Tent Embassy Notes

The Tent Embassy in 1972 helped to create a sense of identity amongst Indigenous Australians and encouraged people to stand up and fight for their rights. The aim of the Indigenous people during the Tent Embassy was to coerce the government into creating ‘uniform rights across the nation’. The protests that occurred during the Tent Embassy, were about wanting fairness and equality amongst those of ‘white’ and Aboriginal decent. Imagine the Indigenous population’s feelings towards a government that promises one thing and never acts upon it.Indigenous Australians did not trust the government due to the lack of action taken towards equal rights. Whilst most of the ‘white’ population were against the special treatment of Aborigines, The Trade Union published a declaration trying to encourage people to help created equality. This declaration stated ‘To all Australians we say: Campaign actively in every possible way to achieve these objectives. Change the Federal Government as a positive step’. This was the first sign of ‘white’ Australians supporting the Aboriginal campaign. The initial set up of the ‘Embassy’ on the lawns in front of Old Parliament house, started with a simple beach umbrella and eventually grew into tents. The Aborigines thought these tents to be their Embassy as they were like foreigners in their own country due to the way they were being treated and they believed that they had ‘never ceded our sovereign rights over this land’. This campaign was peaceful until the attempt to forcibly remove the tents by the police, which reignited the reason to fight. The embassy drew crowds of tourist’s to visit every day and became ‘a national focus’. In 1976, Margaret Franklin stated ‘It was a symbolic gesture to all Aborigines, for in traditional Aboriginal society, the young are led by the elders’. The significance of this statement is that because in Aboriginal culture the elders lead the young, the way their took a stance in the tents was developing and