I don’t remember ever voting for any multicultural Diversity leaders, come to think of it, I can’t remember any body asking me if I wanted to live in a diverse state of Occupation. Let alone surrender what our Aboriginal and our ancestral heritage left us to be guardians of.
The only community leaders need to be consulted are the ones boarding the boat out of here along with the rest of the Human trash that attached it self like a parasite, sucking the life blood and life out of the host Kenny, you ungrateful little critter. Commentary like that will not earn you any friends or perhaps you can try your luck in some pokey little poo hole somewhere else. If it was not for the White Trash, you would be where? Start learning Australian History. Australia Prospered well before diversity destroyed us. And declined after Whitlam, Mere Coincidence hay.

I liked this letter by Christina Ho in the SMH today http://www.smh.com.au/letters/?page=fullpage#contentSwap2

"What's with all the talk of "our women" and "their women"? Women don't belong to anyone, just as the beach doesn't belong to anyone. It's this misplaced sense of ownership which seems to drive the disturbing displays of aggressive masculinity we've seen in Cronulla. Neither the beach nor women need to be "defended" by violent vigilantes. "

I support the right of all women to wear whatever they want to the beach, be it bikinis or headscarves - or even both at the same time ;-) if any item of clothing should be banned at the beach it is DT's / budgie smugglers but again I support the right of men to wear whatever they want to the beach too.... yes even DT's (ugh).

Ms Malaise,

A broad based, community protest regarding the continued failure of NSW police and muslim community leaders to address the continued hatred, intimidation and violence perpetrated by Lebanese gangs, was hijacked by a small proportion of neo-nazi thugs. Yet, according to your logic, ordinary Australians are expected to say a mea culpa, and apologise to these community leaders and the NSW government for the actions of the few.

'It seems that if your part of a particular ethnic group there is an expectation of a higher standard of social behaviour. This has been termed as a two-tiered citizenship approach.'

Yes I agree.

However, the community protest about the continued violence and hatred by the lebanese gangs is to be accepted? Perhaps, they should be counselled about how bad we are, and that we deserve to be attacked because of the actions fo the few?

Ms Malaise, if you seek to attack the use of double standards - please do not advocate using them. The protest happened because ordinary Australians are sick of intimidation and violence by ethnic minorities. Unless these communities address these tactics, and prevent the continued attacks on ordinary Australians, asking the average Australian to apologise for their own criminal element is a red rag to a bull.

Perhaps it is time to stop the political blame game, and seek to address the cause of the problems (although as the majority of the NSW parliament is made up of minorities, out of proportion to the community, I would not hold my breath).

Either politicians address the continued violence by ethnic gangs, by demanding community support to condemn it, or the average Australian will refuse to condemn the actions of our own criminal element.

I consider myself Australian even though I'm first generation Australian. I have served in the Australian army including overseas deployment. My parents are not Australian, nor after 30 years living in this country do they consider themselves anything other than the country they grew up in. We are religious yet haven't stepped in a church since my teenage sister was baptised.

I consider myself no different to anyone caught in the violence from either side respects to ethnicity. Yet I have been labelled by my skin colour by the media, both from australia and across the world, and feel ostracised because of them.

So when John Howard states he doesn't think Australia is rascist, he is lying. I believe he played the race card to win the last election. Why else would the Australian Government flex it's military muscle against a boatload of refugees offshore of christmas island before sep 11.

But this racism is equal on both sides of the violence. In different ways. And the violence has been building because of the inability of the courts to protect everyones rights.

While credit card fraud gets more jail time than paedophilia. While evidence in gang rape trials are suppressed because the teenage females were called names and recieve threatened because of their heritage, nothing will change.

I am Australian, I'm not lebanese australian, not greek australian, not chinese australian, not anglo-australian. I am however male and and until female australians are free from persecution of any sort, sexual and racial, the war we fight in iraq and afghanistan will continue to have a second front in sydney.

Which is scary because that's why people think they are escaping to australia.

By the way, I am white, as the media likes to preach to me. How's that for reducing the racial tension.

All:
Kenny's commentary has won my friendship! who would have predicted that?

I like the twist on the aborigines and the heritage they "left" us as well. Cunning take I must say.

Australia pospered under the influence of diversity; We have tried to stamp it out; race riots in Clunes 1873 (Chinese), Kalgoolie (Southern Europeans)1919, '34 and a few other sporadic attempts.

The cultural diversity was such a problem that both sides of politics were particularly opposed to immigration for decades. Parts of the trade union were staunch supproters of the White Australia policy.

It was post war immigration that kick started the economy in the fiftes. And as for prosperity declining check out the web site of the Departmment of Trade and Foriegn Affairs - I think there is a link on an article I published in OLO a few weeks ago (29th NOvember) - you probably wont like it. But according to this government we have prosperity coming out of our ears!

We are facing a failure of law and order, social policy and in political will. I concede these issues were bubbling away for years. A startling ( to be expected though) lack of leadership has led to this federally and at least in NSW.

This isnt a problem with Islam as much as it is a deficiency in Australia. Like the drovers dog we vomited this mess up, so we'd better eat it.

Kym Durance

Oh, the joy, the rapture, of seeing in others the faults we so rigorously overlook in ourselves. I remember, as a teenage girl in Sydney, being very nervous of walking past packs of boys (Anglo-Celt in those days, with the odd Italian, Greek or Maltese), because of their threatening and disparaging comments. I put it down to my being fat and plain. Then I got thin, and, well, less plain, and the comments, though different, were still threatening. It's just a fact of herd behaviour (a common feature among young people with too many hormones and not enough sense, and something they mostly grow out of. Just as common, though differently expressed, among girls, and worse, if anything). What's said to have been the casus belli in Cronulla is a pita reflection of white bread adolescent behaviour. Adolescent behaviour everywhere. Presumably it's different for the locals because the perpetrators are identifiably ethnically different.

But what it ain't is a problem exclusively confined to Islam. I was appalled a while back, overhearing several conversations among my son's (then) housemate and a number of the housemate's friends, about "Aussie sluts" and pretty much the whole gamut of abuse the Anglo Avenging Angels of Cronulla are quoting as justification for violence. And I assure you I wouldn't have wanted to be a nearby young female when the whole mob of them were in full self-sustaining cry at the beach. This particular group of youths were Jews, predominantly of Russian parentage, and largely Australian born and educated. (Oh, and before you accuse me of anti-Semitism, the background to the housemate's pre-eviction – sometimes it's good to own the house – friendship with my son is that my son's father is a Russian Jew). It's not religion. It's not even culture. It's insularity, herd-mindedness and insecurity. Good old boring, nasty tribalism.

And I doubt even the Skippie-est of us can pretend we're immune to that. Sadly. But we can, should, and must try.