Dear Jay,

Thank you for your civil response and your explanation.
I understand where you're coming from and I do
respect your opinion. I can only make assumptions
based on my own experiences.

cont'd ...

Dear Jay,

I forgot to add that as you've "walked both sides"
on this issue, I bow to your experience and
knowledge. I've only ever had positive
experiences. Therefore my experiences are
obviously not as broad as yours have been.

Dear Chris,

There were many people who went to war because
they loved this country. You're not the only one.
And their ancestries were of many nationalities.
They also are entitled to leave a legacy for their
granchildren - including the right to be different,
to protect their traditions, and to remember their
languages. Our society today no longer views homogeneity
as mandatory. Today we're a different society from the
dull, self-satisfied and joylessly conformist of the past,
Thanks to multiculturalism we've ended up with a more
vigorous and exciting country. And if you don't like
it you can always leave. ;-) (joke).

Foxy and her presumptuous(over-)use of the Royal 'we'. Politically correct storytelling in lieu of facts. The rhetorical trickery of Marxism.

When did the Australian people ever give federal government the mandate to make Australia the cultural 'melting pot' of Asia? When did Australians get to vote on the self titled political 'Progressives' 'goal' of diversity?

BTW Foxy, your contemptuous, snide dismissal of another poster's military service - your "And if you don't like it you can always leave" - is no joke.

OTB.
OK but you have to look at the facts, there was no benchmark for "multiculturalism" in the 1960's, perhaps Menzies, Holt, Whitlam and Fraser had looked at the U.S.A and the situation of the Negroes or the Windrush generation in the U.K and saw something they could reproduce.
Well we know now what the long term results of assimilation have been, in the U.S Negro business ownership has withered to 30% of it what was before 1964, 64% of Negro children grow up in a single parent household when in times past it was 15%, and don't let's get started on the situation in the U.K..or rates of incarceration..educational achievement...HIV rates..unemployment.
Multiculturalism is a failure, allowing Negroes and Mohammedans to to emigrate to majority European countries has been an unmitigated disaster, this is now beyond argument.
What's the solution? Foxy doesn't have one beyond more of the same, I'm a nihilistic revolutionary who's quite happy to see the whole society go up in flames if it means national rebirth, what can you right wingers bring to the table?

In my clumsy way, what I was trying to explore was how do people see themselves in relation to Australia, over time, and usually after many years of hard work, each person working with people from all sorts of backgrounds, and in turn contributing to THEIR experiences of working with others in 'Australia'. Of course, people don't forget where they come from, but they also build up a rich picture of good and bad experiences of this place too, and of those of their mates, and of their children. So each person, over the years, brews their own Australian-flavoured soup, you might say.

But the active ingredient seems to be effort, work, the hard slog. Of course, many of our newest arrivals are fully prepared to put in the hard slog. Some may not. And those newcomers may not learn the lessons, and gain the insights, of those who have gone before them, who have done the slog.

And the consequences are overwhelmingly positive: next time you drive past a secondary school at home-time, check out all the friendships you can see coming out the gate, kids horsing around, young men and women obviously getting on together. It's going to be a rich, beautiful world. Half their luck :)

Best wishes,

Joe