Stereotypes Of Young Indigenous Australians

Introduction:
Countries like Australia have tried to keep the cultural and the traditions of multicultural nature of Australian’s alive. The aboriginal Australians and Torres Strait islanders have endured hardships and challenges like discrimination, segregation and prejudice as a result of the negative stereotypes influenced and developed by white settlers on their arrival and colonisation of the ironically called, lucky country since the year 1788. Many Aboriginal Australians are ashamed of their cultural background due the judgment and perception they have tolerated over the last two centuries. A number of issues have aroused from this native race and unfortunately these issues are not exclusively directed at adult indigenous Australians,

The issues that these young indigenous Australians are facing are racial discrimination, poor educational benefits and systems, lack of employment, poor health, abuse, violence, substance addictions and misuse. The adolescents that are subject to these issues only understand as ‘this is a way of life’ and are difficult due to the aboriginal culture, which now has been given the stereotypical generalisation of today’s society as that this is the way of life. The livelihood of aboriginal culture has become what the Australian perception believes as succumb to living which has now moulded this image. The perception that is given to the adolescents of young indigenous Australians are remote areas, child neglect, family and community violence, living in a low socio economic society, unemployment and little education these are all attributes of how society view the aboriginal culture and is an issue for younger, future generations of Indigenous Australians. Among this has it has resulted in many indigenous Australian’s to be more susceptible to many health issues such as, such as multiple injuries as a result of assault cases, self-harm and more extreme medical issues like cardiovascular disease, cancer, diabetes, kidney concerns, oral health issues, eye

This has given them a negative label across the current Australian society. For example, there may be some aboriginals who drink alcohol and commit violent crimes however this is only a small minority of them. The impact from the society is still evident in the negative stereotypes of aboriginals that exist today. This is due to the large impact of media, reporting numerous amounts of negative events much more frequently then positive actions of aboriginals. Furthermore, many Australians believe that ‘we are not responsible for the past’ and don’t owe Aboriginal people anything, a view advocated for many years by former Prime Minister John Howard. Our education system must inform young children of today that aboriginals are not all as problematic as their stereotype would suggest and that they can be valuable contributors to our