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I'm Australian and though I don't live there now, I did for 27 years. Most of the things you're describing are just a function of the people you were hanging o

I'm Australian and though I don't live there now, I did for 27 years. Most of the things you're describing are just a function of the people you were hanging out with. I knew people like that, and I chose different friends. People definitely used gay as a slur when I was in high school, and then people grew out of it because it was childish and awful. Perhaps it was at about the time that some of us came out as gay. Diversity is certainly not uniform in the country, obviously, and exposure is a critical part of being well rounded. We had a lot of people from PNG and Sri Lanka where I grew up, and when I went to Uni there were a lot of foreign students from Kenya and other places. Being weird or racist about it would have been pretty fucking unacceptable to me and my friends. But I have met people who are indeed weirdly racist or sexist. Also, I have noticed a pretty broad shift in this from people in my parents generation to people in my generation, and I'm sure again to people younger than myself. I think this actually happening in lots of places though, not just Australia. As far as swearing goes... Yes? We swear a lot. It works for us! We have lots of problems, and a truly horrendous history of colonial violence -- which we have at least begun to address in history class in schools in the last thirty years. Lots more work to do. I'm sorry you had a bad go of it, but please don't assume that you have a picture of every Australian.

bedobi 3y ago
Of course not all Australians are like that. But I've lived in many different countries and in my experience nowhere even comes close to how ubiquitous, accepted, even encouraged all the above are in Australia, how large a share of the population really are like that. Let's be real, it's not small. And sure, you can make a bubble of good people around you, but you have to exist outside it as part of your everyday life, and that's not easy if you're the type to notice these things. In the US, you could never ever get away with saying half the things that are casually said in an Australian workplace, at a social gathering etc etc, it simply would not be tolerated. I mean, try to imagine a white American acting all surprised and impressed a dark skinned person speaks good English, and chirpily complimenting them for it. It would never happen, lol. But in Australia it's par for the course. Anyway this is my experience and how I see it, completely understand if others see it differently. But I do think anyone who's under the impression Australia doesn't still have a loooot of catching up to do are kidding themselves.
- tomhoward 3y ago
  All the points of criticism you've asserted as being true in the present tense in all of Australia are heavily, increasingly pushed back on these days. Sure, Australia may have been slower to catch up than the rest of the world; it's a small, isolated country. But it's all changing very quickly now, and indeed has been for a long time. I grew up in Melbourne in the 80s surrounded by many different cultures, and spent time living in Sydney in the 00s. Sure racism existed but has been increasingly unacceptable ever since I was young and is not tolerated among anyone I know of now. "Gay" as a pejorative has been unacceptable among anyone in inner Melbourne and Sydney since the early 00s - i.e., for at least 20 years. No doubt you'll find exceptions and segments of the population that are slower to reform, just as you do in all places/cultures. Most of that is circumstantial; reform happens when people are exposed to people from different walks of life they become aware of them and more tolerant of them. That's how it's always happened, everywhere. Moralising about these kinds of things really serves only to feel morally superior in yourself, rather than understanding the society you're critiquing. To slur the whole country with your observations of a particular region/cohort at a particular time is to succumb to the same kind of failing of which you're accusing others.
  - bedobi 3y ago
    IMO either you're very very lucky or you're kind of blinkered and kidding yourself. Even at the ABC, hardly a workplace where you'd intuitively expect the kind of behavior I'm referring to, it's rampant https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-63699881 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-63699881 Another famous example would be AFL - the racism on display not just in the stands but within the teams and the AFL org itself, would be unimaginable in any other country. Imagine if fans, teammates, coaches etc abused black NFL players the way black AFL players get abused. It would not be tolerated, and it would never happen, it's completely unimaginable. These are not cherry picked examples, they're just two manifestations of the massive problem. But Australia and Australians get a pass because "it's Australia". It's not flattering to be unable to realize and admit maybe your country has some work to do. (it's not an attack on you personally)
    - 3y ago

bedobi 3y ago

Of course not all Australians are like that. But I've lived in many different countries and in my experience nowhere even comes close to how ubiquitous, accepted, even encouraged all the above are in Australia, how large a share of the population really are like that. Let's be real, it's not small. And sure, you can make a bubble of good people around you, but you have to exist outside it as part of your everyday life, and that's not easy if you're the type to notice these things. In the US, you could never ever get away with saying half the things that are casually said in an Australian workplace, at a social gathering etc etc, it simply would not be tolerated. I mean, try to imagine a white American acting all surprised and impressed a dark skinned person speaks good English, and chirpily complimenting them for it. It would never happen, lol. But in Australia it's par for the course. Anyway this is my experience and how I see it, completely understand if others see it differently. But I do think anyone who's under the impression Australia doesn't still have a loooot of catching up to do are kidding themselves.

tomhoward 3y ago
All the points of criticism you've asserted as being true in the present tense in all of Australia are heavily, increasingly pushed back on these days. Sure, Australia may have been slower to catch up than the rest of the world; it's a small, isolated country. But it's all changing very quickly now, and indeed has been for a long time. I grew up in Melbourne in the 80s surrounded by many different cultures, and spent time living in Sydney in the 00s. Sure racism existed but has been increasingly unacceptable ever since I was young and is not tolerated among anyone I know of now. "Gay" as a pejorative has been unacceptable among anyone in inner Melbourne and Sydney since the early 00s - i.e., for at least 20 years. No doubt you'll find exceptions and segments of the population that are slower to reform, just as you do in all places/cultures. Most of that is circumstantial; reform happens when people are exposed to people from different walks of life they become aware of them and more tolerant of them. That's how it's always happened, everywhere. Moralising about these kinds of things really serves only to feel morally superior in yourself, rather than understanding the society you're critiquing. To slur the whole country with your observations of a particular region/cohort at a particular time is to succumb to the same kind of failing of which you're accusing others.
- bedobi 3y ago
  IMO either you're very very lucky or you're kind of blinkered and kidding yourself. Even at the ABC, hardly a workplace where you'd intuitively expect the kind of behavior I'm referring to, it's rampant https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-63699881 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-63699881 Another famous example would be AFL - the racism on display not just in the stands but within the teams and the AFL org itself, would be unimaginable in any other country. Imagine if fans, teammates, coaches etc abused black NFL players the way black AFL players get abused. It would not be tolerated, and it would never happen, it's completely unimaginable. These are not cherry picked examples, they're just two manifestations of the massive problem. But Australia and Australians get a pass because "it's Australia". It's not flattering to be unable to realize and admit maybe your country has some work to do. (it's not an attack on you personally)
  - 3y ago