Dear Suse,

I can only speak from my own experience.
I grew up in the Western suburbs of Sydney.
With quite an eclectic mix of people. My
parents worked hard and taught me the importance
of hard work and above all - education.
Moving to Melbourne - the same applied - work hard,
study, and you'll go far. I've got family living
in rural NSW all of whom work and wouldn't live
anywhere else.

We should really count our blessings - who else
has a public holiday for a horse-race. What other
country gives so many public holidays, has such a
high minimum wage, and such a high standard of
living.

I consider myself very lucky indeed.

I feel a bit sorry for JoM - because the Australia he apparently sees around him bares no resemblance to the one around me.

Looking out my front window, I see a quiet street, houses, a few cars, green grass, trees, a few people walking past and blue skies.

I suppose it depends where you happen to live as to which impressions you carry with you - and also the comparisons they engender with the past.

I have to say that I did quite like it when Australia wasn't consistently accused by the UN of torture - time way back when we looked down our nose and protested against countries who incarcerated and tortured innocent people fleeing persecution.

Another time, another zeitgeist....

"UN report to state Australia is in breach of international torture convention"

http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/un-report-to-state-australia-is-in-breach-of-international-torture-convention-20150308-13ymlk.html

If you accept what is and make the best of it whatever it is you'll be probably be happy in most places. If you long for imaginary times past and wish you were somewhere else you'll probably be unhappy in most places.

Miniver Cheevy

By Edwin Arlington Robinson

Miniver Cheevy, child of scorn,
Grew lean while he assailed the seasons;
He wept that he was ever born,
And he had reasons.

Miniver loved the days of old
When swords were bright and steeds were prancing;
The vision of a warrior bold
Would set him dancing.

Miniver sighed for what was not,
And dreamed, and rested from his labors;
He dreamed of Thebes and Camelot,
And Priam’s neighbors.

Miniver mourned the ripe renown
That made so many a name so fragrant;
He mourned Romance, now on the town,
And Art, a vagrant.

Miniver loved the Medici,
Albeit he had never seen one;
He would have sinned incessantly
Could he have been one.

Miniver cursed the commonplace
And eyed a khaki suit with loathing;
He missed the mediæval grace
Of iron clothing.

Miniver scorned the gold he sought,
But sore annoyed was he without it;
Miniver thought, and thought, and thought,
And thought about it.

Miniver Cheevy, born too late,
Scratched his head and kept on thinking;
Miniver coughed, and called it fate,
And kept on drinking.

I am in Australia because my wife wanted to go back to where she was born and grew up. It's a pretty good place. So are many others. I'm happy here although I don't like it when people say it's the best country on earth. One can be happy here without putting down other places.

Well Foxy, everything you said is true and is still true in many
places, except even in those places many mothers are reluctant to let
the kids go and play with the other kids in the street.
They seem reluctant to let them out of sight.
Road traffic aside there is a change.

What you described is not true everywhere, whereas it was true everywhere.
This may be a feature of larger and more diverse population.

Suse,
Using the word racist is racism in itself.
I don't blame brown people for anything, they can't help it if they're stupid and violent and it's got nothing to do with me aside from having to educate my kids to stay away from them....which isn't hard because in working class areas like Preston there's very little social interaction between young people of different races anyway.
With only a couple of exceptions my clients are all White, middle class, inner city professionals, I can't explain why they're not spending money on home renovations at the moment but it's probably got nothing to do with immigration or security issues.
I've had a couple of wealthy Chinese clients recently which is fine but I'm never going to get a call from the West Asians, the Arabs, Afghans or the Africans because hardly any of them work or own homes, it's not "racist" to point out the bleeding obvious that people whose primary income stream is Centrelink aren't going to be paying it forward. As a recent study in the UK showed the only people who benefit financially from immigration are immigrants, it has no effect one way or another on the wider economy because they take out only slightly less than they put in.

Bazz,

"....except even in those places many mothers are reluctant to let
the kids go and play with the other kids in the street.
They seem reluctant to let them out of sight..."

Yeah, I think that's got more to do with our vastly different lifestyles than anything else.

Back then there were local shops and local communal facilities - hubs where the "local" community interacted on a daily basis.

We now have a society where most folk travel encased in a capsule to and from centralised shops and amentities. The "mall" now serves many suburbs which would have once each hosted those faciities themselves. People were more familiar with their close neighbours, etc - and that engendered a trust that the children would be reasonably safe if they went around their local communities unsupervised by their own parents.

So we don't travel, shop and commune with our fellow residents like we once did - which explains why kids don't play locally in the street with their peers....the parents don't know each other and are reluctant to allow the kids to roam around the neighbourhood willy-nilly.

Our Mr13 is not allowed to roam about - he's allowed to go independently to the local library, shops, etc and friends that "we do know" locally - but he spends time at his friends' houses only if we know the parents.