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First Contact: ‘We need to move on from the Stolen Generations’

Renae Ayris (centre), Nicki Wendt (2nd right) and Natalie Imbruglia (right) meet members of the Stolen Generation.

Renae Ayris (centre), Nicki Wendt (2nd right) and Natalie Imbruglia (right) meet members of the Stolen Generation. Photo: SBS

Singer Natalie Imbruglia and actress Nicki Wendt broke down in tears while ex-One Nation politician David Oldfield remained unmoved during a confronting episode of SBS series First Contact.

Tuesday night’s episode of the show, which aims to challenge Australians’ views on indigenous people, saw six celebrity participants meet with survivors of the Stolen Generations.

Prior to meeting with the survivors, the celebrities shared their thoughts on the Stolen Generations.

“I don’t think it was done as an act of cruelty,” Wendt said. “I think the government at the time thought they were doing the right thing.”

Meanwhile, beauty queen Renae Ayris argued Australia needed to “move on” from the Stolen Generations, a long-running period beginning in 1905 in which Aboriginal children were forcibly removed from their parents and often trained as domestic servants or stockmen.

“Forgiving is a massive part of life,” Ayris said.

Host Ray Martin asked Oldfield whether he believed in the Stolen Generations.

“No,” Oldfield responded, “I think in many cases it’s able to be demonstrated it was well intentioned and many of the Stolen Generation, had they not been removed, would not be alive today to talk about the experience.”

The group soon had their views challenged by Aboriginal elders who recounted being kidnapped and separated from their siblings before being forced into labour and told they were unwanted and unloved.

Imbruglia and Wendt both broke down in tears when one woman revealed she hadn’t seen her brother since the age of seven.

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Natalie Imbruglia and Nicki Wendt with a survivor of the Stolen Generations. Photo: SBS

Ayris, who previously admitted she was “scared” of Aboriginals, decided to push the matter further, asking whether the government’s actions may have been designed to protect the children.

“Were there situations where there were children pulled from alcoholics, abuse?” she asked.

One of the elders retorted that her parents were “of good character” and her father was a war hero.

After spending a day with the survivors, Imbruglia said: “For anyone to suggest there’s no such thing as the Stolen Generation for me is horrific.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JhyXE_5Ls5o&feature=youtu.be

‘You’re saying they deserved it’

However, Oldfield remained steadfast in his views, despite meeting men who had endured abuse and were able to recall the day they were removed from their families.

“Frankly everything I’ve heard today is an indescribably ugly life characterised mostly by institutions not necessarily based on how they came to be here – they don’t know how they came to be here themselves,” he said to fellow participants Ian ‘Dicko’ Dickson and Tom Ballard.

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Ian ‘Dicko’ Dickson and David Oldfield absorbing abuse stories from Stolen Generations survivors. Photo: SBS

After protestations from both Ballard and Dickson, Oldfield continued to voice his opinions, arguing there was “a lot of confusion” about what had really taken place.

“You really think this is evidence do you?” he asked Dickson.

“You’re saying they deserve to be here,” Dickson interrupted.

“Why don’t you just come around the back and put words in my mouth?” Oldfield retorted.

Ballard, meanwhile, remained silent but later admitted Oldfield’s views had rattled him.

“I feel sick, I feel f***ing sick,” he said to the camera.

“What happened to these men was horrific and I’m just appalled by David’s white denialism, his white blindfold.”

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