Oh f... did I say 'tenants'? Sorry, I'm a complete dork, I meant 'tenets'. Aphasia, you know.

rossco... I've always had the picture.

You however seem to be having a problem distinguishing between a singular item and many items.

One cannot be many.

Australian cannot be Italian. Italian cannot be Turkish. Turkish cannot be Chinese.

Are YOU getting the picture yet?

Snout, I've been thinking about your comment "The suggestion that prospective visitors should be made to sign their assent to such values is frankly insulting to them, and I’m deeply embarrassed at the prospect of treating our guests in such a patronizing manner.".

I bushwalk when I can. Each time I apply for a permit to camp in a wilderness area I am presented with a list of values/rules for my visit into the wilderness area. Most appear to me to be common sense items because I'm familiar with them. I don't feel patronised or insulted because the National Parks service spells out clearly the behaviour that is required during my visit. Not everybody who visits those areas seems to share those values.

It's a somewhat less formal approach for a day hike when I don't need a permit but most main walking tracks have a signboard up with a similar list on it.

It need not be patronising to give visitors a summary of the rules of the place prior to their deciding to visit. On the other hand I doubt very much that those processes achieve much except with visitors who want to behave respectfully in the place they are visiting.

Has there been anything published which suggests that we have some general problem with the behaviour of short term visitors? Clearly some groups in the community don't respect the kind of values being discussed but don't think that they are tourists taking time out from looking at the rock or lying on the beach to tell passing women about the imagined size of their bits and pieces.

We generally don't want people on tourist visa's working too hard, just spending hard and getting good memories to take home.

Telling tourists something about acceptable behaviour does not sound like it would achieve much but it does not have to be insulting.

R0bert

RObert, I don’t think you can compare a visit to a National Park to a visit to a country. National Parks have quite defined and explicit rules partly because they can be delicate places that have to carry a lot of potentially damaging traffic and because caring for such places is not necessarily second nature for many of their visitors. I don’t reckon you can compare entry to a whole country like Australia to that situation: it seems precious, and yes, condescending.

Come to think of it, though, there is one rule I’d like to see stamped on all tourist visas:

“Please don’t climb Uluru. No, we’re not going to fine you or jail you if you do, but the traditional owners are kind of hoping that when you visit you’ll understand why we ask this."

T800. For centuries countries have invaded, colonised and interbred with one another. What is Italian? What is Turkish? What is Chinese?

I am Australian. My grandparents are Lebanese. My Great, Great Grandfather was Irish. My great, great Grandmother was Turkish. I am all these things because of immigration. I'm told I look Italian, sometimes Spanish, sometimes French, sometimes Greek - sometimes Turkish. I then discover that all of the above countries were once occupants of Lebanon - how can one possibly identify with anything when we are so diverse in nature!

It explains my ethnic makeup, my features, my heritage etc. but my personality traits and my upbringing is influenced by a whole myriad of factors. I was raised in this country - but who am I? Do I even need a label? How restricting is it to label anyone anyway?

Stop focusing on ethnicity for a second - we're discussing values. Why should certain values be exclusively assigned to certain ethnicities and countries.

Remember the song: 'we are one..but we are many'

A Lebanese girl from Beirut once said that the Lebanese in Australia are not truly Lebanese. The values they adopt under the guise of 'Lebanese' are old fashioned and outdated. They have held onto these values because they felt threatened when they first arrived on these hostile shores.

When asked what are the Lebanese values today - what does it mean to be Lebanese today she replied 'it's about having fun'

Now there's a values form I'd happily fill out and sign with little to no hesitation. For a country that claims to be so relaxed, laid back and easy going we certainly know how to get worked up and uptight over the strangest and the silliest of issues.

People are dying in our world everyday from natural disasters and political turbulence and here we are sitting around a campfire discussing values as if they're facing the threat of extinction. It's almost comical really

I thought that one of the Aussie characteristics, and one I particularly like, was our sense of irony and the ability to laugh at ourselves and not take ourselves too seriously, I feel that we are realy losing that.

This stuff about things being unAustralian, I really don't like it, it sounds so sanctimonous and pompous, something I thought Australians generally were not. I don't know, all this talk of "unAustralian" sounds to me, well... very American!