Comments on: Pride or Conceit?

By: school grants

school grants — Sat, 01 May 2010 04:30:03 +0000

Wow this is a great resource.. I’m enjoying it.. good article

By: Fiona

Fiona — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 11:06:00 +0000

Proud enough to cheer for Roger over Lleyton tonight

By: Dave

Dave — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 08:44:37 +0000

My Australia day outfit consists of Australian-made clothes, just like most of my everyday clothes.

By: Fiona

Fiona — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 07:13:37 +0000

Thanks Sheila- see even I get confused about what actually happened on 26th January and which invasion we talk about!

By: Sheila (@stinginthetail)

Sheila (@stinginthetail) — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 07:04:53 +0000

Captain Cook had already set foot on the country and he did it in 1770 – not ‘a few days earlier’- he had to set foot on Australia to claim it – he also named New South Wales. Australia day commemorates an event 18 yrs later, when the First Fleet moved their initial settlement to Port Jackson.

As someone from WA, to me it’s a NSW holiday that was imposed on the rest of Aust with scant recognition of anyone except NSW. Sydneycentric, much?

We could recognise Federation Day as Australia Day instead, but that wouldn’t give the bogans (the racist ignorant bigots who our politicians spend all their time sucking up to now) another public holiday. (It being January 1, already a public holiday).

As an Australian who’s proud of my foreign ancestry and my Aussie forebears (back to the first fleet), i no longer enjoy what used to be a family holiday and a time for quiet pride in our country – one we could see had lots of flaws, including our treatment of Aboriginal peoples (they’re not all Kooris, that’s another east coast myth).

It’s been taken over by commercialism and people with Southern Cross tattoos who have no idea what the Southern Cross symbolises. And as you point out, all the ugly Aussie paraphernalia is made in China.

Still, this is what the pollies wanted when they made sure our public schools were dumbed down, when they took tertiary education away from the people and made sure only the rich could afford it. Ahem, i’ll get off my soapbox now

Nice post – you certainly made me think
Sheila (@stinginthetail)´s last blog ..You want me to stick rhinestones where?

By: Corey

Corey — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 06:48:38 +0000

Great post Fiona. It seems to me like the flag has been appropriated by the Marketing machine and the xenophobic thugs who use it to add cache to their pseudo-patriotic ramblings. I hate feeling like every time I see the Southern Cross, I’m looking at thrift-store hate speech. And I mean, honestly, would it be so hard to move Aus Day to a date that didn’t mark the invasion of a land owned by our Indigenous peoples?

Thanks for the read.