Edited by Azizi Powell
This pancocojams post showcases the Australian song "Took The Children Away" by Archie Roach
The lyrics of that song are included in this post along with selected comments from that YouTube sound file.
The Addendum to this post presents information about Australia's child removal policies that resulted in what is called "stolen generations" of indigenous Australians.
The content of this post is presented for historical, socio-cultural, and aesthetic purposes.
All copyrights remain with their owners.
Thanks to Archie Roach for composing and performing this song. Thanks to all those who are quoted in this post and thanks to the publisher of this sound file on YouTube.
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LYRICS- TOOK THE CHILDREN AWAY
(Archie Roach)
This story's right, this story's true
I would not tell lies to you
Like the promises they did not keep
And how they fenced us in like sheep.
Said to us come take our hand
Sent us off to mission land.
Taught us to read, to write and pray
Then they took the children away,
Took the children away,
The children away.
Snatched from their mother's breast
Said this is for the best
Took them away.
The welfare and the policeman
Said you've got to understand
We'll give them what you can't give
Teach them how to really live.
Teach them how to live they said
Humiliated them instead
Taught them that and taught them this
And others taught them prejudice.
You took the children away
The children away
Breaking their mothers heart
Tearing us all apart
Took them away
One dark day on Framingham
Come and didn't give a damn
My mother cried go get their dad
He came running, fighting mad
Mother's tears were falling down
Dad shaped up and stood his ground.
He said 'You touch my kids and you fight me'
And they took us from our family.
Took us away
They took us away
Snatched from our mother's breast
Said this was for the best
Took us away.
Told us what to do and say
Told us all the white man's ways
Then they split us up again
And gave us gifts to ease the pain
Sent us off to foster homes
As we grew up we felt alone
Cause we were acting white
Yet feeling black
One sweet day all the children came back
The children come back
The children come back
Back where their hearts grow strong
Back where they all belong
The children came back
Said the children come back
The children come back
Back where they understand
Back to their mother's land
The children come back
Back to their mother
Back to their father
Back to their sister
Back to their brother
Back to their people
Back to their land
All the children come back
The children come back
The children come back
Yes I came back.
Songwriters: Archibald William Roach
Took The Children Away lyrics © O/B/O Apra Amcos
From
TheRaaaaw, Published on Apr 27, 2010
Für alle, die es wie ich verzwifelt gesucht haben.. aber nur solche blöden Versionen gefunden haben ;)
Sehr cooles Lied, ich glaube die meisten hier kennen es aus dem Englisch Unterricht :D
-snip-
Google translate from German to English: "For all who desperately wanted it like me .. but only found such stupid versions;)
Very cool song, I think most of you know it from English lessons: D"
-snip-
Here are some comments from this sound file's discussion thread, with numbers added for referencing purposes only:
1. Alissa Xo, 2012
"Such a beautiful song that touch's the soul and such a blessed voice luv he's music =)
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2. TheMimifur,2014
"This is not just a song. It's Archie's story and his life. The music was used in a film called Rabbit Proof Fence - a story about these children. This happened in our life time. Be outraged."
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REPLY
3. Glenda Pospisil, 2017
"Yes certainly in my time but I was totally unaware of it and grew up beside an indigenous family. They were very close friends of mine."
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REPLY
4. Anythya Silvadragon, 2018
"My great grandmother was one of those children stolen, I'm proud to be Koori, but sad that they white washed us."
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5. Rebecca Jones, 2016
"my kids play this song all the time it makes us cry all the pain that our children have because they took way from there morther and farther this is never go to end"
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6. Russell Lean, 2016
"I met Archie in 1993 at the last ever Maleny festival. What a beautiful voice, beautiful generous spirited man. Such stories of truth. The history white Australia doesn't want to hear. the stories we need to hear. Blessings Archie."
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REPLY
7. Erin Redford, 2017
"im an Aussie and we learnt about this song In school!"
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8. sallie6, 2016
"children (black and white) are still being taken from their families without realising the long term effects when these children become
adults"
**
9. Marche Singleton, 2016
"The sad thing is this is universal. In America it was the American Indian children. Now it is African American and Spanish. Social service will pay an unfit foster parent to raise someone's child, but will not give that same help to the parent. Sex, money and abuse too often falls on the child. You have to wonder about the evil intent of this madness."
**
REPLY
10. Gabby Thommo, 2017
"indigenous baby's got taken away for no reason"
**
11. Michelle Gillam, 2016
"where is the justice for children taken away in the 1970s because mother was single"
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REPLY
12. TRACEY HANSHAW, 2018
"and in the 60s because their mother was single and their father was white ? Same sh&t* different decade. Nothings changed 50 years on"
-snip-
*This word is fully spelled out in this post.
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REPLY
13. Michelle Gillam, 2016
"i Know what its like they took my baby .White mother.Single 1970 unmarried mother they just took Queen Victoria Hospital She never came back. How about the white children they took away"
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REPLY
14. Kenneth Kelly, 2018
"Im sorry you lost your child. As an Aboriginal son whose dad was Stolen from his mother I understand your loss. This song is for you as well."
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15. Meri Rowe, 2017
":'( Deeply damaging to the First Nation. Thanks for the honesty in your music , Archie. I'm sorry my people did such evil to your people :'("
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16. colin macdonald, 2017
"stumbled upon this, done lots of homework,so sorry to the peoples who were bellonging for 60,000 yrs maybe longer
please do keep singing THE TRUTH."
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REPLY
17. Ty, 2018
"Same things that happened in Australia happened in North America, look up ‘My Country Tis Of Thy People You’re Dying’ by Buffy saint Marie, if you change some words it’s similar to Australia’s story. I think y’all should start standing up for aboriginal Australia and raise more awareness about the history, that’s what I’m doing for my tribe, good luck from the Syilx tribe of the Salish Nation of Canada!"
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REPLY
18. Leonard Carr, 2018
"Tyler 1/32 Ngai Tahu NZ Maori,nearly makes me cry.54 yr old biker looking fella!😢"
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19. ritenrong jusayen, 2017
"I was taken,so yeah,this,I,do relate to.thanks for sayen&singing how it is.love u brother.still crying.."
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20. Darren, 2017
"What a disgraceful part of this nations history. Good on you Archie for writing this song."
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21. David Barker, 2018
"My Dad, and 3 Aunties were stolen. Because they lived the old ways and the government came and said it was child abuse?! Living the way that sustained our people for 1000s of years having strong families, food and shelter since time began was all of a sudden unacceptable for our people?! And the results of their so called actions for the health and well-being of my Dad and Aunties turned out to be the most damaging and abusive things that ever happened to them!
They elders and ancestors had it way harder than we do now... But they would curse us from the dreaming if we didn't continue to stand strong against todays continued injustices! Their lives are fuel for our spirits to continue holding people accountable..."
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REPLY
22. Angie pangie, 2018
"@David Barker I'm so sorry for what happened to your family. My sons are damaged too.politics in my state told me oneday I'm not of aboriginal decent, when I grew up in the community😞 then they took my boys. I try so hard to remember all that elders taught me as a kid so I can help my boys now they home after being abused in care. I get scared that I will forget all that the elders taught me as I try to keep it alive for my healing sons"
**
23. Delleise Exton, 2018
"love this song always brings me to tears....love my people n love this song."
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24. Barry Brown, 2018
"Im so sorry for all the hardship u indigenous ppl of australia suffered,even tho im a native of new zealand we had similar experiences maybe not as hard but we still had to fight for wat was originally ours and we still fighting we ended up getting a treaty and are the only indigenous to have so but our land is not as vast as yours and the minerals and treasures god gave australia was incredible so the british just had to have it unfortunately and take the whole lot there"
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25. Amanda Crocker, 2018
"My kids dad dad is 1 that was taken back in the day I do not know a lot about this but I am getting there as my kids need to know where family come from"
**
26. Anythya Silvadragon, 2018
"My great grandmother was one of those children, stolen from her family and forced into a girls camp to grow up without her mob, so this resonates with me. I'm Proud to be Koori, even if i'm milky. Lol"
**
27. Super Bolt, 2018
"I'm aboriginal like u brother"
**
28. TURN DOG QUICK TV, 2018
"Playing this song on 26th January 2018 when Aboriginal children are still being taken by the Australian Government."
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ADDENDUM- INFORMATION ABOUT AUSTRALIA'S STOLEN GENERATIONS
From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stolen_Generations
"The Stolen Generations (also known as Stolen Children) were the children of Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander descent who were removed from their families by the Australian Federal and State government agencies and church missions, under acts of their respective parliaments. The removals of those referred to as "half-caste" children were conducted in the period between approximately 1905[1] and 1967,[2][3] although in some places mixed-race children were still being taken into the 1970s.[4][5][6]
Official government estimates are that in certain regions between one in ten and one in three indigenous Australian children were forcibly taken from their families and communities between 1910 and 1970.
Emergence of the child removal policy
Numerous 19th- and early 20th-century contemporaneous documents indicate that the policy of removing mixed-race Aboriginal children from their mothers related to an assumption that the Aborigines were dying off. Given their catastrophic population decline after white contact[7], whites assumed that the full-blood tribal Aboriginal population would be unable to sustain itself, and was doomed to extinction. The idea expressed by A. O. Neville, the Chief Protector of Aborigines for Western Australia, and others as late as 1930 was that mixed-race children could be trained to work in white society, and over generations would marry white and be assimilated into the society.[8][9][10]
Some European Australians considered any proliferation of mixed-descent children (labelled "half-castes", "crossbreeds", "quadroons", and "octoroons",[9][11]:231, 308 terms now considered derogatory to indigenous Australians) to be a threat to the stability of the prevailing culture, or to a perceived racial or cultural "heritage".[11]:160 The Northern Territory Chief Protector of Aborigines, Dr. Cecil Cook, argued that "everything necessary [must be done] to convert the half-caste into a white citizen".[12]
[...]
Feature film and television drama
The Australian film Rabbit-Proof Fence (2002), directed by Phillip Noyce, was based on the book Follow the Rabbit-Proof Fence by Doris Pilkington Garimara. It concerns the author's mother and two other mixed-race Aboriginal girls who ran away from Moore River Native Settlement, north of Perth, and returned to their Aboriginal families. In a subsequent interview with the ABC, Doris recalled her removal in 1931 from her mother at age three or four, and subsequent rearing at the settlement. She was not reunited with her mother until she was 25; all those years, she believed that her mother had given her away. When the two women were reunited, Doris was no longer able to speak her native language and had been taught to regard Indigenous culture as evil.[79]”...
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From https://www.australianstogether.org.au/discover/australian-history/stolen-generations The Stolen Generations
The forcible removal of Indigenous children from their families.
"Between 1910-1970, many Indigenous children were forcibly removed from their families as a result of various government policies. The generations of children removed under these policies became known as the Stolen Generations. The policies of child removal left a legacy of trauma and loss that continues to affect Indigenous communities, families and individuals.
What happened and why?
The forcible removal of Indigenous children from their families was part of the policy of Assimilation. Assimilation was based on the assumption of black inferiority and white superiority, which proposed that Indigenous people should be allowed to “die out” through a process of natural elimination, or, where possible, should be assimilated into the white community.[1]
Children taken from their parents as part of the Stolen Generation were taught to reject their Indigenous heritage, and forced to adopt white culture. Their names were often changed, and they were forbidden to speak their traditional languages. Some children were adopted by white families, and many were placed in institutions where abuse and neglect were common.[2]
Assimilation policies focused on children, who were considered more adaptable to white society than Indigenous adults. “Half-caste” children (a term now considered derogatory for people of Aboriginal and white parentage), were particularly vulnerable to removal, because authorities thought these children could be assimilated more easily into the white community due to their lighter skin colour.[3]
Assimilation, including child removal policies, failed its aim of improving the lives of Indigenous Australians by absorbing them into white society. This was primarily because white society refused to accept Indigenous people as equals, regardless of their efforts to live like white people.
[...]
What has been done about this?
In 1995, the Australian government launched an inquiry into the policy of forced child removal. The report was delivered to Parliament on the 26th May 1997. It estimated that between 10 per cent and 33 per cent of all Indigenous children were separated from their families between 1910-1970.
The report, Bringing Them Home, acknowledged the social values and standards of the time, but concluded that the policies of child removal breached fundamental human rights. The Keating government commissioned the inquiry into the Stolen Generations, but the Howard government received the report. Howard’s government was skeptical of the report’s findings, and largely ignored its recommendations.”...
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