Harmony or Cacophony in Australia?
Multiculturalism is definitely an asset but at this phenomenal growth rate, the nation could be in for chaotic times in the years to come.
Multicultural Australia celebrated Harmony Day last week – a day of cultural respect, widely celebrated across schools, childcare centers, community groups, churches, businesses and federal, state & local government agencies. The theme for 2013 is ‘Many Stories – One Australia’. Well, all this makes for delightful reading but seriously, does the community embrace other cultures that exist in society?
No matter what people say, there will always be an element of prejudice held against people from non-English speaking backgrounds.
The Australian National University conducted a study on whether ethnicity influences recruitment in Australia in 2009 and the results are quite a revelation.
It was revealed that an applicant with a Chinese name needs to send out 68% applications more than a candidate with an English name and a candidate with a Middle-Eastern name had to put in 64% more applications. One with an indigenous name had to submit 35% more and one with an Italian name 12% more.
These stats are a clear indication of how hard it is for a migrant from an Asian background to break into the job market in this country.
Moving on, ‘The Interventions into Policing of Racialised Communities in Melbourne’ report released in 2010 states that young Africans are a constant target of police harassment, racism and assault that goes either unreported or inadequately investigated. Additionally, police often resort to hostility and aggression when dealing with them. For this study, 27 males and 03 females from either a Sudanese or Somali background aged 15 – 27, were interviewed.
This is what one had to say:
“The police picked me up, put me in the back of the car and took me to (locality withheld) and beat (expletive) me and left me there”.
In tune with this, Australia has sadly earned a reputation of being prejudiced, as is evident from the stories below.
In November last year, a French woman was subjected to racist taunts in a Melbourne bus for singing in her native language. And in the following month, two Indian women were racially attacked on a bus and told to ‘Go back to where they came from’ before being slapped by an irate passenger in Melbourne’s CBD.
Chinese Aussie Rules players were recently the target of racist abuse by Australian spectators in a game organised by the Australian Consulate on the occasion of Australia Day in Macau this year.
Popular ABC newsreader Jeremy Fernandez of Malaysian origin wasn’t spared either. A woman called him a “black c—” after a slight disagreement about her child’s behaviour on a bus in Sydney a few weeks ago.
We live in an age wherein the evil and the bad always make top headlines and there’s complete disregard for a good endeavor. Therefore, Australia will always be branded notorious on the subject of prejudice.
A recent report in the Herald Sun revealed that the population in the country is set to reach a mind-boggling 23 million in a month’s time primarily due to the arrival of immigrants every two minutes and 20 seconds! Government figures also claim that overseas arrivals account for more than half the entire population growth and that the population of Australia is predicted to explode to 40 million by 2050.
Multiculturalism is definitely an asset but at this phenomenal growth rate, the nation could be in for chaotic times in the years to come. As for Harmony Day, it will continue to be celebrated every year but like they say, ‘old habits die hard’.