ABSTRACT In 1997, the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission released Bringing Them Home, documenting historical practices of forced Indigenous child removal in devastating detail. The report was released into a fractious political environment in which historicised understandings of race were being heatedly debated. Responses to the report played out through the media as conservatives sought to reassert a traditional narrative of Australian history. The Howard Coalition government steadfastly refused to implement most recommendations of the report, including a formal national apology. The government’s stance, and its capacity to dominate the news cycle, almost immediately shifted public focus from the contents of the report to its reception. This reframing meant that, when a formal national apology was finally offered by the incoming Rudd Labor government in 2008, it offered closure not to 220 years of racial violence as was claimed, but to a 20-year acrimonious debate dominated by white elites. This process demonstrates the ways that, against the starkest evidence, institutional power can be leveraged to facilitate widespread forgetting of historical violence inflicted upon Indigenous peoples. Indigenous children in Australia continue to be removed from their families at heavily disproportionate rates.

中文翻译：

---

“你背叛了你的国家”：在都市报上记住和忘记被偷走的一代

摘要 1997 年，人权与平等机会委员会发布了《带他们回家》，以毁灭性的细节记录了强迫原住民儿童搬迁的历史做法。这份报告是在一个动荡的政治环境中发布的，在这个环境中，对种族的历史化理解正在激烈辩论中。随着保守派试图重申澳大利亚历史的传统叙述，媒体对此报道做出了回应。霍华德联合政府坚决拒绝执行报告中的大部分建议，包括正式的全国道歉。政府的立场及其主导新闻周期的能力几乎立即将公众的注意力从报道的内容转移到了报道的接收上。这种重构意味着，当即将上任的陆克文工党政府于 2008 年正式向全国道歉时，它并未像声称的那样结束 220 年的种族暴力，而是结束了由白人精英主导的长达 20 年的激烈辩论。这一过程表明，在最鲜明的证据面前，可以利用制度权力促进对土著人民历史暴力的广泛遗忘。澳大利亚的土著儿童继续以极其不成比例的比率离开他们的家庭。可以利用机构权力来促进人们普遍忘记对土著人民施加的历史暴力。澳大利亚的土著儿童继续以极其不成比例的比例离开家庭。可以利用机构权力来促进人们普遍忘记对土著人民施加的历史暴力。澳大利亚的土著儿童继续以极其不成比例的比例离开家庭。