Hi Frank :) glad you here you live in the 'enlightened' city of good ol Melbourne...*grin*

Actually.. I don't so much "accuse" you ... thats a bit strong I think. I'm tryyyying to understand you.

On your 3 stints in Turkey.. let me add a 'dimension' to it that you may not have experienced.
If your water had been cut off by the ethno religious group which the 'mosque' represented... and if each morning you went to the local market and passed by the bloke who was given the job of slaughtering all the men women and children of your predecessors simply because they were 'Christian', and if during an election where a Catholic bloke had been elected in spite of massive Muslim party activity,and you saw the rage on the face of every Malay/Muslim the next day, if you had spoken to villagers who had been threatened, abused, and deceived by Muslims...if your own house had been 'raped' by being forced to display 'pro Muslim' campaign posters (to influence Christians) If the leader of the local Christian executive body (representing hundreds of villages and churches) had been told point blank by the Muslim Chief Minister "CONVERT....or else"

Would you still 'hear' the 'wakeup call' as you put it the same way ? :)

I hardly think so.
I could go on for hours about how it is in a 'mixed' and competitive society. Your experience in Turkey was little different from Australia. VAST Turkish majority TINY non Turk minority. Very managable.. very peaceful... like Australia. (Lets keep it that way.)

But if you dug a bit deeper.. and went back to 1914.. when there were
around 1.8 to 2.1 Armenians there.. and then checked their population 1918 with the below inbetween.....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armenian_Genocide#Armenian_deaths.2C_1914_to_1918

well..you might have a wiser perspetive on how 'competing' societies relate to each other. Has human nature really changed ?

David

You had a sad and no doubt frightening experience.

But, tell me, what has all that got to do with Mutlicultural Australia in 2007? Have you had any experience of that sort in this country?

Neither have I. Multicultural policies help bring out our common humanity.

MC is a failure.
I hear today of more violence by ethnic minorities. Two people waiting at the lights in Carlton were attacked with rocks by a group of around 10 Africans. Just waiting at the lights doing nothing.
I also noted that the ABC unlike a few other networks refused to state they were Africans. Another report stated how it has nothing to do with race. I can't remember the last time 10 Aussies surrounded a car and stoned it trying to get the occupants out for no reason.

MC is a failure. Australia does not need migrants. Migrants are of no overall benefit to Australia. The tide is changing. Those of us who are educated and know this is destroying Australia need to speak up loadly against MC. For too long the PC hardliners have bullied ordinary Australians with the threat of being called racists. No longer. The more people of good standing come out and denouce MC, the more the average Aussie will feel safe to speak up against it.

Don't blame Multiculturalism for criminal activities that should be taken care of by the police.

Foxy,
MC tells Australians that bringing people here from all different cultures is good for Australia and Australians. I have given you an example of where is is not. I therefore blame MC for lying to Australians. MC is a failure.
One of these people last year murdered a colleague of mine by stabbing her multiple times in the neck. Should I again not blame MC and just say its only a police matter.
Sooner or later you need to admit its a symptom of MC.
How many of these incidents do you need before it becomes more than just a police matter?
You are a racist. By covering up these incidents you distort the truth and make particular ethnic minorities look better than they actually are. You consequently make other groups that are not responsible look worse than they really are. Things should be seen for what they are.

It was ever thus. Pick any topic that involves the differences between people, and it inevitably descends into the conservative bigots vs. the liberal love-thy-neighbours.

Neither side can convince the other.

One believes that foreigners are to be feared and shunned ("Australia does not need migrants. Migrants are of no overall benefit to Australia" - knopfler) while the rest can't understand the fuss ("Multicultural policies help bring out our common humanity" - FrankGol).

The reality, however, is that in this ever more connected world, we are somehow going to have to live with a greater level of cross-border porosity than ever before. This is reality, if only because none of the keep-'em-out brigade can come up with a workable alternative policy short of disconnecting us from the rest of the world.

Becoming a closed community, as we see in the North Korean model for example, is inconsistent with what most Australians want. So we will have to lump it, I'm afraid.

It would be better therapy, I think, if the xenophobes looked for a twelve-step programme that helped them with their insularity problem.

Alternatively, articulate a policy of engagement with the rest of the world that is a little more constructive than "close the borders and hunker down".

The world doesn't work that way any more. Sorry.