There has been a lot of racially-motivated violence in Melbourne, for sure - and the majority of Australians are disgusted by it, just as they were disgusted by the Cronulla riots and Pauline Hansen's One Nation. But, MadForIt, you seem to be under the impression that one could just walk into Flinders Station and see a bunch of Ethiopians fighting Indians fighting Italians fighting Anglos fighting Vietnamese. Obviously, that's not the case at all. These are isolated incidents. With you going around calling Australians 'barbarians' and whatever, I'd say you - a Brit - are more culturally intolerant than any of the Australians posting here.
As for the Indian protest in Melbourne - well, I think the Police could have done their job less violently (let's face it, isn't that the case everywhere?), but I think only one side of the story is being told by the journos. Hell, just look at this bit in the BBC article:
"The protest was described as largely peaceful, although the Melbourne Age website showed photos of damage to a main train station after some protesters reportedly threw missiles."
I'm going to assume that while the majority of the protesters were indeed going about peacefully, there were surely a select few doing things that were less than admirable. Sounds familiar.
Nonetheless, I am still annoyed that Rudd hasn't addressed this issue as he could have, as there's no doubt still a lot of racism that needs to be dealt with in this country.
