Here We Go Again - Chapter 24 - Sledging, Colonialism or Racism

Australia is a vast land. So vast in fact it is made up of states and territories when one looks at a traditional map. There are also, through the stories handed down by the first inhabitants, many “nations” with their own language, their own stories, their own ways that inhabit the same map.

We are, as a people, a tribal bunch, regardless of whether you are descendants of the first peoples or a “Johnny come lately” and have been a part of the influx over the past 250 odd years. Everyone who is here has bought something with them. It is impossible not to.

But we are Australians.

Like a country watching their athletes perform at an Olympics, we take pride in “our” success and fall with their failures all in the name of patriotism. This stretches right down to the grassroots level to sports at a domestic level.

Last week we congregated to watch the Rugby League State of Origin. The banter between the states, “cockroaches” versus “cane toads” was lighthearted as much as it was strenuous. The roar from the pro Queensland side of the room or the pro New South Wales was met with comic derision or simply silence from the other side as the tables tipped in favour of one side and then the other. It didn’t matter of course that the series had already been decided in the previous game. This was war between “bitter rivals”.

It was seemingly lighthearted, and for us it was fun. We were on neutral ground in the Northern Territory – but where do you draw the line, because if you believe the hype the marketers use promoting these games, its “state versus state and mate versus mate”.

But where does “the greater good” fit in when the underlying ideal of patriotism is instilled in the very fabric of our existence.

Australia, the supposed bastion of the free, taking all manner of “WOGS, WOPS, LEBBOS” and the like, not unlike the the immortal words emblazoned on the Statue of Liberty – “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”, in probably the most racist of countries, The USA, huddled behind words like “the land of the free”.

We write this stuff. Lofty words with lofty ambitions and then apparently simply ignore it. Immigration lines, boat people, Sharia Law, all words that send shivers down the spines of many. Andrew Smith suggested it best “People fear what they don’t understand and hate what they can’t conquer.”

So what is “freedom” and how does it fit in with “patriotism”. It certainly isn’t, in my view, the ability to be able to call or deny anyone anything by virtue of race, creed or history. It does not manifest itself in words like “Queensland hospitals are for Queenslanders”.

So I ask – where is the line and why do we knowingly continue to cross it, when we know full well we are supposedly better.

But the apparent indifference starts from the lowest level. It commences from birth. It is taught in schools where rivalries go past the willingness to strive, beyond into “being better”. Not just better but better than someone else, and that’s where the conundrum exists.

The Covid pandemic has brought these notions to the fore.

What does it mean to be Australian? 

Does it mean our single minded devotion, not only hangs on our national flag, pervades like a cancer right through our culture.

We are a nation. Why cant we progress as a nation. Not a group of individuals or individual states, territories or tribes, just striving to be better than the next man, woman or child in a game of one upmanship. If we need to be led, why must those who lead need to be “better”. Why cant we all do our small piece to ensure the betterment of everyone.

Remember that when next we look to emboil ourselves in discussions of supremacy. It might seem to be fine at a team level, but when that sort of thinking purveys itself right to the top of government, some will be left behind.

Do we need a Dave Brailsford (English Olympic Cycling Coach) to take Team Australia – all of Australia – and instill in them the need to go from a mediocre underwhelming team (so bad in fact international cycle manufacturers would not sell them bikes), individually improve 1% at a time for the collective good of the team. Why is there not a political leader with the ability to lead on that premise?

We are for that matter all Australians.

We are, for that matter, all interested in a better life. Why? Because we want ours to be better than the next man, and there lies the failure in society.