No more silent tears for the National Museum of Australia

Instead, all was offered was defensive rhetoric. My thoughts are bracketed:

• 'We don't create exhibitions on demand' (Where's the ultimatum? I only hear Forgotten Australians wanting to talk with you)
• 'We have DONE an exhibition on the Forgotten Australians' (It only lasted for three months. Most objects in your galleries are displayed for several years)
• 'We rotate stories' (No you don't. You rotate objects. Some historical narratives have been privileged with prolonged representation in the Museum, since its inception– convicts, migration, horseracing, fashion, farming and industry, for example)
• We can digitise the collection (Even so, you will continue to display objects in your galleries. What are the principles that determine what history is confined to an online platform and what is valorised in your galleries?)

Superficial and patronising retorts dominated by explanations about organisational minutiae and Museum governance serve as a smokescreen to avoid an authentic and much-needed, open debate. Council, senior management and all staff at the National Museum of Australia may benefit from, courageously and openly, sharing amongst themselves their collective values and unconscious biases about those historical narratives that pertain to trauma and violence. Because it is fair to assume that that their current curatorial choices are positioning certain survivor groups as more culturally interesting and grief worthy than others.

Museum community engagement may also benefit from a trauma-informed and non-autocratic approach. What might have developed if museum staff in that storeroom had asked the Forgotten Australians:

• What can we do better?
• How can our resources help to support you and your living history?
• What can we do to make the Museum a place that allows you and other Forgotten Australians feel like you matter and belong?
• What objects and narratives are important to you?

There are currently over 47,000 children in statutory, out-of-home care in Australia. Adults who are care-experienced are over-represented in the criminal justice system. Meanwhile, the Northern Territory has lowered the age of criminal responsibility to ten. The Queensland Government aims to amend the Youth Justice Act 1992 to include 'adult crime, adult time'.

There is much that our nation can learn from the experiences of the Forgotten Australians. The National Museum of Australia could play a meaningful role in bringing much-needed democratic, nuancing to the child-justice debate.

The display of the No More Silent Tears for Forgotten Australians memorial quilt would be a good place to start.