I can understand how you feel. Seeing a way of life that you know and love being changed by things that are totally alien to you is very hard to take. Especially if the change is so vast and different from what you're used to - and you feel it lowers your standards.

My husband and I recently travelled from Melbourne to Sydney and visited my "stomping ground" of Parramatta. It was quite a shock.
And I too didn't like it at all. It looked like a "rubbish dump."
I even wrote to the local council asking them to enforce stricter regulations in their town planning and zoning restrictions - not to allow the city to be "cheapened" by the direction it was going.

The City Council has to restrict the types of business that it allows.
There should also be city inspectors that monitor activities. Otherwise people are going to move elsewhere - and cities will either die or become ghettos - as happens elsewhere in the US, UK and Europe.

Dear Banjo,

You say that I am "clearly wrong" and from your perspective, I suppose I am.

We all tend to be subjective, especially about issues that we feel rather strongly about. Also our cultures, education, and experiences influence our ways of thinking.

Until recent years, racist policies were also embedded within Australian laws and institutions. The most telling examples of these were the removal of Aboriginal children from their families and the denial of full citizenship rights to Aboriginal people and Torres Strait Islander people. Similarly, the White Australia policy aimed to restrict immigration by people from non-European backgrounds.
Historically, rises in unemployment have often led to calls for immigration restrictions and in some cases led to the scapegoating of people who were seen to be different to members of the dominant culture.

While legislation now exists to protect the rights of all citizens, there is a continuing legacy today from the effects of these racist practices. I know about what I'm talking about because I've experienced them.

So, I repeat... you are entitled to think that I'm "clearly wrong."
That's from your point of view. But from my point of view - it's what I've experienced.

We want the respect of our basic rights, as equal opportunities, respect to our personality, integrity or equal pay for equal work etc.
These are very simple things, and in theory every one accept them and they are or should be protected by law.
The racists are not more than 15% of the Australian population , most of them are extreme right, One Nation, extreme right wing from the liberal Party etc.
Most of them have low education level, are low skilled ,unskilled workers or unemployed, and they are the persons who have effected the most of cause the migrants. I understand their fillings to us because I know what means to lose my job or to be under permanent threat to lose my job because the migrants have more skills and they are ready to work more hours for less money.
Although I understand their feelings and their worries, they must understand, every one must understand that we came in Australia legally, that we come here because we knew Australia will respect our basic rights, that as Australian citizens we will have the same rights with all Australian citizens, that first and second class citizens, that first and second class employee could not exist.
Today a big part of Australians, about 43% are non Anglo Saxon, we have the politic power, the vote numbers and we could press successfully any political party or the government to protect our rights
I think the best way to solve this problem is the respect of our rights and common activities to promote our mutual benefits.
The victims of race discrimination have done everything to avoid the division from our country but if we have no other choice then we could create our political organizations to protect our basic rights politically.
I think the ALP will be friendly to our rights and we will avoid any racial conflict.
The Howard nationalist government moved backward the relations in our society and during his government we had an increase number of race victimization.

Antonios Symeonakis
Adelaide

Dear Antonios,

It is unlawful to discriminate on the basis of race, colour, national descent, ethnic or ethno-religious background. Australian laws make it illegal for people to engage in racist activity, to encourage, incite or permit racist acts to occur. However while legislation makes racism unlawful, it cannot address the underlying social issues.
It cannot make people follow the rules.

Only through education (together with effective legislation) is our best hope for developing a society free from racism.

But I'm not sure that this will happen in our lifetime. My hope lies with our children and grandchildren - who hopefully will be free of our baggage and prejudices (and all of us have those - as you know).

ASymeonakis said

Today a big part of Australians, about 43% are non Anglo Saxon, we have the politic power, the vote numbers and we could press successfully any political party or the government to protect our rights.
Reply
I don’t know who we are? But let me ask you If Aussies swamped wherever and which ever country you came from not respecting the laws- then on top of it making clear threads stating we had political powers to change your laws -I would suggest we wouldn’t get very far would we?

Nor would we get legal aid welfare dental Drs for free would we?.
I encountered this same attitude in Cairns.

When we pointed out to these Chinese that they couldn’t sell food in the manner they were.-

They couldn’t because it broke every health safety guideline that we all have to follow.

This is while physically grabbing your arm and insisting you try, you taste, you like, the food chicken etc and on and on...

We don’t live like that. "Especially in a country town".

Also they are not employing any of the local aboriginal people or locals.

Oh no they bring their own over who BTW can not speak English most times.

They were not talking either but shouting right in your face.

Do you know what they said? Oh No we don’t worry for these things- “your laws”! We do like this--- We do different. We do our way.

Our way is poisoning the town because of their low health standards.

When we rang the council health inspector he was enormously hard to understand because of his accent.

BTW they owned EVERY single shop there.

Plus they were dirty and rude in the accommodation houses. We stayed in three.
Then we asked them to stop physically grabbing us. It was really annoying and again it’s quite illegal in several ways.

Eventually we told them that hawking was illegal here – even food.

The same thing- Oh no worry we no worry for this.

Australians have the right to keep our culture, heritage, health standards.!

Dear PALE&IF,

I'm so sorry that you've had such bad experiences. Of course it must be frustrating to see the town standards disintegrating. But you have to take active action. It would be a shame that our beautiful tourist
destinations would lose their charm.

If the City Council does not take responsibility, organise a citizen's group, go to the next Council Meeting with petitions, demanding action or replacement of Council.

Only group action will achieve anything. Organise a boycott of the problem shopping areas and maybe they will either be forced to comply with higher standards or move out.