Talk:Oombulgurri Community, Western Australia

message: I am suspicious about the authenticity of this page. Geoscience Australia has no record of a place name (town or otherwise) of Forest River Mission – although there is a Forest River in WA up near the NT border. The place does not have an Australian post code.
Googling I found a couple of references. The Battye library 1 has a collection of photos "3611B Photographs of Forest River Mission [Anglican Mission of St Michael] PUBLISHED: 1914-1967." on microfilm. I also found a bio 2 of a bloke who's father was born there, although it refers to it as being in the Northern Teritory.
The original entry was anon from an IP currently assigned to a North American ISP. The population of under 10,000 seems a bit odd as that is also the population of my office when no one is there.
Possibly it is a mission that has been abandoned, or it may have been renamed. I will probably have to go up there to check it out, but I am not sure where to submit Wikipedia travel expense claims.
I have added a 'not verified tag'. If it does turn out to be real it needs a link from the Forest River disambiguation.
IanBailey 05:18, 9 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Authenticity of this page

message: I have rewritten the entry according to the few online sources I could find. It could probably do with some expansion. I moved it to "Forrest River", as that seems to be the actual name of the mission. I got the approximate location from this entry in the Geoscience Australia database. I wasn't sure what to do about the national park though, so I've left it as is, and left the unverified tag on the article, in case that is incorrect as well. Graham/pianoman87 talk 07:05, 9 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Rewrite

message: I am going to move this page to Oombulgurri, Western Australia, as that is what the town is known as these days. See this government newsletter for a reference. I've expanded the article a little more as new information has come to light. Any comments would be appreciated: this is the first time I have tried to make an article like this. Graham/pianoman87 talk 10:56, 9 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Hi Graham, I have emailed the Rev Peter to see if there is any chance of a photo, and to see if he can add anything. Cheers IanBailey 06:25, 10 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Did you get any response by email? My exams are over, so I can now concentrate on research, rather than just correcting typoes. Graham/pianoman87 talk 07:22, 24 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text:  No, but by coincidence I have found one of my neigbours worked there for a while. I haven't had a chance to catch up with him about it but when I do I will hopefully scab a photo. I hope the exams went well. Cheers IanBailey (talk) 08:47, 24 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Page move 

message: I have just found out about the Oombulgurri Association, the association that manages the day-to-day running of the community of Oombulgurri. An entry about it can be found at this government site. I have emailed the address given there, and asked if there is more information, or the possibility of creating a photo for the place. As I said in the email, this could be an interesting opportunity. Graham/pianoman87 talk 09:24, 22 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Oombulgurri Association 

message: I have been looking for more information on the child abuse cases, and have been unable to find more than three convictions. Those convictions were of two Wyndham residents (apparently relating to abuse at least some of which occurred at Oombulgurri) and a case relating to abuse during the 1980s. The only other reference I have found was to a high level of acquittals in the Kimberley sexual abuse cases.
I have also found this article suggesting that the closure of Oombulgurri has actually resulted in bigger problems and more children under threat: . The transportable housing provided was only provided in January despite most of the residents having moved to Wyndham before September and many of them having to live in the marshes on the town's outskirts. Wyndham's marshes are mudflats and mangroves along the edges of Cambridge Gulf and are inhabited by hordes of mosquitoes and sand-flies (non-biting midges) as well as significant numbers of large crocodiles.
The one line section on the child sex investigation is a significant over-simplification and I think it is probably very inappropriate to be reporting charges which have not resulted in convictions. I don't think any of the charge reports linked to actually relate to the two people convicted.
I am also concerned that the complexity of this issue is not dealt with here, and we would probably be better to be cautious. 
I am not suggesting that a blind eye should be turned to sexual abuse of the type in the convicted cases (they were reported as an adult couple (in their late thirties) preying on a girl in her teens, and an adult now 70+ abusing a ten year old girl). 
What I am suggesting is that many of the cases being reported in the remote communities in Northern Australia in recent times have related to relationships between people in their late teens and early twenties which are considered acceptable by many of the people in the communities, but which contravene the Australian legal principle that the age difference must not exceed two years. I have known of one case where a boy was just over two years older than his partner and he was arrested within a week of turning eighteen. If they had been white and lived in the suburbs of a southern city I suspect people may have turned a blind eye despite the technical offence?
I feel that we should be careful how we deal with this issue as we do not want to vilify the Aboriginal people of Australia who are not all paedophiles, and we do not want to hide the real offenders like the convicted cases I mentioned in a smoke screen of "everyone is doing it".
Now that I have said this, how do people think we should deal with this on the Oombulgurri page and all the others where it is relevant?    Djapa Owen (talk) 13:00, 18 September 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Sexual abuse