Federal Liberal backbencher Dr Dennis Jensen is a right wing MP with views not unlike those of his colleague Corey Bernardi.  He “distinguished” himself this week in Parliament with a diatribe about Indigenous communities supposedly living a ‘noble savage’ lifestyle:

“I put it to the members of this place that the taxpayers of Australia should not be funding lifestyle choices. Yes, I agree with the former Prime Minister, the member for Warringah, when he refers to Indigenous Australians’ choice to live in remote communities as ‘a lifestyle choice’,” he said.

“In essence, if the ‘noble savage’ lifestyle, a la Jean-Jacques Rousseau, the same one often eulogised, is true, then there is nothing stopping any Indigenous men or women from pursuing such an existence on their own. Just do not expect the taxpayers to subsidise it. My contention is that the ideal of the noble savage may be less sanguine and altogether more Hobbesian: ‘nasty, brutish and short’.”

The evident racist tone of Jensen’s contribution is unfortunate, because it masks a very real and important issue in Indigenous affairs.  There are very few if any remote communities that could meaningfully be described as living a  ‘noble savage’ lifestyle.  What is undeniably true, however, is that most adults in most communities live lives of idleness, boredom and welfare dependency, features which play an important role in high rates of crime, violence and a range of other toxically dysfunctional behaviours.  Numerous commentators including Noel Pearson have stressed the importance of overcoming welfare dependency.

Jensen’s “solution” appears to be to defund remote communities, effectively forcing their residents to decamp to Australia’s towns and cities.  However his vision is historically blind to an almost breathtaking extent.  This is precisely what occurred throughout Australia over the many decades leading up to the 1967 referendum. Aboriginal people were forced off their traditional lands by pastoralists and others, and ended up in fringe camps on the edges of most cities and country towns.  The suffering and disadvantage this phenomenon generated is well-documented and undisputed.  Moreover, many non-Indigenous Australians, especially those who identify with the views of politicians like Dr Jensen, would not welcome (for largely selfish reasons) the re-emergence of extensive Aboriginal fringe camps adjacent to mainstream towns and cities.

Fortunately I think there are much more constructive and market-based alternatives that would over time result in a sustainable Aboriginal economic base without forcing or engineering the abandonment of remote communities.  Over the fold is an extensive extract from a long article on this subject that I posted here at Troppo back in 2014.  It didn’t generate much discussion at the time, but it’s worth continuing to raise these issues because they are important.

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