Spendocrat, see whay I mean about the topic being very subjective. I write something that means one thing to me, and you take it in a totally different context. What I meant was that if immigrants form their racist opinions after they arrive in Australia, due to poor treatment given to them by "Australians", then we only have ourselves to blame. But I just dont think that we should be importing other people's problems (and to clarify that, I DONT mean that we shouldnt help people in need, just in case someone wants to have a dig for that comment).

Even if Australians ARE a racist mob, two wrongs dont make a right. If you think that this is a problem, then we need to work on our problems, not invite more to the table.

Jolanda, I am with you on this one. There is nothing wrong with preferring "your own people", that isnt racist. Its no different to choosing your friends, and making friends with people that have similar tastes and likes to you. Eg, whilst I have a few friends from the city, I tend to make new friends with people from the country (and even more selective, it tends to be people from a farming background), as they have similar views and similar likes to me. To try to liken this to saying that it acceptable to support terrorist because they are like you is just silly and inflammatory

Quiz – yes or no: White privilege

1. You can if you wish arrange to be in the company of people of your race most of the time.

2. When you are told about our national heritage or about "civilization," you are shown that people of your colour made it what it is.

3. You can be sure that your children will be given curricular materials that testify to the existence of their race.

4. You can be pretty sure of having your voice heard in a group in which you are the only member of my race.

5. You can arrange to protect your children most of the time from people who might not like them.

6. You do not have to educate your children to be aware of systemic racism for their own daily physical protection.

7. You can be pretty sure that your children's teachers and employers will tolerate them if they fit school and workplace norms; your chief worries about them do not concern others' attitudes toward their race.

8. You can do well in a challenging situation without being called a credit to your race.

9. You are never asked to speak for all the people of your racial group.

10. You can criticize our government and talk about how much you fear its policies and behaviour without being seen as a cultural outsider.

11. You can worry about racism without being seen as self-interested or self-seeking.

12. You can be late to a meeting without having the lateness reflect on your race.

13. You can choose public accommodation without fearing that people of your race cannot get in or will be mistreated in the places you have chosen.

14. If you have low credibility as a leader I can be sure that your race is not the problem.

15. You will feel welcomed and "normal" in the usual walks of public life, institutional and social.

Adapted from Peggy McIntosh’s paper which you can find here
http://seamonkey.ed.asu.edu/~mcisaac/emc598ge/Unpacking.html

It is sometimes hard to exactly pinpoint the position Country Gal is taking in this debate. (Same for Jolanda.) She appears to have 2 stances when it comes to the issue of racism, one for the white and one for everyone else. I have not come across in this forum anyone suggesting an idiot’s guide to making friends, Gal, but it might be a good idea to start a new thread than to confuse people here. Of course you are welcome to make friends as you wish based on your criteria of race or whether they know how to farm or not. (This does nonetheless make your world quite limited and teaches you on how to find faults in others). Racism appears to be okay if it comes from a white member of the population, but not otherwise. When white stick together, it appears to be fine by you, but when "ethnics" stick together you make a major issue of it. How dare they form ghettos and exclude me! So Gal it kind of makes your argument a little untenable, even when you try to downplay your concern to one of making friends. And your favourite little phrase “Two wrongs doesn’t make a right” sounds catchy and fit for political slogan, but are you implying that apart from the “wrong” you are trying to coin “immigrants”as committing, there is also “wrong” on the white side of the divide you are creating. Sound like an interesting stand.

And praise for Spendocrat and Amel for exposing it.

And for Jolanda, based on your view/attitude of observing the law, in particular the Racial Discrimination Act and similar statutes, I can tell you are not a Christian. Am I wrong again?

-/Cont/- Anthropology 101

3a- The front end of my PhD involved developing cultural antecendents. Periphery reading was concerned the behaviour of clans [Chinese peasants]. Sometimes, there are differences of opinions on definition. Respectfully suggest, you underestimate, the role of Kinship in a clan vis~a~vis nationalism/patriotism/multi-racialism in a nation.

-3b- A clan will coalasce around ancestory; a nation, around an ideology. A nation may be uniculural or multicultural, but, adopt memebership organisation beyond lineage.

-3c- The nation-state is a later development than sovereign's state.

-3d- Is the Jewish Diaspora a nation? Is Singapore, three "nations", Chinese, Indian and Malay? In the first case, I would pefer to stay with Diaspora and in the second society(ies).

-4- I have no desire to rain on the parade, if, "some" aboriginal Australians wish, wrongly, refer to themselves as a "nation", outside their Australian citizenship. These first Australians (60,000 BP) and latter Australians (after 45,000 BP) have a genuine gripe. Irish and Catholic [often both are the case, for one person] have a gripe against the British Crown, from 1788 (actually, before, in the UK too). Seemingly, 1901, was not the turning point. Surely, a just solution involves building mutualism and diversity, and, more pragmatically, a more diverse "middle/upper middle class".

Oliver,
Nationhood is about perceptions-if Aboriginal Australians consider themselves to have been singled out as a group for various forms of racist abuse over 200 years and now want to gather under their Nation's flag to celebrate their uniqueness and give each other strength for the inevitable" battles" with those that resent their existence then fair enough .They are a Nation as far as I am concerned.
Howard's insidious ,wanton destruction of ATSIC proves my point .

Rainier, Are not you a bit hard on country gal's aunt -at least she was in having a go .
If think you no one white person has learnt an Aboriginal Language then if you get a chance try to read some of the Strehlows' literary works with the Aranda people of Central Australia .
The Lutheran Missionary Carl Strehlow's son Theodore was raised at Hermansberg virtually as a member of the tribe in the early 1900's.
He then went to University ,and returned to spend nearly all his life gathering a huge body of wonderfull myths and legends
from old informants that could speak no English [or German for that matter] at all.
The Strehlow Research Centre in Alice Springs is his Legacy to all Australians, particularly the Aranda and Other language groups in Central Australia .
As I am LUCKY enough to contain DNA contributions from all over the world ,[starting in Africa we are told], I find it very hard to maintain a Racist position on anything or anyone,damn it!!

I am aware poor or wrong education is the reason for most problems in the Muslim and Aboridginal comunitys.
The throw away line about always haveing teenage criminals is an attempt to get away from the truth.
Young Aboridginal kids commit crimes to get away from home!
Sexual asults of children are massive! heart breaking! and come from within the comunity.
We white Australians must fix this problem, if tought love is the answer then so be it.
Hideing the problem, denieing the problem, is not the answer.
And nothing less than an end to 200 plus years of waiting for answers to come is our shame.
Bleeding hearted liberalism is the problem not the answer.
Fix it Australia it shames us all.