THE MEANING OF OZ - All you need to know!

Was just thinking: if the Chasers will now have to submit their scripts to ABC management for approval (after their two week suspension, that is), who know what other potentially "sensitive" issues will deemed unsuitable for public consumption? I think this could be the beginning of the end for them, really. And maybe ABC management wouldn't be exactly unhappy with such a notion?

Yeppers.

I don't know ABC's attitude to them...I assume they get a lot of viewers?

I think it's a shame.

Their whole thing is to be on the edge.

Sometimes they're gonna fall off.


Gotta love Auntie giving them Time Out for bad behaviour.

I wonder if they will have to do without dessert?

Yes, but this is the first time (I'm aware of) that there's been such an angry public backlash to the Chasers. I imagine there would have been plenty of Liberal complaints to a lot of their material during Howard's last year ... & the ABC Board has many a conservative sitting on it, so ... maybe this is an opportunity not to be missed? The problem is, of course, if one program can be censored or tamed, who's to say others can't be? It's a worry.

Moving back to racism, Indian students & Oz. This article was published today in the Sunday Age. I think it's a very thoughtful analysis of the situation. Well worth a read. I'd be very interested in any responses to it. :



http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/indians-passive-by-nature-dont-add-insult-to-injury-20090606-bz5x.html?page=-1

I'm pretty sure that was the right episode. The offending segment seems to have been removed.
Prepare to be offended.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oS36ZuCW-7c

Thankee.

I am afraid it fits right in with my very black humour!

Very interesting.

You know, the influx of Asian students in the seventies was more a social engineering thing than anything else...Oz hoped that generations of Malaysian, Indonesian, Filipino, Chinese and Chinese diaspora etc. students would form a home ruling class that had knowledge about and friendly ties to Oz.

It is certainly a MAJOR cash cow now!!

And it, along with increased migration from these countries plus the Middle East and Africa, has similarly transformed central Adelaide and some suburbs. Truly, when I am walking through the city in the mornings, or catching my bus in the evening, I feel as though I am in Asia! I can see that this could be very challenging to many.

I really like the analysis of the new immigration policies, multi-culturalism, and the whole Mabo thing. Whoa!!! That was, indeed, a lot for a country to do in a short time.

The other thing I notice (mainly with clients) is how extraordinarily racist many of our familiar, white immigrants are. I hear truly awful things from Central European, German, South African Russian etc migrants...not to mention Greek and Italian extraction folk...(and you should HEAR the Vietnamese on the Africans, and the Moslems from different countries on each other...remind me to tell you about our "teaching Moslem refugee women to swim" experiences for tales of vicious xenophobia!!!) so we are battling the racism and xenophobia not only of our Anglo-Saxon roots, but that of the rest of the world!!! And now the religious prejudices!

The author certainly seems to have no doubt that Indians ARE being targeted by thugs.

If this is happening at regular places (sounds like train stations eg? I know lots of white kids who get beaten up by white thugs at places like that, too...however..) then the police are certainly remiss if they are not putting in resources at known trouble spots.

In a way, I don't "get" the whole "are we racist" thing. Of COURSE we have a racism problem....I am not sure if there are many countries who do not?

I think we melting pot countries make our racism way more evident, because we challenge the racism all the time. The article mentions countries who do it really well...I wish he had identified these. We ought to be learning from them.

Surely this is an assumption we make and try our best to ameliorate and educate and generally do stuff to try to alleviate, in an ongoing way? As our schools are doing.

Anyhoo, ALL foreign students here deserve the best we can give them in terms of comfort, safety and support, because we sure are getting a lot out of them...and because they are people we are living with.

Food for thought :-----

There is so much I could say in response to your post, Deb. (Maybe, due to a shortage of time right now, I'll keep posting away over the next few days! Otherwise dinner might not get cooked & eaten. )



By "it" you mean the overseas student "industry" in Oz. (Just filling in anyone who might not have been following this discussion too closely.)
Yes, it's a huge source of revenue for this country. One of our largest sources of o/seas revenue, in fact. With all variety of positive & detrimental effects on the students themselves, the communities they live in & the provider education institutions themselves. (There is so much that could be written about this!)

But one aspect of the "o/seas student industry" that the writer of the article didn't touch on is that the tertiary education sector has become a de facto immigration agency - along with our "official" migration intake. To put it another way, o/seas students pay up big for their courses, many with the intention of actually migrating to the country. In fact, this is the reason that many undertake their courses in the first place. I have a big problem with this, not just the exploitation of the students - Indian & others - but with the notion that anyone should pay up to migrate to the this country. Absolutely abhorrent! It also infuriates me that some migration "legitimately" takes place via this avenue while asylum seekers arriving by sea so often face such harsh treatment - often years of detention & distress - before being acknowledged as "legitimate" by the Australian authorities. We hear so much about "que jumping" on the part of desperate asylum seekers, yet our government cynically allows de facto migration via fee paying students. I could go on & on about this ...



They (the attacks in Melbourne) do appear to be happening in the same suburbs, train lines at night, the same railway stations (& these suburbs tend to be the more affordable ones for the students). These same suburbs have received wave after wave of migrants because of their affordability. Footscray, for example, has a huge Vietnamese population, followed by a large fairly recent African (& other) refugee influx. Same with Springvale & St Albans (constant "trouble spots" for indian students). Many people these suburbs tend to be not too well off financially (high unemployment/welfare rates) & yes, I'm sure there is resentment at the constant flow of so many new o/seas residents on the part of some "old" residents. And unfortunately the new residents/migrants are not given sufficient support services within their new communities, say nothing of the proper supervision at regular trouble spots, like train stations. I read a recent report that Indian students were forming their own support/protection groups at St Albans Station. I also read that another Indian man was bashed there last night. Sigh. When are the authorities going to address the problems at known trouble spots, for god's sake? All we seem to get from them is PR.

What's the source of that quote, Deckland? Is this your view, too?

17 cm of snow here at lunchtime.

Really?

Been raining cats n dogs in Melbourne! (About time, too!)

Is that a permanent covering during the winter months or gone the same day dadpad?

Come on, Dutchy! SA weather report, please!

As you wish msolga, 15 degrees in Port Lincoln where I am at present, with lots of rain, 20mm, very welcome for this wheat growing district.Rained pretty well all over the State.

Excellent, Dutchy! The farmers will be thrilled!

Not quite so much here, I think, but a helluva relief to actually see rain again. It's been weeks since the last decent downpour!

Farmers are happy, crops are in and these follow up rains is just what is needed. Little fishing for me though, waters are to rough besides I don't like the cold.

But I'll bet you have plenty of fish you've caught in the freezer, to tide you over, Dutchy.

I don't remember where that quote came from msolga, but there may be some truth to it. I thought I would do what you have been doing and post it and wait and see what others had to say before I made a comment of my own.

You're correct there msolga. enough to see me through to early August when I'll next visit this place, will stock up then. Son will probably be in town before then and drop something off.