We are one, we are many and from all the lands on Earth we come.
We share a dream and sing with one voice: I am, you are, we are Australian!
I wasn’t going to mention this for fear of currying political disfavour, however Josh put me up to it. Last week Electric Firefly donated a $300 prize voucher to the inaugural Refugee Ball in Sydney, which we then upped to $500 when we found it had been won by one M. Collins from The United Nations High Commission for Refugees.
There are many among us who live in fear of refugees and their impact on “our way of life”, but I don’t believe everything I read in the Herald, nor that reported in prime time news or on current affairs programmes. History has shown that with each new ingress of survivors from places like Vietnam, Chile, Fiji, Iraq, Iran (Persia for the politically delicate), the former Yugoslav Republics and, like my grandparents, the death camps of “civilised” Europe, our culture and economy have been strengthened for the diversity that these people bring us. Far from taking our jobs and impregnating our women, refugees are among the better contributors to the national economy, taking the hand-up-not-handout approach by starting businesses and educating their children more than the average Australian family.
Now, it has been said over and again that this will undermine our way of life, and I’m quick to agree. “Our way of life”, let’s not forget, was forged on the backs of colonial labourers and cannot be sustained if we were to pay for the true cost of what we have. Protecting the selfish interests of the few million white Australians at the time of Federation (1901) was the motivation behind our very first Act of Federal Parliament – The Immigration Restriction Act, or “White Australia Policy”. This abominable law was conceived in the fear that hardworking Chinese and wider Asian peoples would work harder than European Australians and take away something they saw as a God-given right – to organise the lives of our lesser developed neighbours to suit our own economic structure. By this time, most of Papua New Guinea was earmarked for mining, sugar and pineapple plantations. As little as 10 years ago our then Foreign Minister grappled with the President of fledgling East Timor for control of oil fields that were East Timorese under international law (and very much needed to rebuild the shattered economy of the region), fighting on “in our interests” and coming away, once again, with more than our share. But that’s another story…
Refugees come to Australia to escape war, environmental changes and unthinkable suffering, not when they see policy changes making our country a “soft target”. They are themselves a soft target for politicians with no other policy platform than to incite fear and hatred towards an unknown enemy. Xenophobia, if I may please explain, is an unreasonable dislike and/or fear of that which is unknown or different from oneself, and a particularly ugly personality flaw. I’ve often wondered why they scrapped the second verse of our national anthem and I’m thinking this might be the clause that discomforted: “For those who’ve come across the seas, we’ve boundless plains to share; with courage let us all combine to advance Australia fair”.
Support refugees, there are more than 90 million of them worldwide.
Support our economy by buying Australian.
Further discussion and/or hate mail can left as comments below. Yes, comments are moderated for the purposes of blocking spam, however rest assured they’re not censored.
Tags: Buy Australian, Herald, immigration, refugees, United Nations
Posted November 13, 2009 by Simon under Off Topic, Politics
November 30th, 2009 at 12:27 pm
I am confused now. Some people say we should take more refugees and migrants. some people say not. I read here – its ok. I read APP stuff (australian protectionist party)- they are veru convincing that we just about to be in trouble importing more people here.
I found the opinion poll to voteon these matters- the results are interesting- that is what people think. see activeopinion.org
People are not that welcoming towards refugees at all. some say Australia should stop being a signatory to UN refugee conventions because of abuse by people smugglers.
December 3rd, 2009 at 1:06 pm
Hi Freedomofspeech, thanks for your reply, I hope I can clarify my political and personal perspectives for you.
Politically: Nationalist politicians like the APP or Australia First Party have always been afraid of immigration – it is very easy to make people scared of unknown “enemies”. It is the same kind of politics that Pauline Hanson used, but failed spectacularly to articulate any rational arguments.
Australia has a history of racism and xenophobia. Every intake of refugees from wars and brutal governments in Europe, Asia and South America has met resistance from many Australians, but these fears have eventually been proven wrong and their victims shown to be grateful, contributing members of our society, like my grandparents.
The idea that our national nemesis will slip silently into the country and live among us, learning our ways etc., is an easy-sell political platform from the uninspired to the uneducated, but to suggest that Australia is sinking under the weight of its population, when compared with other nations, is laughable.
To deny humanitarian support to refugees because of fears that someone, somewhere, may be taking advantage of us is to isolate ourselves as a fearful and racially-based society. Morally, the so-called denial of freedoms like speech is trumped by a moral obligation to fundamental freedom from war, abuse and systemic poverty. We are lucky to be able to offer these protections to less fortunate people.
Personally, we are all entitled to free speech, but to “make a stand” against refugees is pretty piss weak. Be the bigger man and see that multiculturalism is what makes this country great, not weak. The world has been “globalising” since the 16th century so don’t think it will go back to normal one day, we’re getting closer to other countries and cultures and if we don’t play well with others, they won’t play well with us. We are judged more by the Cronulla riots and Iraq war than Crocodile Dundee and the Sydney Olympics.
Don’t be afraid of people.