Being indian ( asian ) in australia

[MovingtoTasmania]

Australia in the 70s was great- really laid back and friendly. I think more friendly than now - people were less suspicious then, you could leave your front door open and your car unlocked.

 

Just proves that people's views and opinions are very subjective. Australia in the 70's was awful; very racist (IMO)

[MARYROSE02]

I've been in Australia since 1978, and I don't recall thinking that Australia was an awful, and very racist place.

[MovingtoTasmania]

Having seen your picture, perhaps you wouldn't have. But I can recall going in to Brisbane city centre with my grandparents and being petrified because of all the skinheads. Perhaps it's because I was young, but trust me, if you had naturally brown skin, Australia was racist.

[Bobj]

Just proves that people's views and opinions are very subjective. Australia in the 70's was awful; very racist (IMO)

 

But I can recall going in to Brisbane city centre with my grandparents and being petrified because of all the skinheads. Perhaps it's because I was young, but trust me, if you had naturally brown skin, Australia was racist.

Errr...So, one city centre to an adolescent and you condemn a country???:arghh:

 

Cheers, Bobj.

[MovingtoTasmania]

But I can recall going in to Brisbane city centre with my grandparents and being petrified because of all the skinheads. Perhaps it's because I was young, but trust me, if you had naturally brown skin, Australia was racist.

Errr...So, one city centre to an adolescent and you condemn a country???:arghh:

 

Cheers, Bobj.

 

It wasn't one occasion, it was my childhood experiences of growing up in Australia. I'm sorry if that doesn't suit you @Bobj but I have to be honest.

 

Contrasting that to the UK, I felt that Australia, at the time, was very racist. What can I say? It's subjective. Perhaps if I had been white, my experiences may have been different.

 

Also, don't forget that when you are young (primary school age) your whole world is very small and your world view is, consequently, small. My world was Brisbane, Surfers (where we had a beach house) and the suburbs around where we lived.

[Bobj]

It wasn't one occasion, it was my childhood experiences of growing up in Australia. I'm sorry if that doesn't suit you @Bobj but I have to be honest.

 

 

Again...So you condemn a country?

 

Cheers, Bobj.

[MovingtoTasmania]

Again...So you condemn a country?

 

Cheers, Bobj.

 

Yes because I can only go on my experiences at that time. Rightly or wrongly, whether or not you agree, those were my experiences.

[Bobj]

Yes because I can only go on my experiences at that time. Rightly or wrongly, whether or not you agree, those were my experiences.

 

I was born in India and saw rioting against the british in Dehli in 1947; should I condemn the whole of India, based on your reasons??

 

I think not.

 

Cheers, Bobj.

[MovingtoTasmania]

I was born in India and saw rioting against the british in Dehli in 1947; should I condemn the whole of India, based on your reasons??

 

I think not.

 

Cheers, Bobj.

 

I don't know. You can think as you wish. To me, in my experiences I found Australia racist. I'm sorry if that doesn't fit your view but then it's probably good that we don't all think the same way isn't it?

[Bobj]

I don't know. You can think as you wish. To me, in my experiences I found Australia racist. I'm sorry if that doesn't fit your view but then it's probably good that we don't all think the same way isn't it?

 

Had you said, "I found Brisbane racist", that would have been a far better statement than to condemn a complete country on your observations in one city.

 

And, because of 'statements' like yours, people get a bad idea to what is actually the real thing.

 

Cheers, Bobj.

[Fair Dinkum]

Hey, I am mancunian and when I walk about in my own city I get a vibe people are looking at me, I just put it down to being good looking :wink:

[MovingtoTasmania]

Had you said, "I found Brisbane racist", that would have been a far better statement than to condemn a complete country on your observations in one city.

 

And, because of 'statements' like yours, people get a bad idea to what is actually the real thing.

 

Cheers, Bobj.

@Bobj I was talking about a specific point in time.

 

If you read the post that I wrote earlier in the thread you will see that I wrote that Australia is not racist any longer.

 

Just because my view of 1970's Australia doesn't match yours, doesn't mean that my experiences are wrong or that my view of 1970's Australia isn't as valid as yours. I used Brisbane as an example, but it certainly wasn't the only place that I went to in Australia were I saw people, who when seen through the eyes of a young child, seemed quite sinister (to me) and scary.

 

I am pretty certain, in fact, I know, that if I saw those same people now, in any country, it wouldn't faze me. However, at that time, in those places, it did.

[MovingtoTasmania]

Hey, I am mancunian and when I walk about in my own city I get a vibe people are looking at me, I just put it down to being good looking :wink:

 

WTF?? People stare because they can't believe that someone as gorgeous as me is with a gingery person like you who has a dodgy beard :wideeyed:

[MARYROSE02]

It's not easy being English in Australia just because we speak the same language. Even the Irish, Scots, and Welsh have their own 'communities' along with just about every other race, ethnic group, religion, sexual preference. Nobody ever talks about 'the English community' in Australia. Just about the only time we are 'recognized' in the media is when they are making jokes i.e. being racist, but it does not count as racism because they are talking about 'the English', so we can be called football hooligans, lazy, dirty, soap dodging, work dodging, etc. ad nauseam. but being English, and, unlike just about every other race, ethnic group, religion, sexual preference, we CAN laugh at ourselves.

 

The last really nasty, racist, example I can recall was when the Brisbane Courier Mail, I think, gave Stuart Broad a right going over in the media before and during the Ashes Test in Brisbane. I can still remembe the journo who initiated it being interviewed on Sky and saying something about 'it just being a bit of fun.'

 

I seem to remember The Daily Telegraph here in Sydney, back during the Rugby World Cup in ?2003?, the one 'we' won in Australia, sneering, after an early game 'Is that all you've got?' (i.e. Jonny Wilkinson.)

 

I can also remember 'Sir Les Patterson' during a sketch about an English trade unionist (You know, the ones who run and ruin Australia trades, although, ironically enough, you don't hear many Pommie accents during the Royal Commission into Union Corruption) saying 'Piss off Pom.'

 

You can't be racist about Pommies, unless they are non-white of course. Pommies can't blame their problems on any other race, or any other historical experience, the way that other races are allowed to escape responsiblity for their own actions.

 

So just about every country that was colonised by the English (except the white ones) can blame all their problems on the English, just as The Middle East never had any problems until the West, dominated by The English invaded, conquered and enslaved them, just as they did throughout Africa, India, Asia.

 

But the English suffered over a thousand years of invasion, conquest and enslavement, followed by another thousand or so of failed attempts by other countries to do so, but we are not allowed to use that as an excuse for our own years of invasion, conquest and enslavement. We can't say 'well, that is all we ever knew, so we thought it was the only way to go' as an excuse. We can't blame our own economic and political failures on anybody but ourselves.

 

And we are proud of the fact that we were invaded and enslaved. Can you believe that, alone in the world, we teach our kids to be proud of our Roman/Norse/Norman, etc heritage, Roman Roads, Danelaw, Norman castles and churches, The Bayeux Tapestry, The Domesday Book, 1066 celebrated as reverentially as 1588, 1805, 1814.

 

Why aren't Indians as proud of the Raj, as we are of Roman Britain? Look at what William the Conqueror did to the native English:- We never achieved this kind of total control in India, or any other colony.

 

A direct consequence of the invasion was the almost total elimination of the old English aristocracy and the loss of English control over the Catholic Church in England. William systematically dispossessed English landowners and conferred their property on his continental followers. The Domesday Book meticulously documents the impact of this colossal programme of expropriation, revealing that by 1086 only about 5 per cent of land in England south of the Tees was left in English hands. Even this tiny residue was further diminished in the decades that followed, the elimination of native landholding being most complete in southern parts of the country.^[99][100]

Natives were also removed from high governmental and ecclesiastical office. After 1075 all earldoms were held by Normans, and Englishmen were only occasionally appointed as sheriffs. Likewise in the Church, senior English office-holders were either expelled from their positions or kept in place for their lifetimes and replaced by foreigners when they died. By 1096 no bishopric was held by any Englishman, and English abbots became uncommon, especially in the larger monasteries.^[101

 

[MovingtoTasmania]

 

@MARYROSE02 A lot of the older generation Indians are proud of the Raj and the opportunities it brought for Indian people. It's mainly younger ones, say under 45ish, that harbour that resentment to the British but I think that's more to do Partition then actual living under the British because however bad it may have been perceived at the time, the fall out when the British left, was worse. But then hindsight is a wonderful thing isn't it?

[MARYROSE02]

If the younger ones harbour that anti British resentment (not that it ever stops them from wanting to live in Britain) then perhaps there is a problem with the way Indian history is taught in schools and universities. British children have always been taught to be proud of our Roman / Norman heritage. I imagine if there is an Indian version of The Bayeux Tapestry and The Domesday Book, they are reviled as awful reminders of British occupation?

 

And we have had 2,000 years of 'hindsight!'

[MovingtoTasmania]

If the younger ones harbour that anti British resentment (not that it ever stops them from wanting to live in Britain) then perhaps there is a problem with the way Indian history is taught in schools and universities. British children have always been taught to be proud of our Roman / Norman heritage. I imagine if there is an Indian version of The Bayeux Tapestry and The Domesday Book, they are reviled as awful reminders of British occupation?

 

And we have had 2,000 years of 'hindsight!'

 

I didn't go to school in India so have no idea but i do know that post-partition South Asians have a different view than older ones. Residual feelings from partition. There are many books you can read such as those written by Bose, that give both sides of the story. Those anti-British and those pro-British. I have no idea if there is anything similar but it might be worth remembering that there hasn't been 2000 years since the British left India..........

[fish.01]

...

The last really nasty, racist, example I can recall was when the Brisbane Courier Mail, I think, gave Stuart Broad a right going over in the media before and during the Ashes Test in Brisbane. I can still remembe the journo who initiated it being interviewed on Sky and saying something about 'it just being a bit of fun.'

...

 

Yes Ben Dorries...such an immature journalist though I suspect the editor he is under isn't much better. It isn't his only pathetic article. I wrote a letter to the editor about his ashes drivel and I'm Australian.

[Harpodom]

I think anyone who denies that racism exists in Australia, or worse, claims that racism DOES exist, but ONLY the sort that exists between different ethnic minorities, or from ethnic minorities directed at whites, is lying/bonkers/in denial.

 

Racism exists everywhere, it is a base human trait, but like any prejudice it can be overcome. Just look at the change in attitudes to homosexuality.

 

I f**king despise the 'look over there' distraction technique employed by some, whereby the justification for Australia's racism is made on the grounds that other places are worse, or the 'if Australia was so bad, why would people still want to come here?' argument.

 

Both are effectively justifications for ANY reported intolerant behaviour, eg reports of racist beaviour on public transport. They are arguments for the lowest common denominator. They argue for the status quo to be protected, but still moan about the awful discrimination whites receive from Aborigines. WTF?? Get real..

 

In response to MTT's comments about racism in Australia being worse in the 1970's, considering that the White Australia policy was in place until 1966, it would make sense that the vestiges of this racist policy would still be around in the 1970's.

 

Even in six years of living in Geelong, I've noticed quite a change in the numbers of African migrants living here.

 

Times change. Some frightened, angry individuals desperately try to cling to the past.

[Harpodom]

Yes Ben Dorries...such an immature journalist though I suspect the editor he is under isn't much better. It isn't his only pathetic article. I wrote a letter to the editor about his ashes drivel and I'm Australian.

 

Par for the course with *that* sort of rag.

[gee13]

I still wonder what folks classify as racism. Is it racism if one person stands looks and thinks a bad thought about someone elses culture? This is certainly passive racism and mostly evident in Australia. I havent yet heard of (recently) say Aussie of European descent having plans to round up a group of non European Aussies and trying to exterminate them en masse. Or is it racism if some European Aussie kid chucks a sandwich at you because you are of non European appearance? Or calls you derogatory names. Is it the boss that advances one person and denies another because of their appearance. What really is the kind of racism in Australia. From what I have seen its mostly passive.. its borne of ignorant insecure people. I dont think most ignorant people in Australia are going to abduct you and commit a hate crime because of your race or appearance. So a question to the OP.. are you just worried that someone is going to call you names, are you worried about your job prospects or are you worried that someone is going to commit a crime against you because you are Indian?

[MARYROSE02]

Then there is sexism and ageism and homophobia to consider and remember too that those groups that complain loudest about racism indulge in the midst intolerant forms of sexism and homophobia.

[MARYROSE02]

It is only 70 years since the end of WW 2 around the same time as partition but there are very few Brita and Aussies who either hate the Germans and Japanese or who blame them for the huge amounts of money and lives we expended fighting them I wonder why?

[MARYROSE02]

Changes in attitudes to homosexuality in the WHITE community But try and look for it in the non white communities in different religions too.

 

And why is it wrong to compare different countries and to ask why people come here if the particular ism is allegedly so bad?

 

Did Jews emigrate to Nazi Germany? Of course they didn't. So why would anybody want to come to Australia if they knew it was a hotbed of racism?

[flag of convenience]

Then there is sexism and ageism and homophobia to consider and remember too that those groups that complain loudest about racism indulge in the midst intolerant forms of sexism and homophobia.

 

Then there is the simple look a foreign man can direct at a female, that in cases the female can take exception to and report it as sexual harassment. Certain cultural norms conflict within society like ours leaving the outsider dumb founded.