So reward someone who uses bribery and damages property?
If I did that I'd get locked up, but on a University campus it's to be commended?
This country is really screwed up...

as long as she pays her international fees and agrees to be dumbed down by leftist ideology she is sure to pass all her grades.

And another " unhappy with Chines" comment..I wonder did Andrews sneak over the Victorian border to apologise to her for the White Australia policy?
And the Australian middle class again propped up with wealthy chinese at any expense to rest of us, including changing the rules to suit them!
F* , I'm over this madness.

Not sure we learned very much here? Just that there is a cultural difference! I'm glad the young lady in question persisted, if only to demonstrate that we lead by example as a truly multinational, inclusive, tolerant society.

Now if we could just transfer that to Beijing, Moscow, Istanbul, Islamisbad, Damascus, Cairo, Belfast, the old dart and all points inbetween, what a wonderful world this would be?

As Sir Winston Churchill noted, democracy is the worse form of government, but better than all the rest!

And the home of modern democracy, the US of A, has the very best democracy money can buy, minus the cultural red envelope.

We for our part, are not as pure as the driven slush in this regard, with tales of foreign billionaires supporting this or that politician or electoral college with very large cash donations?

And we here in Q have quite a history of highly corrupt, brown paper bag diplomacy! Cultural red envelopes, being far too small!

Were none of this not so, we would like as not, have a sane energy policy and the sustainable economic growth it alone can bring!

Powerful people buy influence everywhere you look, not all of it transparent or aimed at progressive outcomes! Just protecting or gaining an assumed advantage?

And the (please explain) plane truth, stands as a glaring, perceived example?

Some even hack into the emails/voice mail of others, looking for a perceived political advantage or usable (Slipper) scandal/emotional blackmail etc/etc?

That said, nowhere is very transparent crowdfunding for any purpose, including electoral outcomes, ever critiqued? Perhaps another lesson for would be political candidates/plane customers?
Alan B.

This person has written a book titled, “The New Chinese: How they are changing Australia.”. That alone gets my back up; Chinese should NOT be changing anything in Australia. We certainly do not want Chinese practices – bribery, bullying, in our country.

The “poor girl” in questions was CERTAINLY taught to bribe; it is part of the culture. “Cultural differences” are not acceptable excuses for abusing Australian culture!

 
“support and tolerance for cultural difference from Australian society makes a great difference to the new Chinese and every new migrant in this country. ..”

What? We are supposed to accept Chinese 'differences' (corruption), or am I not understanding this weird article?

". with tales of foreign billionaires supporting this or that politician or electoral college with very large cash donations?."

State and Feds have always been Anglo-Saxon to the bootstraps decent chaps. When they retire it's to run soup kitchens for water-side workers and grow roses for nursing home invalids. No cash ever tainted the linen pockets of the honourables until the Chinese gold grabbers threw their opium fouled bribes under the table . Our land is dirt by sea and always shall be.

It is difficult to tell whether the author is being serious or ironic when he has focused on this incident of accepted corruption by a Chinese student as an example of a desirable cultural difference to be tolerated and learned from.

Why does this student choose to study in Australia, and perhaps eventually apply for PR (as most international students do)? Is it to learn something about Australian society, or is it to impose her values on the host country? Does she see an opportunity for a prosperous, comfortable middle class life in Australia? If so, she might reflect upon how that middle class life is lived. In Australia, this middle class life includes doing most things openly. In China, one can enjoy a middle class life, but one is subject to the whims of officials who may demand bribes for services taken for granted in Australia. Would this student change things in Australia, so that we have to pay a bribe for everything that makes for a decent life, e.g., bribing school officials for a place in a decent school, bribing teachers to pay more attention to our children or bribing municipal officials to repair roads in our local area, to name but some examples?

Yes in Australia, we also have corruption, but we also have ICACs, Royal Commissions, Ombudsmen and a free press to investigate corruption.

Instead of being granted PR, this student should return to China where she can demonstrate true bravery and determination fighting the Chinese government for the release of those Australians who are in Chinese prisons on specious bribery charges. Perhaps she can eloquently persuade government officials that they have misconstrued the actions of those Australians and that the whole thing was a cultural misunderstanding.

For its part, Sydney University has been shamefully remiss in giving in to this student. Its actions will not give the student a sense of what a civil society is.

There are some aspects of our culture which cannot be compromised in the name of diversity and tolerance. One of those aspects is the idea of a civil society.