Talk:Australian history wars/Archive 3

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

Archive 4

DO NOT ARCHIVE (Early July 2009)

See also Wikipedia:Editor assistance/Requests#History Wars (again)

Archiving is not a technique to remove discussions. These discussions are still very relevant.Likebox (talk) 14:22, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

Likebox, the talk page was 419 kilobytes long before I archived it and, there had been no conversation on it for a week. It was long overdue to be archived, and the break in the conversation was a good time to do it. Nothing has been removed all the discussions are archived. If you think that there is a relevant discussion that we need to continue then we can copy the section headers of the active discussions onto the new page and provide a link to the same section in the archive. --PBS (talk) 16:49, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

Ok, that's what I did. I cut it down to 210K from 400 something. I am restoring the discussion.Likebox (talk) 19:34, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

200K is way to big for a talk page they should not be over 32k in size. I have placed the most recent section from the archive below to show how it can be done without excessive copying. If anyone (including you) wants to add a comment to the section they can do so. If you think that there are any other sections that are relevant and still active please link to them in the same way. --PBS (talk) 13:08, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

Maaka: The indigenous experience

See /Archive 2#Maaka: The indigenous experience for earlier discussions on this topic.

Problem with intro

The intro currently says: The Australian debate centres on whether the history of European settlement since 1788 was:

• humane, with the country being peacefully settled, with specific instances of mistreatment of Indigenous Australians being aberrations;
• marred by both official and unofficial imperialism, exploitation, ill treatment, colonial dispossession, violent conflict and cultural genocide or;
• somewhere in between.

This is surely too simplistic a breakdown. Every argument has at least 2 extremes and a spectrum of views in between. So obviously (c) is the correct answer, before you even know anything about the topic, regardless of the spectrum of views.

Can we rewrite this so that the history wars are framed as ongoing attempts by certain people/academics to set the record more firmly in one direction or the other? Not as a kind of multiple choice test with 3 distinct positions. Exactly the same thing happens in analysing the negative and positive effects of the British empire. Generally the more recent and mature the writings the more clearly the "somewhere in between" is elucidated. Donama (talk) 01:20, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

Could you suggest some wording here? --PBS (talk) 13:35, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

I like the this, which incorporates the above:

The Australian debate centres on whether the history of European settlement since 1788 was:

• humane, with the country being peacefully settled, with specific instances of mistreatment of Indigenous Australians being aberrations; or
• marred by both official and unofficial imperialism, exploitation, ill treatment, colonial dispossession, violent conflict and cultural genocide.

In general the history wars are framed as ongoing attempts to set the record more firmly in one direction or the other, for broadly "political" reasons. Every argument has examples of these two extremes and a spectrum of views in between." regards, Keepitshort (talk) 13:59, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

NO NO NO!

The current wording is made to look like a multiple choice with "two extremes" and option c looks the best, because people (stupidly) believe that the truth usually lies between two extremes. The truth is NEVER between two extremes. This idiotic idea is only social convention to allow people to come to compromises, and it is the reason that academics do not trust the general public.

Anyone who believes that the truth lies between two extremes can be easily manipulated by a propagandist. For example, suppose I want to make you believe that the moon is made of cheese. I say, there are three positions:

1. The moon is made entirely of cheese.
2. There is no cheese on the moon at all.
3. The moon is only partly made out of cheese.

And then, of course, option 3 looks most correct, and you will believe that the moon is partly cheese. Similarly, in the 16th century, there were three options:

1. All the planets go around the earth.
2. All the planets go around the sun.
3. Mercury and Venus go around the sun, mars, jupiter and saturn, around the Earth.

Option 3 was the majority opinion among academics for a long time. The truth NEVER lies between two extremes. This is a rhetorical trick designed to brainwash gullible people into partly believing odious lies.

In this case, the introduction is framing the debate to make it look like some of Australia was peaceably settled. Option b is what nearly all historians believe. The history of Australia is marred by genocide and disposession. These "history wars" should be labelled what they are, a propaganda campaign to deny genocide. This is not an extreme, it is just the accepted historical record.Likebox (talk) 15:48, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

Every topic is different. Some hypotheses are falsifiable so are capable of objectively shown to be either A or B. This is not such a case though. The dispossession of Australian aborigines, like most social issues, is a hugely subjective issue. The preposition that the settlement of Australia was "humane, with the country being peacefully settled, with specific instances of mistreatment of Indigenous Australians being aberrations" is unfortunately not falsifiable. Classifying the examples of mistreatment as either aberrations or the general case is a matter of opinion. Individual actions and events within the whole process of settling Australia could probably be shown to be either true or false, but I hope you can see that how these events and actions as a whole reflect on the whole process is subjective. Donama (talk) 02:05, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

Actually, I agree with you. History has a lot of subjectivity. But these comments are not about the subjective/objective distinction. They are about this article which was written from a single point of view by conservative Australian partisans who would like to keep out any reference to the well documented massacre of the Aboriginal inhabitants of Tasmania.

To be fair, the Australian conservative viewpoint is not totally outrageous--- I am sure that there were some instances where the natives were not treated like animals by the settlers and murdered for sport. But the debate that is being presented here is presented in a slanted way using a favorite tool of the propagandist: create a false dichotemy to make a denialist position sound like a compromise. This is not good for history or for Wikipedia.Likebox (talk) 03:28, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

Genocide debate

See /Archive 2#Genocide 4 for earlier discussions on this topic.

Likebox I do not agree with many of the changes you recently made to the section "Genocide debate". Do you need me to list them, or are the previous discussions enough to cover my objections? --PBS (talk) 13:35, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

We are going to have to go over EVERY SINGLE POINT all over again, and this time, you will hopefully be alone.Likebox (talk) 15:39, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

The problem with the section on genocide is that the position of Windschuttle, which is a fringe minority position is being treated with respect. Let us be clear:

1. The Natives in Tasmania were murdered by settlers. They were hunted down with intent to exterminate.
2. There is no debate in the mainstream literature: this was a genocide.
3. There is a fringe minority in Australia which denies the genocide.

In this article, the majority position about the Tasmanian genocide is not given any weight at all. This must be rectified.

A long discussion occured regarding this. Since it has been archived, I will make every single point I made before once again, going over every source in excruciating detail.Likebox (talk) 15:38, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

Sure I do not mind going through the issue one by one. Here is the first sentence you replaced:

"After the introduction of the word genocide in the 1940s by Raphael Lemkin, Lemkin and most other comparative genocide scholars..."

with

"Ever since the introduction of the modern term in the 1940s, Raphael Lemkin and most other comparative genocide scholars have considered the events of the Black War on Tasmania as a defining example of a genocide."

What is your source for the change from "After" to "Ever since"? Do you have a source to back up that statement? --PBS (talk) 19:38, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

Do you have a source for after?Likebox (talk) 19:59, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

Yes it was mentioned in /Archive 2 see Revision as of 12:10, 19 June 2009 -- PBS (talk) 20:13, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

Of course it wasn't. Please quote the source, and in particular the part that supports "after" as opposed to "ever since".Likebox (talk) 21:21, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

The source says exactly what PBS has said it does and is easily found via the link PBS provided. There is no need for PBS or anyone else to provide you with that information yet again. We have been over this issue before and your preferred wording still has no support from any other users. Webley442 (talk) 03:34, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

You are LYING. Stop LYING. There never was a source provided, you are just hiding that behind a wall of text called "archive two".Likebox (talk) 14:18, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

Please follow the link (Revision as of 12:10, 19 June 200) I provided --PBS (talk) 16:22, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

I did follow the link, and it ends with an Anne Curthroys quote which is not apropos. The question is: Has the Tasmanian genocide been classified as a genocide within genocide studies consistently since the 1940s? I say the answer is "yes", and I have given you sources that support this position (at least for recent years). You are claiming that the position has changed, and there is no source to support the position.Likebox (talk) 18:21, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

OK, try this: Saying “Ever since the introduction of the modern term in the 1940s, Raphael Lemkin and most other comparative genocide scholars have considered the events of the Black War on Tasmania as a defining example of a genocide.” implies that they were using Tasmania as a defining example of genocide in 1950, 1955, 1960, 1965 and so on. They weren’t. Tasmania wasn't even on their radar at that time. Genocide scholarship was almost exclusively focussed on the Holocaust in those days with some (not much) attention given to the Armenian Genocide and very little else got mentioned.

As the text in the links say, Lemkin never published his work on Tasmania.

In the linked page of Genocide and settler society by Dirk Moses it says: “in one of the first major works on the subject, published in 1981, Leo Kuper referred to the “systematic annihilation” of Aborigines in Tasmania.” It then goes on to discuss work published in 1985, 1986, 1990, 1995 and so on.

In the linked page of Empire, Colony, Genocide also by Dirk Moses, it says that: “Genocide scholarship had really got underway in the 1970s, and grew dramatically in the 80’s………”

So we are looking at a period AFTER the introduction of the word ‘genocide’ in the 1940’s but the period in which ‘comparative genocide scholars’ start referring to ‘Tasmania as a defining example of a genocide’ starts in the 1970s and really takes off in 1980s.

Can you cite works by ‘comparative genocide scholars’ in use in the 1950s or the 1960s in which they say anything like Tasmania is a ‘defining example of a genocide’?

If not, please let's move the discussion on to your next sentence. Webley442 (talk) 08:09, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

There is no real field of "genocide scholarship" in the 1960's as you say. But the "genocide" notion introduced by Lemkin, and repeated in several sources does include Tasmania. All your denialism is very irritating. It is difficult to talk to people like you, and I wish you would go away.Likebox (talk) 13:05, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

If you have sources that you can cite showing that comparative genocide scholars have been using Tasmania as a defining example of a genocide "ever since" the 1940s, i.e. they were saying it in the 1950s, the 1960s and all the way through to the present day, let's see them. Not just vague phrases like "repeated in several sources" but give us verifiable citations, otherwise, how about you just admit you can't support your preferred wording with appropriate sources and we go on from there. Webley442 (talk) 13:24, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

Listen, those sources don't google, and I'm not about to go do research. But I know the general picture, because I read references to this in popular books many times over. This statement is designed to comply with undue weight. I am not adressing my comments to you, because it is not possible to convince people like you of anything, you must be suppressed by force of numbers.Likebox (talk) 14:26, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

Genocide debate section Should Read Thusly

There has been debate among certain Australian historians as to whether the European colonisation of Australia resulted in the genocide of groups of Aborigines, and in particular the Tasmanian Aborigines.

Tasmania

Ever since the introduction of the modern term in the 1940s, Raphael Lemkin and most other comparative genocide scholars have considered the events of the Black War on Tasmania as a defining example of a genocide. During the Black War, European colonists in Tasmania nearly completely annihilated the Tasmanian Aborigines. From a population of approximately 5,000 individuals, they were hunted down and killed until only a few hundred individuals were left. These were then relocated to Flinders Island, where disease and neglect reduced their numbers still further, until the last full blooded native Tasmanian died in 1876.

Most Australian historians don't dispute the historical events, but some of them don't agree that it should be called a genocide. Some of the debate is over to what extent the governing body of the settler outpost had the goal of complete extermination in mind. What is known is that in 1826, the Tasmanian Colonial Times declared that "The Government must remove the natives -- if not they will be hunted down and like wild beasts and destroyed." Governor George Arthur declared martial law in November 1828, and empowered whites to kill full blooded Aboriginals on sight. A bounty for was declared for the head of a native, £5 for the killing of an adult, £2 per child. Journalist and publisher Henry Melville, described the results in 1835: "This murderous warfare, in the course of a few years destroyed thousands of aborigines, whilst only a few score of the European population were sacrificed”

While accepting that most of the natives were killed by exterpationist settlers, Henry Reynolds has nevertheless rejected the label of genocide, because he believes that the settler's goal of extermination did not include every native, and that the governor of the island did not intend annihilation. Tatz has criticized Reynolds position as follows:

Genocide of a part of a population is still genocide... criminality is inherent in incitement participation and complicity

Mindful of these disputes between genocide scholars and Australian historians, Anne Curthoys has said: "It is time for a more robust exchange between genocide and Tasmanian historical scholarship if we are to understand better what did happen in Tasmania in the first half of the nineteenth century, how best to conceptualize it, and how to consider what that historical knowledge might mean for us now, morally and intellectually, in the present.

The political scientist Kenneth Minogue and historian Keith Windschuttle disagree with the mainstream historical narrative, and believe that no mass killings took place on Tasmania. Minogue thinks Australians fabricated this history out of white guilt, while Windschuttle believes that most of the native Tasmanians died of disease. Disease is not believed by other historians to have played any major role in Tasmania before the 1829 relocation to Flinders Island.

Mainland

Regarding events on mainland Australia, there have been occasional accusations of genocide, but no clear consensus. Many of the deaths on the mainland were due to smallpox, which is commonly believed to have come from Europe with the settlers. Many historians, like Craig Mear, support the thesis that the settlers introduced smallpox either intentionally or accidentally. Intentional introduction would be considered a form of genocide.

Historian Judy Campbell argues that the smallpox epidemics of 1789-90, 1829-32, did not start with the Europeans. She believes that the smallpox was not a result of contact with British settlers, but instead spread south from the far North of Australia, and was due to contact between Aborigines and visiting fishermen from what is now Indonesia. While this has always been the accepted consensus about the source of the later smallpox epidemics of the 1860s, for the earlier epidemics this view has not met with widespread acceptence, and has been specifically challenged by historian Craig Mear. Mear writes:

They had been coming to this coast for hundreds of years, yet this was the first time that they had brought the deadly virus with them.

He also argues that the scientific model that Campbell uses to make her case is flawed, because it modelled the smallpox at significantly higher teperatures than those recorded at the time. It has also been argued by Lecture in Indigenous Studies Greg Blyton that smallpox did not reach the Awabakal people north of Sydney in 1789-90 and that non-genocidal violence including massacres accounted for depopulation there after 1820[36] [37]

Genocide in a broader sense

See also: Genocide definitions

In the April 2008 edition of The Monthly, David Day wrote that Lemkin considered genocide to encompass more than mass killings but also acts like "driv[ing] the original inhabitants off the land... confin[ing] them in reserves, where policies of deliberate neglect may be used to reduce their numbers... Tak[ing] indigenous children to absorb them within their own midst... assimilation to detach the people from their culture, language and religion, and often their names." These questions of definition are important for the stolen generations debate.

DO NOT COLLAPSE

There is no need for a "collapse box". The text above substitutes for the badly broken text in the article. There is no need to hide it.Likebox (talk) 21:17, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

In particular--- the text above is no longer than the corresponding text in the article, and allows a reader to visually diff the two to see where the biases in the current text are. In addition, the sources must be clearly visible, as I will be refering to them again and again and again.Likebox (talk) 21:23, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

Large Changes, Incremental Changes

When a page has awful, offensive material on it, it is difficult to only make small edits. A small edit sort of implies that you agree with the stuff you didn't touch. When the rest of the stuff is a racist fiasco, this can be very discouraging. So we need a big edit, and it needs to stick.

The same mechanism prevents well meaning readers from adding new things, like the massacres on the mainland, because to do so would be to implicitly support the rest of the nonsense on the page. This means we need to have a big change, and go on from there. I have made an attempt at a big change. I will do so periodically until it sticks.Likebox (talk) 20:34, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

Are you satisfied with the last explanation given in the section #Genocide debate or can we move onto another sentence? --PBS (talk) 14:19, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

You are not explaining anything. You are dogmatically repeating yourself, with no support from any literature.Likebox (talk) 19:31, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

See this edit and this edit the explanation of why the fist sentence you wish to include is not acceptable and that it has been explained to you with cited sources several times. Here is another link to a previous conversation on the same issue from Archive 2 from 13:37 on the 6 June, (see the first paragraph). Do you have any sources that contradict those sources? If so please include them at the end of the conversation in the section #Genocide debate above. --PBS (talk) 14:05, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

Again, there is no point in talking to people like you. You must be put down by force of numbers.Likebox (talk) 14:28, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

I have reverted your change of 18:05, 30 July 2009 Likebox, because you have yet to address the problems with the first sentence, and as such we have not yet been able to move on and discuss the other changes you wish to make. Given postings like the one directly above this one and your editing of the article to insert sentences you know are disputed, your actions could be seen as disruptive. For the moment I'll take no further action than to revert your last edit, and await your new sources to justify the change in the first sentence. --PBS (talk) 20:25, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

You made up the problem with the first sentence. There is no problem with it at all. I will give you no sources, and I will wait until you go away.Likebox (talk) 21:05, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

The section above "#Genocide debate" explains the problems there is a summary in the same section provided by Webley442 see Revision as of 08:09, 12 July 2009. BTW Likebox, I suggest you take my warning in my last posting to this section seriously and consider if your last two edits to the article were or were not disruptive. --PBS (talk) 20:12, 31 July 2009 (UTC)

And I would consider if you have not been editing for months in bad faith, without any regard to the established historical consensus. Your behavior is not out of ignorance, it is willful.Likebox (talk) 13:58, 1 August 2009 (UTC)

Likebox no-one is trying to stop you contributing to this article but there are some issues with the text you want to insert that need to be resolved. Philip is trying to work through it step by step, in a logical manner, starting with the first sentence. If you would accept that there are reasons why others don't think your first sentence is an appropriate wording, we can work through the rest of your material and work out a version that is acceptable but there are some issues that have to be resolved. Among other things, there are serious factual errors in your material, for example your sentence: "A bounty for was declared for the head of a native, £5 for the killing of an adult, £2 per child" is factually incorrect. (Check the source that you cited for that, even it doesn't say that the bounty was for killing Aborigines.) The only bounty that was issued in Tasmania was for the capture, ALIVE, of Aborigines (and their children) caught while engaged in attacks on settlers. You have to recognise that it is entirely inappropriate for that sort of incorrect material to be put into Wikipedia otherwise the only conclusion that other editors can draw is that you are deliberately trying to be disruptive. Webley442 (talk) 02:24, 2 August 2009 (UTC)

Possible sources to supplement the article.

"Faces of hate", by Chris Cunneen, David Fraser, Stephen Tomsen, Hawkins Press, 1997, ISBN 1876067055. (pp 5-forward) may contain some useful information as it links John Howard's views to those of the extreme Right. --PBS (talk) 20:10, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

The Political Methodology of Genocide Denial, Elizabeth Strakosch ("recently completed a BA (Hons) in the School of Political Science and International Studies at The University of Queensland."), Dialogue (2005) 3:3, pp 1-23, Political Science & International Studies. She compares holocaust denial techniques with some of those techniques used in the history wars. (She seems unaware that she too is taking a social/political position in this analysis) --PBS (talk) 16:47, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Can I help?

I've come here from from WP:ANI as an uninvolved admin. I know absolutely nothing about the subject matter, which does mean that I am totally neutral. I do have some experience in getting warring sides out of article deadlock. Theresa Knott | token threats 10:50, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

Not sure if anyone can help. There are problems here relating to differing (and very strongly held) interpretations of what is NPOV, what is Undue Weight and how you apply these principles to an article that is not about what the majority view is on the particular area of history, nor is it about what the minority view is. The article is about the debate, that's why it's called History wars. Obviously there are strong opinions held by some of us involved as to which side is right (or closer to being right than wrong).

How much space does a 'minority' viewpoint get in an article about a debate about whether that 'minority' viewpoint is correct?

There are also problems in getting accurate statements of what the 'majority' position on these issues are as there have been different opinions expressed at different times by different historians and some of those historians have changed their own positions over time.

How much weight do you give to the opinions of 'international genocide scholars' who know very little about Australian history as opposed to local historians who have detailed knowledge of it?

There are writers of popular history books who repeat claims of genocide, atrocities and violence to meet a market demand for that type of 'history' with very little regard for how poor the evidence is for their claims. Who are the majority whose opinion you reflect in the article?

If that's not complicated enough, the fundamental issue behind the History wars is a proposition put by a historian named Keith Windschuttle . His argument (which has received support from other historians including Geoffrey Blainey) is that much of the history written in the past 30 years or so of alleged genocide and massacres of Aborigines in Australia has been falsified and misrepresented. In other words, his position is that the 'majority' position regarding genocide in Australia is based on academic fraud.

It's not easy to achieve anything resembling a balanced NPOV article here. Webley442 (talk) 14:08, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

This is one point of view. The other point of view is that this article is written to exclude any mention of the mainstream historical consensus regarding the killing of nearly all the natives on Tasmania in the 1820s. This is a form of denialism, and it is a denial that is not shared by any mainstream scholars on Australia or outside.

Windschuttle's book has not been accepted widely, it is a fringe history. The "debate" here can mention this book, and go into detail, but undue weight means that the consensus on what actually happened comes first. That's easy to source, because there is a dedicated book called "contra Windschuttle" which was written to rebut the position.

The undue weight fix is simple: add a few mainstream sources (Tatz, Madley, Mear) to balance Windschuttle/Quadrant. These mainstream opinions are shared by the vast majority of scholars, and this should be stated. That's all. After that, Windschuttle can get as much space as anyone wants.Likebox (talk) 15:29, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

The view expressed above are an underlying problem. But the immediate problem is a disagreement about how to develop the section called "History wars#Genocide debate, Likebox want's to delete several paragraph of the the current content of the section and replace it with new text. (S)he has several times stated that incremental changes are not possible (see for example Archive 2: Large Changes/Incremental Changes, and #Large Changes, Incremental Changes) This results in a bold edit by Likebox followed by a reversal,and a discussion such as that in the section above called #Genocide debate where no progress is made, as we can not even agree on the wording of the first sentence. --PBS (talk) 16:32, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

That argument is sort of silly. The text I am suggesting is not that huge a change, and I don't care if you edit the first sentence in minor ways. What I object to is the current sentence, which says that Lemkin et. al were working based on "previously published histories", and that "more recent histories challenge the details on which the consensus is based". That's just denialist nonsense.

The first sentence disagreement is pretty trivial--- the main source of conflict is that anything which comes from mainstream genocide studies is knee-jerk deleted by either you or Webley. If you kept the stuff from mainstream sources and changed the wording of the sentence, or even reintroduced a really long, detailed description of Windschuttle's position, I wouldn't care. So long as it is preceded by the mainstream opinion, and a sentence that says "what follows is a fringe minority opinion" for each fringe minority opinion.Likebox (talk) 19:30, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

Just a few points: if you did want to refer to the book written to rebut Windschuttle, it isn't called "Contra Windschuttle", it's called "Whitewash: On Keith Windschuttle's Fabrication of Aboriginal History" edited by Robert Manne 2003. It's not surprising that Likebox couldn't remember the name correctly. It sunk pretty much without a trace. Even ardent supporters of the 'contra Windschuttle' position tend to be embarrassed to mention it, as it has become pretty much a byword for 'how not to write a rebuttal'. It was so bad that an entire book called "Washout" (by John Dawson) was written just about the flaws in "Whitewash".

As for Likebox's claims that he/she doesn't object to Windschuttle getting as much space as anyone wants: yet virtually every edit he/she makes deletes large portions of the material on the work and arguments of Windschuttle, Campbell and others. He/she's been asked to ADD material on the mainstream position if he/she feels it isn't adequately represented but he/she persists in doing it his/her way.

Re his/her objection to "the current sentence, which says that Lemkin et. al were working based on "previously published histories", and that "more recent histories challenge the details on which the consensus is based".": 1. Lemkin did base his work on "previously published histories", he certainly did no original research on Tasmania, Likebox has been cited sources which confirm that. The same is true of most of the other sources he/she refers to, like Tatz. As for "more recent histories challenge the details on which the consensus is based" - that's what the debate is about. The more recent works of Keith Windschuttle, Judith Campbell, Josephine Flood and others do challenge those details and the arguments for the 'mainstream' position. (As does some of the material included in older history books written by people like James Bonwick, NJB Plomley, Geoffrey Blainey and others.) Webley442 (talk) 23:14, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

Blah blah (namedrop) blah blah (namedrop). All this nuanced debate is irrelevant. Thousands of people who have done primary research like Madley agree with the mainstream view that what happened on Tasmania in the 1820s was mass killing of thousands of natives. The rest is irrelevant nonsense designed to distract from the main point.Likebox (talk) 18:43, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

To other editors, please do not be intimidated by Webley's verbosity and source-citing. The number of sources that agree with his position is miniscule, and they are all right wing zealots.Likebox (talk) 18:45, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

Once again we have the mysterious "(t)housands of people who have done primary research..." of whom Likebox names a grand total of .... one, Madley. That's right up there with "those sources don't google, and I'm not about to go do research" and "I know the general picture, because I read references to this in popular books many times over". One on the 3 key Wikipedia policies is VERIFIABILITY. There is no point getting upset with me (or PBS, for that matter) because we can cite and quote from verifiable sources to support our positions. If you want to put material in the article and have it stay there, get some verifiable sources for it. Webley442 (talk) 23:02, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

I gave you Tatz Madley and Mear. Two textbooks, and some primary research, all backing up mainstream consensus. Do you seriously think that Madley is the only person who did primary research in this? There is a longstanding CONSENSUS here, I shouldn't have to do any more digging. Nothing is ever enough for denialists with an agenda.Likebox (talk) 03:19, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

And you’ve been told before, citing that Tatz or Madley or Mear say X happened does not mean that this verifies that the mainstream consensus is that X happened. All that is verifiable from those cites is that Tatz or Madley or Mear argue that X happened. That Tatz, Madley and Mear are reliably representative of the mainstream consensus is your unsupported contention. Until you can produce a verifiable source that says what the mainstream consensus is, stick to putting in the article only what is verifiable from the sources you do have. Webley442 (talk) 03:45, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

From /Archive 2

"Windschuttle's argument that genocide was not committed in Van Diemen's land should be driected towards popular historians and journalists who hold this idea rather than those in academia who generally do not." (John Connor The Australian frontier wars, 1788-1838, UNSW Press, 2002 ISBN 0868407569, 9780868407562 p. x).

That coupled with the footnote currently in the article

"However it is notable that while comparative genocide scholars assume the specifically Tasmanian case to be one unmitigated genocide, the majority of Australian experts are considerably more circumspect." (Mark Levene, Genocide in the Age of the Nation State: The rise of the West and the coming of genocide, I.B.Tauris, 2005 ISBN 1845110579, 9781845110574 p. 344 footnote 105).

along with the other citations fully support the current sentence. The problem with your (Likebox's) suggested replacement sentence is that it does not do that. --PBS (talk) 08:16, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

But Australian experts don't deny that about 3-4 thousand natives were killed by settlers, except Windschuttle. They ALL agree that disease had nothing to do with it, except Windschuttle. That's what makes Windschuttle crazy, and this is the part that needs to be "extirpated" from this article.

The two quotes you give are by Australian historians, who acknowledge the events but don't like to call them genocide, for obvious political reasons. The genocide scholars will not give in, because this example is the only one where the annihilation was TOTAL. Everyone was wiped out, leaving only a few collaborators and slaves. This makes it very important to record the history honestly.Likebox (talk) 15:26, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Mark Levene is not Australian. The first sentence which you wish to replace says "... because more recent detailed studies of the events surrounding the extinction by historians who specialise in Australian history...", the wording makes it clear that an extinction took place, but it explains that the extinction may not have been a "text book example of a genocide" as some comparative genocide scholars have claimed (As Anne Curthoys explains the history of the events surrounding the extinction was more complicated that that). What are the "for obvious political reasons"? --PBS (talk) 15:53, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

The point is that one should not mix up people who deny that the events constitute genocide, which is all the scholars above, with people who deny the events. The events are agreed upon by all minus Windschuttle/quadrant. Whether this is genocide is up for debate, but this debate has two sides: genocide scholars say "genocide", Australian historians sometimes say "not genocide". But to conflate "natives died by killing, but it was not genocide", which is legitimate history, with "natives were killed by disease" which is not, is not appropriate. You have to separate the two positions.

Levine is saying that Australian historians do not like to call it genocide, but agree on the events. There is nobody that questions that the natives were killed except for kooks and crackpots.Likebox (talk) 19:59, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

There is no question that the Tasmanian Aborigines died (and I do not know of anyone who does not think that there is a correlation between colonisation and the extinction). Whether they were deliberately exterminated due to a genocidal conspiracy is open to question.

However this is straying from the issue of comparisons of the first two sentences. Until we can agree on the wording of the first sentence there is little point discussing later sentence. Do you know except that the two sources are authoritative on the position of experts or do you have another source that contradicts Mark Levene and John Connor? --PBS (talk) 20:20, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Sorry that I left a note offering to help then disappeared! Events IRL have kept me away, but I'm back now with a lot of reading to get through. Theresa Knott | token threats 12:58, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Oh my good God! The article is very dry! In fact it's more than dry it's boring. A Wikipedia shouldn't feel like a chore to read should it? Theresa Knott | token threats 13:24, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

The product of being a very disputed and highly political area, I'm afraid. There have been more attempts to bias this article one way or the other either overtly or by implication than anyone cares to remember. Bits get added by advocates of one side of the debate, the counter arguments get added by those on the other side. The only major rewrites attempted tend to have been done by those determined to rewrite it in a way that is strongly biased towards their particular point of view, which of course isn't acceptable to other users. Just take a look at the attempts by PBS to get some sort of agreement over the wording of the first line in the Genocide section. That's been going round in circles for an eternity. Webley442, (talk) 14:11, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Yes, I have seen it happen in other articles. The cure would be for people to put their strongly held views to one side and replace them with a really strongly held view that Wikipedia should be the best damned enclopedia ever written. It seems to me that the section should read:

A quick explanation about the disagreement. POV1) who holds it? what are their arguments? Are their any supporting facts (Numbers not opinions) POV2) Who holds it? What are their arguments. Again are their any supporting facts. Some kind of summing up perhaps. The whole section needs to be trimmede down to th3e basics to ensure that the text is lively and readable. If this is a lively debate it should read like one. Quotations should be used only if they add to the understanding of the argument. Ther3e are far to many quotes in the section at the moment. Theresa Knott | token threats 16:43, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

OK, I've made a very small start on the trimming process, got rid of some excessive quotes and irrelevant material. You'll probably soon hear the screams of outrage from those convinced that this material is vitally important stuff. Much, much more needs to go, some of which should be summarised first and then perhaps we can focus on rewrites of what's left. Not touching the Genocide section yet. When I get the time I'll post proposals on the talk page regarding that section and see how they fly. Webley442 (talk) 02:52, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

In the interests of full disclosure - it's no secret that I am one of those who leans more towards Windschuttle's side of the argument. My own reading and research has convinced me that he is more right than wrong, I disagree with some of his interpretations but I consider that his representation of what happened in Tasmania, in particular, is closer to what actually happened than that of his critics. HOWEVER, and I admit it took me a while to get there, for the purpose of a Wikipedia article on the debate between the different positions, I am looking to achieve a balanced NPOV result with the positions of all participants in the debate fully and fairly represented, but with none stated in such a way as to imply one is the TRUTH and anything different is FALSE. If we can simplify and shorten this article to make it more readable without caricaturing or misrepresenting the arguments, we should all be satisfied. Webley442 (talk) 07:09, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

Could I ask a favor of you? When you type something on this talk page could you do a quick scan before you hit save and look for phrases such as "You'll probably soon hear the screams of outrage" and just remove them. There is a tendency for people who have been in a long running battle to assume that the problems are unsolvable. This attitude is natural but unhelpful. Far better to be positive, assume that we will be able to work out a solution, and its not them and us but just us. By removing defeatist language from our arguments it lightens the tone of the talk page and makes collaboration much more likely (IMO anyway). This advice is for everyone. You are not the only one who has spoken this way on this page. Theresa Knott | token threats 17:24, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, that bit was intended as a joke. Webley442 (talk) 09:13, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

Who needs sources

To establish undue weight all you need is reference counting, and some informed opinion. In order to say that "flat Earth" is a minority opinion, I don't need a source that says "most scholars believe that the Earth is round". Likewise, that most natives were violently killed by settlers is undisputed in Tasmanian history, except Windschuttle disagrees. When you have a crackpot with a personal denialist history, don't treat him like a scholar.

The debate here on undue weight is ill informed, because Webley throws a lot of smoke in the air. There is no dispute between reasonable people about what happened on Tasmania.

1. All the natives were killed, minus a few collaborators and slaves
2. by the settlers
3. who wanted to annihilate them
4. for space and for sport
5. because they were a nuisance

That is the consensus on the events. That's called genocide by genocide scholars, it's called "an unfortunate incident" by Australian historians. But at least they agree on the events.Likebox (talk) 15:38, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Please stop generating headings and re-stating things that have already been addressed. See for example my posting in the previous section that starts:"From /Archive 2..."[2] which shows that one can establish weight using sources.

Even if one could establish weight by reference counting, that would be original research and could not be included in the article text. Why is it that you wish to reference count and no use the opinions such as John Connor and Mark Levene? --PBS (talk) 16:02, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Reference counting is how you establish undue weight. It's always been like this, and it always will be. You look at the literature, and see how many people support the thesis that there were mass killings in Tasmania, and how many do not.

The quotes you give are ridiculously taken out of context. They are saying that the events on Tasmania (which are agreed upon by nearly everyone to involve mass killing) do not constitute genocide for one reason or another involving government policy and intent, which is the position of many Australian historians. That's true, but irrelevant. Windschuttle is not denying the classification or interpretation of the killing spree, he is denying the killing itself. He is denying history, not interpretation. That makes him a kook, and you don't need a source specifically saying he is a kook, although such sources exist.Likebox (talk) 19:55, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

See my answer in the previous section. There is no point expanding this conversation, until we can agree on the content of the first sentence. Do you have any sources to contradict John Connor and Mark Levene? -- PBS (talk) 20:23, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Introduced disease and the Tasmanian Aborigines

A quote from Likebox: “But Australian experts don't deny that about 3-4 thousand natives were killed by settlers, except Windschuttle. They ALL agree that disease had nothing to do with it, except Windschuttle. That's what makes Windschuttle crazy, and this is the part that needs to be "extirpated" from this article.”

Now what do the historians really say?

"Mr Catechist Clark was informed by the Natives, when at Flinders Island, that, before the English ships arrived in Sullivan's cove, a sudden and fearful mortality took place among the tribes. It was viewed as a premonition of a dreadful calamity affecting the race."

Bonwick, James: Daily Life and Origins of the Tasmanians, Sampson, Low, Son and Marston, London, 1870, p87. (nb: 1. Catechist is a title, not his first name. 2. `a mortality' was an old term, in common use, for a wave of killer disease/an epidemic of a lethal disease.)

Henry Reynolds in Fate of a Free People reports that James Bonwick in The Last of the Tasmanians, 1870, p85, records another similar conversation.

"A strong oral tradition indicates that a catastrophic epidemic occurred even before British settlement. Robert Clark, a teacher at Wybalenna Aboriginal Establishment, reported that Aborigines told him they were originally `more numerous than the white people were aware of ' but `their numbers were very much thinned by a sudden attack of disease which was general among the entire population previous to the arrival of the English, entire tribes of natives having been swept off.' Before 1803, disease may have come from sailors or early sealers."

Flood, Josephine, The Original Australians: Story of the Aboriginal People, published by Allen & Unwin, 2006 pp 66-67, citing Bonwick, James: The Last of the Tasmanians, 1870, p85.

Historian Geoffrey Blainey (Professor of Economic History, then Professor of History at the University of Melbourne, and Dean of Melbourne's Faculty of Arts, foundation Chancellor at the University of Ballarat.) says that by 1830 in Tasmania:

“disease had killed most of them but warfare and private violence had also been devastating.”

Geoffrey Blainey, A Land Half Won, Macmillan, South Melbourne, Vic., 1980.

Then we have George Augustus Robinson, appointed Conciliator to the Tasmanian Aborigines, whose contemporary hand-written journals were found in Britain in the 1950's by historian NJB Plomley, transcribed and reproduced in Friendly Mission, Plomley, N. J. B., 1966, Tasmanian Historical Research Association, Hobart.

On Bruny Island, 1829/1830: After the arrival of whites on Bruny Island in 1829, 22 Aborigines are recorded as dying of respiratory disease over that winter. By January 1830, of over 40 Bruny Island Aborigines who were there when Robinson arrived, there were only 17 still alive, the others having died of disease. Robinson's diary, Plomley, NJB: Friendly Mission, p 77

At Recherche Bay, February 1830: Robinson's travelling party discovered the body of a woman who had been left to die by her tribe after becoming ill. As recorded by Robinson:

"The natives informed me that plenty of natives had been attacked with Raegerwropper or evil spirit, and had died. Thus the mortality with which the Brune natives had been attacked, appears to have been general among the tribes of aborigines."

Robinson's diary, 2 February 1830, Friendly Mission, p113 (nb: 19th century spelling can be a little variable, hence Brune/Bruny)

“The aborigines of this colony are universally susceptible to cold and that unless the utmost providence is taken in checking its progress at an early period it fixes itself on the lungs and gradually assumes the complaint spoken of i.e. the catarrhal fever.”

GA Robinson, note with letter, MacLachlan to Colonial Secretary, 24 May 1831, Friendly Mission, pp461-2 (nb: in those days, catarrhal fever was a term used for influenza, although it is applied to other diseases today)

In North and West Tasmania, September 1832:

"The numbers of aborigines along the western coast have been considerably reduced since the time of my last visit. A mortality has raged amongst them which together with the severity of the season and other causes had rendered the paucity of their number very considerable."

Robinson writing to Edward Curr, 22 Sept 1832, Friendly Mission, p 695.

What was the source of the `mortality'? Most likely, it was the earlier visit by Robinson's party. In his role as the Great Conciliator, Robinson, accompanied by a mixed group of white and Aboriginal servants/interpreters, travelled repeatedly throughout Tasmania and especially into remote areas, far from the settled regions, to extend a germ-laden hand of friendship to the Aborigines.

In January 1839, Robinson visited the Melbourne area of Victoria, caught the Spanish flu that was afflicting the colonists there and took it back to the Establishment on Flinders Island with him. 8 Aborigines at Wybalenna promptly died of it. Plomley, Weep in Silence, pp937-947; Ryan, Aboriginal Tasmanians, p, 193; Journal of George Robinson jr., Robinson Papers, 28 March 1839, vol 50, ML A7071.

There are numerous other reports regarding disease and its devastating effects on the Tasmanian Aborigines. Because of the close proximity of white observers, there are records of how lethal influenza, in particular, was amongst the Aborigines at Flinders Island and Oyster Cove. Virtually every time a supply ship visited, more Aborigines would catch the latest strain of the flu, it would rapidly develop into pneumonia and they'd die within days.

Venereal disease had sterilised most of the women on Flinders Island and at Oyster Cove, which is why the birth rate was abysmal.

"Of the 9 women at Oyster Cove in 1869, only 2 had ever given birth and all babies had died. Truganini, Dray and Pagerly all had been `afflicted with a loathsome disorder which they had contracted during their cohabitation with the whalers at Adventure Bay.'"

Flood: The Original Australians, p90, citing Robinson as per Plomley, Friendly Mission p132.

Until relatively recently, the fact that introduced disease killed a lot of Aborigines in colonial Tasmania was pretty well known but very little understood; i.e. just how badly people with no prior immunity were affected was not understood and still isn't by many people. The `denialism' regarding the devastating effect of disease on the Tasmanian Aboriginal population started in the mid-1970's, when Lyndall Ryan claimed in her PhD thesis which was reworked and published in 1981 as Aboriginal Tasmanians, p 175 (the sarcastic remarks in brackets after each claim are all mine, of course):

.there were no epidemics amongst the British colonists therefore they had no contagious diseases to pass on to the Aborigines. (Oh sure, there's no way that 19th Century British settlers, soldiers and convicts could have suffered from the common cold, influenza, tuberculosis, several varieties of venereal disease, etc, etc since they were such a clean-living, healthy bunch. How a rational human being could swallow such nonsense is beyond me.)

.Tasmania has a benign, temperate climate. (Ah, that explains why disease is completely unknown in Britain, France, etc, etc.)

.their diet was high in protein, vitamin C, iron and thiamine. (So is the diet of the Inuit and we know how well that worked out for them when they first had contact with European diseases.)

.contact with sealers in Bass Strait, which started in the 1790's before colonisation in 1803, may have helped them build up a resistance to European diseases. (Well, it appears to have done so for at least some of the Aboriginal women that the sealers took back to the Bass Strait islands with them, which is why some of them survived long enough to have children by the sealers. Ryan got something partially right - half a mark out of 4. However, since modern medical studies have established that men don't have as strong a natural resistance to disease as women do, having the Aboriginal women who were taken by the sealers survive while the Aboriginal men left behind died from the diseases at a greater rate, or didn't have any women left to reproduce with if they did develop some resistance to introduced diseases, didn't do much for the survival of the full-blooded Tasmanian Aborigines.)

Back to Flood -

"The severe effects of smallpox, influenza, tuberculosis and venereal disease have been seriously underestimated by most historians, who instead overemphasise the role of conflict in the disintegration of Aboriginal society. Worldwide, the process of globalisation caused a drastic decline in indigenous populations from the unintentional spread of killer diseases to the new worlds of the Americas, Pacific and Australia. The impact of new germs on people with no prior immunity was horrendous."

Flood: The Original Australians p 128

And before Likebox tries to pin a label like `right wing zealot' on her, here's how others describe her and her work:

"Dr Josephine Flood is a prominent archaeologist, recipient of the Centenary Medal and former director of the Aboriginal Heritage Commission. She has published a number of books on Australian archaeology and history, including the influential Archaeology of the Dreaming and The Riches of Ancient Australia."

"Another enthralling account by Josephine Flood, of Australian Aborigines! Her enduring respect for her fellow humans underwrites every part of her exploration of the life and times of the Aboriginal people." Pat O' Shane, Magistrate (and Australian Aboriginal woman).

"This is an up-to-the-minute and balanced account of Aboriginal experience from earliest prehistory to today. Clearly written and well-illustrated, this is the best book to give someone who wants to know about Aborigines, their survival through the millennia, and the experiences they have to contribute to modern Australia." Emeritus Professor Campbell McKnight, Australian National University Webley442 (talk) 09:58, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

I am not sure how relevant this is at the moment, because the section on History wars#Genocide debate does not give any explanation of how the Tasmanian Aborigines died, all it does is discuss which expert groups think it was or was not a genocide. The above may be part of an explanation for why these views are held by Australian experts, but they are not discussed in the article. Instead we have simply stopped at the point of explaining that the description of the extinction as a genocide is not universally accepted. --PBS (talk) 10:17, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

Well, perhaps one reason that the extinction isn't universally accepted as genocide is because unintentionally introduced disease isn't widely accepted as being an instrument of genocide, although there are those like Barta who argue that it should be. Webley442 (talk) 10:27, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

There have been a couple of pretty dumb counter-arguments made regarding disease, originating from Robert Manne and James Boyce.

One argument is that almost all the accounts of imported disease are from 1829 on and become more common after the transportation of the Aborigines to Flinders Island and later to Oyster Cove. The implication is that something changed in 1829, which somehow made disease a problem that it hadn’t been before. (Manne does mention ‘a conversation recorded by James Bonwick’ about disease before 1829 but carefully avoids disclosing that the account is of an oral tradition of a major epidemic prior to colonisation, presumably caught from passing sailors or sealers, which greatly ‘thinned’ the Tasmanian Aboriginal population and ‘swept off’ ‘whole tribes’... It’s the information that the black armband historians and their supporters withhold that is often of more importance than what they do tell you.) This argument is associated with a suggestion that conditions on Flinders Island were so deplorable that they caused the disease problem. However, even Henry Reynolds admits that it was the ‘best equipped and most lavishly staffed Aboriginal institution in the Australian colonies in the nineteenth century’. The food supplied and standards of accommodation built for the Aborigines were good for the day. Aborigines were free to roam the island, which abounded with bush tucker, and they were often absent from the main settlement for extended periods on hunting trips.

The other argument is basically that the Aboriginal women who went with the sealers did not succumb to disease so it couldn’t have been that serious, i.e. the Aborigines couldn't have been that susceptible to disease.

However...1829 wasn’t a ‘magic’ year in which Aborigines suddenly became more susceptible to disease than they had been before. If they were highly susceptible to dying from, say influenza, after 1829, then they were highly susceptible to dying from it before 1829. The only difference was the presence of literate white observers to record what was happening. G.A. Robinson began his travels around Tasmania in 1829 by moving to Bruny Island and so became one of the main recorders of Tasmanian Aboriginal life and death.

Historians pretty much universally agree that relations between settlers and Tasmanian Aborigines were peaceful in the first couple of decades after colonisation (with some exceptions, Risdon Cove on 3 May 1804 being one). During that time the Aborigines got into the habit of paying visits to the settlements and to outlying settlers’ homes, where they were given food and other presents like blankets and clothing. (There was also a certain amount of trading going on including the trading of the sexual services of Aboriginal women to white men.) But after such interactions, the Aborigines would leave peacefully with no harm done or so it seemed. Except that during those peaceful visits, they’d unknowingly risk acquiring some unwanted presents from the white settlers; germs, which they could then have taken back with them and spread around to any other Aborigines they came into contact with. Entire tribes could be ‘swept off’ by fatal diseases or large numbers infected with venereal diseases that destroyed their reproductive abilities with no white observers out in the bush to record it.

The Tasmanian Aborigines believed that the evil spirits (disease) inhabited particular places so it's likely that they would often move away from the place where a member of the band got sick. As an band with already infected members moved around, trying to escape the evil spirits, they’d increase their chances of coming into contact with other bands and spreading the infection further. Individual members of a dying band would be highly likely to seek refuge with another band and so carry the disease to them, too.

The black armband historians want it both ways. They want us to believe that white settlers violently murdered thousands of Tasmanian Aborigines out in the bush with less than 200 of those killings being documented in some way. But we aren’t supposed to realise that it’s more likely that large numbers of Tasmanian Aborigines died of, or were rendered infertile by disease out in the bush with no documentation of it.

Why didn’t the Aboriginal women who went with the sealers succumb to disease?

1. We don’t know how many of the Aboriginal women who went with the sealers did die of disease. It may be that the sealers simply went and got ‘replacements’ when women died. The Aboriginal women who survived and developed some level of immunity are likely to just be a percentage of the total taken.

2. A Canadian study (McGill University) indicates that the female sex hormone oestrogen gives women's immune systems an enhanced ability to fight off infection. Since women have a stronger natural resistance to disease than men do, you’d expect a greater survival rate amongst women.

3. A considerable percentage of Aborigines who’d fall into the category of ‘died of disease’, would actually have died of a lack of care. One known response of the Aborigines to disease was to believe it was caused by evil spirits and for them to abandon the sufferers to their fate. Rather than abandoning sick women, the sealers, having gone to a certain amount of trouble to acquire women and not having a superstitious fear of what were to them familiar diseases, are likely to have supplied them with whatever remedies and medicines they had, kept them warm and provided water and food. So the survival rate for women living with the sealers would naturally be higher, probably much higher, than that for Aboriginal women living in an Aboriginal band.

4. As a matter of self-protection, the sealers may have prevented men with a venereal disease from getting access to ‘their’ women.

5. Sexual exclusivity and jealousy also play a role in limiting the spread of venereal diseases. It appears that some, if not all, of the sealers’ women lived with one man only, i.e. they were not ‘shared’ between a group of men and so were less likely to get infected with a venereal disease. Webley442 (talk) 04:16, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

Well this may of happened or that may of happened and little green men may have whisked them off in a spaceship. All this is speculation. The only thing that matters as far as this article is concerned is what argument are historians actually making? Theresa Knott | token threats 17:40, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

The argument that SOME historians have made is that the settlers killed thousands of Tasmanian Aborigines. The problem with that argument is that there is actual evidence for less than 200 deaths by violence, all the rest IS speculation and often falsification on the part of historians.

The argument that the Tasmanian Aborigines died principally from introduced disease, which is actually supported by some credible evidence, has been around a lot longer and is supported by respected historians.

I inserted the above because I am very, very tired of this article not being progressed in a rational way because 1 user keeps making claims that NO historian except Windschuttle argues that disease was a factor and that every historian but him agrees that it was mass murder. On that basis, that user wants to reduce all material in the article regarding the "Windschuttle' side of the argument to a couple of lines, remove all mention of the evidence supporting it, label it 'fringe' and rewrite the other side of the debate as proven, undisputed fact. I was hoping that the above would address these claims so that he/she would stop trying to rewrite the article that way or at least that anyone else viewing these pages would have enough information to have an informed opinion. Webley442 (talk) 23:13, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

Opinion Counts

Webley and Windschuttle are indistinguishable. They both believe that disease "took off" the natives, a pathetically ignorant version of history that was commonly repeated in textbooks of the irredemably racist Australia of the 1950s.

Genocide historians and Tasmanian historians both dismiss the "disease theory". They say that the hunting of the natives for sport and for space was what killed the natives. This killing began in the 1820s, and culminated in the 1829 black line, a human line of settlers that swept the island end to end, in order to exterminate all blacks. The black line was psychologically devastating to the survivors. Defeated, outnumbered and starving, they cast their lot with a white man who promised to protect them if they agreed to relocate. They were herded into a concentration camp on Flinders Island, and there they were left to die of disease and neglect, until the last surviving members, objects of ridicule and contempt, died in the 1870s, and their corpses were mutilated for medical experiments.

The records and newspapers of the time document hundreds of unpunished murders of Aboriginal Tasmanians, cheered on by polite society. The settlers wanted the natives gone, exterminated, because they felt that they were subhuman. The actual number killed during the rampage is most commonly estimated at 3-4 thousand people (out of 5 thousand total). This comes from eyewitness estimates, before/after population estimates and the widely acknowledged fact that disease played no role from 1820-1829. This history went essentally undisputed from the 1840s to the present day.

In the 1940s, Lemkin outlined the modern concept of "genocide", and identified the behavior of the Tasmanian settlers as an early example. The notion caught on in the 1960s, and the events on Tasmania were then classified as a genocide by most of the world. This made Australian conservatives angry. They deny that it was genocide, for one reason or another.

But Windschuttle boldly goes where no man has gone before. He theorizes that virulent colds and VD were responsible for the deaths! This new theory is so STUPID that it's hard to argue against. I ask new editors to please do a quick google search.Likebox (talk) 04:18, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

I suggest new editors do a quick Google search using keywords 'venereal disease', 'Aborigines' and 'infertility'. You'll find thousands of references to the devastating effect that introduced venereal disease had on the Aboriginal ability to reproduce themselves across Australia. Then you should ask yourselves why Tasmania would be any different.

Windschuttle's argument is not that different to the arguments supported by generations of historians before him. A combination of respiratory diseases like influenza (leading to pneumonia) and tuberculosis caused a catastrophic number of deaths and venereal diseases caused widespread infertility in a non-immune population. And yes, even the common cold can have fatal results if it weakens the sufferer's immune system to the point that pneumonia can take hold. None of this is particularly new. Worldwide, it is acknowledged that introduced diseases did more damage in colonised areas than violence. Tasmania was no exception to the rule. The idea that disease played no role before 1829 is based on the fact that it wasn't until then that George Augustus Robinson started his travels around Tasmania and started to record the effects of disease when he saw it. Webley442 (talk) 23:37, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Again, this is nonsense. The disease theory is a denialist crackpot theory that has no academic support, and very little non-academic support. The reason diseases killed so many Aborigines in places other than Tasmania is because smallpox was a massive killer, and the timescale was much longer. On Tasmania, they slaughtered everyone first. I am tired of arguing this, write all you want about disease theory, just say "This is a minority opinion. Most people think that the Tasmanians were killed by settlers" before launching into the denialist nonsense.Likebox (talk) 02:21, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Rewriting

FYI I've started rewriting (and moving around) some of the material in the article so far mainly in the Background and Black Armband debate sections but I propose to move on to other sections as I develop ideas on what to do there. Both these sections were, in my opinion, pretty unreadable, with excessive quotes and disjointed text. I've also added some material in the Black Armband Debate section to explain the change in the debate from how it originally started over whether there was an excessive focus on negative aspects of Australian history to a debate over whether, or to what extent, there had been fabrication of the history. I don't think anything I've put there so far would be controversial. (When I get to anything that is a controversial issue, I'll raise it in the talk page first.)

I believe that there is more needed in that section regarding the counter arguments to the 'fabrication' arguments and plan to put some more material on it in there, however, I'm trying to clarify the article. I don't believe that we should be trying to put all the evidence and arguments in the article, people need to read what's in the links and the books if they want to go into that much detail. Our job should be to summarise the relevant material in a reasonably readable form and get rid of what is irrelevant to the debate (eg all the material that had been there about previous uses of the term 'black armband' was very interesting but irrelevant to the debate over the 'black armband' view of history so it just served to bloat the article).

CONSTRUCTIVE input is always welcome, no-one 'owns' this article. Make suggestions on the talk page or do some rewriting of your own in the article but, obviously, if what you put in the article is unsourced, flat out wrong or biased, don't expect it to have a long life there. If you think what you want to put in the article may raise the hackles of other users, I'd recommend that you raise it in the talk page first and see how much support it gets. Webley442 (talk) 23:37, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

You should not edit this article, because you write biased stuff.Likebox (talk) 18:07, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

I welcome comments on the changes I've made so far but I'd like a little more detail in them than the above. As I said before, I don't think that anything I've put in so far should be too controversial but if there is something there that anyone objects to, then give some valid reasons, propose an alternative, give us a way forward. Webley442 (talk) 00:22, 31 July 2009 (UTC)

Given the level of disagreement on this talk page, unilateral re-writes should be avoided as they'll produce nothing but edit warring. I'd strongly suggest that all major changes to the article's text be negotiated here first before being added to the article. Nick-D (talk) 08:35, 31 July 2009 (UTC)

I'd agree with that if there was any real chance of getting agreement on the talk page but I think it would just stall the way the argument on the Genocide debate section has stalled. So I thought I'd try working on some of the most disjointed, overworked sections and see if the changes I made were accepted rather than rehash the same issues over and over. If someone feels very strongly about the changes I've made then they are free to make their own, point out faults in my re-write that they feel need fixing or to make other suggestions. Webley442 (talk) 10:55, 31 July 2009 (UTC)

In line with the comments by an disinterested administrator Nick-D I have reverted the change by Likebox to the genocide section, but I have left in place his revert to an edit by Webley442. Likebox, please address the issues over the first sentence of your new version of the genocide debate, and please explain why you object to the alteration that Webley442 made with this edit that you have reverted. --PBS (talk) 15:19, 1 August 2009 (UTC)

Really can't see how anyone could have problems with that particular edit as it was specifically designed to make the text MORE neutral. Webley442 (talk) 02:10, 2 August 2009 (UTC)

Likebox do you have any comment to make on this edit. If not then it can be reinstated (Wikipedia:Silence and consensus). --PBS (talk) 11:32, 6 August 2009 (UTC)

Crackpot History

This page is full of crackpot history written by Webley, supported by PBS. I do not intend to cite a SINGLE SOURCE for this statement, because it is too obvious to cite. I will unilaterally assert it, again and again, until somebody fixes the problem. The natives on Tasmania DID NOT die of disease as everyone knows--- they were murdered by settlers. There is no debate about this among sane historians. Please do not be intimidated by the administrator status of PBS, he has taken an unsupportable position. Do not be intimidated by Webley's hot air--- his historical research is biased. Neither should touch this page, since everything they write is garbage.Likebox (talk) 14:16, 2 August 2009 (UTC)

If you look at the history of the article you will see that I did not revert both of your most recent edits. Please see the previous section. If we are going to progress this page to a version which everyone can live with, then you have to explain why you make edit reversals such as this one. --PBS (talk) 16:41, 2 August 2009 (UTC)

Why Tasmania is important

The actions on Tasmania were the first modern genocide. It was the smallest in scale, only a few thousand victims, but the most successful--- everyone was killed and the culture destroyed forever. The patterns laid down here propagated and evolved: in the Boer War, then in the Armenian genocide, finally perfected by the Nazis. But all the main ideas were first cooked up in Tasmania.

1. justification: racist dehumanization
2. motivation: theft of property/mass rape
3. fringe benfit: slavery
4. structures: concentration camps
5. policy: mass murder justified as "deportation" + "anti-insurgency".

Incredible. all the modern ideas about the ingredients for a successful genocide are already there! So this is a test case. The deniers start by denying this little example, and if they succeed, they can move on.Likebox (talk) 15:22, 2 August 2009 (UTC)

Frontier genocide

See also Talk:History wars/Archive 2#Did European colonisation of Australia resulted in genocide 2

I intend to edit the genocide section and add to the paragraph "Much of the debate on whether ..." to include mention of Moss's distinction between "Intentionalists" (intentional genocide like the Holocaust) and "structuralists" (structural genocide which "averts the issue of perpetrator agency and intention by highlighting anonymous 'genocidal processes' of cultural and physical destruction."), and Madley's term "frontier genocide".--PBS (talk) 11:42, 6 August 2009 (UTC)

I also intend to remove the paragraph "Reynolds also points out that Raphael Lemkin,..." as it now just repeats what is written in the paragraph that starts "After the introduction of the word genocide...". --PBS (talk) 11:42, 6 August 2009 (UTC)

I've been meaning to suggest removing that myself (but was diverted by other matters). I've also been thinking that some attempt should be made to restructure this section so the text dealing with the issue of smallpox and other introduced disease is all linked together better. It seems to need to be summarised better and more briefly as well, but keeping the distinction between claims of deliberately introduced smallpox and the claims that it wasn't. Perhaps it might be possible to fit some of that into the Intentionalist argument, ie the idea that it was deliberately introduced? Though, on the other side, the argument that smallpox came from the Macassans doesn't really fit into the Structuralist argument, does it? Well anyway, go for it and we'll see how it comes out. Webley442 (talk) 13:20, 6 August 2009 (UTC)

7 August 2009

Neither Webley nor PBS should edit They both misrepresent historical consensus without shame or remorse. I hope someone else will get involved to get rid of their influence. It is impossible to talk to them.Likebox (talk) 18:40, 7 August 2009 (UTC)

Likebox, I’ve reverted your edits, see all the previous comments regarding why.

This is pointless. You continue to represent yourself as the ‘defender’ of the mainstream consensus but as you have admitted on these pages, you are not widely read in the subject. It seems that you get all your information from cheap ‘popular’ histories and whatever you can find with Google rather than putting in the time and effort to read and understand what is in the work of serious historians and particularly that of specialists in Tasmanian colonial history. If you had, you’d have a better understanding of what the mainstream position really is. If PBS and I were misrepresenting it, you wouldn't be the only one objecting, especially after other editors and administrators have been requested to involve themselves. Webley442 (talk) 02:17, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

I don't need any more sources, it's you and your buddy that's the problem here. The textbooks and papers I have given you should be enough, were you a reasonable editor. I have pointed out to you that the majority (by FAR) agrees that the natives on Tasmania were slaughtered, and given you several mainstream sources that support this opinion, which is in NO WAY shifted in over one hundred and fifty years. You and your buddy decided to delete the text based on all these sources. That's biased editing, in anyone's book.

You persist in including IDIOTIC statements like "... based on previously published histories ..." and " whether genocide includes acts of omission ..." which distort on purpose, and you do not qualify the lunatics at quadrant as what they are--- a small fringe minority even within Australia.

I will continue to push until someone else comes along who is willing to antagonize the likes of you and your buddy.Likebox (talk) 04:35, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

For new editors: I am most certainly not the first to point out the egregious undue weight violation here. If you look at the archived talk pages, you will see at least three other editors have made similar comments in the past. They were all scared away by the dynamic duo. PBS is an administrator, and when an administrator reverts you, you don't fight. Hopefully another administrator can stop this madness.Likebox (talk) 04:46, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

Actually you are the only editor to allege undue weight on this article. Other ‘visiting’ editors have made suggestions and asked questions about various issues relating to the article (as Michael C Price did about the bounty which was offered for the capture of LIVE Aborigines engaged in aggression in the settled areas). Those editors were given reasoned responses with appropriate sources. The responses to the issues they raised apparently satisfied them, and it seems that they didn’t find your ‘arguments’ convincing. They haven’t complained about being scared off that I’m aware of.

I would imagine that a little reading of these talk pages also satisfied them that your comic-book notions of history aren’t supportable. BTW: I notice that you still haven’t bothered to correct the error in your own preferred text in which you claim that the bounty was offered for killing Aborigines (and it's ‘extirpationist’). Webley442 (talk) 05:29, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

Michael Price only came here because I asked him if he could get involved (sorry bout that Mike). It's soul-sapping to argue with genocide deniers, and I don't blame anyone for leaving. But as long as this type of denial is here, it is a blight on Wikipedia.Likebox (talk) 20:09, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

Article protected for one week

I have just protected this article for one week to allow for dispute resolution. The edit warring over its content appears to be escalating and is not productive. Please use this time to civilly discuss options to improve the article. As a disinterested observer, I'd suggest that the best way of handling the current dispute is to stick to a simple narrative of what the different views are rather than attempt to write thematic paragraphs which discuss multiple views. Nick-D (talk) 05:54, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

I agree. But can someone please agree that at least SOME material sourced from Tatz, Madley and Mear can be kept somewhere on the page? These are very mainstream sources.Likebox (talk) 04:36, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

There has never been a problem with putting accurate representations of what historians say in the article. There is a problem if there is an unsourced conclusion then drawn that because Tatz and Madley say that X, Y and Z happened, that is what 'everyone believes'. You need a source that says something to the effect that 'the majority of historians argue that X, Y and Z happened' like the ones PBS has cited.

Just on Mear: again, no problem with using him as a source, however, the quote from him that you want to use: "They had been coming to this coast for hundreds of years, yet this was the first time that they had brought the deadly virus with them" is probably the worst argument from Mear that you could have selected. Logically it's nonsense...if only because there is ALWAYS a first time for everything. For the Macassans to infect Aborigines with smallpox AND cause an Australia-wide epidemic, a number of things had to fall into place: there had to be a smallpox epidemic in progress on their island at the time they were about to depart; a member of a Macassan crew had to have been exposed but not yet be symptomatic (because nobody with a functioning brain is going to take someone with obvious symptoms of smallpox on a trip in a small boat with them), the boat has to make it to Australia, i.e. not sink due to accident/storm or turn back for home because they've realised that one of them has smallpox; there had to have been close contact between infected Macassans and Aborigines; and there had to have been a long and unbroken chain of contact between the north to as far south as the Sydney area. There is no particular reason why this combination of factors had to come together for the first time in any particular year. Webley442 (talk) 06:59, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

I agree too, not having visited for a month or so in the hope that there might have been some progress. IMHO, the structure of Likebox's boxed paragraph (ie, Tasmania, Mainland, Genocide in general) is sensible. IMHO, PBS's distinctions - from the general literature - between structural and other forms of genocide are essential for anyone trying to understand why the debate about "genocide" has no absolute answer that will ever be agreed. IMHO, this is not a topic for an entertaining article, so if it is as dry as dust,that is not a defect. At the risk of starting another edit war elsewhere, might I also refer editors to Tasmanian Aborigines? Much of the debate here about causes of death belongs there. My point here is that, as I have said before, this article should be limited to the particular debate/s that are collectively known as the history wars in australia, and perhaps the function of such a debate in a settler society that likes some parts of its history better than others, but not about the "truth" of the history, which needs to be dealt with elswehere in Wikipedia. See yous in a month or so Keepitshort (talk) 07:16, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

I would like to alter the paragraph, and if there are no objections to the alterations I have suggested in the section #Frontier genocide above, by the time the block comes off I will do so. In principle it would be a good idea to give a few of the details of the specific disputes between historians (for example whether the treatment mmeted out to Queenland Aborigines was genocide) and a general overview of intentional/structural genocide. I suspect that if we go that way we need to add the intentional/structural genocide first as it helps to frame the debate whether Australian colonialism was genocidal. --PBS (talk) 09:53, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

In answer to this: the reason there is no progress towards consensus is because every single sentence I have ever added which references Tatz, Madley, or Mear, has been deleted by PBS or Webley with the feeblest of excuses. The sentences were deleted without rewriting, and the original version restored, and all mainstream sources were deleted. This was not an accident, nor is it caused by ignorance. It was a deliberate attempt to get rid of the mainstream point of view regarding genocide from this page.

The same editors used to edit on Tasmanian aborigines too. By focusing their denial efforts here, it became possible to fix the other pages to reflect mainstream consensus. Tasmanian Aborigines used to include the same damnable Windschuttle/Quadrant nonsense too.

The fact that Webley does not recognise the mainstream consensus in his own head is his problem. That it is a mainstream consensus is obvious to anyone who reads the literature for half a day.Likebox (talk) 20:05, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

'Every single sentence" of your material gets reverted because the changes you make are so extensive and there are problems with virtually 'every single sentence'. Practically every sentence is either heavily biased or contains outright factual errors. Rewriting your material to fix the problems and to re-insert material contributed by other editors that you have deleted would be extremely time-consuming and as your past edits show, you simply change it again. If you want some of your contributions to be accepted by others working on this article then you have to be prepared to work through it and correct the problems, not just reinsert the same material over and over again and then get upset when it gets reverted.

Cheap popular history books and works by people who have made careers out of pushing the genocide line do not give an accurate picture of the diversity of opinion that is out there regarding Tasmanian colonial history and genocide in Australia. You have been cited works which show that but because they don't agree with your opinions on the subject you have ignored them.

Another factual error on your part, I have never edited the Tasmanian Aborigines article but looking it over I can see it needs a lot of work, too. Webley442 (talk) 23:41, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

You did not edit Tasmanian Aborigines (hopefully you won't), but someone else did. That article used to claim that the natives died of diseases, instead of being murdered. This was recently fixed by me and a few other editors over there.

I made many efforts in the past to edit out the crap that's here. Once or twice, I edited only by deleting the idiocy "based on previously published histories", and by replacing another idiocy "crimes of omissions" by a brief description of the not-at-all-of-omission crimes sourced from Tatz. You/PBS deleted these edits. You have done the same with every other edit which makes any reference to the MASS MURDER, the EXTERMINATIONIST RACISM, the MASS RAPE, or any other genocide indicators. It is my firm conclusion that there can be no compromise with the likes of you. You should not edit Wikipedia. Also, if you happen to belong to a religion, I suggest you might consider undergoing its penitance ritual.Likebox (talk) 06:34, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

"The same editors used to edit on Tasmanian aborigines too." See the edit history of the article Tasmanian aborigines. Neither Webley442 or I have edited that article. I note that you have in part corrected your statement with your reply to Webley442 "You did not edit Tasmanian Aborigines (hopefully you won't), but someone else did." and I request you to correct the record on this talk page by striking out the original false statement. Also consider if on reflection your repeated ad hominem attacks against Webley442 and myself are conducive to reaching consensus on this page. If not then please strike out you posting immediately above this one. Likebox, if you continue with your personal attacks on this page with a refusal to engage in a constructive dialogue on how we can advance this page, I will start an A user-conduct RfC. I am loath to do this because it is very time consuming for everyone involved and I am sure we all have better things to do, but at the moment it might be quicker than having to deal with repeated ad hominem posting to this page. --PBS (talk) 09:53, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Likebox if you would like to discuss constructively the first sentence of the edit that you have tried to impose on this page, then I am happy to do so. The objections to it have been repeatedly pointed out, but if you would like them reiterated I am happy to do so. If unless you have any additional factual arguments to present, then I suggest that we agree not replace the current sentence with your first new one and move onto the second and third sentence of your version. --PBS (talk) 09:53, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Sentence by sentence discussions are not productive, they are just a method of stalling rewrites. If you don't like the first sentence, just provide an alternate phrasing, keeping the sources and the content unaltered. If you really don't like the first sentence, replace it with the first sentence here, except omitting the unsourced and unsupportable "based on previously published histories".Likebox (talk) 20:03, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Wrong comments struck, as requested. I was confusing Tasmanian Aborigines with Genocides in History. Sorry.Likebox (talk) 20:06, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

See WP:REDACTED. The idea is you only strike through comments. You do not alter comments (other than strike out) once someone has replied to them as it makes it difficult to impossible for third party to follow the thread and understand what has been said. Please reinstate the original wording and strike through as requested. I assume from you lack of action (with a strike through or an apology) on the second paragraph I objected to, that you stand by your ad hominem attacks against Webley442 and myself. Is my inference correct? --PBS (talk)

Still wrong Likebox, I've never edited Genocides in History either. A sentence by sentence discussion would be more productive than what's going on at present. There are a lot more problems with your preferred text than just the first sentence. Webley442 (talk) 23:15, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

For those who are reading this section for the first time please see the section higher up this page called #Genocide debate for the debate over the first sentence of Likebox's proposed large change. To date we have not been able to agree on the proposed wording of his/her first sentence and until we can there seems little point in discussing the other sentences. I suggest Likebox that if you wish to progress with the large change that you wish to make that we agree to keep the current sentence that your change would replace and move onto the next sentence.

Likebox there are proposed changes by other people where you have failed to respond. You reverted a small change by Webley442 yet have failed to explain why when asked to do so in the section #Rewriting. You have not responded to my suggestions in the section #Frontier genocide. If you do not do so then it makes it difficult to reach agreement with you unless you are willing to allow you silence to be taken as agreement. --PBS (talk) 09:01, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Your sentence by sentence nonsense is just a stupid and obvious method of stalling. If you include text summarizing Tatz, Madley, Mear into this article, and properly qualify Windschuttle's opinion as a fringe minority (as it is well known to be), you end up with something I find acceptable. I don't care how you do it, if you actually do do it. I don't comment about what you and Webley do, because everything you have touched will have to be rewritten anyway, so I don't bother with it.

As far as "redacting", I am sorry if you don't like what I did. just fix it. I do remember someone (I thought it was you) commenting about genocides in history, and reverting some changes that I made there. That might be a false memory. If so, I apologize.Likebox (talk) 20:01, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Regarding a source or support for "based on previously published histories": After referring to art critic Robert Hughes' book The Fatal Shore and to economic historian, N.G. Butlin and their claims that what happened in Tasmania was genocide, Henry Reynolds wrote: “Few international genocide scholars would have faulted these condign judgments. Many of them have named Tasmania in their lists of legitimate case studies, although their usually slight grasp of island history might have counselled caution.” Chapter 5 by Henry Reynolds "Genocide in Tasmania?" in A. Dirk Moses, Genocide and Settler Society: Frontier Violence and Stolen Indigenous Children in Australian History, p 128. I think it’s pretty clear that Reynolds is referring to the fact that most international genocide scholars base their claims regarding Tasmania on histories published by others as opposed to doing their own research in the Tasmanian Archives. Plus, of course, there is no mention in his biography of Lemkin ever visiting Tasmania. Webley442 (talk) 10:22, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

In the ‘Was it Genocide?’ section of the chapter, Reynolds wrote: “One problem with much of the international literature concerning Tasmania is that most writers appear to be unaware that at the critical period in question, the colony was immersed in fierce guerrilla warfare. Lacking this essential information, the writers cannot understand the actions of the colonial government beyond assuming there was a brutal but generalized desire to get rid of the Aborigines. Linked to this failure to understand settler motivation is an entirely patronizing view of the Aborigines as helpless but pathetic victims of the colonists’ murderous impulses or the violence of psychologically disturbed or even psychotic convicts. The reality was quite different. For five years the Colony was seriously disrupted by Aboriginal aggression.” and “The settlers in the countryside lived in high anxiety for years on end.” p 146 Henry Reynolds "Genocide in Tasmania?"

“Whether Governor Arthur strayed over the unmarked border between warfare and genocide cannot be answered with any certainty. As always, it depends on what is meant by genocide. It was clear that he was determined to defeat the Aborigines and secure the permanent expropriation of their land, but there is little evidence to suggest that he wanted to reach beyond that objective and destroy the Tasmanian race in whole or in part.” p 147 Henry Reynolds "Genocide in Tasmania?" Webley442 (talk) 10:53, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

In case it isn't obvious, I inserted the above quotes from Reynolds because he puts the problems with putting too much reliance on 'international genocide scholars' pretty well. Should the article be based on the opinions of 'international genocide scholars' who know very little about Tasmania's history and who just assume that "there was a brutal but generalized desire to get rid of the Aborigines"? Or do we try to base it on the work of historians who actually know something about Tasmania? Webley442 (talk) 12:56, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Reynolds is just as much of a denier as Windschuttle, except he doesn't go to the same lunatic extreme. Of course he says that people were ignorant, he is pushing his own revisionism (Reynolds revisionism= Mass killings but no genocide), which places him on a lone desert island where no scholars go. Windschuttle goes further, and denies that there were mass killings too, which puts him on the far side of the moon.

All these wackos are spouting fringe nonsense. There are hundreds if not thousands of scholars, like Madley, who did primary research on Tasmania and who wholeheartedly agree that it was a genocide. These people are in the majority even among only those scholars that have done significant primary research.Likebox (talk) 19:24, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

You have already made this assertion several times (see Talk:History wars/Archive 2 and this reply by me on 19:51, 23 June 2009:

We have two sources that state what is the position of most Australian experts/historian: John Connor "Windschuttle's argument that genocide was not committed in Van Diemen's land should be directed towards popular historians and journalists who hold this idea rather than those in academia who generally do not." and Levene (which is used as a source in the article) "The debate about whether the term genocides is applicable to the broad Australian context... However it is notable that while comparative genocide scholars assume the specifically Tasmanian case to be on of unmitigated genocide, the majority of Australian experts are considerably more circumspect." both are already cited on this talk page, so I will not repeat the citations. The sentence [in the article that starts "After the introduction..."] states exactly what the two sources say and quotes a third source Anne Curthoys, who holds a similar opinion is also quoted later in the paragraph. ...

This passage and the sources for both quotes can be found in Talk:History wars/Archive 2. Have you yet found a source that contradicts Connor and Levene? --PBS (talk) 20:17, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

While you are looking for that source Likebox, what is your source for your claim that there are “hundreds if not thousands of scholars, like Madley, who did primary research on Tasmania and who wholeheartedly agree that it was a genocide”. The paper in Archive 2 that you linked to as Madley’s primary research contains no evidence of primary research that I can see; in that he cites only secondary sources (like Plomley). I can find no source elsewhere that indicates that Madley ever did primary research on Tasmanian colonial history.

Jesse Shipway, who lives in Tasmania, went to University there and who DID do his PhD on Tasmanian colonial history, does agree that it was a genocide but his argument is based on a much broader definition of genocide than the legal one; his incorporates unintentionally introduced disease as an agent of genocide.

“Jesse Shipway disputed the analysis of Dirk Moses by suggesting that the Tasmanian genocide “was a by-product of modernisation [the Bauman thesis]. The indigenes died of disease and interruptions in fertility functioning that resulted from incidental encounters with the European interlopers, but the keenness of the administrators to move the Aborigines out of areas suitable for pastoral expansion cannot be separated out from this larger diorama of mortality.”” John Cooper: Raphael Lemkin and the Struggle for the Genocide Convention, Palgrave MacMillan, New York, 2008 ISBN-13: 978-0-230-51691-5, ISBN-10: -0-230-51691-2, p248 (Jesse Shipway: PhD thesis, Scars on the Archive, Vision of Place: Genocide and Modernity in Tasmania)

While I disagree with the notion that unintentionally introduced disease is genocide, at least Shipway, with access to the primary sources, knows about the role of disease and acknowledges it. Webley442 (talk) 22:41, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Madley has a ton of papers on the event, he is a scholar specializing in this stuff. He not only does primary research (as you can see by reading the paper), he has many other papers on the same events.

Tatz and Madley contradict Connor and Levene, as do the hundreds of sources you find by typing "Tasmanian Genocide" into google. Here are some of these:

1. this site
2. Runoko Rashidi, "Black War, The Destruction of the Tasmanian Aborigines"
3. this paper, primary research, analyzes Windschuttle's methods and finds them wanting.
4. same author, another paper about a massacre that Windschuttle discounts.
5. secondary source mentions genocide with no qualification

Anyone can check which way undue weight goes. I shouldn't need to do this. Remember, undue weight is about what most scholars believe today.

I am aware that Windschuttle/Quadrant dismiss all the scholarship on this event as biased by systematic flaws in academic discourse. This type of distrust is normally healthy, it leads you to question recieved knowledge, but in this case it is coupled with a right wing agenda and ends up producing extremely shoddy research. Even the conservative but rational Reynolds does not deny the massacres the way Windschuttle does.

You should not give an isolated writer with a radical position and seriously criticized methodology free reign over the mainstream consensus. Windschuttle is in the position of an outsider and a kook. Many of the massacres are surprisingly well documented considering that the perpetrators were the only ones documenting anything.Likebox (talk) 22:51, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Primary research in the context of history is going into the Archives and wherever else original source information can be found, pulling out the old newspapers, letters, diaries, reports and so forth and then basing your opinion on your analysis of them. It is not reading someone else’s work and then basing your opinion on what they say the primary sources contain or on whether you agree or disagree with what they said.

Forget “a ton of papers”. It’s irrelevant here whether Madley has done primary research on Patagonia or Outer Mongolia. Give us one source that says Madley has done primary research on Tasmania. Either that or please withdraw the claim that Madley has done such research.

Give us one source that says Runoko Rashidi has done primary research on Tasmania. Considering that many of the stories that he cites as having happened in Tasmania are considered to be incredibly doubtful by Australian historians (not just Windschuttle) and the other bizarre claims unrelated to Australian history that he has made as a ‘historian’, I don’t know why anyone would want to cite him as a source.

Give us a quote and/or a citation of where Tatz and Madley contradict John Connor on this: "Windschuttle’s argument that genocide was not committed in Tasmania should be directed towards popular historians and journalists who hold this idea rather than those in academia who generally do not." and Levene on this: "The debate about whether the term genocides is applicable to the broad Australian context... However it is notable that while comparative genocide scholars assume the specifically Tasmanian case to be on of unmitigated genocide, the majority of Australian experts are considerably more circumspect."

Of course, Lyndall Ryan criticises Windschuttle’s methods. She was the principle target of his criticisms in Fabrication. Her responses to his criticisms have been dissected by others and found wanting, in some cases, just plain laughable.

Anyhow, none of the sources that I and PBS have asked you for in this section are on Windschuttle’s work. How about just admitting that you don’t have sources for your claims and then we can we move on? Webley442 (talk) 04:09, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

You should not edit Wikipedia. I am not going to give you any of the MORONIC INFANTILE stuff that you ask for, I will just ask that you go away.

For other editors: Runoko Rushidi is presented, along with others, as evidence of undue weight. Him, and thousands of others, reject Windschuttle's shoddy research and agree that mass killings happened in Tasmania and were a primary cause of the death of the Tasmanians. The sources I have given above include a detailed primary analysis of claims in Windschuttle, and show just how incompetent a history he has written.

Webley is no longer satisfied with sources. He would like sources about the sources to establish that the sources are OK. Then they would probably like sources for the sources about the sources, and so on until there are no more sources. This imaginative Wikilawyering is not in service of the article, but in service of a political position. It can only be stopped by ignoring him and making the necessary changes without him as part of the consensus.Likebox (talk) 04:30, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

This isn’t about the sources themselves; it’s about the inaccurate claims that you have repeatedly made on this page about your sources.

In the context of discussing here who is likely to provide better and more reliable information regarding Tasmania, those historians who have done primary research on Tasmanian colonial history or those who rely only on secondary sources (and thus are less likely to know enough about the subject to know whether the sources that they relied upon are good or bad), you are the one making the claim that Madley has done primary research on Tasmania. The link that you provided to his supposed ‘primary research’ is to a document that is obviously not the product of primary research on Tasmania; he cites only secondary sources in it regarding Tasmania.

You are the one making the claim that Tatz and Madley contradict Connor and Levene in the context of a source for what the majority of academics and Australian experts believe regarding genocide in Australia and specifically in Tasmania.

And your attacks on Windschuttle above are a pretty obvious attempt to divert attention away from the fact that you still can’t supply sources to support your claims regarding Tatz, Madley, Connor and Levene.

If it bothers you to be called to justify inaccurate claims that you make on these pages, that’s easy to remedy, just stop making inaccurate claims. Webley442 (talk) 10:35, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

What bothers me is that you/PBS are trying to use criteria of VERIFIABILITY to try to settle claims of UNDUE WEIGHT. Verifiability issues are settled by finding specific sources for specific claims. Undue Weight issues are NOT settled by looking for sources that say "This is what most people believe". Undue Weight issues are settled by actually googling and looking at what most people believe.

If there is a small minority position that is only a small minority because the subject matter is obscure, then it can be talked about without caveats. But when you have Windschuttle, who's obviously a minority of one, who's opinions are opposed by nearly all serious scholars, even conservative ones, then you need to say so prominently. You DO NOT need a source saying that "most scholars disagree with Windschuttle", and you can write this even if Connor and Levine write that "Most scholars agree with Windschuttle", because they are wrong. They are not distinguishing between Windschuttle's opinion of "no genocide" (which is agreed upon by many historians who live in Australia/Tasmania) with his opinion of "few massacres" (which is opposed by everybody).

You do not source such claims by finding sources that make them, because they are only relevant for Wikipedia. The way you check UNDUE WEIGHT is by googling, seeing specifically what opinions are held by how many. This simple procedure MUST be done, there is no other way to establish UNDUE WEIGHT, and it shows that Windschuttle's opinions on the massacre's are not accepted at all. In fact, his writing is rejected as that of an incompetent boob.Likebox (talk) 18:33, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

Likebox you are completely wrong about how one establishes and represents a position in an Wikipedia articles please read WP:WEASEL and then read WP:SYN in light of WEASEL. But do not take my word for it ask at Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard --PBS (talk)

The article say what two reliable sources say (as quoted here): that "comparative genocide scholars, basing their analysis on previously published histories, present the extinction of the Tasmanian Aborigines as a text book example of a genocide, however the majority of Australian experts are more circumspect ..." do you have any sources that either state that most comparative genocide scholars base their analysis on primary sources, and/or do you have any sources that state that most Australian experts are not more circumspect. Note I have emphasised the word most (not one or two but a source that states or indicates that they mean more than half. --PBS (talk) 20:13, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard#History wars --PBS (talk) 20:30, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

(deindent) The sentence that the "majority of Australian experts are more circumspect" is correct if the phrase "Australian experts" is interpreted as "experts within Australia". It is also correct if "more circumspect" means that they are not sure if the events qualify as a full scale genocide, or if it something close but not quite there. You are not correct if it is interpreted as "The majority of Australian experts agree with Windschuttle about the scale of the massacres". That phrase is just plain wrong.Likebox (talk) 21:07, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

I have never stated or claimed here that they have, or put such a statement into the article the statement that is in the article is "After the introduction of the word genocide in the 1940s by Raphael Lemkin, Lemkin and most other comparative genocide scholars, basing their analysis on previously published histories, present the extinction of the Tasmanian Aborigines as a text book example of a genocide, however the majority of Australian experts are more circumspect, because more recent detailed studies of the events surrounding the extinction by historians who specialise in Australian history have raised questions about some of the details and interpretations in the earlier histories." There is nothing in that sentence that claims or suggests that "The majority of Australian experts agree with Windschuttle". --PBS (talk) 22:18, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

BTW I think you have shifted your position since you made this statement "All these wackos are spouting fringe nonsense. There are hundreds if not thousands of scholars, like Madley, who did primary research on Tasmania and who wholeheartedly agree that it was a genocide. These people are in the majority even among only those scholars that have done significant primary research .Likebox (talk) 19:24, 12 August 2009 (UTC)" Which clearly implies that you are asserting what the majority is without providing a source. --PBS (talk) 22:23, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

Likebox, trying to shift the goalposts again by pretending that the debate in this section has been about the scale of massacres is an obvious diversionary tactic. Please address the issues that have been raised about what the majority of academics/experts believe regarding genocide and primary vs secondary sources or simply admit that you have no sources to support your position and move on. Webley442 (talk) 22:28, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

This is not "goalpost shifting". The debate has always been over the following interpretation:

1. Natives died by being massacred
2. Natives died by disease

Theory 2 is supported by Windschuttle alone. Theory 1 is what has always been underrepresented. The articles I am giving you show that Windschuttle is considered by several authors to be FULL OF SHIT about the massacres. He is denying extensive killings that are acknowledged by the rest of historians. These historians also claim that violence took the lives of about 3-4 thousand natives on Tasmania.

In reading more about this, I realize that objectively, we might never know for sure if there were 1,000 natives killed by settlers, or 5,000, because the record keeping is so sparse. But this means that it is DOUBLY important to insist on undue weight. The majority of historians believe that the armed settlers hunting down the natives were responsible for their massive decline. However, there were also food supply issues since the settlers hunted the same animals the natives did, and disrupted their gathering lifestyle. So this particular genocide was complex.

But the issue of massacres is the key: the natives were slaughtered is what nearly everyone says. Windschuttle is alone in denying the killing.Likebox (talk) 05:45, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

I ask new editors to ignore the comments of Webley/PBS aboe, and please look at the sources provided. The sources show just how fringe Windschuttle's history is. To use it as a basis for comments such as the settlers were guilty of only of "acts of omission", and that genocide scholars base their views on the Tasmanian genocide on "previously published histories" is a gross mischaracterization. The right way is to say what the mainstream view is, and then explain how the KOOKS and NUTCASES in Australia deny it.Likebox (talk) 05:48, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

"A strong oral tradition indicates that a catastrophic epidemic occurred even before British settlement. Robert Clark, a teacher at Wybalenna Aboriginal Establishment, reported that Aborigines told him they were originally `more numerous than the white people were aware of ' but `their numbers were very much thinned by a sudden attack of disease which was general among the entire population previous to the arrival of the English, entire tribes of natives having been swept off.' Before 1803, disease may have come from sailors or early sealers." Flood, Josephine, The Original Australians: Story of the Aboriginal People, published by Allen & Unwin, 2006 pp 66-67, citing Bonwick, James: The Last of the Tasmanians, 1870, p85

Historian Geoffrey Blainey (Professor of Economic History, then Professor of History at the University of Melbourne, and Dean of Melbourne's Faculty of Arts, foundation Chancellor at the University of Ballarat.) says that by 1830 in Tasmania: “Disease had killed most of them but warfare and private violence had also been devastating.” Geoffrey Blainey, A Land Half Won, Macmillan, South Melbourne, Vic., 1980, p75

"The natives informed me that plenty of natives had been attacked with Raegerwropper or evil spirit, and had died. Thus the mortality with which the Brune natives had been attacked, appears to have been general among the tribes of aborigines." George Augustus Robinson's diary, 2 February 1830, Friendly Mission, , Plomley, N. J. B., 1966, Tasmanian Historical Research Association, Hobart. “The aborigines of this colony are universally susceptible to cold and that unless the utmost providence is taken in checking its progress at an early period it fixes itself on the lungs and gradually assumes the complaint spoken of i.e. the catarrhal fever.” GA Robinson, note with letter, MacLachlan to Colonial Secretary, 24 May 1831, Friendly Mission, pp461-2 (nb: in those days, catarrhal fever was a term used for influenza, although it is applied to other diseases today) Robinson writing to Edward Curr, 22 Sept 1832, Friendly Mission, p 695, in North and West Tasmania, September 1832: "The numbers of aborigines along the western coast have been considerably reduced since the time of my last visit. A mortality has raged amongst them which together with the severity of the season and other causes had rendered the paucity of their number very considerable."

“Jesse Shipway disputed the analysis of Dirk Moses by suggesting that the Tasmanian genocide “was a by-product of modernisation [the Bauman thesis]. The indigenes died of disease and interruptions in fertility functioning that resulted from incidental encounters with the European interlopers, but the keenness of the administrators to move the Aborigines out of areas suitable for pastoral expansion cannot be separated out from this larger diorama of mortality.”” John Cooper: Raphael Lemkin and the Struggle for the Genocide Convention, Palgrave MacMillan, New York, 2008 ISBN-13: 978-0-230-51691-5, ISBN-10: -0-230-51691-2, p248 (Jesse Shipway: ‘Modern by Analogy: Modernity. Shoah and the Tasmanian Genocide’, Journal of Genocide Research 7:2 (2005): 218-19) Webley442 (talk) 06:50, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

"Theory 2" is your invention, Likebox, the combination of factors argued by Windschuttle to have lead to the extinction were: 1. The pre-colonisation Aboriginal population of Tasmania was low to start with. 2000, 4000, 5000, whatever guess you use and they are all pretty much guesswork, it was low. 2. Life expectancy was low as it was for most hunter-gatherer societies. 3. Infant mortality was high. 4. There was ongoing internal violence: casual violence, feuds, killings over suspected sorcery, and raids on other tribes/bands for women or for other reasons. 5. Deaths through introduced diseases. Diseases could have been introduced not only through the British settlement but also through contact with passing ships including the French visits in 1792 and 1793. The Tasmanian Aborigines were the most isolated group of people on the face of the Earth at the time of British colonisation. Having been isolated since the land bridge to mainland Australia was submerged at the end of the last Ice Age, they had an exceptionally high susceptability to introduced disease. 6. Infertility through introduced venereal diseases. Untreated venereal diseases can lead to infertility. 7. The loss of a significant number of women of childbearing age from the full-blooded Aboriginal gene pool to white sealers and settlers. Some Aboriginal women were abducted, some (possibly including captives taken from other tribes or bands) were traded, i.e. sold by Aboriginal men, some may have been given as ‘gifts’ meant to incorporate the new arrivals into Aboriginal society through marriage and a not insignificant number voluntarily associated themselves with various white sealer and settler groups (easier life, better and more certain food supply). 8. Deaths through conflict between the Aborigines and the British. Webley442 (talk) 07:25, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

Likebox, you say: "The sources show just how fringe Windschuttle's history is. To use it as a basis for comments such as the settlers were guilty of only of "acts of omission", and that genocide scholars base their views on the Tasmanian genocide on "previously published histories" is a gross mischaracterization." It appears that you haven't read the text in the article carefully. The quote "the term 'genocide' only applies to cases of deliberate mass killings of Aborigines by European settlers, or ... might also apply to instances in which many Aboriginal people were killed by the reckless or unintended actions and omissions of settlers." doesn't come from Windschuttle. It comes from Debates on Genocide - Part One Debates on 'Genocide' in Australian History from the Australian Government Department of Education Science and Training website. Also the source I cited in support of the text "basing their analysis on previously published histories" was, again, not Windschuttle. It was Henry Reynolds. It appears that you are letting your opposition to Windschuttle get in the way of accuracy, again. Webley442 (talk) 13:03, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

Likebox you wrote above "This is not 'goalpost shifting'. The debate has always been over the following interpretation: (1) Natives died by being massacred, (2) Natives died by disease. Theory 2 is supported by Windschuttle alone." No it is not, the debate is between those who think it is a clear cut example of genocide as defined by the Genocide Convention (Moss's "Intentionalists") those who do not. Of those who do not there are a range of views from the Structuralists who think that colonialism frequently resulted in a genocide (but a genocide defined without the intent which makes up part of the definition of the Genocide Convention, through to those who do not consider that it is appropriate to use anything other than the Genocide Convention so that without a conspiracy of intent, no genocide is possible. It is not the simple black and white (Windschuttle denialist v. comparative genocide scholars) debate that you repeatedly present. What I am trying to show in this brief overview of an article is a balance which indicates that a range of views exist, and in part whether it is a genocide or not depends on which definition of genocide is used. You seem determined to draw the conclusion that "[All] Natives died by being massacred" which is in my opinion as naive a presentation as someone who says "No Tasmanian Aborigines were ever murdered". The historical record just does not contain enough evidence to definitively conclude one way or another what precisely happen, so the experts look at what is available and then draw conclusions based on that partial evidence. It is not surprising that there is a range of views, and that at the moment the debate is still in progress. It may be in 10 years time a consensus will have emerged and there will be a consensus between comparative genocide scholars and Australian historians on how to describe the events that lead to the extinction of the Tasmanian Aborigines, but at the moment, as there is a range of view, there is no consensus, and our article should reflect that. --PBS (talk) 12:00, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

To quickly respond to the content above:

1. Webley is listing evidence above that there might have been an epidemic just before the Europeans arrive. This type of thing is then speculatively extended to become the cause of death during the black war. That's a self-serving lie. An 1803 epidemic, or even an 1820 epidemic, does not change the mainstream story. So nearly all the information Webley quoted is completely irrelevant to the discussion about genocide.
2. The current article is written as if there were a consensus about widespread diseases, as if genocide by massacre and persecution was not the majority opinion. It must be made to comply with undue weight by including a representative sample of the many mainstream sources I have provided.

The argument "History book X is inaccurate in this detail, therefore the big picture it paints should be entirely left out" is without merit--- all historians make mistakes here and there. This argument would make things worse for Windschuttle, since his documented undisputable mistakes are the most outrageous.

Therefore one must state the traditional view: most historians believe that it was not diseases but massacre and persecution, that drove down the native population. Windschuttle and a few at quadrant disagree. But then sources X,Y point out errors in Windschuttle, as he has pointed out errors in others work.Likebox (talk) 21:33, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

The evidence, as listed above, includes a record of a strong oral tradition amongst Tasmanian Aborigines of a widespread epidemic before British colonisation that is believed to have wiped out a considerable percentage of the Aboriginal population. There are also records of epidemics there after colonisation, which also are believed to have wiped out a significant part of the Aboriginal population. In other words, the epidemics started with the first contact between Aborigines and passing ships and continued through the period of colonisation as a result of contact between Aborigines and sealers, British convicts and settlers. These records fit in well with what is currently known about the effects of introduced disease on non-immune indigenous populations.

Many of the recorded incidences of epidemic disease amongst the Aborigines were recorded by GA Robinson. Rather than try to whitewash violent conflict by lying about disease, Robinson was only too eager to record reports of violent conflict too (so much so that some people played upon his gullibility by telling him tall tales of murderous attacks upon the Aborigines which he dutifully recorded as fact).

Actually the traditional view in Australia was that diseases played a large role in the demise of the Tasmanian Aborigines though violent conflict played a role too and it is still widely regarded as the most credible explanation for what happened.

How evidence regarding the issue of whether the Aborigines mostly died from disease rather than violence is irrelevant to the genocide debate escapes me.

Windschuttle's argument isn't that historians make mistakes, everyone knows that. It is that certain historians have extensively fabricated and falsified evidence to support their arguments. It is only those historians and their supporters who are arguing that it was "a few minor mistakes". If you strike through the fabricated and falsified material in the books and articles of these historians, there is little or nothing left to support those arguments.

As it happens, those same historians and their supporters have behaved similarly with regard to their criticisms of Windschuttle. Many of the alleged errors that they claim Windschuttle made are actually fabrications on their part. They claim that Windschuttle said X and prove that wrong, counting on the fact that only those willing to read his work thoroughly and pay attention know that Windschuttle never said X in the first place; they simply misrepresented his words. Another tactic used (in particular by Lyndall Ryan)has been to claim that further evidence that they produced afterwards proved Windschuttle was in error but if you look closely, it is all smoke and mirrors and the further evidence produced doesn't prove anything of the kind. You've got to pay attention to the details with this mob.

So far, just off the top of my head, the only errors in Fabrication that seem to stand up to scrutiny as genuine errors as opposed to differences in interpretation are 1. where he says a particular Tasmanian colonial painting is in a particular gallery in Tasmania and 2. where he states his belief that an especially bad post-war history textbook was only used in far north Queensland. Apparently that painting is on display in another gallery (although the painting is owned by the gallery he indicated) and that textbook was apparently made use of in NSW. Big deal!Webley442 (talk) 03:14, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

I urge readers to ignore the blatantly biased crap above, and look at the source I provided above (in case you missed it. It's this paper). The mistakes Windschuttle makes are so enormous, it is hard to believe he is a professional historian.

These mistakes lead him to discount the credible eyewitness accounts of massacres, which are the basis for the genocide argument. The massacres are believed to be genuine and widespread by nearly all historians. They are still believed to account for the elimination of the Tasmanians by genocide.Likebox (talk) 04:38, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

Likebox you wrote above that "The current article is written as if there were a consensus about widespread diseases, as if genocide by massacre and persecution was not the majority opinion." The part of the article that specifically mentions the Tasmanian Aboriginies' extinction does not mention desease. The article cites Mark Levene (and another source, John Connor has been cited on this talk page), that states that the majority of Australian experts do not consider the extenction to be a genocide. I have repeatedly ask you to supply a source that contradicts them in their assesment of the debate. To date you have not done so. So why do you repeatedly make statements on what the majority postion is without a source to back it up? --PBS (talk) 06:39, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

Once again: the article LIES and says that the genocide debate is mostly about "crimes of omission". It LIES again and presents Windschuttle's side without mentioning that it is a minority position. It LIES again by not mentioning that the view on mainland smallpox is that of a crazy right-winger. The fact that you and Webley do not recognize what majority and minority positions are should lead you to disqualify yourselves from editing.Likebox (talk) 07:27, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

What PBS is suggesting is in line with one of the common ways of settling disputes over NPOV issues - I've always found that the best way of handling such debates is for everyone to provide all their sources (summarised in a table where possible to keep it concise) then using the results to develop the article. Nick-D (talk) 07:43, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

Just to jump back to the source you keep recommending everyone read, Likebox. One of Lyndall Ryan’s papers, of course. What a reliable source for you to recommend! This is the historian who cited the diaries of Reverend Knopwood as the source for the claims in her book The Aboriginal Tasmanians that between 1804 and 1808 British colonists killed 100 Aborigines in Van Diemen's Land. When Windschuttle pointed out, not unreasonably, that the Knopwood diaries mention only four Aboriginal deaths in that period, Ryan claimed in an interview that her ‘real’ source was an 1810 report by the explorer John Oxley. Unfortunately for her, the journalist had done her homework and questioned her about the fact that the Oxley report doesn’t mention 100 Aboriginal deaths either. Ultimately when backed into a corner and asked by the journalist: “So, in a sense, it is fair enough for him to say that you did make up figures? Ryan answered: “Historians are always making up figures.” Great source, I'd dissect out and comment on all the misrepresentations and fallacies in the linked paper but it would run to pages and pages and it’s not worth my time. For anyone who reads it and can’t spot the misrepresentations and fallacies for themselves, a warning….if you are ever in Sydney and a local comes up to you and offers to sell you that big bridge over the Harbour cheap, don’t give him your money. Webley442 (talk) 08:14, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

The fact that you keep attacking more and more sources as biased is telling. You do not get to make up who gets to be heard here and who does not. A source is a source, and many sources are evidence of undue weight. Also, all the mistakes of Ryan, Tatz, Madley, Mear, and Rashidi put together do not add up to the mistakes of Windschuttle, which are beyond the pale.Likebox (talk) 19:32, 30 August 2009 (UTC)

I haven't 'attacked' Tatz, Madley or Mear as being biased. I do question how much detailed knowledge of the events in Australian history Tatz and Madley have and I question whether Mear was being just a little ambitious in claiming that the opinion of a world renowned expert in smallpox was wrong, however, once again, I have no problem with accurate representations of what they say in the article. The problem that I do have is that I think the use or interpretation of their work that YOU make in your preferred text is extremely biased.

As for bias and Ryan, her past history with regard to historical accuracy including admissions of just making things up and especially the fact that her work was a principal target of Windschuttle's criticisms should indicate that anything she claims with regard to his work or methods shouldn't just be accepted at face value. Once again, I don't have a problem with her papers being cited. I think anyone capable of analysis and critical reasoning plus a little knowledge of the subject can see that the arguments she presents are highly questionable.

If you knew more about the subject, you wouldn't make claims like "all the mistakes of Ryan, Tatz, Madley, Mear, and Rashidi put together do not add up to the mistakes of Windschuttle". Webley442 (talk) 23:54, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

Possible COI

Seeing as Webley has such an intimate familiarity with the events, it is possible that there is a COI. How does one verify that indeed the editing is COI free?Likebox (talk) 04:49, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

By working with other editors to ensure that the article's text takes a neutral point of view. Seeking to identify editors is very strongly frowned upon as it can constitute harassment, and doing this can lead an immediate block. Please see WP:OUTING and the fifth para at Wikipedia:Conflict of interest. Nick-D (talk) 04:57, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Ok--- I do not wish to harass or "Out" anyone. I am just curious--- when one side is represented by a strong authoritative voice that wishes to drown out all opposing voices by sheer verbosity, how do you make a neutral text? This isn't about outing, it's about neutrality.Likebox (talk) 06:19, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

You seek other editors' views (using the dispute resolution process if appropriate) and make positive proposals on how the article can be improved. Nick-D (talk) 08:10, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

I’d call your comments above a bit hypocritical, Likebox, coming, as they do, from someone with a history of WP:3RR violations and other forms of edit warring on other articles (and of denying it). You seem to have become accustomed to getting your way by repeatedly reverting or replacing other people’s work and by denying that what you write is disputed or inaccurate until they give up, abandon the articles and let you edit them as you please.

You are well known for your tactics, Likebox, and I can understand why you have been so frustrated with regard to this article. Instead of giving up on an article that you have tried to ‘take over’ like others have in the past, the other editors working on this article, including PBS and myself, have stuck with it and called upon you to justify the changes that you want to make (which you have still failed to do satisfactorily) and have not let you dodge the issue with diversions and misrepresentations.

What you call neutral text, I call heavily biased as well as extremely simplistic, demonstrating your lack of detailed knowledge of this subject.

And what you call verbosity, I call being forced, over and over again, to provide other editors (whom you have repeatedly called upon to ‘suppress’ us by weight of numbers) with enough information about the subject that they might understand that your claims don’t withstand even the briefest scrutiny.

The history of relations between white settlers and Aborigines in Australia is a complex issue and Tasmanian colonial history has been particularly vexed with people trying to use and abuse it to suit their own agendas going all the way back to Henry Melville in the 1830’s. It isn’t possible for anyone to get an accurate idea of what happened and what the majority of Australian historians have said about the history based on what you can google. You have to do the hard work and read the long, dry history books by reputable authors, and you have to read a broad range of them, not just those whose opinions you agree with.

Lastly, there is no COI here. If it were to become necessary to establish that fact to an administrator, I can do so with no difficulty. Webley442 (talk) 10:16, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Ok, I believe you about COI, but I can assure you that I am not well known in any way. I do strongly believe in the "antagonistic" model of Wikipedia, where progress comes from two opposing sides working in good faith.

In this case, though, one side consists of two people, and the other consists of myself alone. So I am always outnumbered, and the information that ends up in the article always ends up biased. The discussion here intimidates people by its sheer length. You make your points in such a verbose way, that nobody wants to slog through your explanations. I read them, but they are not always directly relevant.

I gave you by now six reliable sources that have been edited out. I do not insist on the text I gave here because I think it the best possible. I insist on it because it is a counterbalance to the biased stuff here. This article should mostly deal with Windschuttle's denial attemps.

But this page should include a few mainstream sources, which means you talk about Tatz, Madley and Mear, and the new sources, conscious of your responsibility to undue weight.Likebox (talk) 20:09, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

I suspect that you are alone and always outnumbered because others with an interest in this article simply don’t agree with you. Isn’t that telling you something?

As for it being just two on our side, no doubt a lot of people don’t have the patience to keep on dealing with your tactics and that this is what you have counted on with regard to other articles. You just keep it up till everyone else ‘goes away’ and lets you win by default. Wearing everyone else down to the point where they give up trying to contribute and you can edit as you like is not a way to achieve a balanced article. Here it seems that everyone else is content to let PBS and myself deal with you. I know that a work colleague and good friend of mine, who recently ‘outed’ himself to me as being The Schoolteacher, gave up on these pages because you make him too angry and that’s not good for his health. (Get well soon!)

Your text gets edited out not because of the sources but because of the unsupported interpretations that you include with them. Once again, it’s fine to say “Tatz argues X, Madley says Y”. (Though there are better sources and if you lived in Australia and had easy access to an Australian University library, you’d know that; just as you would have reason to know that there is a lot more diversity of opinion regarding conflict between settlers and Aborigines and the impact of introduced disease amongst historians than you claim.) That Tatz, Madley and Mear are representative of the majority opinion held by historians is your unsupported contention.

Try putting up for consideration some text that accurately reflects what Tatz, Madley and Mear say without construing it as the TRUTH as believed by everyone in the world and the opinions of those on the other side as lies and the work of ‘kooks’ and ‘nutcases’.

Personally I prefer the work of experts in Australian history, to that of ill-informed international genocide ‘experts’. Of the 3 sources you name, Tatz, Madley and Mear, only Mear was born and educated in Australia (and even so it strikes me as somewhat 'ambitious' for a historian to be disputing the opinion regarding smallpox given by a medical expert, Frank Fenner, a virologist who is a recognized authority on smallpox). Tatz was born and educated in South Africa. Madley was born and educated in the US.

This is an article about the public debate known as the History Wars, not a forum for you to try to disprove Windschuttle’s arguments. Once again, if you lived in Australia and had access to an Australian University library, you’d know it’s not just him arguing that the level of violent conflict (particularly in colonial Tasmania) was not as great as it has been claimed by some historians and that the impact of introduced disease has been grossly underestimated.

Since you seem unaware of much of the historical literature by reputable Australian historians with expertise on this subject, you aren’t in a position to say what is undue weight.Webley442 (talk) 02:05, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

I do not trust anything you say, because you have been so intellectually dishonest about the content of the literature. You refuse to acknowledge the fact that most experts disagree with Windschuttle about diseases and massacres. In this article, you have to label the opinions held by a minority as minority opinions.

I can see that, very rarely, a falsified position can be reinforced by just two people. So the methods of Wikipedia are not infallible. But unlike other debates which occur in secret, the talk page eventually leaves a trail of documentary evidence, and this is useful for future debates, which hopefully will involve more people.

There are plenty of people that agree with me. Here's a sample of their opinions:

Martha P. Grupplepimple: I agree with Likebox! On 'count 'E's so nice an'all.

Wilbur Q Wendlesworthy: Upon first impulse, so to say, initially, I tended to incline to side with that Webley. Now, rather, this Likebox chap is making a lot more sense to me.

Dorothy Knockerpepper: Likebox is my squash partner, and I think he's a really great person.

Jim Youk: Go likebox!

Well, the numbers have it. And to Wilbur, hope your wife gets over her incontinence. Yo Jim, get me some crackers if you stop by the store. And Dorothy, you got one hell of a backhand. Martha, wish I knew you better. Take care,all.Likebox (talk) 05:01, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

I'm sure the above comment will convince everyone of your detailed knowledge of Australian colonial history. I'm even more sure everyone is aware now that your tactics are to make claims that you can't support with valid sources and keep on making them until the other side gives up. That's not going to happen here. Webley442 (talk) 07:45, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

Introduction

As the introduction to an article on a debate between opposing positions, the opening paragraphs need to be neutral. An introduction which effectively 'decides' the outcome of the debate is unsuitable. Wikipedia doesn't rule on who wins debates, it reports what secondary sources say about the debates. Properly sourced text regarding claims made about the aims and motivations of participants in the debate belong further into the body of the article.Webley442 (talk) 22:33, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

I agree there are still problems with the introduction, but it is the "multiple choice" style options that bother me. This is already mentioned above but consensus to change was not reached. Donama (talk) 23:36, 27 August 2009 (UTC)

This was the text Webley replaced (with a minor alteration to be more neutral):

The History wars in Australia are a debate over the history of British colonisation of Australia, and its impact on Indigenous Australians and Torres Strait Islanders. It resembles internal historical debates about past oppression in other countries.

Mainstream history has described Australian colonization as marred by both official and unofficial imperialism, exploitation, ill treatment, colonial dispossession, violent conflict and genocide. This version of history, nearly unanimously supported by academics, is still largely denied by the Australian authorities.

Conservatives within Australia maintain, along with their government, that the history of European settlement was humane, peaceful, with specific instances of mistreatment of Indigenous Australians being aberrations. They claim that that the standard story of dispossession and genocide is harmful for Australian national identity, and is based on bad Historiography tainted by leftist ideological biases.

How does that look to you?Likebox (talk) 03:39, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

Likebox, claims of it being an Australian Government conspiracy might have had some kind of 'relevance' under the previous conservative government. They don't really work too well since the election in which the conservatives were kicked out and a left of centre government elected. Webley442 (talk) 13:27, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

This is not conspiracy, it's a property of denial. Governments on the Australian left and also on the Australian right are to the right of the international consensus, just as Japanese governments left and right minimize WWII atrocities. This is exactly the difference between "Australian NPOV" and "World NPOV" which I brought up originally.Likebox (talk) 20:00, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

And 'World NPOV' or the 'international consensus', as has been pointed out before, isn't very useful in this context as it is based on a very poor understanding of what actually happened here. I've been looking over some of the 'international' literature regarding Australian colonial history and time and time again, I see them making claims about things that supposedly happened here that Australian historians, more broadly read in the details and sources, know are pure invention or based on stories told by highly suspect sources. Webley442 (talk) 22:38, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

You are wrong. It is the same as saying "World POV is not as useful as Israeli POV on the Arab/Israeli conflict" or "World POV is not as useful as Japanese POV regarding Nanking". The fact is that you have a very poor understanding of what actually happened, as do most of those conservative nitwits in Australia. NOBODY outside of Australia agrees with them, and it's not out of ignorance.Likebox (talk) 05:08, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

You are missing the essential difference between Australian colonial history and, in particular, Tasmanian colonial history vs the Arab/Israeli conflict, the Japanese atrocities in Nanking and though you didn't mention it, the Holocaust. The last 3 HAVE been intensively studied by 'world' experts. In those cases, 'world' experts actually went to the locations, dug into the records, in many cases interviewed survivors and participants, often spending years doing it. In the WW2 genocide and atrocity investigations, the earliest researchers were often assisted by the occupying powers who used whatever force was necessary to get to the evidence. That didn't happen with Tasmania. Can you name one of your 'world experts' on the alleged genocide in Tasmania who ever actually set foot in the Archives there? Didn't happen. As I have pointed out before, several times, none of the sources you have cited have done primary research in the field. They relied on secondary sources and on their own assumptions.Webley442 (talk) 06:05, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

I didn't mention the holocaust, because holocaust denial is repudiated within Germany. On the other hand, the Japanese denial of Nanking massacres is well known, as is the Turkish denial of the Ottoman era genocide of the Armenians. Both of these have a "world" POV and a "perp" POV. The "perp" POV always seeks to minimize the issue, and to claim nothing extraordinary was going on, and blames the world for not studying the issue enough.Likebox (talk) 17:07, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

More of the same faulty logic - criminals tend to deny having committed their crime, therefore by your logic, anyone who denies committing a crime must be guilty. Instead of examining and weighing the evidence, the 'denial' becomes your principal 'evidence', more important than any actual evidence relating to the alleged crime.Webley442 (talk) 12:03, 30 August 2009 (UTC)

I am not using logic to make an argument, nor do I need to. This is not a debate between me and you, because your side has no legitimacy as far as I am concerned. I might as well be arguing with a bot.

What I am asserting, not so much for your benefit as for the benefit of others who come to this page, is that both the primary and the secondary literature have a consensus regarding events, a consensus strong enough that it should be convincing to anyone except a moron or a bigot. The only reason this page does not reflect consensus is because a few Australian deniers have taken it over.Likebox (talk) 15:17, 30 August 2009 (UTC)

Rudd calls for history wars truce

New reference, the content of which, probably could be mentioned somewhere in the article: http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/08/27/2669177.htm Donama (talk) 23:37, 27 August 2009 (UTC)

Many historians have

"Many historians have described Australian colonization as ..." are weasel words unless there is a source that can be cited the old wording is better (Wikipedia:Avoid weasel words). So I am reverting the older wording until such time as there is a proposal of how to avoid weasel words such as "Xyz has stated that many historians..." or some other formulation. --PBS (talk) 13:48, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

Since it seems impossible, at present, to quantify the numbers or percentages of academics/historians who hold particular positions on these issues, I was hoping to skate by with 'many' but fair catch, weasel it was. I have no great problems with the older wording, was just trying for some sort of more neutral (and factually accurate) version of Likebox's attempt to see if it could work.Webley442 (talk) 22:26, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

"Mainstream history has described Australian colonization as marred by both official and unofficial imperialism, exploitation, ill treatment, colonial dispossession, violent conflict and genocide." Like box do you have a source for the statement of what is "mainstream history" and its description of Australian colinisation? --PBS (talk) 20:38, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

Mainstream history is history for the last 20 years, and one source is the article quoted in the previous section. Besides, you don't have a source for the crap that's in the intro now.Likebox (talk) 05:09, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

What that sources says is "'I used the term often because there's something very real that it was describing... which was that around about the time of the Howard government, a group of intellectuals, often associated with Quadrant Magazine, began to challenge what was perhaps 20 years or so of history about Aboriginal dispossession and regard it as a kind of left-wing fraud,' he said." That does not say it was the "Mainstream" and it is the view of one of the protagonists to the debate so is phrased in his language.

You are using "conservative" to mean "right wing" although for those who do not have Commonwealth English knowledge might think it means conserving the predominant position (which is why Robert Peel adopted Conservative in place of Tory).

The problem is that your writing from one POV. Your mention "Mainstream" and "Conservative" one could just as easily write "Left wing historians" and "Other historians". It would provide the same information, but would imply in the neutral point of view taken in the passive voice of the article was with the "other historians" (who are not on the left wing extreme), while "Mainstream" and "conservative" which you wrote implies the opposite. --PBS (talk) 09:57, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

The difference is that the POV I am writing from is universal outside Australia. Despite what Webley believes, many people outside Australia are aware of Tasmanian history, and some of them have dug through the archives. It was a popular subject of study in the 1960s-1980s, in the wake of the holocaust, probably continuing today. The consensus outside Australia is so far to the "left" of all the Australian debate, that all the Australians look like loonies to us non-Australians.Likebox (talk) 17:03, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

Likebox you say: "many people outside Australia are aware of Tasmanian history, and some of them have dug through the archives". As I asked above, can you name one, from outside Australia, who has gone into the Tasmanian Archives and done primary research there? If you can't, do you really want to persist in claiming that people who haven't looked at the records know more about what happened than people who have?

The reason that the debate in Australia is different to the debates about what happened elsewhere is that there were a unique set of circumstances here. If there had been the scientific knowledge regarding disease and the lack of immunity of isolated peoples that exist today at the time when Tasmanian colonial history first came under study (and if historians of the time had been interested in disease and its effects rather than only in exploration, political action, warfare and so forth), Tasmanian colonial history would have been used as the definitive case study on the effects of disease introduced through colonialism.Webley442 (talk) 22:24, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

Likebox you wrote "It was a popular subject of study in the 1960s-1980s, in the wake of the holocaust, probably continuing today." Yet Mark Levene, (citation in the article) lists as his earliest reference a comparative genocide paper from the 1980's what is the source for your claim for 1960's-1980's? Also this article is about "History wars" which is not just the extinction in Tasmania, but about the interpretation of the colonisation of Australia in general and how it was implemented. As to your comment "The consensus outside Australia is so far to the 'left' of all the Australian debate, that all the Australians look like loonies to us non-Australians." Do you have a reliable source for that? If not then please keep to the topic title, write within NPOV boundaries and only summarise what the sources say. Oh yes and who is "us non-Australians"? --PBS (talk) 08:14, 30 August 2009 (UTC)

If you think I am going to find sources for comments on the talk page, you've completely lost your mind.Likebox (talk) 15:22, 30 August 2009 (UTC)

<--The purpose of the talk page is to discuss changes to the article. Likebox, you are in part justifying you edits to the article, by making sweeping statements on the talk page. But unless you can present sources to justify such statements, all you are doing is using this talk page as a forum for presenting you own opinions. If you have no sources, then please do not edit the article and please do not use this talk page as a forum for you own opinions (WP:V, WP:POV, WP:TALK). -- PBS (talk) 19:10, 30 August 2009 (UTC)

What kind of sophistry is this? A talk page is for people to express their opinions about what should and should not be in the article. Their talk page opinions need not be, and will never be, something that needs to be carefully sourced.

You have expressed the IGNORANT opinion that Windschuttle's opinion is respected academically. That's incorrect, and I have presented sources to establish that. You ignore those sources, and that's your ignorant prerogative. The claim about the 1960s-1980s is based on my familiarity with old literature, my internal timeline for genocide studies, and the few non-academic references to the Tasmanian genocide I read about from that era. I will not try to source it, since it would be a waste of time.Likebox (talk) 19:18, 30 August 2009 (UTC)

"You have expressed the IGNORANT opinion that Windschuttle's opinion is respected academically." Where have I expressed that opinion?

"The purpose of a Wikipedia talk page is to provide space for editors to discuss changes to its associated article or project page. Article talk pages should not be used by editors as platforms for their personal views." (WP:TALK) couple that to What Jimbo once said "There seems to be a terrible bias among some editors that some sort of random speculative 'I heard it somewhere' pseudo information is to be tagged with a 'needs a cite' tag. Wrong. It should be removed, aggressively, unless it can be sourced. This is true of all information, but it is particularly true of negative information about living persons." (WP:PROVIT) and "The claim about the 1960s-1980s is based on my familiarity with old literature, my internal timeline for genocide studies, and the few non-academic references to the Tasmanian genocide I read about from that era." seems to be very much "random speculative 'I heard it somewhere' pseudo information". Now if you had only done this one, it would be one thing but you keep doing it time after time, and refuse to o the hard work and find some sources to back up you speculation on what all right thinking people know to be true. Spend some time finding some sources to back up your position or pleas stop using this talk page as a platform for your personal views. --PBS (talk) 21:00, 30 August 2009 (UTC)

I have never tried to get the claim that "most people thought it was genocide in the 1960s-1980s" into the article. I'm just telling you that because it's true. The claim I tried to get into the article is that this is the longstanding consensus within the field of genocide studies, and outside Australia. This I have supported by numerous reference. This is what we are arguing about.

What you call my own "personal views" are in fact the views of nearly everyone outside of the Australian right that studies the Tasmanian genocide. I gave you sources, and you ignore them, so I continue to speak, and nyah nyah, you can't stop me.Likebox (talk)