Dear David F.,

I did go back a bit too far. So just ignore
the last sentence. Access and equity has been
in place as a policy framework for quite a few
decades as a means to encourage Australian
Government programs and services to consider
barriers facing people based on race, religion,
language or culture.

The Australian Government's National Agenda For
a Multicultural Australia: Sharing Our Future (1989)
stated:

"...our institutions are now required to respond to
the needs of a culturally and linguistically divers
society ... it is in the interest of all Australians
that the three tiers of Government, Commonwealth,
State, and Local, intervene where necessary to manage
our diversity in the interests of cultural tolerance,
social justice and economic efficiency..."

I think "Australia" is all ready past tense.

With the first wave of post war migration there were enough of us to bring most migrants, a number of them from not very pleasant societies into the fold. We converted all those European to the Australian egalitarian way. Remarkably quickly we became one.

Come the first wave of Asian migration, even with the now Australianised first wave to help us, we were not quite so successful. May be the antisocial, & criminal element element was higher or stronger, but still many aspired to become that nebulous "Ozzie" & did so.

Now however we have been overwhelmed. With our past successes we thought we were invincible. How wrong we were.

We have brought in by invitation, & by letting gate crashers stay, many truly horrible people, from very nasty societies. They have no intention of fitting in, or making a contribution. They are here only for what they can get, & many hate us for having what we have managed to put together.

We may be one of the last of western countries on the slippery dip of collapse, but we are on our way down, into the pool of failed civilizations. Our new culture of entitlement & handout is lubricating the slope, while our latest arrivals are using our good nature to push us down.

Hold your breath folks, it wont be long now.

Dear Hasbeen,

Where's the lovely sailor that we've all come
to admire?

Of course there will be problems
in a society that sees homogeneity as not
only desirable but mandatory.

There was always going to be
tension between the ethnic groups and "us,"
not to mention between and within the ethnic
groups themselves. But in
the process we've ended up with a more vigorous
exciting Australia, and in the future, as we've done
to date, through interaction and discussion, we'll
sort the problems out.

cont'd ...

This may cheer you up:

http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/politics/everyday-australians-make-multiculturalism-work-20110217-1axoj.html

RECHTUB your post above has me cringing.
You talk of nothing should over rule the law.
IF I was on Hasbeens boat I would rush for the rail.
Law upheld the man your thread targets right to not wear a helmet.
It did so years ago in that RSL, backed by the RSL movement.
It does for people of Jewish faith.
So what is your point?

Dear Yuyutsu,

I agree with you that the state should not reign supreme. However, that need not have anything to do with religious belief. If one feels that a law is unjust and the injustice is not a trivial matter then one should disobey the law. Henry Thoreau refused to pay taxes to support the Mexican War as he thought the war was unjust. He went to jail for his refusal to pay the tax.

http://thoreau.eserver.org/civil.html points one to his Essay on Civil Disobedience which inspired both Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr.

Their protests were connected with their religious beliefs, but Thoreau's essay does not justify his protest by any appeal to religion. One's conscience may or may not be influenced by religion. A sense of right and wrong need not be justified by any belief in the supernatural.