We Are One, But We Are Many
February 11, 2008 | Filed under Politics
According to a Monash University (hey, my university!) study, about 40% of Australian-born people from my local area believe that “Australians are justified in thinking that their way of life is threatened by multiculturalism”.
Seriously, do I have to spell it out again? Australia’s way of life is built on the basis of multiculturalism, and no matter what the colour of skin or your birthplace, you will never be culturally Australian until you can embrace the fact that we are a rainbow community.
Really, if you want to get down to the nitty-gritty, do these Australian-born people consider that they too are migrants, as the original Aboriginal Australians had their way of life threatened, nay, demolished, by the multiculturalism offered by white migrants hundreds of years ago? Of course not. In their eyes, as white inhabitants of Australia, they are the true Australians. What crap.
And in other news, apologies for the downtime yesterday.
8 Responses to We Are One, But We Are Many
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To be honest, I would have thought the number would have been higher. I suppose the positive to take from this is that 60-70% DON’T feel it is a threat.
Funnily enough, these are usually the same people who are against an apology to the Indigenous people with the argument that “people have been invading and conquering for hundreds of thousands of years: the Romans and Vikings did it to us, so the Aborigines should suck it up” (a depressingly common argument), but then hate immigrants because they’re “taking over”. Irony++
To conclude: as long as we still have sport, beer and sickies, we’ll be Australians no matter what our skin colour(s).
Rebekah on February 11, 2008 #
That’s sad to hear that people are still being threatened by diversity. I’m an immigrant and sometimes I feel that people sort of think that I’m weird, just because I wasn’t born in Canada, and don’t share the same way of life (and whatnot) as they might. But Canada, is a great place that’s really diverse and understanding. I’m thankful for that.
Yara on February 11, 2008 #
Come on, Amanda, admit that you have the intention of enslaving White people and turning Australia in a communist country. *eyeroll*
Julie on February 11, 2008 #
Australia’s diversity is one of the first things I was impressed with when I moved to this country. I’m American, my husband is the Aussie. I think the multiculturalism of Australia is beautiful!
Deborah on February 11, 2008 #
I was waiting for someone to post about something like this, since I’m too scared to do it myself.
Most people who live in Australia aren’t actually pure australian, right?
Kristina on February 11, 2008 #
lol. People are retarded, enough said.
Mar on February 12, 2008 #
@Kristina: Most white Australians are descendants of Irish criminals. The only “pure” Australians are the aborigines, who are a minority in an extreme way.
The CIA factbook says that 92% of the population are white, but I bet half of those “white” people are actually mixed race. Especially with the large communities of Italian and Greek Australians. But I guess they’re considered white people, despite the fact that they’re major contributors to the idea of MULTICULTURALISM!
Nellie on February 12, 2008 #
That false xenophobia is not uncommon. There’s this great cartoon featuring a White male demanding that a Hispanic immigrant depart from the U.S,. but when a Native American is displayed, he is immediately silenced. Imagine, what would happen if the natives of either of our nations spoke up and took back what was once theirs. A lot of us would be shit out of luck.
Asia on February 12, 2008 #