Wobbles....

'swamped by Asians'... makes her either a racist or a prophetess :)

I remember in 1981 'they said' "Box Hill will be swamped with Asians within 5 yrs"

At the time it was attritubed to 'racist xenophobia/propoganda'.....

I didn't really know what the basis of it was, because I was on leave from overseas service, where I was 'swamped' with Asians who I didn't mind a bit, I just remember the comment.

But now, one can drive throught 'Little Singapore' :) ie..Box Hill.

So... not that it actually bothers me, still, I could understand some residents feeling a bit 'identity threatened'.

Of all that I've heard about Pauline.. the only thing I'd truly call racist would be a reported comment here.. "I will represent white people" if thats true..then its rather sad and indeed racist.

She also said "All Australians should be treated equally, irrespective of race"..which is definitely an ANTI racist statement.

Well.. have fun on this one :)

Passey

You raise an interesting point. Hanson was not a facist - just some naieve person thinking that she could do something about a situation which she saw as being out of control.

If Hanson had actually succeeded in getting some form of movement going, then smarter people who were facist types would emerge to capitalise on what she had established.

Remember the 2 Davids behind Hanson? Not that they were facists but each of them knew that they could not be the face of the party.

Whether or not one agreed or disagreed with Paulines and One Nations policies is irrelevant. The question is what lessons were learnt from her time on the political scene.

The two main things that were learnt, in my view, are as follows.

1. Because of the ammount of money the Government and Opposition spend on advertising. The media will everything to discredit any emerging party, especially when there is quite a deal of support for that party, its policies and leaders.

2. The two major parties have a cosy relationship and will tolerate a few small parties, like the Greens and Demos, but if a small party begins to get too big and becomes a threat to them, like winning 10 seats in Queensland, they will collude to bring the party down. Take Abbotts 'get Pauline committee' and the Beattie Governments involvement in the trumpted up charges and jailing of Pauline.

If anyone doubts this, ask why no crown witnesses were charged with perjury after Pauline and David Ettridge were aquitted.

"Swamped by immigrants" would be xenophobic - "swamped by Asians" is definitely race-specific.

As far as enclaves go, all major cities have them. They are usually temporary and tend to fade away when no longer needed. I remember inner-Sydney suburbs with English/Greek street signs years ago - now English only. Earl's Court in London was known as "kangaroo valley".

Maybe she isn't a typical racist/supremacist but she's definitely a small-minded bigot.

Not nearly enough people add the word 'ignorant' when they talk about racism. IMHO, Pauline was pretty damn ignorant, as well as a racist. Her comments didn't deserve the oxygen of publicity.

But the real issue was Hansonism in the media and public discourse.

Whose followers bashed an elderly person with a brick for going to hear public speech? It wasn't Pauline Hanson's followers that did that! It was self-righteous hate, whipped up in the media that inflamed the leftist rent-a-crowd to the extent that they committed an act like that.

It wasn't so much the statements by Pauline that caused our asian neighbours to feel unwanted or threatened. It was the huge beat-up the dumb words got in the media

I'd add one more idea to this otherwise excellent article. Core to Pauline's appeal was her working class ethos- work hard get rewarded and keep striving. That some middle class wannabe journos, academics and hoi polloi felt threatened by this says more about them than it says about Pauline.

Nobody could argue with the case she presented against the capitalist class, except those same people. (By capitalist I mean those who make money out of money; not by the production of goods and services, and the exchange of same).

And you can include in that a parliament full of party hacks who never got, (figuratively or literally) their hands dirty in an honest days work.