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Film premiere tells the stolen generation story

Published on Monday, 29 April 2024 at 3:09:15 PM

Aboriginal organisation Yokai – Healing Our Spirit will premiere its groundbreaking and confronting documentary Genocide in the Wildflower State at Albany Town Hall next month.

 

Yokai is the peak body representing Stolen Generation Survivors in Western Australia and has produced this eye-opening film into a dark chapter of Western Australia's history.

 

It explores the six decades between 1905 and 1972 when thousands of mixed-race Aboriginal children were forcibly removed from their families, causing enduring intergenerational trauma and grief.

 

The hour-long film gives voice to Stolen Generation Survivors, who compellingly recount their experiences and demand answers to pressing questions.

 

The Bringing Them Home Report 1997 presented an inquiry into what occurred during this genocidal period before WA became the first state to apologise for these injustices, and in 2008 Prime Minister Rudd formally apologised to the indigenous community.

 

The documentary questions current Government policy and the lack of redress in Western Australia for impacted families and individuals of the stolen generation.

 

Yokai Chairperson Jim Morrison said Genocide in the Wildflower State offers a deeply moving and disturbing exposé of the industrial scale of child removal in WA and the resulting misery families experience today.

 

“We believe much can be done to heal the ongoing wounds of this catastrophe,” Mr Morrison said.

 

Genocide in the Wildflower State is truth telling and a demand for justice. It holds to account successive parliaments in Western Australia that have failed to make redress.

 

“It is about helping to heal the trauma in the Survivor community and building understanding in broader society.”

 

Albany Town Hall will host the local premier of Genocide in the Wildflower State on 10 May at 2pm. Bookings are essential and can be made at www.albany.wa.gov.au/bookable

 

A Q&A panel with Stolen Generation Survivors will take place following the film.

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