a great country
Australia must be one of the greatest countries on earth.
Where else would you find an appointed Senator and Shadow Minister who is simultaneously:
(1) a migrant
(2) an Asian
(3) a woman
(4) only 36 years old
(5) a lesbian?
How much more of a minority can Penny Wong be?
I can imagine this happening in Britain and several other European countries, but not the US and certainly not in Malaysia.
Australia is a great country!
Posted on October 26th, 2004 by jl
Filed under: lost blah blah
really ah?
I always considered Oz to be a basket case land… as long as there is a huge basket of goodies..no one is going to complain.. ha ha ha..
Dear Jikon,
Thanks for the reminder of why i MUST find the opportunity to get qualified to practice law in Australia one day. No PR for me otherwise. Sob!
Did you know a Tasmanian took the country to the UN Human Rights Committee and managed to secure the repeal of the offence (in Tasmania)of sex btwn consenting adult males in the Tasmanian Criminal Code?
A great country indeed. You can be who you really are, more so than in most other countries (let’s not count western europe - cost of living is wayyy too high).
Hi Jikon,
Look buddy, unless you’re a PR or citizen here, you may find yourself disadvantaged in many areas.
To their credit, The Aussies in general (and there are exceptions) are not racist. The country is quite progressive. Could be better but better than most I reckon.
But they are EXTREMELY xenophobic if you hold a foreign passport if you know what I mean.
I’ve lived in Europe and I’ve not that much difficulty being a non-permanent resident as such there.
But in Oz… mmm….
And don’t mind the Tassies, they’re a bunch of … nah… less said the better. You know Tassies…
i hear this penny wong chick is a m’sian from KK.
in case anybody is eyeing an NZ PR, i can say that the gov here is pretty strict on applications and really take their time in processing it. i’m still waiting on mine after a year .. they say it’ll take another 2 years before its granted. NZ PR allows u unlimited access to aust without pension of course.
rob - xenophobia is an increasingly apparent and growing social phenomenon in most countries. malaysia included - i’ve heard more than my fair share of comments about indons, burmese, pakis, bangladeshis etc. and that’s only about the foreigners!
Aussies not racists? WOW… has everyone forgotten Pauline Hanson?
How about the number of times, I got hackled from the indigenous tribe..yes, the aborigines, just for walking in the street…And let’s not forget, these 40 something year old caucasion women, who are total road bullies!
NOT RACIST? Please…. in every country, there is SOME form of racism, it is just how we choose to tolerate it.
Being Chinese myself, I can honestly say that we’re among the most racist people in the world.
Without going into too much detail, just look at what we call the other races. They’re all either ‘kwai’ (ghost) or ‘chue’ (pig), except for oh, look - the Chinese ‘people’.
My parents have also forbidden me from marrying people of certain religions. Of course, as I?m gay that?s rather irrelevant. Come to think of it, I don?t know which would be worse for them.
Jay
Your post reminds me… Did you ever see the sketch here in the Asian comdey series (”Goodness Gracious Me” I think) where the asian (Indian) parents were worried their son was about to tell them he wanted to marry a non-Indian woman?
They were so relieved when he got to the point and explained that he wasn’t planning such a marriage. Their relief was so great they didn’t seem to mind in the slightest that what he actually told them was he was gay and he had a boyfriend…. who was white!
It was very well done and illustrated the point so nicely
Mike
an aussie pr no less, pauline hanson is just one person, not the whole of australia.
rob was right to say in general aussies are not racist. in general, mind you. that doesn’t mean ALL. sure there are racists aussies and non racist aussies, but GENERALLY most of them are not.
methinks racism in australia is more evident in certain parts only. i have 2 sisters who were adopted by aussie parents, one stays in perth, the other in sydney. the one in perth complained many times of being heckled at or discriminated and so on, while the one in sydney said nothing like that happened to her.
LUCIA :
I’ve lived on both sides of the country..HECK, I’ve lived on three sides of the country..left, right and down… and I’ve encountered racism at every side. Maybe it’s me? Maybe it’s the group I was with. Hell..I even got racist remarks from Vietnamese “boat people”.. Look, Australians will ALWAYS fight for whatever cause there is to fight for in Oz Land (and sometimes out of their country)… WHY? Because if they don’t and get complacent, then the government will take total control and “take care” of everyone … like a certain country i know.
So, racism is everywhere, as is, being homophobic.. you can’t stop people from being who they are. You just have to learn to live with it.
no such utopia in this world…sigh..
well.. there are such cases as.. under the closet or hidden gay / lesbians present in the house of parliament.. need i say more
I am aussie. I am racist, but what can I say?
I have nothing against the many aboriginals living around my part of my fair city, but thing is I have had quite a few negative encounters with them. See its not that Australians are racist, it’s the fact that the very dark people themselves are racist against us whites! We just fight back!
I was riding my bike from School, when I was a little tike, when I passed a park. As I was riding along the MAIN ROAD I passed an fairly elderly black person (or parkie) I noticed he had a bottle in his hand and wouldn’t move from the bike lane as I was riding towards him. I rode around him, but as I did he took a swing at me! He missed thankfully, I think the bottle may have had something to do with that, but that was my first taste. And since then a couple more incidents have happened with blacks as I have grown up and more and more racist I have become.