The tactless stampede by thousands of people from around the country to have a crack at climbing Uluru before today's ban took effect would appear to augur badly for Australia's ongoing journey towards reconciliation.
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If so many of us can't respect the wishes of the traditional owners of the Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park on something as simple as this then what are the chances of a referendum on the constitutional recognition of indigenous people ever being passed?
The good news is that the recent images of lines of tourists up to a kilometre long snaking their way up the side of the sandstone monolith hidden in the heart of the driest nation on earth are not an accurate representation of who we are as a people.
One of the factors taken into account in making the decision to impose the ban on the 34th anniversary of the rock being handed back to the Anangu people was that fewer than one in five visitors were actually making the climb.
Under ordinary circumstances the vast majority of visitors to the park are actually very respectful of the traditional custodians whose association with this very special place predates the rise of western civilisation by tens of thousands of years.
What we have just seen was the last hurrah for the iconoclastic die-hards who, for some perverse reason, seem to believe they have just been stripped of a special right or a privilege.
One man, who has already climbed the mountain four times and was back again with his family, vowed that he would defy the ban in future despite the $6000 penalty.
"I will climb in the future regardless of the moves by Parks Australia," he said. "I see it as an important part of my cultural heritage."
Go figure. What about the heritage of the local people whose ancestors have been dwelling in the shadow of the rock for well over 30,000 years?
The saddest aspect of such attitudes, which were echoed by Pauline Hanson when she said the ban was akin to closing Bondi Beach, is that it makes a mockery of the Hawke government's far sighted decision to return Uluru to the traditional owners. The transfer of custody took effect 34 years ago today.
It is not the mountain we conquer, but ourselves.
- Sir Edmund Hillary
That, rather than whether or not some individuals over-endowed with a sense of self-entitlement have a desperate need to summit a world heritage listed icon, is what we should really be talking about.
Highly controversial at the time, the decision effectively overturned a ruling by the then Aboriginal Lands Commissioner, Mr Justice Toohey, to reserve Uluru, the surrounding National Park and The Olgas to the Crown.
It was slammed by the then Chief Minister of the Northern Territory, Paul Everingham, as "another body blow by Canberra to the Northern Territory" that "comes on top of the knock-back on our uranium mines".
Bob Hawke saw it differently: "This is an historic decision; it is a measure of the willingness of this government, on behalf of the Australian people, to recognise the just and legitimate claims of a people who have been dispossessed of their land but who have never lost their spiritual attachment to that land".
Uluru has been returned to its rightful owners and they, in turn, have been so good as to share this wonder of the natural world with the rest of us ever since.
The decision to close the climb reflects safety and environmental as well as cultural concerns.
Sir Edmund Hillary once famously observed "it is not the mountain we conquer, but ourselves".
The time has come to recognise choosing not to climb, a respectful act of self-denial, is much more life-affirming than seeking to vanquish the monolith for the sake of our vanity and pride.
