The brumby debate will never be settled until we face the role horses played in colonisation
Retrieved on:
Tuesday, October 17, 2023
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Neither a heritage listing in 2018 nor the 2021 Management Plan brought the issue to a close.
Key Points:
- Neither a heritage listing in 2018 nor the 2021 Management Plan brought the issue to a close.
- The horse-human partnership has existed for around 4,000 years, and humans and horses share a co-evolutionary history.
- Horses, we are often told, have a special connection with the Australian character and are part of our national psyche.
Horses and colonisation
- Horses were crucial to the colonisation of this land.
- Richard Swain (Wiradjuri) is an ambassador for the Invasive Species Council and a founding member of Reclaim Kosci, an organisation that seeks to raise awareness about the impacts of feral horses and create support for their humane reduction.
- He has been targeted in racist attacks from the pro-horse lobby, including being threatened with the “colonial experience”.
- Read more:
Feral horses will rule one third of the fragile Kosciuszko National Park under a proposed NSW government plan
A symbol of belonging
- Compare horses with camels.
- Camels are culturally and historically significant for Arab peoples, yet here they are routinely culled without a second thought.
- Despite their long history in Australia, camels are associated with Asia and the Middle East and seen as exotic and foreign.
An evolving conversation
- Beyond the wild horses, an understanding and acceptance of this element of our dark colonial history may also better enable us to embrace reconciliation.
- Read more:
If The Man from Snowy River is Indigenous, what does that mean for our national myth-making?