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Thank you Peter for the detailed and compelling reply,

With the silly season in full force, I will briefly reply to two of your questions/points in this reply, and over the next couple of weeks read your cited literature (thanks for the PDF by the way, that has made things both cheaper and simpler) and consider a more detailed response to that section.

My answer to your first question is that your assumption is quite correct that no, I do not think customary law ought to operate as an exuse as either a full defence or an attempt to reduce a sentence. Yes I agree that there is definitely an overlap with how IP is applied contemporarily and cultural relativism. I reject cultural relativism completely regarding basic human rights (I am not really bothered by things considered rude/polite behaviour though, for instance I have no trouble with a Muslim woman holding her heart when greeting me as opposed to shaking my hand).

I understand that regarding those asserting 'bullshit law', we can feel as though the argument is that it would be permissible if true, but it is false. But as noted by the Australian Institute of Criminology, if the cultural explanation is false, or is not the driving factor, then the negative consequence is two-fold: One is that it draws our focus in the wrong direction, and secondly it perpetuates the negative stereotype. Now at this moment I concede that you give compelling evidence that this is not the case, which is really appreciated (especially since you are working on your final charge against IP), thus I will not argue right now that it is false. But the main point I make here is that this is one reason why one would invoke 'bullshit law'.

Second, I would like to clarify I point I was making regarding your reply when you say:

"You point out that in former times the subjugation and exclusion of women was a feature of Western societies. That is undoubtedly true, but Western societies have evolved."

The point I was attempting to make here was that when we consider the intergenerational nature of culture norms, beliefs, practices, that this was not all that long ago. When I was saying that it was late as the 1980s rape within a marriage was legal, I am saying generationally speaking this was a blink of an eye ago. I was a young child when this law was changed. And there are many cases in non-indigenous society even now domestic violence is, consciously or unconsciously, seen as a 'family issue' and being self-deterred to intervene. Thus why we still have campaigns such as white ribbon day, designed for the very purpose to encourage men to speak out against domestic violence. So to say that Indigenous culture holds these attitudes, in my view, does not give us alot on its own to explain why we don't see that same proportion in non-Indigenous cultures.

Now of course the reply to this is the entirely true statement that Indigenous women are far more likely to experience domestic violence than non-Indigenous women, but then this leads us back to the original argument on what are the likely most influential causes of such statistics. And this is indeed the tougher question to answer, which is why I will need to consider your literature that although compelling, raises questions why the AIC and other major governing bodies seem to reject the cultural explanation.

Thanks again and Merry Christmas,

Andrew.