Extended comment list

Why do Australians repeatedly refer to their sense of 'Australian values' when Australian values are not clearly and formally defined and enshrined in legislation in Australia? So why do Australian values remain taken for granted and not enshrined as Australian's fundamental legal rights? Why do Australians keep referring to 'Australian values' when no government boldly protects these in law nor enshrines these into our Constitution? So this allows Australian core social mores to be relegated to token notions with no legitimacy. It is as if Australia had no status beyond the British convict colony and remains a dumping ground. After 220 years of Australia's struggle into a nation (not withstanding the colonist genocide of its Aborigines), why then do we leave the flood gates open and worse, encourage immigrants to have rights to dictate their social standards? When 300,000 foreigners arrive in Australian airports yearly, are Ausralians too complacent about their values and way of life for their own good? The majority of Australians seem too busy with their own lives to detect a noticeable change and pressure on established Australian values, so therefore don't detect immigration calls for foreign values to be a threat. Australians need a wake up call! Mass immigration with encouraged ethnic segregation ('multiculturalism' with the spin removed) brings all sort of foreign values with it. Some of those foreign values clash with 'Australian values' and are indeed foreign to Australians. It is a misguided premise is that the majority of Australians and their values are not discriminated against. Australians are generally accommodating of diversity and have a deep sense of fair play and giving people a fair go. Australians are told that they are one of the most tolerant peoples of others and should be proud of it - more multicultural spin. Public discussion is needed into what constitutes Australian core values. Ideally these should then be enshrined into the highest of laws, the Australian Constititution. Meanwhile, in a power struggle to achieve equal status, without compromising their own foreign values, many new arrivals bring their baggage with them and do not seek assimilation into their new home but want a little (insert ethnic name) and to associate with their own. Thus emerges the ghetto and a minority political action group calling for (insert ethnic name) rights. Politicians pass legislation to protect ethnic rights. The problem is that racial discrimination is allowed to label those foreign values that are contrary to Australian values. To try to debate this one is immediately dismissed as 'racist'. Have a read of the NSW ANTI-DISCRIMINATION ACT 1977 - SECT 7: "What constitutes discrimination on the ground of race" (1) A person ( "the perpetrator") discriminates against another person ( "the aggrieved person") on the ground of race if, on the ground of the aggrieved person’s race or the race of a relative or associate of the aggrieved person, the perpetrator: (a) treats the aggrieved person less favourably than in the same circumstances, or in circumstances which are not materially different, the perpetrator treats or would treat a person of a different race or who has such a relative or associate of a different race, or (b) segregates the aggrieved person from persons of a different race or from persons who have such a relative or associate of a different race, or (c) requires the aggrieved person to comply with a requirement or condition with which a substantially higher proportion of persons not of that race, or who have such a relative or associate not of that race, comply or are able to comply, being a requirement which is not reasonable having regard to the circumstances of the case and with which the aggrieved person does not or is not able to comply. (2) For the purposes of subsection (1) (a) and (b), something is done on the ground of a person’s race if it is done on the ground of the person’s race, a characteristic that appertains generally to persons of that race or a characteristic that is generally imputed to persons of that race. So the scarfed or burkha'd woman on the bus can seek to rely on this clause to override Australian values. Message: Foreign values are overriding Australian values in legislation. Where is this leading Australia? I like the term anti-Australian in much the same way that anti-Semetic has worked very effectively.

Tigerquoll wrote:

"It is as if Australians had no status beyond the British convict colony and remain a dumping ground."

Legally that is how we are treated. Our 'citizenship' contains few enshrined rights. For instance, in Victoria non-residents and non-citizens may vote in council elections if they own property. And, whereas once built property was protected from being bought up by overseas buyers, and ditto Australian companies and resources, now there is little or nothing to protect those and we actually encourage, through lower conveyancing charges in some cases, foreign property buyers.

"After 220 years of Australia's struggle into a nation (not withstanding the colonist genocide of its Aborigines), why then do we leave the flood gates open and worse, encourage immigrants to have rights to dictate their social standards?"

I think this is a purposeful technique to keep us disempowered like colonials so that a financially powerful clique may continue to run things for its own profit.

"When 300,000 foreigners arrive in Australian airports yearly, are Australians too complacent about their values and way of life for their own good?"

A real part of the problem is that this continuous influx combined with the constant reorganisation of suburbs, transport and roads, and the need to travel to work and frequently change jobs, plus the increasing demand that work makes on time, disorganises us. We cannot organise. People generally organise locally first, but our local governments have been purposefully disempowered. Try organising through a state government and you will realise how distant those politicians are and how little they do on the 'citizen's' behalf. Another thing which disorganises us is the general reliance on and trust in the mainstream press. The problem is that the mainstream press does not report matters of concern if they counter the corporate ability to continue to profit from Australia as a colony. So people may have concerns, but they do not see them mirrored anywhere else. They are not able to identify people with similar concerns in distant suburbs or even across the road or even in government. Actually, we would do better to read Hansard daily than the Age or the Herald-Sun or the Australian, since politicians do sometimes communicate there in a valuable way which is generally not reported in the newspapers or on tv.

"The majority of Australians seem too busy with their own lives to detect a noticeable change and pressure on established Australian values, so therefore don't detect immigration calls for foreign values to be a threat. Australians need a wake up call! Mass immigration with encouraged ethnic segregation ('multiculturalism' with the spin removed) brings all sort of foreign values with it. Some of those foreign values clash with 'Australian values' and are indeed foreign to Australians."

I think that a lot of Australians on every level are very concerned but, disorganised, they find it hard to recognise each other and assemble or unite in their own defense. The people organising this buy-out of our land for housing and influx of job applicants, students and business financers, are making lots of money out of it and are well organised in lobby-groups.

And the government and corporate press representing the lobby-group interests have skilfully normalised a fear in Australians of express themselves politically outside the mainstream. Look at what happens to new political parties if they try to question immigration on any or all grounds. If they object on environmental grounds they are not reported, or, if they object for cultural reasons, their members are harassed and attacked as racists. The press lead the cry and groups with no interest in democracy infiltrate groups concerned about what is happening to democracy and intimidate and isolate their main activists. And wedge politics keep people from straying away from the established parties.

If an effective challenge were led against the ruling clique (Liberal and Labour combined) that manipulates population growth for its own profit, some fear that the dirty laws brought in against terrorism would be used against us.

Joe Toscano of Anarchist Network was reviewing this situation recently (can be downloaded as a podcast), describing how

Three ministers of the crown can call out the Australian armed forces if they believe that commonwealth interests are threatened. If members of the armed forces are called out to restore order, for instance, in the face of mass strikes, or peaceful protests in the streets, once the armed forces are called out, if they maim or kill or damage property, they are legally indemnified by legislation passed within this decade, and supported by every major political party in parliament, including the Greens."

"The Federal attorney general can at any time ban any organisation, jail its members, confiscate its property, and jail anyone assisting them in their legal defense for up to 25 years because he or she has been advised by the Federal police that they may pose a threat to the Commonwealth."

"These are laws which have been passed in the last decade.
People in Aust can be legally detained, secretly, and questioned for weeks because the authorities believe thye may hva info inadvertantly which may asssist investigations. And if you refuse, you may be jailed for up to 7 years."

"It is a misguided premise that the majority of Australians and their values are not discriminated against."

Yes, we are unable to defend our property from infilling and our surroundings from being carved up and sold off. Australian citizenship carries few real rights. Mostly you defend yourself with money. No money and where are your rights? The government will not see that you are housed or fed.

"Meanwhile, in a power struggle to achieve equal status, without compromising foreign values, many new Australians bring their baggage and do not seek assimilation into their new home but want a little (insert ethnic name) and to associate with their own."

What is fascinating is the way the press seize on such minority movements and keep them alive so that they really can become a threat because any objection then makes a martyr of a person who may simply have been clinging onto a symbol for personal or idiosyncratic rather than political reasons.

Then, when 5,500 new immigrants (sometimes predominantly from one country) are suddenly settled in a growth corridor in a blow-out of city boundaries, spilling into what was once the country, no-one dares to point this out because, gee, those people are new-Australians and to say that they should not be there will be cast as racism, even though it is a protest against the intensification of settlement.

It also suits the political numbers business to be able to polarise and divide communities so that they identify in blochs. You then craft your spin to appeal to the bloch's focus in the hope that they will vote for you on this emotional issue. This used to be called 'balkanisation' and was a specialty of the Labor Party, but John Howard took it up in a big way.

"So the scarfed or burkha'd woman on the bus can seek to rely on this clause to override Australian values."

One or a few people dressing in a uniform that symbolises values antithetical to women brought up in a tradition of franchise is no big deal; it is the prospect of large blocks accumulating and undermining established rights by failing to defend them.

The government and press spin against the fear of this prospect is that we must embrace change, but it is always the incumbents who are supposed to embrace change, not the newcomers. The majority are supposed to adapt to the minority. That is not democratic. This is how Colonialism works.

"To try to debate this one is immediately dismissed as racist."

Yes, it seems totally twisted to say that a woman trying to defend the common symbols of political franchise and personal freedom - the right to show one's face in public and to wear light cool clothing in summer or shorts that free one to run or work in - is racist because she criticises the burka as a symbol of gender oppression. The burka is a symbol of gender oppression. In the middle ages europeans wore the equivalent of burkas and nuns in traditional clothing still wear habits covering their faces partially, but they are defined as a special religious class; it is not expected anymore that all women will conform to this dress or be branded or stoned in this country.

On the other hand, the coverall clothing seems to occur in places where few men have enough money to marry and those who are wealthy marry more than one woman. Women are thus status symbols and objects of jealousy by the males who do not have access to women. Although it is a symbol of oppression (and of being an object) it has also had the function of protecting women from being singled out as desirable objects worth stealing. Although they have value as status symbols and may often have personal value in the home, the women in the burkas almost always have little value publicly in terms of citizenship. I suppose that, for people who come from such cultures, it could be extremely difficult to believe that the same threats that are used to justify the burka do not exist in our culture (well, not to nearly the same degree.) At a psychological level it may be difficult to discuard a kind of clothing which has become necessary for social survival in the country of origin, in which case the retention of the burka may not be a political statement, just an artefact of foreign social conditions.

Anti-Australian is a useful expression. Maybe we need to start talking more about examples of anti-Australianism?

Sheila Newman