the Celebration of ”Australia day” is seen by more and more as an affront to the indigenous peoples that had existed on the australian continent in the tens of thousands of years when the british began to colonize it. Protest groups call instead the day ”Invasion Day”, invasionsdagen.
On Saturday the to shut thousands of people up on the streets in various cities of the country to protest. ”It is offensive to celebrate the genocide”, said one of the organisers in Sydney on the official celebrations.
the day that attention was actually ”the start of an attempt to subjugate the 500 different nations”.
On 26 January is the anniversary of the first british flottstyrkans landing in Australia in 1788. The force landed in Port Jackson, which now is a part of the country’s largest city, Sydney.
Demonstrators in Sydney started its manifestation with a rökceremoni in Hyde park and marched then to the official so-called yabunfestivalen in victoria park a couple of kilometres away. The festival draws attention to the indigenous cultures.
“this is not a day to celebrate Australia’s many successes, but a day to reflect on the possible consequences and everything that indigenous peoples still have to go through,” said David Shoebridge, member of parliament for The greens in the state of New South Wales, to the participants.
those protesting is that you should change the date for the national day celebrations. But the organizers of Saturday’s protestmanifestation argued that it is not enough without ”the country needs to change” to put an end to the discrimination of the descendants of the first australians.
Support for nationaldagsprotesterna has increased in recent years. Last year a total of 30,000 protesters in Sydney. This year, the heat, around 35 degrees, have prevented some from participating.
Prime minister Scott Morrison has said that he is positive to the idea of creating a special day to draw the attention of indigenous people the 60,000-year history, and that ”the two days can co-exist”
celebrating the national day of its official skäls sake came on Friday an exciting novelty. The british captain Matthew Flinders, remains were reported to have been found in London after having been missing for 200 years.
Flinders is seen as a historical hero by many australians of european descent, and lots of streets, squares, parks and even a mountain range is named after him. Flinders was 1802-1803 the first navigator who sailed around Australia, something he described in a book.
Archaeologists found, against all odds, Flinders, remains in connection with the excavation of an ancient burial site where a new path for high-speed trains between London and Birmingham will be built.
unlike most of the other 40,000 people buried in the long-roofed necropolis of Saint James had the Flinders coffin a namnplatta of lead.