Ladies and gentlemen, well may we say 'God Save the Queen', because nothing will save the Governor-General. The proclamation you have just heard was countersigned Malcolm Fraser, who will go down in history as Kerr's cur.
Gough WhitlamRead
Australia's treatment of her Aboriginal people will be the thing on which the world will judge Australia and Australians - Not just now, but in the greater perspective of history.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote highlights that a nation's true character is reflected in how it treats its marginalized communities, emphasizing the importance of historical judgment.
Gough Whitlam's quote asserts that the treatment of Aboriginal people in Australia will significantly impact how both current and future generations perceive Australian society. It underlines the moral responsibility of a nation to care for all its citizens, especially those who have been historically wronged. By stating that the world's judgment will come from this treatment, Whitlam emphasizes the weight of history in evaluating a nation's values and ethics.
Themes
AboriginalTreatmentJudgmentHistorySociety
In practice
Example use cases
This quote can be used during discussions about social justice and reconciliation efforts.
More from Gough Whitlam
All quotes βConscription is an impediment to achieving the forces Australia needs. It is an alibi for failing to give proper conditions to regular soldiers. We will abolish conscription forthwith. By abolishing it, Australia will achieve a better army, a better-paid army - and a better, united society.
Gough WhitlamRead
Hostility towards China distorted Australia's international affairs for 20 years until 1972, but reconciliation with China 30 years ago had produced a quarter century of constructive bipartisan relations with our region and the world, unmatched in Australian history.
Gough WhitlamRead
I was profoundly embarrassed by it [the White Australia Policy] and did all I could to change it.
Gough WhitlamRead
She was a remarkable person and the love of my life. We were married for almost 70 years. She encouraged and sustained me and our four children, their families and many other people in a life full of engagement with Australians from all walks of life.
Gough WhitlamRead
I have more influence now than when I had the power.
Gough WhitlamRead
Similar quotes
People must be taken as they are, and we should never try make them or ourselves better by quarreling with them.
Edmund BurkeRead
To preach Christ is to feed the soul, to justify it, to set it free, and to save it, if it believes the preaching.
Martin LutherRead
It is among men of genius and science that atheism alone is found.
Percy Bysshe ShelleyRead
See how the World its Veterans rewards!_x000D_ _x000D_ A Youth of Frolics, an old Age of Cards;_x000D_ _x000D_ Fair to no purpose, artful to no end,_x000D_ _x000D_ Young without Lovers, old without a Friend;_x000D_ _x000D_ A Fop their Passion, but their Prize a Sot;_x000D_ _x000D_ Alive ridiculous, and dead forgot.
Alexander PopeRead
Meaning is a shaky edifice we build out of scraps, dogmas, childhood injuries, newspaper articles, chance remarks, old fillms, small victories, people hated, people loved; perhaps it is because our sense of what is the case is constructed from such inadequate materials that we defend it so fiercely, even to death.
Salman RushdieRead
Make no laws whatever concerning speech, and speech will be free; so soon as you make a declaration on paper that speech shall be free, you will have a hundred lawyers proving that "freedom does not mean abuse, nor liberty license," and they will define freedom out of existence.
Voltairine De CleyreRead