Frank I admire your persistence in responding to some posters. This week has been the first week I've participated in OLO (I'm on holidays). A debate is fantastic to actually get out what we all really think.

A discussion on what we all think are Australian values would be interesting. It is more then shaking hands, on that point, 25 years ago no Aussie male ever shook my hand. I made a fool of myself on that score a few times until I learned! That little bit of culture has been imported from another culture. It is more than just the loose phrase of a Fair go. Some Aussies have been behaving in a most unAustralian manner on that score.

What fascinates me about many 'old', if you will, Australians is their inability to articulate what Australian values are or indeed what Australian culture is all about. Ask some people who come from elsewhere and who have lived in other cultures with some different values.

For years I've found myself defending Australian culture to many multi generational Australians who bemoan their lack of kulcha and how much more kulcha there is elsewhere. As if culture is only about old buildings and historical figures and is a static thing.

My 18 year old Australian born son tells me I've become a 'Forum Troll (trawler??) and I should stop stirring. I've had to remind him that stirring is a quintessential Aussie thing to do and now I can stir on matters of religion, politics and sex. Something else I was told 25 years ago was unAustralian. The blokes stuck together and talked cricket/rugby, the missus fixed the food and talked kids But look at us now!

Australia is multi-cultural, not multi-national, like for instance Great Britain (England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland), but multi-cultural, and the richer for it.

nationalist fundamentalism... this search for self definition can only ever be a destructive feature for Australian society, much in the same way political correctness has negatively impacted American and UK societies. I use PC as an example because of the destructive ways in which it has been ossified into a set of rigid rules and procedures that all too often curb individual freedom and encourage tyranny, contrary to it being created to minimise forms of discrimination.
ultimately nationalism is always going to be a struggle against human behavior itself as people continue to fundamentalise the image (values, traits, cultural artifacts) of the pure Australian, Japanese, Frenchman, Dutchman, Palestinian etc..
Values are constructed on so many levels of society from the immediate local to the international, but none can be capitalised by any one group

Boaz, I have to agree with Frank, you are beginning to lose touch with reality.

>>don't you consider it highly likely that Greeks coming here would feel they had a more valuable and important historical/cultural heritage than we Aussies in this convict infested 200 yr old country<<

Wasn't that what all European migration was all about? Bringing the benefits of mature and developed culture to a land wide-open for new experiences?

If you suspend judgement for a moment on whether the existing population actually wanted these experiences, and even whether the imported culture was in some way "better", you have to admit that this was the overriding intent in migrating here.

Even for many of the convicts, it was the "clean slate". For many immediately post-war immigrants, it was a "fresh start". They brought with them their accumulated experiences of social conduct - both good and bad - and used that experience to carve out a more rewarding life in Australia.

It never occurred to them that they should consult with the existing population whether their "cultural or religious superiority attitudes" were acceptable or not.

At some point you will be forced to accept, Boaz, that not only are there people who are different from you, but also that they rejoice in being so.

Of one thing I am certain. If Australia was populated by 19,999,999 people who thinks the way you do, and only one who thinks the way I do, I would still be convinced your attitude is wrong.

Furthermore, if those were indeed the circumstances, I would consider it very bad manners on your part to expel me, an Australian citizen, for thinking the way I do.

Values is a very personal thing so to define exactly what Australian values are is a deliberate attempt confuse national identity. Australian values that are applicable to everyone is democracy, respect for the rule of law and equality. Every other value depends on your political leanings!

Australian culture can definitley be defined: the english language, capitalism, hard yakka, sport, the urban block in combination with a million other things. Multiculturalism is designed to destabilise Australian culture for ideological purposes and should be vehemently opposed. Australian culture is heavily influenced by its Anglo Saxon origins, all the micro cultures imported here are also anglo-cised to be able to function with the broader culture...

So there!

Do away with "multiculturalism", and Australia would still be multicultural. The exercise of multiculturalism is socially divisive. It provides for a cultural pecking order and this aids racism and intolerance and a political necessity to administer to cultural demands according to the numbers and not to society in general and in total. Government by pecking order. He who cries victim loudest gets the attention the soonest. Every culture I've ever spoken to on the subject of Australian government and social equality understands this. It's something they first learn coming through the doors. The people who came before and are now established educate the next wave to the system and what one must do to be heard.
After two generations of cultural marxism, if you can find an Australian that can physically hold his head up, and has the faintest glint of pride can but whinge in defence of his culture, "Leave off mate. I pay my taxes.

Well "trueassie" how delightfully sarcastic. To that I say, why don't we just form a lynch mob. Clearly, Australian society is currently embroiled in massive turmoil, and the end is nigh.
The only solution, clearly, is to whip out the ole' pitchforks, and defend the 'true' aussies, right trueassie?

I'll go light my torch.

I wasn't saying there aren't problems - there is a fire here, but you know what they say about fires - it tends to be the smoke surrounding them that gets you.