foreign fighters who return to Australia. The effectiveness of this legislative response is evident in the detaining of two brothers at Sydney Airport, “the boys aged 16 and 17 were detained on Friday on suspicion of attempting to prepare for incursions into foreign countries for the purpose of engaging in hostile activities” (ABC News, 9 March 2015). Despite this, this response has also shown to be lacking in effectiveness due to its…
The policies of Assimilation and Protectionism had detrimental impacts upon the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander (ATSI) communities throughout Australia prior to 1965. While Protectionism aimed to be a ‘smooth pillow to die on’, the policy of Assimilation culturally mixed the races. Assimilation was a policy implemented by the Australian Government which integrated ATSI into the Australian Society, this policy aimed to make Aboriginals ‘similar’ to white Australians and culturally mixed. As a result, this policy would extend the language, culture, beliefs, clothing and manner of living of the ATSI race but would genetically ‘die out’ through natural elimination. The most tragic aspect of the policy of Assimilation was legalised kidnapping which contributed to the ‘Stolen Generation’, this event makes clear that the ATSI faced a loss of identity, beliefs/spiritual, connection, bonds/ties, culture, taken from family such as biological parents, and a disconnection to the Indigenous heritage and traditional knowledge.…
The political and legal system in Australia has provided both advances and setbacks for the Indigenous Australians. There have been many setbacks for Aboriginal people in their fight for equal legal and political rights like the legislation 's, constitution, voting rights and parliamentary laws. They have also had some gradual advances from the amendments to the electoral act, the 1967 referendum and Prime Minister Whitlams actions to give land back. Early on in Australia 's history Indigenous people had many setbacks in their political and legal rights. The Stolen Generation was a big setback for Aboriginal people.…
The Aboriginals faced numerous issues after the white colony dominated Australia. The predominant issues they faced were the Protection and Assimilation policies. The Protection policy detached Aboriginal people from families and traditional land the Christian missionaries and government reserves believed were unsuitable for them. The aim was to isolate by disputing them into homes, reserves or missionaries until their Aboriginal beliefs, culture and spiritualties start to diminish. The distant relocation of the Aboriginal people resulted in breaking their systems and traditions as they had less people to share and pass down the teachings of the dreaming connected to the aboriginal spiritualties taught by their ancestors.…
Australian Indigenous HealthInfoNet (AIH 2015) reported that Indigenous Australians account for around 3 percent of the total Australian population. Compared to the past decade, the number of Indigenous people has increased, but the life expectancy of Aborigines is 10 years shorter than non-Indigenous Australian. A group of diseases, such as cardiovascular disease, cancer, diabetes, kidney diseases, respiratory and eye health and other factors negatively affect Indigenous Australians today. A higher proportion of Aboriginal people were reported as suffering from diseases than non-aboriginal people especially, diabetes and kidney health. Indigenous people presented to hospitals 10 times more frequently than other Australians.…
Why did so many men and women enlist for World War 1? Men and women from all over Australia rushed to enlist for the war when Prime Minister, Andrew Fisher declared we were going to help Britain. One of the reasons they rushed to enlist was that the war was glorified. They believed that they were going to be heroes and that the war would be over before they had a chance to be part of it.…
As Australians we are proud of our culture we deem fair and just. Yet we often forget the prosperity of Australia was in great part the result of dispossessing the Aboriginal people of their lands. The Aboriginals lived peacefully, their culture and society sacred and complex. The land, a fundamental component of their spirituality and identity. However with the arrival of the British, Australia was declared Terra Nullius, a land that belonged to no one.…
The importance of the court can be seen through the development of the legislation and their essential role in Native Title matters. Aboriginal ownership of land has always been recognised by Britain; however, despite British recognition, the colonists in Australia managed to officially disregard this recognition by creating Australian law on the concept of ‘Terra Nullius’. Terra Nullius is the fiction that Australia was unoccupied at the time of colonisation. Many land councils and aboriginal organisations throughout Australia lobbied the Federal Government to protect any native title and fought for a more flexible and appropriate system than the one offered through the courts. It wasn’t until 1992 that Native title was first recognised in…
“Let me be a free man. Free to travel. Free to stop. Free to work. Free to think and talk and act for myself” - Chief Joseph of the Nez Perce Tribe Johnson v. McIntosh.…
You may often hear Indigenous Australians refer to an incident that ‘shamed’ them or they are too ‘shame’ to say or do something. This means they were ashamed or embarrassed. Indigenous Australians can often be shy and feel ‘shame’ if singled out or laughed at. Even when the singling out is for positive reasons it may still leave them feeling shamed because they do not want to appear better than others, particularly other Indigenous persons.…
There is a topical ongoing debate in society about whether citizenship is becoming an outdated notion in the 21st century. Citizenship refers to the “state of being vested with the rights, privileges and duties of a citizen” (Dictionary, 2016). In the last century, the concept of citizenship has altered drastically and in addition, there is now more then one type of citizenship in existence. Until the modern era arrived, there were only two types of citizenship; natural born or naturalised. A natural born citizen refers to “a citizen being born in the state and a naturalised citizen is a person whom moved to the country post-birth”…