The government Policies of Protection and Assimilation impacted the lives of the Stolen Generation negatively, contradicting its main purposes. The term ‘Stolen Generations’ was used to describe the unwilling removal of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children from 1901 to 1970. The children had to abandoned and reject their Aboriginality, assimilating into western values and norms. Consequently, many suffered from the trauma of losing their families, identity and culture. Also, the Aboriginal children had to cope with discrimination from the white community and the fact of having their human rights taken away.
The loss of family and a motherly figure negatively impacted the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children. The Policy …show more content…
The Policy of Assimilation was based around the idea of encouraging Aboriginal people to give up their Aboriginal culture and adopt the ‘white’ ways. This policy was meant to do good for the Aborigines, but it was truly just another way of destroying the Aboriginal culture. According to source B, the Australian Government mainly targeted the children of mixed descent or also known as “Half-caste” (a term now considered derogatory), for the purity of White Australia. Children taken away from their families were stripped of their Aboriginality and they had to adopt white culture. Their names were changed completely and they were forbidden to speak in their native language. Source E is a photo of boys in an institution and it clearly displays that they have assimilated into Western culture. The boys were wearing masculine clothing with neatly groomed hair. Assimilation into White culture can also be seen in Source A and it shows a staged photo of Margaret Kay at Cootamundra Girls Home (A domestic training home where girls were trained to become servants. Any contact with the family was not permitted). In the photo, she was wearing a long, white dress, looking neat and tidy with a smile on her lips. In both of the sources, the children stood in an orderly manner, very regimented compared to the Aboriginal culture. Those with a lighter skin tone were brainwashed into thinking that they have no Aboriginal heritage and only found out about their real culture when they became adults. As the children grew up, they had no sense of belonging and identity as the White society could only see them as an Aboriginal and nothing else. Some have tried to return to their Aboriginal communities and in some cases, they were not welcomed back since they were too ‘European’. Hence, the Policy of Assimilation was a negative impact to the Stolen Generations as it resulted in the