<
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/sep/04/racism-in-australia-is-hardly-new-to-address-this-we-need-media-and-politicians-capable-of-navigating-complexities>
"Perhaps it is inevitable that the two most persistent evils in human societies
– racism and misogyny – can be at times difficult to define and pin down.
It’s like the elephant in the archetypal parable about the blind men who each
touch one part of the beast and assume they know its nature.
One touches the tail, and conceives a snake-like creature. Another the flank,
and thinks of pillows and comfort. Another the tusk, and perceives danger.
When they compare notes, they can’t believe the other’s account to be genuine.
They suspect the others of delusion, or even of lying.
Some of the obvious signs and symptoms of racism are a subjective experience,
so we often find it hard to agree on the nature of the problem, let alone
tackle it.
This might go some way to explaining why, after the disturbing anti-immigration
protests on the weekend, we can’t agree on what they mean and whether racism
was at their core.
In this age of misinformation, even the numbers of protesters are not agreed.
Elon Musk, a metaphorical blind man if ever there was one, shared a post on X
which claimed it was 150,000 in Sydney and Brisbane. Police say it was closer
to 21,000.
Even immigration numbers have been misreported. The spurious claim that 1,500
migrants arrive every day in Australia was used by
2GB Radio host Ben
Fordham, among others, to suggest the “March for Australia” protests were being
held as a response to legitimate concerns about housing, rather than motivated
by racism. But the figure he used is wrong, as the Australian Bureau of
Statistics has been trying to make clear.
Meanwhile, Andrew Bolt on
Sky News Australia bangs the same drum. He asserted
that while there were a minority of racist “morons and thugs” at the protests,
it was “defaming some good people” to claim that racism was the prime
motivation.
Australia has a long history of this kind of defensiveness and denial."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
