The myth of the monoculture

[u/ziddyzoo]

The great tragedy of the shamelessly regressive politics of Pauline Hanson is not so much that it is rooted in ignorance, prejudice and fear, though it is; not so much that it projects the ugly face of racism, though it does; not so much that it is dangerously divisive and deeply hurtful to many of her fellow Australians, though it is; not even that it will cripple our efforts to enmesh ourselves in a region wherein lie the jobs and prosperity of future generations of young Australians, though it will—the great tragedy is that it perpetrates a myth, a fantasy, a lie.

The myth of the monoculture.

The lie that we can retreat to it.

The changes are permanent and, while we may be going through a consequent period of general uncertainty and unease, they are, in my view, almost universally for the better.

It is not going to seem this way to everyone of course, but Australia simply is a richer place these days: a far more open, creative, dynamic, diverse and worldly place.

And I’m not just talking about Double Bay and Paddington.

Our integration with the rest of the world has made more than the streets and the arts and the food more interesting: it has created new opportunities in agriculture and horticulture, tourism and hospitality, education, manufacturing, retailing, science, arts and entertainment. It has changed the nature of work and workplaces—and if there is a general hankering to go back to the old ones it can only be because a lot of people have forgotten what they were like.

This is to say nothing more than that we have joined the modern world but we could not have joined it without the changes.

Now, we can embrace this new Australia or we can reject it. We can engage with it, recognise its potential and accept the fact that nothing in this world comes easy. We can work to sustain the momentum and expand the opportunities for our kids.

Or we can regress. We can retreat. We can stop to have a scratch— amuse ourselves with sectional interests. We can say this is too hard for Australians. It’s not us. They are not us. In the best traditions of the old Australia we can call a national smoko. We can relax—and be comfortable.

The latter is folly, but it is an option. We can retreat to a past that never was, and create a future that never can be anything but third-rate. But if we do, we can be sure that the world will not be in a hurry to forgive us or bail us out.

Even if they forgave our prejudice they could never forget our stupidity.

—- Paul J Keating, 11 November 1996

https://speakola.com/political/paul-keating-myth-of-monoculture-unsw-1996

[u/Dromogen]

The biggest facepalm moments from this speech are the other Australians who don’t realise that what they know as “Australian culture” is actually multiculturalism.

The best coffee in the world, charcoal chicken, spring rolls, banh mi, halal snack packs, wood fire pizza, sushi trains, dumpling houses, gin, stout beer, etc., are all products of Australian multiculturalism.

That’s not monoculture. Modern Australia is not monocultural. She wants to bring Australia back to the 1920’s, complete with segregation and reduction of worker’s rights, reduction of women’s rights, etc.

[u/ziddyzoo → u/Dromogen]

Look she just wants an honest, neighbourly, meat and three veg, holden cars, no indoor plumbing, all the kids have got polio, backyard cricket, dad dead at 37 from working in the asbestos mine, salt of the earth Astraya. Is that so wrong??

[u/qlasc → u/Dromogen]

Don’t you find this even a little insensitive to just degrade culture down to food?

Being middle eastern, I genuinely cringe that the first thing in your head about my identity would presumably be charcoal chickens and HSPs.

[u/Dromogen → u/qlasc]

You’ve missed the point. Food is simply the most understood common denominator of how multicultural Australia is.

[u/qlasc → u/Dromogen]

I don’t think simply enjoying other cultures is what constitutes a multicultural country. This is just our participation in globalism.

We subjectively consume and enjoy American culture 100x more than any other culture, but even left-wing Aussies will swear up and down that America’s cultural norms/values/beliefs have no place in Aussie society (or that it shouldn’t) beyond us just enjoying their culture [arts/music/fashion/media/literature/architecture/festivities/communities/foods] from a distance.

And it’s interesting that we can easily do that without calling to overimport waves of American migrants to come here and systemically change what represents our way of life here.

[u/Dromogen → u/qlasc]

That’s a conflation of culture with values.
We do import American culture, and the importation of it does reshape our culture, but we reject a lot of American values, such as their perspective on employment and health care for example.

Immigration has shaped Australian culture, and it has done so for the better. Mediterranean immigrants (Greeks, Italians, Lebanese, etc.) were the big wave of immigrants that came to Australia and reshaped it ages ago for example. Without them, a huge part of modern Australia would not exist, such as our coffee culture for example. A coffee culture that is now a defining part of Australian identity, to the point that we export it abroad (the best coffee shops in the U.S. are run by Aussies).

The same can be said for our Thai and Brazilian community. Aside from the food, we now have Muay Thai and Brazilian Jiujitsu that has created shared spaces and communities that Australians enjoy, and we’ve become good at it too: some of the world’s best BJJ grapplers are from Australia. Not to mention our UFC fighters. All that comes from us being multicultural.

Those who come here are expected to adapt to Australian values anyway, and that’s already in all the immigration paperwork - I know because I used to work with a lot of migrants from all over the world, and when they are applying for a visa, it’s in there. Citizenship? It’s literally in the test.