Stan Grant takes a controversial dig at Captain Cook as part of new project: 'Nation is founded on a lie'
A new documentary featuring Stan Grant aims to challenge the false narrative of Captain Cook prior to his Australian landing in 1770.
A new documentary featuring Stan Grant aims to challenge the false narrative of Captain Cook prior to his Australian landing in 1770.
Titled Before 1770 and produced by the Islamic Abu Hanifa Institute in Berala, Sydneys west, the film seeks to celebrate the historical relationships between Muslims and Indigenous Australians before colonisation.
In the documentarys first trailer, released on Friday, Grant, a journalist and activist, described the traditional narrative of Cooks story as a lie.
When a nation is founded on a lie, then how do we find a sense of belonging and connection? he narrates over the trailer.
Grant, a Wiradjuri-Kamilaroi-Dharrawal man, is one of the many people interviewed by director Sheik Wesam Charkawi for the documentary.
The film recounts the history of sea cucumber fishermen, known as Macassan trepangers, who travelled from the Indonesian island of Sulawesi to northern Australia.
Stan Grant has said Australias history is a lie in the upcoming documentary Before 1770 which seeks to challenge the recollection of the First Fleet
The documentary is produced by the Islamic Abu Hanifa Institute in Berala in Sydney s west and directed by Sheik Wesam Charkawi
The film was designed to encapsulate the history of Muslims in Australia before the First Fleet.
Certainly, we want to challenge the false narrative of Captain Cook, Mr Charkawi said.
Australia was not discovered. Aboriginal people are the worlds oldest continuing culture.
Archaeologists agree that Indigenous Australians have been on the continent but have debated whether they got here 50,000 or 65,000 years ago.
Captain James Cook made landfall in Botany Bay in 1770 before Captain Arthur Phillip delivered the First Fleet to its shores in 1788.
Captain Arthurs arrival marks the official state date of Australias colonial period.
Outspoken Indigenous businessman Warren Mundine accepted the Macassans are related to Indigenous Australia, but rejected Before 1770s revisionist perspective.
Macassans were trading with Aboriginal people from northern Australia and for me thats something for us as modern Australians that we should be celebrating, Mr Mundine said.
But to then jump to modern Australia and say that the institutions and everything we have here is a lie I think is a big stretch.
Certainly, we want to challenge the false narrative of Captain Cook, Mr Charkawi said
Captain Cook arrived in 1770 and Captain Arthur Phillip delivered the First Fleet in 1788 but Before 1770 pre-dates both by focuses on Indigenous Australian and muslim collaboration
Australian National University professor Campbell Macknight was also interviewed for Before 1770 and he said the purpose of the film was to reassure young Muslims.
The political purpose of the film is to reassure young Muslims in western Sydney that they really have a place in modern Australia, said Professor Macknight told the Courier Mail.
And that there were Muslims in Australia before Captain Cook.
Oxford theologian Nigel Biggar also acknowledged Australias history predating English settlement but reiterated that settlement had created the modern nation.
By all means tell the story of different groups but dont pretend that it created Australia because it didnt, he said.
Appearing in the documentary will be the latest in a string of controversial moves from Grant which began when he stood down as host of Q&A in 2023.
Grant said he left because of racist abuse he suffered after discussing the ongoing impacts of colonialism ahead of the coronation of Charles III during an episode.
He has also published a book, The Queen is Dead, arguing for the end of the monarchy in Australia that same year.
Daily Mail Australia has approached Stan Grant for comment.
