Each morning our papers tell of another attack on Indian students. Though i believe much of the problem is simply more violence per se. I don't deny racial undertones across our society as a whole but living and working late at night in Melbourne's CBD i have to walk home through the city or try to get a cab around 2:30 am and from what i see it is mindless violence projected on ANYONE, regardless of skin colour. It actually seems quite racial of our media to only focus on violence against certain ethnic groups.
I have been bashed in the city on my way home from work for no apparent reason. without even making eye contact with those who hit me off my bike and surrounded me kicking and punching me until i was able to escape. I have seen people being bashed, and i have learnt to get the hell out of the CBD as fast as possible and to ignore the taunts and provocations (which happen almost 100% of the time, from car windows, street corners etc).
It is disgusting and shameful. The 2am lockouts made it worse, liquor licensing is favoring large, generic fight club, drinking centered night clubs.

I'm 32 and 4th generation Australian of Irish french, Scandinavian background. And i'm disgusted with my city's behavior.”

Violence happens against everyone from every ancestral background. I'd be interested to know if Indians are disproportionately featured in crimes stats. I doubt it.

Here's a paper I found that sorta backs up my thoughts on it.

http://proceedings.com.au/isana2009/PDF/paper_Spolc.pdf

Dear AP,

According to one website there have
been 100 reported cases of attacks
on Indians (mostly students) in
Melbourne in 2009, as against 17
in 2008.

This has resulted in the Victorian
Premier announcing the appointment
of Australia's first "Minister for
Respect," (I'm not kidding). Former
football player - Justin Madden
has been appointed to the job. The
Victorian Premier said this was part
of a "broader response to the scourge
of alcohol fuelled violence and
vandalism." The Premier claims that
the new Minister will be an additional
voice in the community promoting diversity
and racial tolerance, including providing
educational and Law and Order approaches.

It all sounds like PC gone a bit mad.
However - as I've stated on another thread -
it may appease the Indian newspapers and media.

Will it make Victoria a safer place?
I doubt it.

More and - better trained police might help.
As might a review of the licensing laws
and hours of opening of clubs, hotels,
and so on, and more severe penalties for
loutish, drunken behaviour.

I am truly surprised any one could ask the question.
You can bet some of it is racist some just violence and some who carry out the crimes are idiots.
Yes Indians are targeted not every time, some attacks have been Indian on Indian.
Some Lebanese vs Indians, more religion than racist.
But some thugs would think targeting others is a worth while thing, and that racism is linked to knuckle dragger's, fools with nothing better to do.

with a 15Billion dollar a year international education factory here it really seems we need to invest some of these profits into Domestic education at pre, primary and high school levels. I don't remember being taught ethics, morality or respect and interest in our neighbors fascinating and highly respectable cultures. Sure they had a religion class every now and then that was as fantastical as a fairy tail to me plus they taught us Indonesian (language) purely to prepare us for the great economic trade potential we thought we were going to have.

Violence against ANYONE is wrong. whether it be Indian v's Indian or Lebanese v's Australian. What is the problem is that someone or groups of individuals would actually want to hit someone until they are unconscious and then continue hitting them or stab them and walk away laughing or believing they have done someone proud. It's unfathomable.

Ha. Justin Madden as Minister For Respect
That is a good one. I'm not sure about Madden's past but by golly, professional football players are not the role models my children will be encouraged to look up to.

What about Ben Cousins for Minister of responsible drinking and recreational drug abuse

ok. i realise that the 15 billion a year education industry is private money and not available to our gov to inject into primary and high schools. but you get what i mean . it's a systemic problem.

Shortly after the attack a police spokesman (A spokesman could be someone who repairs bicycle wheels) announced that the attacks were not racist. Without knowing who did it I wondered how the spokesman could be so sure of anything about motive.

AP
As I said elsewhere if Justin Madden wanted respect he should have played for Collingwood instead of Essendon. while this was a witticism it was intended to show two serious points.
A. a footballer (albeit a relatively sensible one) is hardly a moral role model.
B. It is gross window dressing, spin, tokenism by the state government in response to a much deeper, more entrenched problem.

I tend to agree with StG that the problem is the violence regardless of nationality or either the victim or culprit.

I venture to suggest that the upsurge in Indian victims is a symptom of deeper issues.
Alienation felt by other marginalized groups or Australians (not Lebanese, Belly). The distinction is both part and symptom of the problem.

Urban racial perpetrators of violence is generally a symptom of alienation etc.

Aussie louts/bigots et al are most often so because they too feel less part of the community that they feel they should be.
i.e. they are looking for someone/thing to blame or take out their frustrations on.
This in no way makes their behaviour acceptable but it does spot light the area that has need for improvement.

Aurum,

I believe that there does seem to be a fad of attacking Indians. While there is no particular dislike of Indians in our society, there is a segment of our society that would attack any group, if they saw other people doing the same.

Regarding schools, all of the research about bullying suggests that teaching prosocial skills to kids is important, but not as important as adults making and enforcing rules. The problem isn't that teachers aren't discussing values, as much as teachers cannot enforce rules to the extent that they would like. Too many of our schools operate on the law of the jungle and kids learn that thugs are top of the pile. Therefore, many drunks want to belong to this "high status" group. We need to lose this idea that every single child has a right to be in normal schools and find alternative arrangements for these few children who drag down the rest of their class.

Without being there hard to be sure. It seems uniquely Punjabi Indians who are victims. As many people from many lands look Indian seems a great degree of sophistication in race identity among the thugs. very smart lol. Police will sort out and if it is racist they should say so but the reaction should be that an individual committed this crime. I am thousands of kilometres away and I refuse to take the balme as many disturbed, unhinged people seem to want.

has the Indian press reported the chief suspects of the latest Indian murder in Australia are actually Indians? I doubt it. The silence of the press and white loathers is deafening.

Runner

The hypocrisy should be alarming, but it isn't.

When "white" Australians in southern Sydney got fed up of the anti-social behaviour remember, well white men rape. White men do this, white men do that. Green Fake left mantra lol. Not racist at all. How dare anyone mention it was racist, how dare they? Even if the language and the defence indicated otherwise.They are OBLIVIOUS to the fact they incited the hysteria by their objection, denial and outright contempt of victims rights. Then the researches (LOL) come along with a bias already established and proceeded to waste many hours coming to the wrong conclusions.

Yet now Green Fake Left call it for what it is, outright racism and it must stop. Of course now that the media does not actually make a big deal from the race of the attackers after being sued or threatened into censorship submission. So now these ethnic thugs are RACIST. LOL. I wonder if they even realise that many are refugees and odd assortment of disadvantaged?

It is inter-ethnic conflicts with just a few whites thrown in to justify the silly rants of the dysfunctional self indulged whose lazy bigoted minds blame the bogans.

Of course anyone with more IQ points than 10 would realise crime is related to lower socio-economic status and cultural differences often add to the financial woes of newer migrants. But tell them to lose some cultural traits if they want to improve their lot..well you are racist. Paternal racism destined to extend victim status.Avoidence of the real issues as they get thrown into too hard basket.

So you cannot totally blame the Indian press when they are offered such illogical nonsense from our media on a platter.

Now we have Vindaloo against Violence, another wankfest. If I lived in Melbourne I would raise my hand and offer a spare room to an Indian student. You know getting back to the victims rather than OUR MASSIVE EGO MASSAGE INDUSTRY.

In fact I may still do, we have a university up here. Van Krudd need NOT apply, racist spoilt little twit.

The media are letting us all down by pointing the spotlight on the race issue when really it shouldn't matter - ie. if particular ethnic groups hate/disrespect other particular groups or indeed ALL others, it should be of no real consequence if they're not allowed to inflict harm.... The BIG issue here is THE FAILURE OF AUTHORITIES TO ADEQUATELY ENFORCE LAW AND ORDER AND PROTECT THE POPULATION. The Cronulla riot wouldn't have happened if Lebanese thugs hadn't been allowed to behave as they had been in the period leading up it - SIMPLE AS THAT!. I also find it quite shabby that Indians have been held up as some sort of special case for seemingly no greater reason than the dollar impact.

It is nothing more than a few Indians seeing advantage in playing the race card and getting up on their soapboxes and inflaming the issue.

Who is committing these crimes? The only time we have seen the perpetrators on TV has been when they were white. It was a "hey look, we were right, the attackers are white racists!" play by the media. However in the vast majority of cases, where the attackers turn out to be other Indians, Lebanese or Sudanese, the media only quietly mentions the fact. Can you blame them? It's embarrassing when you rant and rave about white racism only to find later that whites weren't even involved.

So, is the issue racism? In some cases, yes. Is it white racism? In even fewer cases, yes. Mostly it's racism between non-white groups. But don't let the truth get in the way. The self-appointed Indian spokesmen and the Indian media see a way to profit - perhaps an easier path to permanent residency, lawsuits, financial assistance, concessions from the Australian government. The whole thing makes me sick. These Indians act like they're the only people in this country who suffer from crime. To think that they're deserving of special treatment only makes me despise them.

The real issue is Law and Order - if that was properly maintained people could be as racist as they want but no one would be getting bashed and killed.

Issues of race definitely exist but they shouldn't be ALLOWED to cause real physical harm.

It's encouraging that finally the Indian government themselves have woken up that the big problem lies with the Victorian authorities.