Dear onthebeach,

I am starting to realise what a fearful person you really are. Is this how you lead your life on a daily basis?

When I wrote; “In my youth nationalism wasn't a big thing at all” you asked“Where and when were you born?” then answered your own question with “You couldn't have been living in Australia or the West around or after WW2.”. So if someone doesn't fit into your sense of how the world should be then they are suddenly assumed to be 'other'. That my friend is a classic defense mechanism of an egocentric, xenophobic dolt.

When I gave answered your question with time and place it was if it just did not compute; “Your meandering reply was a self indulgence that did not address the reasonable question to you.”

You then went on to elevate my lack of nationalistic fervour to me having no “loyalty and pride in his country and its defence forces” and my dislike of overt American style nationalism as “hatred of the US” which is patently not what I said.

I had originally thought there might have been a bit of Varis (aka Game of Thrones) about you but that is not the case is it. Rather you are so desperate to attach labels to people, to class them as the 'other' that is informs most of what you do here.

It is hard to get angry about it, more just a little sad, concerned even, because there must be a better way to approach to life. We are not all out to get you, you don't need to be afraid, it is not you against the rest of us, different views are not a threat and hyping them all is a path to madness. Don't be afraid.

I can only contribute from a personal perspective, so, my thoughts:

Australia has been multifaceted for quite a while, even from the first fleet - as the English, Irish, Scots and Welsh were not exactly culturally homogeneous (and arguably still remain somewhat individualistic) - and has progressively grown more so ever since, with a hefty shift post WWI with an influx of European immigrants fleeing war, destitution and loss.
First shock. People of different appearance, language, habits, culture. But not so different really. My dad was one of these.
(I've copped a bit of stick because of my mixed roots, but I've nearly got over it.)

Bigger shock. Post WWII large influx fleeing war, genocide, destitution, the spread of communist ideology and actual presence, and a generally lousy situation.

Gradual acclimatisation, 'wogs' etc, until the really big shock - post Vietnam - when people were just getting over hatred of the 'Japs'. (Or it could have started a bit earlier.)
Asians. Now, there's something really different - physically, culturally, language, etc. Different with knobs on.

The Asians had to stick together to get by, to set up businesses (largely catering to the Asian community), to make a home in Asian enclaves. Pioneers in a foreign land.
Ok, they kept pretty much to themselves, and vice versa. Their kids started to fit in, and family reunion became a bit of a strain, but we're all getting by.
Chinese were already here, but they must have needed to swell their numbers to stay ahead of the Vietnamese. Triads?

Then, immigration must have become more open.
Now, a Middle-Eastern influx, and they didn't seem to even want to try to fit in. Strange dress, religion, 'culture'. But, confusion - some are Christians.

Then Africans. What's happening? What next? Did 'we' get a say?
Special schools, mosques - we'd got used to synagogues and skull caps, and we already had catholic schools, 7th days, Jehovahs, Mormons, etc - lots of colourful variety.
9/11 and skepticism. Mmmm.

MC is going to take a while, and it all seems to be going too fast.

SteeleRedux,

Facts should always be preferred to storytelling, myth-making and re-written history.

Dear onthebeach,

Could not agree with you more.

Saltpetre.

"Australia has been multifaceted for quite a while, even from the first fleet - as the English, Irish, Scots and Welsh were not exactly culturally homogeneous (and arguably still remain somewhat individualistic) - "

Definitely still individualistic; Wales is the only part of the UK where one may expect, as a matter of course, that English will be neither acknowledged nor spoken by a large part of the population.

Later this month I'll be visited by my two eldest sons, from Ireland, and we shall talk Irish Gaelic for the most part and they are both 6th generation Australian born!!

Dear Foxy,

Again, there is nothing in your factual posts that contradicts, or even addresses, my contention that distinguishing between multi-ethnicity and multiculturalism MIGHT explain the difference between Australian feelings about these matters in 1978 and today.

I have met many East European and East Central European post-WWII migrants within what used to be the Captive Nations Council. You would probably find most of then conservative, anticommunist DLP voters, but I never heard them complain about the way Australia treated them when they arrived here with the practically sole purpose of escaping Stalinistm in their home countries.

These were not my personal experiences, I arrived in 1968 and heard only stories (not complaints) from post-WWII refugees. About how even people with tertiary education had to labour for a couple of years in the bush, how, for instance, there was only one place in Melbourne, where you could buy genuine coffee, etc.

My experience in 1968 was different. When deciding to migrate to Australia, it was obvious to me that I would have to adjust to a life in what for me was a British cultural outpost. Yes, the food was still strange, e.g. the butchers cut the meat not along the fibres as in continental Europe but across, when looking for horseradish the greengrocer asked how many pounds a week should he order, etc..

However, another experience impressed me much more: When in a restaurant the waitress asked me, something like “would you like another plight”, and I responded with my poor English whether she meant plate, she apologised! This came to symbolise for me the Australian openness toward immigrants, its willingness to integrate them, and to use their input to broaden (not replace!) the traditional Australian way of seeing things. It was this experience that made me glad (I don’t like the word proud) to have become an Australian.

And that was ten years before the Galbally Report, and at a time when integration vs assimilation, multi-ethnicity vs multiculturalism were unknown distinctions.