Rachael Tension
Monday, December 19th, 2005
Race riots in Australia. I didn't think I would see that in my life time, but then so much has changed since September 11th 2001. And more seems to be changing all of the time.
In the last month we have seen the passage of new anti-terrorism legislation through the parliament, emergency revisions to existing legislation and the arrest of a number of people on charges of planning a terrorist attack here. Now the New South Wales government has, in an emergency session, passed legislation providing police with broader powers to search, detain and restrict access to people engaged in, or suspected of planning violence.
I can see the reasons for these expanded powers and I agree that as a society we need to protect the peace. But what seems to be missing from all of this is a focus on the causes of the violence, beyond labeling as racially motivated. What is causing these groups to lash out at each other and what can we do to deal with these issues?
I think the Prime Minister has been a little disingenuous in his assertion that Australia is not a racist country, I think we are just as vulnerable to narrow and parochial thinking as any country. What we do have is a history of not (usually) getting too caught up in events so that things tend to get worked out, rather than escalated. This time however, I am worried.
The media has been feeding the fear in Sydney and across the country; and local, state and federal politicians are all grand standing over the issue. This is all occurring against the background of a lot of strife for the Muslim community. The recent arrests of predominantly Muslim Australians on anti-terrorism charges, the debate over the new anti terrorism laws, and the ongoing violence in Iraq, Iran and Israel.
I really feel a great deal of sympathy for Muslims, this is not an easy time. I am hardly surprised that a bunch of young guys, having lived with the mounting pressure on the Islamic community since 2001, finally snapped. I am also not surprised that a bunch of Anglo boys felt that they had some sort of tacit community permission to give the Muslim boys grief.
So now what are we doing about it. Is there a push to reunite the divided communities? Is the government coming out with pro active plans to improve race relations? Not so much. We have had lots of condemnation and police action with very little on the reconciliation front. But then this is from the government and the Prime Minister who cant say sorry.
The best we have had is Cate Blanchet getting up and give a speech at the beach. Last time I checked, Cate isn't head of state (except in Lothlórien) and while I am glad she is prepared to come out in support of strengthening the community I don't think she should be leading the charge.
Right now I am not sure what can be done. I have done the obvious, writing to my state and federal Senators as well as the Victorian Premier, but I suspect the thing that we all can do is a little more subtle. I think that if we want to live in a peaceful country, we need to think about what it means to have other religions and nationalities amongst us; to learn to differentiate between what is part of the problem (terrorists) and of the solution (Muslims SHARING our country); and to try and include new Australians so they can share their culture rather than be simply trying to assimilate.
Australia has enjoyed a number of very peaceful years as wave, upon wave of migrants from a range of cultures has come to our shores. These migrants have shared their culture and expanded our horizons, but they did so against the background of relative global peace. The current global climate is not peaceful so it is making things harder, but I think that Australians can manage to deal with the complexities.
