Speech

“Today we honour the Indigenous people of this land, the oldest continuing cultures in history.”
Good afternoon year 8 students and teachers.
Have you ever felt like you have been mistreated? Like you have been singled out for no reason?
This is how Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people have felt, and many still do to this day.
Prime Minister Kevin Rudd’s apology speech in February 2008 was addressed to all Indigenous people, past and present for the previous and at times continuing mistreatment of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.
He particularly highlighted the wrongful removal of young Indigenous children away from their families; those children know being known as the stolen generation and accepted that previous governments had not only stolen these children from their families but from their culture and their land.
Kevin Rudd in his speech said that “we” apologise. He uses goes on and uses the word ‘we’ many more times in his speech. By doing this he apologises on behalf of the whole nation, he also acknowledges that laws that were passed by previous governments which enabled Indigenous people to be unfairly singled out was wrong and should not have occurred. HE also stated that these injustices must never happen again.
Though it was good to see Kevin Rudd acknowledge the past mistreatment of Aboriginal people unlike past governments, he should never been in that position in the first place.
Past governments were the ones at fault and should have never made laws that enabled Indigenous to be mistreated in such ways. People that lived back then and didn’t stand up to this mistreatment are also at fault, the mistreatment of Indigenous people should never have happened.
Prime Minister Kevin Rudd’s apology speech has made me question the values of society. As I said before, he should never been in the situation where he had to apologise, the mistreatment of Indigenous people should never have happened.
Past societies should have...