their memories of that time were clouded, for example, child psychologist Jean Piaget gave an account of his own false memory. He recalled that there had been an attempt to kidnap him when he was young. He recalled seeing his nanny fight off the kidnapper followed by an officer who chased the kidnapper away. Piaget swore it happened however his nanny revealed that she had made the story up. Piaget wrote: "I therefore must have heard, as a child the account of this story...and projected it into the past in the form of a visual memory, which was a memory of a memory, but false." 75 Despite the accusation of ‘false memory syndrome’ being a very valid one indeed, it can be argued that it is very difficult for such a large group of individuals to all be suffering from the same condition. The accounts of the Stolen Generations can perhaps be confirmed by taking a better look at the Aborigines Protection Act, in 1909, the act gave the Aborigines Protection Board legal permission to remove Indigenous children from their families. In 1915, the act was amended; this meant that the Board was able to legally remove any indigenous child from its parents without parental consent or a court order. Poor record keeping meant that it is not known exactly how many indigenous children were taken, which also means that it is almost impossible to find solid evidence to support the cultural genocide that took place in Australia apart from testimonials. 76 On February 13 th 2008, Australian prime minister Kevin Rudd, made a formal apology to the indigenous population of Australia and in particular to the Stolen Generations. He said ‘we apologise … for the removal of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children from their families, their communities and their country.’ The 75 FMS, "False Memory Syndrome Foundation", Fmsfonline.org, 2013 <http://www.fmsfonline.org/?ginterest=CreatingFalseMemories> [accessed 30 April 2016]. 76 Racismnoway, " The Stolen Generations | Fact Sheet ", Racismnoway.com.au, 2016 <http://www.racismnoway.com.au/teaching- resources/factsheets/52.html> [accessed 30 April 2016].
29
Made with FlippingBook HTML5