Australia in genral

[intedomine]

Hahahhahaaa!!

Cronulla riots anyone?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2005_Cronulla_race_riots


"More than any other cultural or ethnic group, Muslims and people from the Middle East are thought to be unable to fit into Australia, with more than half of Australians preferring their relatives did not to marry into a Muslim family."

http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/02/18/1045330603395.html





Australians are just as racist and intolerant as everyone else on the planet, stop kidding yourself

Those riots happened in one small area in one city. Not all Australians live in that particular area in that particular city and I find it deeply offensive for you to generalise in such a way.

There are many racist Australians, and it is a indeed a national problem which needs rectifying. Yet it is too simplistic to say that there is any state-sponsored racism and that all Aussies harbour racial prejudice.

 

[4U2Play]

"Those riots happened in one small area in one city. Not all Australians live in that particular area in that particular city and I find it deeply offensive for you to generalise in such a way.

There are many racist Australians, and it is a indeed a national problem which needs rectifying. Yet it is too simplistic to say that there is any state-sponsored racism and that all Aussies harbour racial prejudice."



I give up




Enjoy your weekend, my friend

 

[Angela Harlem]

Hahahhahaaa!!

Cronulla riots anyone?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2005_Cronulla_race_riots


"More than any other cultural or ethnic group, Muslims and people from the Middle East are thought to be unable to fit into Australia, with more than half of Australians preferring their relatives did not to marry into a Muslim family."

http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/02/18/1045330603395.html


Australians are just as racist and intolerant as everyone else on the planet, stop kidding yourself

How, exactly, are we as racist and intolerant as everyone else on the planet? There's so many things to pick here, I dont even know where to start.

 

[blueeyedgirl]

"Those riots happened in one small area in one city. Not all Australians live in that particular area in that particular city and I find it deeply offensive for you to generalise in such a way.

There are many racist Australians, and it is a indeed a national problem which needs rectifying. Yet it is too simplistic to say that there is any state-sponsored racism and that all Aussies harbour racial prejudice."



I give up




Enjoy your weekend, my friend

Yes, I'd also be interested in knowing how one event in one city is symptomatic of racism in a society as a whole, or do you know something we don't, 4U2Play?

For instance, do we in Australia take the Rodney King riots as evidence of American wide beliefs?

 

[A_Wanderer]

Originally posted by intedomine

Specify how this voucher system would work and I might support it

Parents pay taxes, rather than have the tax money go directly to the schools (e.g. giving payments to Catholic and Islamic schools by the state) the parents are given a voucher for x-thousand dollars that is exchangable The government stops partitioning it all around to the private and specifically religious schools and in principle it is equal in that each kid is getting the same ammount, of course there are other issues that would arise.

The ultimate goal must be to ensure that children who might have only one parent working in a hard, low-paid job are given every opportunity to become the next James Morrison, or Professor Clark, or Shane Warne or Cathy Freeman or John Howard or Missy Higgins.

And whats stopping that now - all of these examples you give aren't a bunch of good old boys, they are excellent at what they do and they got to where they are by their skill, in a world where failure doesn't get you very far it will generally bring some good people to the top. Australia has a very "progressive" education system that is guaranteed for primary and secondary education and merit based for tertiary (although there are full-fee places now).

At the moment, we know that that is not a reality. If a proposed voucher system delivers equal opportunity, then i will support it all the way, but otherwise, what solution is there? Higher taxes that will be directed into greatly improving the education system? Voters will never support that.

And nor should they, not every kid is going to grow up to greatness, the vast majority of people live normal lives, to expect that every human being can be equally brilliant is a fiction.

I'm fed up with seeing the hopes and dreams of children stifled by the failure of an education system that is discriminatory in it's offering of opportunity.

How is having a fricking state education system in place that every damn child is entitled to disciminatory? If they can get the marks at VCE or HSC to get into a HECS course then they are guaranteed a favourable student loan scheme, and if not there are other options and other careers that they can take.

If a voucher system will solve this, then it's the way to go.

But ultimately, what harm is there in having a goal in which every school is equal in terms of the opportunities they can offer.

The harm is upsetting the market with intervention to the detriment of very good private schools that parents pay a lot of money to send their kids too. Stripping the top schools of what makes them prestigious and trying to redistribute everything will only end in equal mediocrity.

 

[dazzlingamy]

We arn't as racist as other countries by FAR! Sure we have a few things now and then, but there is no deep seated hatred here unlike other places. Unlike the black and hispanic and asian people in the states who are still being persecuted today really. The sterotypical views are stilly widely accepted and there is still a lot of hatred and animosity in the south!

i think this is on a large part to do with us being a small nation and having a LOT of multiculturalism

 

[fly so high!]

Apparently you (Australians) consume even fewer vegetables than we (Americans -- I'm assuming they mean the US) do.

However, a greater portion of our veggies are potatoes and we consume more carbs (and I doubt a lot of them are complex) overall.

Here's the article from The Sydney Morning Herald from April 7 of this year:

I know....it's absolutely absurd is'nt it! We are actually on par with the US in terms of Obesity rates too....absolute shocker!!! Our kids are getting fatter as well.....our nation is in the grasp of a Diabetes epidemic that's killing us not to mention heart disease.......

 

[A_Wanderer]

Ugh, those bloody boomers - going to be a real burden on the rest of us, provided that the royal "we" dont venture elsewhere.

 

[A_Wanderer]

Heres a dose of Australian racism

Australia’s 22 terror suspects and their families receive more than $1 million a year in taxpayer-funded welfare and legal aid.
And simply because the men were locked up, their families received a social security pay rise of as much as $1700 a year.

One of the jailed Melbourne men, Abdul Nacer Benbrika—leader of a radical group of Islamists—has been in Australia for 10 years and has never had a job.

Taxpayers provide his wife with almost $50,000 a year in welfare.

link

Okay not quite up to scratch of running them out of town and seggregating ethnics, more of an illustration of how a social democracy works, and over a million dollars for that many people isn't dramatically huge.

 

[fly so high!]

Gee, some people take things a bit too seriously...

Most of my comments were petty and cheap shots, I'm sorry you didn't see them that way.

Jeez....

Maybe i did take what you said a bit to seriously....i have to admit i do get a little testy when i'm PMS'n....Look......I love Sydney, I live in it,.....I love Victoria,especially the Mornington Peninsula (goin' there at Xmas!!!), I love Queensland, have to say i have not been WA,NT,SA(although i've been to outback NSW where near enough is close enough) or TAS, but i can't wait to go!
What i'm trying to say is each state of Australia does have their own unique landscapes,the people have their own unique way of living,working and playing.

I love Australia as a whole, i believe in friendly jibes at one another but i did not get that feeling from you...especially the I hate New South Welshmen & women thing especially how i love Victorians,their sense of style...that's one of the best thing about Victoria,is her shops!!!

But if what you said was meant in jest,then that's fine, it's not like i lost sleep over it........It's cool!!!

I don't like Downer either!

 

[intedomine]

I love Victoria,especially the Mornington Peninsula (goin' there at Xmas!!!)

I love Australia as a whole, i believe in friendly jibes at one another but i did not get that feeling from you...especially the I hate New South Welshmen & women thing especially how i love Victorians,their sense of style...that's one of the best thing about Victoria,is her shops!!!


I don't like Downer either!

Cool, but I don't think i said that i actually said that I "hate" new south welshmen and women, i just had a go at them...

We need some kind of good-natured but passionate interstate rivalry. I just think it'd be healthy.

Rather than seeing ourselves as primarily Australians, I think we should invest some passion in our state and promote what it is to be Victorian or Tasmanian or Newcastlian...might help to restore a sense of community which has kinda disappeared due to things like globalisation...

Downer's an idiot

 

[intedomine]

Parents pay taxes, rather than have the tax money go directly to the schools (e.g. giving payments to Catholic and Islamic schools by the state) the parents are given a voucher for x-thousand dollars that is exchangable The government stops partitioning it all around to the private and specifically religious schools and in principle it is equal in that each kid is getting the same ammount, of course there are other issues that would arise.And whats stopping that now - all of these examples you give aren't a bunch of good old boys, they are excellent at what they do and they got to where they are by their skill, in a world where failure doesn't get you very far it will generally bring some good people to the top. Australia has a very "progressive" education system that is guaranteed for primary and secondary education and merit based for tertiary (although there are full-fee places now).And nor should they, not every kid is going to grow up to greatness, the vast majority of people live normal lives, to expect that every human being can be equally brilliant is a fiction. How is having a fricking state education system in place that every damn child is entitled to disciminatory? If they can get the marks at VCE or HSC to get into a HECS course then they are guaranteed a favourable student loan scheme, and if not there are other options and other careers that they can take.The harm is upsetting the market with intervention to the detriment of very good private schools that parents pay a lot of money to send their kids too. Stripping the top schools of what makes them prestigious and trying to redistribute everything will only end in equal mediocrity.

Shite I can't quote....


Why is there a tendancy for the more successful people in art and sport to hail from private schools? Because they can offer the youth better opportunites itn academia, sport and art. No harm in raising the standard of public education so that these kids have equal access to these opprotunities. Sport, for instance, is one area which really suffers.

Whereas a private school has a developed sense of attachment with a particular sporting team (partly through the schools officialising of training sessions and very well organised week in week out round robin competition against other private schools) public school sport is shambolic (one day a year, disorganised a half-arse footy games that dont run for normal time without qualified referees).

The fault lies partly at the failure of many public schools to encourage students to pursue their goals (rather than treating it like a babysitting service). Teachers should be given more incentive to work afterhours (eg holding training sessions, playing games and having flute practice on saturdays). Offer lucrative bonuses to teachers may be the way to go....

And the VCE and HSC system bewilders me, i've tried understanding it, but why oh why do private schools seem to have such a dominance over the higher study scores and enter scores? I've known of instances where a public school student might get a grade of A+ A+ A+, yet only get a study score of 35/50, whilst a private school student got a deserved 50/50. How can the gap be so big? Probably because schools are graded. A student's performance is apparently highly dependent on how their classmates go.....hmmm very fair....

 

[A_Wanderer]

They can offer scholarships and poach good students to improve their reputation, that is how it should be - those with abilities get the opportunities. You have unrealistic expectations of what services should be provided. The idea that school sport is the foundation for future success also seems ill-founded, what of local teams that aren't affiliated with schools, thats where good players get the opportunities.

Using statistics and bell curves is fair, if one chemistry class at one school gets taught and given tests that are easier and their marks are all straight A's while another one has more difficult assessments and they get B's that doesn't mean that one class is any smarter than the other, using a normal distribution makes it fairer.

 

[foray]

Emily Kame Kngwarreye art

"One of Emily's last paintings, a veritable tour-de-force of brush strokes, using the smallest brush she ever used in the late linear paintings. As in the previous painting with its almost transparent dots, Emily has created a network of fragile luminous lines which have a feeling of depth. Emily pressed down very hard on the brush as she worked it across the surface of the canvas leaving most of the pigment along the edges of the stroke and the center almost translucent. She also mixed her paints "on the fly" dipping from one paint pot to another, changing color but not brushes so that some of her strokes change in color as they work their way across the canvas. One of her great late paintings—stand back Mr. Pollack, watchout Mr. Marden!"

foray

 

[Irvine511]

Those riots happened in one small area in one city. Not all Australians live in that particular area in that particular city and I find it deeply offensive for you to generalise in such a way.
.

so now you undestand what i was thinking and what 4U2Play wrote -- that it was deeply offensive for dazzlingamy to characterize the US in such a sweeping, uninformed manner, and to use that cheap denigration to then elevate Australia.

a good comparison was the Rodney King riots -- of course those didn't speak for the whole nation in the same way that the Cronulla riots didn't speak for all of Australia.

but it was an Aussie in this thread who made that mistake in logic first.

there are racist idiots everywhere.



[q]Unlike the black and hispanic and asian people in the states who are still being persecuted today really. The sterotypical views are stilly widely accepted and there is still a lot of hatred and animosity in the south![/q]

care to back this up? have you spent much time in the South? which states?



in other news, am loving this thread.

 

[4U2Play]

so now you undestand what i was thinking and what 4U2Play wrote -- that it was deeply offensive for dazzlingamy to characterize the US in such a sweeping, uninformed manner, and to use that cheap denigration to then elevate Australia.

Thanks, Irvine!

I usually avoid spelling things out for people, but I guess sometimes it's needed.

dazzlingamy did what a lot of people do: act morally superior to America in order to somehow prove the righteousness of her own country.

Acting morally superior to the US is not a hard thing to do. Many Americans readily agree, and aren't afraid to admit, that we are a racist nation, and that racism is a problem here... just like every other nation on the planet, including Australia.

However, expect some prodding when claims such as this are made: "We are multicultural, and on the whole compared to places like the US, we embraced that wholeheartedly."


"As a black man I feel I am treated better in Britain as a stranger than Aborigines are treated in their own land."

http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/03/21/1079789939957.html

 

[MsGiggles]

Would it be possible for me to bungee off Harbour Bridge in Sydney when I come there??? And I'm assuming I should skip Alice Springs completely then eh??

 

[Irvine511]

is it possible to describe a "typical" Australian? i.e., what do you think might be considered national "characteristics"?

if not, is there a "typical" person from the following cities:

Melbourne
Sydney
Perth
Brisbane

and any others

 

[Tania]

Ms Giggles - No it is not possible to bungee off the Harbour Bridge (unless you want to go to prison). You can climb over it, climb up the towers, sail under it or walk/catch a train or drive a car across it, but no bungee.

 

[indra]

Ms Giggles - No it is not possible to bungee off the Harbour Bridge (unless you want to go to prison). You can climb over it, up the towers and walk/catch a train or drive a car across it, but no bungee.

um. Ok. So...how are Australian prisons?

 

[intedomine]

is it possible to describe a "typical" Australian? i.e., what do you think might be considered national "characteristics"?

if not, is there a "typical" person from the following cities:

Melbourne
Sydney
Perth
Brisbane

and any others

I think it would be impossible because we are such a culturally diverse nation.

Melburnians like to be portrayed as obsessed with football, but I wouldn't call it an "obsession" with football, more of a ritual forced upon us (which is not a bad thing).

Though the media does try to perpetuate stereotypical notions of a dinky-di Aussie, and a lot of people seem to lap these up and indulge in that kind of lifestyle, so ultimately, i becomes real.

 

[fly so high!]

Here is a few clips to help define what a typical aussie bloke is like! Check out my fav....the budgie smuggler clips.

click here

aussie blokes and their sheds

bugie smugglers

Also don't forget to get the latest weather report done by our very own Chopper Reid!
How's the weather chop!

 

[fly so high!]

He,he,he!!

 

[CKONE]

hey, im looking to discuss about Australia, post topics, or ask question about the country, talk about sports, politics anything!

never been but loads of my schoolfriends went to live there.

love the sporting rivalry particularly cricket and rugby - never a dull match of either. always a great atmosphere here when the aussies visit and good natured banter and drinking with them afterwards.

 

[TheQuiet1]

He,he,he!!

Love your sig as well fly so high!

 

[fly so high!]

^ *bows*

Thankyou!

 

[fly so high!]

I thought i might post this link as i everytime i hear some of you call thongs "flip-flops" and G-Strings "thongs" ! I hope this finds you better edumacated

Speak properly!

 

[dazzlingamy]

lol!

so funny

Just reading back on this thread.... very interesting he he he

 

[Angela Harlem]

i cant believe all of them are australian. surely other people say a lot of them too.

has anyone complained about the heat yet?

 

[Kieran McConville]

Ok guys, I'll talk about Australia. It's the place to be!

It's the place to beee!!

Ok, that's about all I got to say about Australia. Also it is very big and not terribly important in world affairs, so if you don't wanna die, come to... Australia! Not a very catchy slogan, perhaps.

However, we do wrestle snakes. And, stuff.