On February 13, 2008, Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd made a gesture unprecedented in human history. He apologized, on behalf of all Australians, for the ``laws and policies of successive Parliaments and governments that have inflicted profound grief, suffering and loss."

He was apologizing to what has become known as the ``The Stolen Generation", Australian Aboriginal people who were torn from their parents and communities by well meaning but misguided policies seeking to assimilate them into white culture. Between 1910-1970, more than 100,000 children were taken from their parents. While some of these children may have needed such intervention, it is widely recognized now that the vast majority neither needed nor wanted enforced separation from their parents.

Neither was their lot universally improved. Many tell horror stories of abuse and neglect among their white `protectors'. Many bear scars to this day, both physical and psychological. As the details poured out, and Australia came to see the damage this draconian policy of child removal had caused, the question of saying sorry began to arise, by current generations who believed they would never countenance such brutality.

Were we, the children of those who had implemented this policy, responsible to the children of those who had suffered for it. Did we, in fact, owe them an apology?

Shamefully the then government of Australia ducked the issue, not because Australians were not appalled by these revelations, but because there might be a monetary cost in admitting guilt and shame, and apologizing for it. The survivors may demand compensation, which they could do if an apology were seen as admitting our culpability for what our ancestors had done.

Never has the word `sorry' caused such debate. Never has an apology created so much furor. But when the new Labor Government was voted in late in 2007, the new Prime Minister Kevin Rudd made a solemn promise to deliver that long overdue apology. Now he has done so - and if ever an apology deserved to be called perfect, surely it is this one.

After all, the people who delivered the apology were not the same people that caused the ``profound grief, suffering and loss." But we are their children, we are part of the human race, and we continue to inflict ``profound grief, suffering and loss" on each other every day around the world.

In the face of such global cruelty, in the wake of such an appalling thing as the Stolen Generation, an apology actually does not seem like much. It cannot heal the scars, it cannot replace the lost years - apologizing at some time in the future will not replace the dead children, torn communities and broken lives of those caught up in our seemingly endless wars, pogroms and political storm trooping.

Let's instead learn the real lesson of Australia's apology to its people - an apology is all very well, but it will never be perfect. The perfect apology is a myth. To stop now, and think and act with real compassion toward our fellows, that is the single greatest reparation we can make to the generations of suffering we have left behind us.

Learn more about this author, Gail Kavanagh.
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