Indigenous Incarceration in Australia

Some children today are raised in ways that make it easier for them to become doctors, scientists or engineers. While others are raised in ways that make it more likely they will become welfare recipients or criminals. For the most part their culture is the main problem as they place little to no value on education.

 

I have to say that public schools (primary & secondary) are actively encouraging those that identify as aboriginal or Torres Straigh Islander to be involved in indigenous events and days where ever possible.
I just hope that these programs are approved by elders, not history as I was taught back then !
One day some of these kids will grow up into roles to effect more change, and for the better.
Only together can we move forward

 

l don't mean give it all back , not possible some things can't be undone.
But some , and if there's tribes all over Australia then that's great , fantastic in fact , give them back some of wherever they are. lf we can sell our biggest and most valued dairy farms in the country and much much more to the Chinese , then we can give some of it back to our tribes too. l know they have , tiny bits though and riddled with conditions, no conditions, give it back and let them look after it and their people,give them their pride and identity back, that's what they need, they'll do a better job in both than we are. lt's a huge country with no people, we could it .
lt'd give us back ours too actually , and how cool would it be , having out native Australians pocketed all over our country , with their ways and lifestyles too. Place is pretty damn plain and boring as it is , things like differences and some variation is just what the joint needs.

 

l hate that Australia is once again following the US but at the same time it is good that they're demo'ing here is about bringing attention to our own people and their situation.

 

As l would;ve guessed , it turns out yeah we do have a few Aboriginal people in Parliament but they basically get no say in anything because Australia's one of the only countries in the world left that haven't passed a referendum giving it's indigenous people any real say. Of course NZ did it yrs ago matter of fact their deputy pm is part mari and Canada and the US and many others . Apparently it even had to be resurrected to even be started again after Howard completely scrapped it when he was in but starting is as far as it's got in all these years since.

So strange how no Aussies even seem to giva **** about anything real , like gw , our indigenous , real recycling our lack of ability to manufacture anything or who's running the country and their views , who's buying the country, not even our terrible wildlife record , just money .
l'd really like to find a forum that cares about this stuff and get involved in all this stuff if anyone happens to know of one , this'll probably get deleted l know.

 

Since the 1991 Royal Commission, 433 x Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people have been killed in custody. That is an average of 23 per year. Awful!!!

But alcohol is a bigger killer of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people than Police. In fact, 190 x Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander deaths per year are caused by alcohol.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander recorded rates of mortality directly attributable to alcohol is five times higher than that of the Non-Indigenous population over the 2013 to 2017 period. The annual average per 100,000 capita for this time frame was 23.8. Non-Indigenous Australians recorded a rate of 4.7 alcohol-induced deaths per 100,000 persons over the same period.

3303.0 - Causes of Death, Australia, 2017

That is 3,600 x Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander deaths at the hands of alcohol vs 433 deaths at the hands of Police/prison officers.

Why aren’t people protestIng against alcohol?

 

Interestingly, the break down of Deaths in custody covers areas I was not aware of.

1. Motor vehicle pursuits.
2. Other forms of pursuit.
3. Natural causes.
4. Self inflicted deaths, (Suicide)

While alcohol related issues has no bearing on Deaths in custody, it certainly is attributable to incarceration rates with many crimes being alcohol fuelled.

 

Exactly.

The title of this thread is:

Indigenous Incarceration in Australia​

By reducing alcohol abuse, one would expect unlawful activity to be reduced, one would incarceration rates to be reduced and one would hope/expect deaths in custody to reduce (currently an average of 15 per year for Indigenous people).

Another side benefit would be that people would live longer (currently alcohol abuse results in the deaths of an average of 190 per year for Indigenous people).

 

l was so disappointed to hear a survey result today after the demo's , and surprise surprise , most Aussies still just don't giva **** basically , about our indigenous and what's been happening and has been for centuries now. Not even just on that one issue of deaths in custody , about anything to do with them.

 

They are known as deaths in custody. Police and prison officers haven't "killed" 433 people in custody. A fair number of those that died have taken their own lives. Some have died during vehicle pursuits. Others have died when they have tried to stab police and been shot in self defence. Police may have been negligent in some cases but the underlying factor is often alcohol.

 

I believe there were over 70 deaths in Custody in Australia in the past 12 months, 17 of which were aboriginal.

 

Sorry, it won't work........
"The Minister for Indigenous Australians, Ken Wyatt, believes the justice problem can't be solved with law reform alone.
"In my home state [Western Australia, you can be] incarcerated for not paying a fine, [taking that away] could reduce substantially and immediately [the incarceration rate]."
"There are serious offences we can not set aside, but there are others we must look at it."
In part I agree, there shouldn't be an unpaid fine if repayments are deducted from any government benefit a person might be receiving (or wage garnishing), but ultimately the fine is the deterrent with non payment being (further fines or) incarnation, otherwise there is no deterrent for committing an offence in the first place

As stated earlier, as a step parent to indigenous children I have seen them let off with no conviction recorded (aka no aboriginal statistic reported) repeatedly for shoplifting while their cohort in the crime was fined with conviction, there was no deterrent and reoffending continues and escalates to this date

PS: All lives matter

 

You are correct. I used the wrong word. I meant/should have used the word “died“. Sorry.

Exactly.

That is why I wrote my original post. If we can reduce alcohol abuse, we will reduce unlawful behaviour, incarcerations and deaths, both inside and outside our justice system.

So why isn’t there (more) protesting against alcohol (abuse) ?

 

Howdy from the NT where a large portion of the population is indigenous.

This is a huge multifaceted problem and everyone wants a solution. I don't have one. God I wish I did. Even then, I'm white and come from a life of relative privelidge and would be adding to the problem, not fixing it if I did.

What I can do though is explain some of the issues that are behind indigenous incarceration. Hopefully this will give you some idea of the mountain a lot of indigenous people have to climb...

Old school Indigenous culture is very generous. If a family member asks you for something - you give it. That's polite and the rules. But this also can make it hard to hold down a job. What do you do if uncle Phil wants the car and you need to get to work? You don't go to work. What if you've just been paid and your cousin is asking you for money? You give it.

I've seen many instances where it's easier to not have a job than deal with the family asking you to support them. Then people become idle, get bored and trouble begins....

Then there's intergenerational wealth. At some point most (not all) of us receive some sort of windfall or inheritance. It may be a little or a lot but it helps us pay off our house, invest in a business...move forward in some way. Most indigenous don't have this and over multiple generations it is totally a factor.

Then there's unintentionally crap government policy. Remember the baby bonus? A lot of parents who weren't parents for the right reasons became parents again... there's now a huge problem trying to house all the people. Houses are overcrowded...this causes big social and health issues.

The NT intervention? Although it was introduced to stop abuse it failed by taking power away from indigenous communities and sent thousands of people looking for a drink into towns and cities where they get into trouble and incarcerated.

Diet? Kids grow up eating generally poor diets due to either poverty or they live on a community where a head of broccoli is $15 and a bag of hot chips is $5. How do you reckon that is going to affect well being...not to mention the ability to think and make good decisions?

FASD. If your mum drinks booze while you're in the womb it can severely affect your mental capacity. This is endemic amoungst the indigenous. Its a real tragedy.

Then there's racism, a lack of cultural awareness by the authorities........

What I've written here is the tip of the iceberg and I've surely missed important things.

It's also worth remembering that a lot of people navigate all of this and go on to do great things but it's undeniably hardest for an Indigenous person in this country than a non-indigenous.

The cards are stacked against them and you can't solve indigenous incarceration without first tackling all the factors that cause it.

One of the biggest factors is that it just isn't discussed. Hopefully now, at least that will change.

 

... 500% more likely to die from alcohol.

 

Exactly

 

Kudos for a quality post
As an outsider, I don't think I can change Abotiginal society, but if they thought like Chinese...

The family matters... hard to break away from

In Chinese families, parents are really important, it is expected that kids will support parents in their old age. But Chinese parents have really high expectations of their kids, must do well at school* and get a good job. Parents often help this by getting to kids to go to out of school coaching. It is just expected. If you don't do well at school and get a good job you will bring shame to your parents, or at the very least, people will wonder what went wrong.

If other Aboriginal family members would stop asking for money from their working family members this would go a long way towards lifting their society. As it is, it appears there seems to be no long term incentives for Aboriginal people to work hard if they have to just give it all away.

*Yes, this can go too far