Australia Day activities?

[Mal McLean]

A great family barbie at our place. A fantastic afternoon. Aussie theme all over. Still basking in the glow tonight when I saw on ABC news our flag get burned, spat on and ground under foot outside Parliament House. Still angry. Outraged. Then one of these indigineous persons said if we don't like it we should all leave. Countless Australian families of every race and creed were affected by the grinding of two world wars and asian and middle eastern conflicts. Man and women served their country honourably and often at great cost beneath that flag.



Well, I have two words for you, you lowlifes. **** ***.

My first angry thought was that if you (only the people directly involved) consider yourselves strangers in a strange land perhaps you could all claim refugee status. That probably wouldn't alter anybodys financial status but it might lead you to a refugee camp where the hygeine is probably better than the tent embassy. But then, by expressing such a view I would probably be labelled a rascist. I'm not, but this kind of crap gives me pause to think that we are all only a hairs breadth away from foolishness.

Saddened outraged and proud to be an Australian

Mal Beveridge
aka Mal McLean aka Mal the Oldfart.

[Bob Pacey]

A big tick from me on every box Mal. These idiots just want what they can get for nothing and do not care who gets in the way.

I'm not a Gillard fan but I think I actually saw a genuine person just for a little bit there and not a manufactureed one.



I'm so hoarse I will need to drink heaps of rum to lubricate my throat again. Hang on i already have !!!!


Bob

[r.magnay]

...good onya Mal, I won't even start!....and you are not a racist because you express a valid opinion, regardless of what the do gooders might say!

[croc]

This is my valid opinion.

If... in the very first place, the bloody Brits hadn’t buggared the country up, there would be no need for any of this type of conversation, or what we sadly saw in the hotel scene.

Being a sea faring nation, they settled the coast from top to bottom and transport was easy... wait for the tide and the wind and orf we go lads. But... they had not one wit about them... any of them, when it came to the interior; our Australian interior still suffers for it today, especially in the upper northern area. No real road networks, no real railway networks... tracks to get well and truly bushed on.

The Brits came out of a land six feet deep in snow and tried on the Ozzy outback and they failed dismally. And... before they came, for many years the Australian Aboriginal had this country singing. The whole of the coast was run by traders who imported produce from one state and exported it to another... all round the country.

The Brits had camels, horses, navigational equiptment, whatever they wanted to take them in a strait line for gawds sake ...and died of bloody starvation. Load gun, point gun at wallaby, pull trigger. It’s not rocket science. Had they had to chuck a spear at it and gain a killing shot, they may not have succeeded. Well... they didn’t succeed anyhow so it doesn’t matter.

And... had they befriended the Australian Aborigine, and learned from him, instead of the bloody appalling way that the man was treated by British civilians... civil?... then this country would be far better orf, and we as second and third generation would not have to pay for the sins of our completely bloody stupid fathers. And to this day Australian Aboriginals are treated like second class dropouts, and it is nowhere near even tolerable, it’s bloody unconscionable, and this type of behaviour and conversation only goes to rub salt into a wound that will never heal as long as people keep beating the drum about it.

This is a young country, rich in prospects and commodities, and it needs all its people as one to get on with life amiably.
Just take time out to think about it.. where did it all start and how soon can we as one nation stop the bullshit.
...croc

[william williams]

we cannot Croc as long as Pollies rear ends point to the ground and their brains are filled with R S and greed controls their thoughts. we have bugger all hope

Bill Williams

[Maureen K Clifford]

Well said croc - and totally agree that it needs all its people as one to get on with life amiably.

Totally saddened to see our flag treated so disrespectfully - many aboriginal soldiers fought and died under it as well. Once again the unthinking actions of a few reflect on the many.

We are all Australians, some by heritage and birth, some by choice - but we all need to work together with acceptance and respect if this country is to go forward to bigger and better things for everyone and not stay mired in the morass of racial slurs, inequality and perceived injustice.

[Nerelie Teese]

Ahhh, such diversity of opinion - and freedom of speech, this is just some of what Australia's all about. Don't have to agree but being prepared to listen to other points of view before telling them how and where they're wrong, followed by a nice cold beer together (sooner or later) ... that's fair dinkum Austrayan mate!

But back to the genuine Australia Day celebrations of people without chips on shoulders or axes to grind, wheelbarrows to push, etc, it looks like most people had a fantastic day joining in with their local events.

My uncle celebrated his 88th birthday with a cold beer from his favourite niece and our area's new Australian citizen received her citizenship at a lovely ceremony with a flyover from local planes, music from the local brass band, and my presentation of one of my new poems 'Welcome to Australia', followed by a great Aussie brekky in the shade of some magnificent red gums near our little billabong at The Aquatic Reserve, complete with cockatoos screeching at us from their overhead perches. Pure Australian nature at some of its best and almost magical timing.

We then headed out to Barmah where I hosted an Australian Bush Poetry session, with traditional and original bush poetry under the shade of a desert ash, very close to the mighty Murray River, with 30+ attending.

A nice cold beer in the Barmah Pub was followed by a bit of a drive around our beautiful Barmah Forest with my grey nomad friends from Melbourne. I don't think they realise just how fortunate we were, and how the bush just seems to bless us whenever we're out there - a small mob of beautiful brumbies crossed the track in front of us and I even got a photo of them amongst the red gums.

Some of the forest's brumbies have bloodlines going back to the ponies and horses put on agistment in the bush with other family farm animals, and supervised or managed by the local herdsman and forest officers, by our local boys before they joined up on the adventure of a lifetime - WWI. Some of our local ANZACs never came home to collect their beloved horses. Hence a living heritage link with the forest's brumbies, our local WWI Diggers and the beginning of Australia's proud ANZAC tradition.

Quiet, friendly and beautiful, that was our 2012 Australia Day.

Cheers Nerelie

[r.magnay]

...we are all Australians by choice Maureen, some of us are born here and choose to stay, some of us choose to come here from elsewhere, some of us are born here and choose to move away. The important thing is that we all start being Australian, whether black, white or brindle.

No sense blaming the pollies for everything Bill, they have a job to do and some do it well while some do it poorly. The people are as much or more to blame than the pollies, when you have two flags, racism that is only classed as racism if it is white Australian against any other race and not the reverse, poor bugger me attitudes by people too bloody lazy to help themselves, "indigenous all stars" of all codes and sports, Aboriginal this, Muslim that, poofter something else! People are all too wrapped up in themselves rather than getting on with life....live and let live....I'm about over it!

As for blaming the Brits for the state of things croc, I guess they need to accept their share of the blame, I do get a bit peed off with the way people talk about the 'origional' inhabitants, or as some people like to say the 'first Australians' being at one with the land though..... it is a sound theory that they too had quite a major impact on the changing face of Australia, not all for the better either. It is believed by some, (me included) that their indiscriminate use of fire through the centuries actually caused the developement or at least the extention of much of the inland desert, that is borne out to me when I fly around this country and see the damage still being caused today by the very same indisciminate use of fire. It is essential that not only we learn from the Aborigine, but also vice versa, the claim that it is their nation carries no water with me, if we invaded them then surely it is our country...their words not mine. The indigenous advocates want all sorts of rights and rewards for being the first people here, but they are quick to embrace the parts of our culture which suits them, I don't recall seeing any cave paintings depicting VB, Toyota's, football, KFC or McDonalds,........ let's look at whole picture before we start singling out individuals and individual groups to point the bone at!

[r.magnay]

....yeah yeah I know, I said I wouldn't comment....just can't help myself.............they don't come any Aussier than me mate!

[Mal McLean]

G'day croc.

Oweryagoinmate?

I agree totally with your historical thrust. Except that I strongly feel that conversation, the expressing of opinions, is the way to best deal with difficult issues, we are on the same page.

I come from a place where i had to deal with a drunken violent WW2 veteran father who wasn't diagnosed with PTSD until 40 years after the war. I was a Nasho. The flag means so much to and about my life that I find it difficult to forgive other peoples disrespect for it, even if they have, or believe they have, a valid reason. I don't know how the wounds can be healed but I know from personal experience that acknowledging a problem and talking about it is the best way to start.

I am no longer angry. I am still saddened.

Keep well

Mal