Charles Perkins Aboriginal Rights

The Charles Perkins 1965 freedom ride was the act of a group of university students organised to have a bus tour of western and coastal New South Wales towns. The whole point of the freedom ride was to draw attention to the state in which aboriginal health, education and housing was in, it was in a poor state. There goal was to hopefully point out and to help lessen the social discrimination against aboriginals that had existed between them and white residents. The group of students formed this group and called it “Student Action for Aborigines” (SAFA) IN 1964 to plan out how the trip would go and try and get media coverage.

The American Freedom Rides were motivated by the ‘Journey of Reconciliation’ in 1947, “led by civil rights activists Bayard Rustin and George Houser”1. The Freedom Rides in America involved riding a bus opposing the segregation of black and whites riding together in buses2.

The rights and freedoms of Aboriginals have improved drastically since 1945 with many changes to government policy, cultural views and legal rules to bring about a change from oppression to equality. Unfortunately on the other hand, some rights and freedoms have not improved at all or have even worsened.

In 1967, a landmark event occurred for the Indigenous Community of Australia. They were no longer declared Flora and Fauna This means that Aboriginal people would be considered a part of the landscape and not humans in their own right.. In 1967, a Referendum was held by all members of Australian society voting on the issue of allowing Indigenous Australian to be a part of the census and thereby able to vote and be counted as part of Australia’s population. This achieved not only citizenship for Aboriginal people, but put the issue of Indigenous Rights on both the political and social platforms. This essay will look at the lead up to the Referendum, how Aborigines and their supporters communicated their belief in their rights to the

"You have the right to live in the kind of world where your rights and freedoms are respected" conveyed in Article 28 draws attention to the way aboriginal people were forced to live in, as they were prejudiced from the main towns in Australia. Article 28 gave respected freedom and rights to the indigenous to live however they want. On the 4th of May, 1961 a similar protest to the aboriginal freedom ride took place. A group of African-American and white civil rights protestants began bus trips to several towns in South America. The Freedom Rides were established by the Congress of Racial Equality, a US civil rights groups. Their purpose was to test the 1960 decision that segregation of national bus terminals was prohibited. They attempted to use 'white only' lunch tables, waiting rooms and restrooms. This proved to be a dangerous mission as they endured a lot of violent. Another evidence of White-Americans hatred towards the Africans was the incident that transpired inAnniston, Alabama. One bus was firebombed and the African-American passengers were forced to flee for their lives.

In 1964 there was a protest outside the US consulate in Canberra that two thousand people had attended to protest about racial segregation and civil rights in the United States. Many people of the general public stated things such as if protesters are going to so much trouble why not protest about racial segregation within our own country. These comments had lead to the making of our own Australian Freedom Riders which were based on the American Freedom Riders who were making a difference with civil rights and discrimination in America. They travelled across America to raise awareness of the issues when it came to the African-American’s rights and they helped achieve equality. The Australian Freedom Riders helped in achieving freedom for

During the ongoing visits on ‘The Freedom Rides’ around the many towns like Bowraville, Boggabilla and Moree, the students had observed the kind of segregation and refusal of service the Aboriginal people faced in places like pools, clubs and shops. In reference to the image in source 3, the itinerary showed the expected dates for stops, demonstrations and surveys and when they would return back to Sydney which would altogether take place over 2 weeks. The students filmed and filed reports to the ABC of the kind of treatment and racism Aboriginal people received, for instance their living conditions and locations which Charlie Perkins in source 4 describes as ‘at river banks, shanties, huts or at the end of a road where there’s (a) rubbish tip’. The main reason of their filming was to show people the truth on what was happening in country towns and to not believe what the news covered Australia to be; that racism did not exist. The publicity gained from The Freedom Rides raised awareness of the racism in Australia and influenced the 1967 Referendum and other campaigns in the future with similar purposes.

The legacy of the Freedom Ride political action was a greater awareness of Aboriginal issues in a rural context. Perkins and his fellow students had successfully stirred up debate and sparked discussion around Australia on the state of Aboriginal affairs. Awakening media interest in Aboriginal affairs was positioned in favor of the Black Australian cause, to the severe embarrassment of many white townspeople in rural New South Wales. In the ensuing public debate, urban public knowledge of racial discrimination grew, some

The NSW freedom rides occurred in 1965 from the 12th of February to the 26th February starting in Sydney, travelling through inland NSW and finishing in Sydney. The Freedom Rides were lead by Kumantjayi (Charles) Perkins who was a member of the SAFA (Student Action for Aborigines) club in the University of Sydney. The activists were concerned with the: Aboriginal living and health issues; aboriginal people being made to live on reserves out of town; local authorities denying Aboriginal people to facilities (hotels, club, swimming pools, service in shops, and equal treatment in cinemas); the ways in which rural communities discriminated against Aboriginal people. The Activists impacted upon the opinions of individual people, the public and of the government by raising public awareness, recognising Charles Perkins as a national figure and by providing support for the 1967 Referendum.

This childhood motivated him to go to university and eventually help other indigenous Australians to follow suit. After Perkins went to the University of Sydney, from where he graduated in 1965 with a Bachelor of Arts he eventually

In February 1965, a young group of regular students from the University of Sydney organised a bus tour that ran through the Western and Coastal New South Wales towns. These bus tours targeted towns such as Walgett, Moree and Kempsey and were recognised as The Freedom Rides. The group aimed with hope to acknowledge and expose to the public the socially discriminatory barriers which existed between Aboriginals and white people. The student body called their group ‘Student Action for Aborigines’ (SAFA) and aimed to draw the public’s attention to the appalling treatment and state of Aboriginal health, education and living conditions in Australia as well as the issue that Aboriginals were not counted as Australian citizens. The students attention

Charles Perkins is a half Aboriginal man who was born in Alice Spring. Father Smith took him and other Aboriginal boys to Adelaide and brought them up in boys’ institution (Source1). When the Church decided to close it because of financial difficulty, Charles Perkins felt dejected as he stated “Which was a real tragedy”(source1) since the boys’ institution was producing some good results from the kids. However, he still faced the toughness in that time because technically he is in the term Stolen Generation and he had his own responsibility to look after himself (Source1). When he grew up, he continued his study in Sydney University (Source 3). Charles Perkins played a key role in Aboriginal right issues through very successful campaign in

The Freedom Riders tested this decision and poor implementation of the law by riding the buses in the South in blended racial groups to test neighborhood laws or traditions that upheld seating segregation on buses. The Freedom Rides, and the brutal responses: stirred outrage, and supported the Civil Rights Movement. They called national attention to the

Racial discrimination is an inevitable concern in this current society. In Australia, it was an underlying, yet very apparent issue during the mid 1900’s. However, this began to change with the assistance of Indigenous Australian Charles Perkins and Sydney University students. They aimed to break the various physical and social barriers between Aboriginals and white Australians by touring Northern New South Wales. This was officially known as the 1965 Freedom Rides. It can be hypothesised that there were multiple factors that were involved in the 1965 Freedom Rides that contributed remarkably towards the 1967 Referendum. The evidence gathered from multiple sources aim to support the thesis statement, discussing matters involving the aims and outcomes of the Freedom Rides, the media involvement in the Freedom Rides, as well as the laws and rights formed in the Referendum as a result of the Freedom Rides increasing awareness of racial inequality. These factors notify the significance of the Freedom Rides.

I am in the group aboriginal rights. Honestly, when I saw I was part of this group I had to look up what the term actually meant. After some personal research to become familiar with the term, I dove in. Our group got to work identifying tasks. There are three members in our group and each member has done an exceptional job putting in key research for the project. I have experience with website design so we agreed I would work on that. Another member of our group was assigned to researching some key sources and has provided us via email with multiple key sources for our topic. The final member gave some suggestions for a focus for our group as well as making some lists to presenting to us. We discussed a focus of our topic as Poor Education