Xenophobic. Having accepted about 140 different cultures into our country I would have thought a more apt label for us would be a country driven by xenomania. In Saeed Khan's case it seems our education system is still capable of churning out dills.

Embarrassment. Under the rules of multiculturalism we have been forced to accept the unacceptable. Should we be embarrassed about people who have four wives? Should we be embarrassed about the cultural delight of FGM? Is their any embarrassment felt by treating women as chattels?

Racist. It is impossible for us to divest ourselves of the racist tag because we are importing racists and bigots. Ask the ‘K’ brothers or the Skafs for verification.

It would appear that membership of the Greens hasn’t changed. You still have to be an intellectual dwarf to be accepted.

Mr Khan is able to say 'no' with great vehemence to many things. I am not clear about what he would say 'yes' to.

I am a migrant also from an non-Anglo country and came to Australia because it is Australia. So if you are also an ethnic and pretend not to understand what Australian means or you spend your waking hours knocking the place, ask yourself - why did you choose to come to this country and not another?

I came to Australia because is a cool, English speaking, democratic, Western country. Let's have all the diversity that 'cool' can encompass but the rest - English speaking, democratic, Western - is clear and simple. They are not part of a Howard plot, they are not oppressive nor discriminatory. Stop knocking them.

I do not believe that such people are honest when they pretend that they are unsure about, or worse, offended by Australia's desire to remain Australian. Or that Australia's desire to remain Australian is a racist plot.. How ridiculous and dishonest to equate the dictation test with requiring migrants to speak one language, English, when they want to be citizens. Not when they want to be permanent residents, mind you, only when the want to be citizens.

I want my children to grow up and participate in the life of this cool, Western, English speaking country. I love these things, I love this country and its promise. I find the constant nay-saying by ethnics rude and offensive. Put a sock in it.

What a joke. My favorite bit of dishonest propaganda
"The Dictation Test was also used most famously in 1938 to try to keep out Egon Kisch, an anti-Nazi activist trying to warn Australians about the danger of Hitlerism. When the Dictation Test failed the Attorney General of the day, R. G. Menzies, drafted a Sedition Act against speaking ill of Germany, among other things, which was recently brought up to date."
Oh. You mean Egon Kisch the communist and one of the leaders of the failed lefty revolution in Vienna? How dare we try and keep someone like that out....

What I love is the authors statements are inherently racist. He implies that only whites can learn english.

Saeed has proved his point judging by the first three posters on this topic. Australia not only kept out Egon Kisch when he had information about what was happening in Germany under Hitler but they kept out the Jewish refugees that fled Germany at the same time.

Both could reasonably be seen to have contributed enormously to the holocaust, along with the rest of the world who sat by and refused to listen to the likes of Egon. Some accomplishment.

Today we who are here and have been here a few minutes in geological time are trying to force new people to do something we did not have to do. Today my great-great-great grandparents who came to Australia from Silesia in 1844 would not be accepted.

Yet while not being able to speak English for decades they built up large chunks of South Australia's farming land and contributed billions to the country. Still do.

The question now is which of the 140 odd nations of people would you good folks like to leave? Arabs? The Australian born muslims whose family have been here since the 1850's? The Skafs and the Lebanese gang rapists were born here - where should we send them?

They are in jail where they belong - where do the people go who planned and supported an illegal war?

Marilyn Sheppard, you are too angry and the only thing you seem to be interested in, or able to engage with, is your anger. It is your badge of virtue. If I may say so, this much anger as a way of life is poisonous. Don't spend your years in the black hole of seething rage.
Your heart will not bear it for ever and will attack back. The only person who has any power over your own attitude, I am afraid, is yourself. Without tempering your resentment I predict a massive coronary.

I don't think the the angry posts to this opinion site are representative of the average Australian's point of view. At least I hope not.

Australians that I know are not that mean and not that unreasonable. They know how much this country has been enriched by the various cultures that live here. The vast majority of migrants from all parts of the globe are hard working and cause no harm.

In my community is a lovely old Chinese lady. Totally harmless. She chatters away to me in Mandarin, and her daughter does the translating. She would absolutely fail the language test. And she probably knows very little about Australian history.

But I am very glad she is in my community. She's much more decent than many Caucasians here who have Australian birthright.