In the history there has been always a conflict between two or more groups everywhere. Those problems could be religious, cultural, economical, political, racial, or of any kind of ideology. Australia isn’t the exception, and there have been problems since the British arrived. The first and maybe the most important is a racial problem between two groups that should be tied, it’s the problem between ‘British’-Australians and aboriginal Australians.  There are many reasons why that problem is so important and it still exists in our times. There are many people and organizations that worked, and still work in the world, and Australia to eliminate discrimination. In this essay I’ll present one person who tried to eliminate discrimination in Australia against aboriginal people trough the ‘freedom rides’, also how discrimination was born, and the impact of the freedom rides into Aboriginal, and non-Aboriginal Australians’ life.

This problem started when British colons arrived to Australia, they evaluated this land and they proclaimed Terra Nullius to establish colonies. That signified that Australia was uninhabited, but it wasn’t. In fact British colons saw that it was habited by Aborigines, the problem was that they told to their government that Aborigines hadn’t any kind of government, or the requisites for Britain to consider them as a civilization or civilized humans. This was the start of the problem. They were considered as ‘inferiors’, or worse they weren’t considered as humans.  The government took aborigine’s land to establish colonies, and they didn’t care that those lands had Aboriginal habitants. That’s one of the right’s that Aboriginals lost when Europeans came. There have been many violent repressions and massacres against Aborigine resistance to lose their lands, and rights. First Australians didn’t have interest in aborigines, they didn’t care about them, but then they saw them as people who needed protection, and later as a problem to solve. They tried to destroy aboriginal culture and identity by many ways. One of them was taking the children from their own families and to give them to white families. Some aborigines grown with the European culture, but many didn’t, and in general they hadn’t rights. Something similar was happening in the United States with black people, they didn’t have the same rights as white people, but in USA they started to defend their dignity and protest against inequality.

That’s the moment when an Aboriginal figure appeared in Australia’s history, his name was Charles Perkins. He was born in Alice Springs (1936-2000).  He wasn’t grown as others in a white house, so he lived the meaning of discrimination since he was born. He’s the first Aborigine in Australia’s history finishing the university. When he felt the discrimination against him and the rest of Aboriginals, he realized that he didn’t want to suffer the consequences of that discrimination, and he wanted to have the same rights as white people, he wanted to live free. He was always making difference, for example he learnt dance, something that wasn’t common in aborigines in those times. He knew about everything what was happening in the United States with black movements and protests, and he wanted to make something similar in Australia to help his people, because here anybody was doing nothing. The old Aboriginals were scared to defend their rights and dignity; they feared a bad reaction from the whites. Anyway, Charles Perkins continued with his conviction, and he created a movement called the ‘freedom rides’.

The freedom rides had as purpose to make a travel in many cities protesting, and demanding same rights for Aboriginals. That travel was made in one bus, with 30 activists, (later they were called the 30 freedom riders). The activists were students, and their leader was Charles Perkins, Some of their stops were Walgett Moree and Kempsey. There name of their organization was ‘students action for aborigines’. They protested during many hours in places where they weren’t allowed to be as, pubs, swimming pools, etc… In some places they had to resist violence from white people. When they tried to use a public swimming pool, many whites got together, and they didn’t let aborigines to enter the pool. Those people started to throw tomatoes and any kind of things against Aboriginals, but the Aboriginals resisted, and they finally could get inside the pool.  There were other violent incidents, and one of them was in the highway. Some cars tried to divert the bus, but they didn’t suffer physical damages.

All these events attracted the international media. The world wasn’t happy with the discrimination in Australia against Aborigines. Many people compared Australia as the deep southern of United States in the way as aborigines were treated. The international diffusion was one important step to return rights to Aborigines. Australian government felt world’s pressure and they started to care about aboriginal rights. Another very significant thing that happened was a change in more Aboriginal people attitude, before they always said that the only thing that you never had to tell a white as response was a no, but thanks to the freedom rights, they started to say no to discrimination. They started to defend themselves.

Those actions were important to have an improvement in Aboriginal people rights. First, there was that change of attitude in Aborigines. If someone is being oppressed, and he doesn’t do anything to claim his rights, he will never get them back. That’s why it was a first step to find an end to that conflict; Charles Perkins was the first pacifist and aboriginal voice against discrimination. By the other hand all the international media was focused in Australia’s events. All this facts had as result the creation of the 1967 referendum. The 1967 referendum had very important advances.  The federal government had the power to change and make laws to support Aboriginal Australians; they had more legal freedom to support them.

In conclusion, that movement was very important to make an improvement of aborigines civil rights. It was start of a new ‘era’ for aborigines. That movement still has effect in our times. The problem is that it wasn’t enough to finish with all discrimination, and many Aboriginal aren’t receiving all their rights. For example, Australians have a higher life’s expectancy than aborigines, but it should be the same, because aborigines are Australians, they live in the same country and they should have the same opportunities. That is just the start to find a solution for aboriginal people.