I'm really not sure what to think of the "send in the troops" solution to the problem of child sexual abuse in Aboriginal communities around Australia. Teams of troops and police being sent to the Northern Territory as part of the crack-down within days has led to a number Aboriginal and community leaders and groups delivering an open letter to the PM to ask if the methods for intervention could be changed (in some ways, I can see why people are seeing this as a rather scary response - imagine if the army was coming to sort your community out!) (also, it seems divisive).

I don't think anyone would disagree with there needing to be something done about the abuse of children in any community. But maybe something could have been done a little earlier instead of waiting for an election. I mean major crisis. I remember watching Lateline last year sometime before my ABC reception died (so it must have been early last year) and a woman talking about a study into abuse in Indigenous communities and how it had been found to be a major problem.

Nothing was done back then, by either State, Territory or Federal governments but bickering. This is something that should be above politics, though, and using it as a political tool of some variety just seems very cynical indeed... Particularly when it comes after years of sitting-on-hands (all while pointing fingers - most uncomfortable!!!).

The chief executive of Anglicare Australia, Dr Ray Cleary, has asked why it's taken so long for the government "to recognise something that the wisdom and experience of agencies like ours have been saying for 20 years." So successive governments have obviously failed to do something about the problem. After two decades of aid agencies acknowledging problems in Indigenous communities, though, you sort of think, "Well, why hasn't someone been listening and doing something about this??"

And this sudden reaction seems half-baked at the best, particularly when there seems to have been no real consultation with health professionals, governments, councils, Aboriginal leaders, etc. Okay, I hear you say abuse needs a quick reaction initially to help the people who are in the situation of being abused. Yes. But how to do it in consultation with Indigenous leaders and all without seeming like whitefella comes in, makes all the rules, rides out feeling brave and heroic while not much changes? Particularly when we have the history we do with the Stolen Generation and generally treating Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders as second-class citizens?

You also have to ask where the funding will come from, where the extra doctors necessary for the health checks for all children will come from (considering the current rural doctor crisis), how this will impact the police forces, just how banning alcohol and pornography and making the Aboriginal people clean their houses is going to stop children being raped?

Indigenous Affairs Minister, Mal Brough, reckons this will take about five years to sort out. There's more about that by Tim Colebatch here.

Little Children are Sacred is the report that's put a fire under the PM and it makes it pretty clear that this isn't something that will just be able to be cleared up nice and quickly - it's more likely going to take decades. The report says that sexual abuse is something that's often the result of social breakdown and wouldn't this imply that society will need to be rebuilt? The report itself says: "Put simply, the cumulative effects of poor health, alcohol, drug abuse, gambling, pornography, unemployment, poor education and housing and general disempowerment lead inexorably to family and other violence, and then on to sexual abuse of men and women and, finally, of children."

Yikes.

All of those things need to be worked on... Rebuilt, repaired, re-educated... And with cooperation and input from the Aboriginal communities. And it's going to take money, time, effort, willingness to change, etc, not just the army in there for five years and some health checks (plus making sure your house is neat). You can't just treat the symptom here, but have to work back through all of the problems that tumble into line behind it. And arguing that Aboriginal people just need to get some jobs is just blah. Rural employment is hard enough to get in most areas. So they should move to where the jobs are is the next argument. But how do you get a job without skills, education, etc? Unless you get one that pays you less than being on the dole and means you're away from your ancestral home.

Ugh. It's depressing. The cynical, tired side of me says it's still political points-scoring, more likely to further alienate the Aboriginal people and like the 2007 version of Children Overboard. Is the rest of the electorate going to see it as such? Who knows. There are more than enough people out there already prejudiced against Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.

Okay, I think I can't ponder this more at the moment without my brain wanting to explode, so you can check out more thoughts about this that I've found interesting here, here and here.

Also, the Northern Territory Government's Inquiry report into child abuse can be found here (download the PDF file). Although the report is long and depressing, the section on Myths (4.2) is particularly interesting, noting that the perpetrators are a mix of Indigenous and non-Indigenous people. So what does this mean for the communities and Aboriginal people themselves, who seem to be the ones blame is being apportioned to? Hmm.