Ext User(Harold McMillian)
21-12-2005, 03:14 PM
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml;jsessionid=VX5NRI2Y0CL53QFIQMGCFF4AVCBQ UIV0?xml=/opinion/2005/12/20/do2002.xml&sSheet=/portal/20
Racism is bad - so is self-delusion
By Mark Steyn
(Filed: 20/12/2005)
What's the deal with these riots in Sydney? You switch on the
television and there's scenes of urban conflagration and you think,
"Hang on, I saw this story last month." But no. They were French riots.
These are Australian riots. Entirely different. The French riots were
perpetrated by - what's the word? - "youths". The Australian riots were
perpetrated by "white youths". Same age cohort, but adjectivally
enhanced.
And, being "white youths", they thus offered "a chilling glimpse into
the darker corners of Australian society", as Nick Squires put it last
week, "with thousands of white youths rampaging through a well-known
beach suburb, attacking people of Middle Eastern background. They were
egged on by white supremacists and neo-Nazis."
Gotcha. White youths egged on by white supremacists. You can't make a
racist omelette without egged whites. Cate Blanchett also subscribes to
the Squires line and, no disrespect to our man down under, she does it
rather more fetchingly. I'm goo-goo for Miss Blanchett in just about
every movie she's made and I'd cut her an awful lot of slack.
But on Friday she toddled along to Dolphin Point on Coogee Beach
wearing a white T-shirt showing the outline of Australia with the
single word "THINK" inside and stood in front of a banner calling for
"a wave of tolerance" to sweep the country (which sounds more like a
tsunami of tolerance). And, even as I was still drooling like a
schoolboy, I could feel myself starting to roll my eyes. At that point,
Miss Blanchett unburdened herself of this great insight: "It's actually
very clear and simple. Violence and racism are bad."
Thank God somebody had the courage to say it, eh? But isn't the
problem, in Australia and elsewhere, that it's not quite that "clear
and simple"?
Take "tolerance", for example. Wave-of-tolerance-wise, Australia for
years has looked like New Orleans the day after Katrina hit. The
broader Blanchett-Squires culture has been tolerant to a fault. In
Sydney in 2002, the leader of a group of Lebanese-Australian Muslim
gang-rapists was sentenced to 55 years (halved on appeal).
The lads liked to tell the lucky lady that she was about to be "fucked
Leb-style" and that she deserved it because she was an "Australian
pig". It was the sentence that was "controversial". As Monroe Reimers
wrote to the Sydney Morning Herald: "As terrible as the crime was, we
must not confuse justice with revenge. Where has this hatred come from?
How have we contributed to it? Perhaps it's time to take a good hard
look at the racism by exclusion practised with such a vengeance by our
community and cultural institutions."
After 9/11, a friend in London said to me she couldn't stand all the
America-needs-to-ask-itself-what-it-did-to-provoke-this-anger stuff
because she used to work at a rape crisis centre and she'd heard this
blame-the-victim routine far too often: the Great Satan, like the dolly
bird in the low-cut top and mini-skirt, was asking for it. Even so,
it's still a surprise to hear the multiculti apologists apply the
argument to actual rape victims.
So suppose we do as Mr Reimers suggests and "take a good hard look" at
"racism by exclusion". As Monday's Australian reported: "Sydney's
western suburbs remained quiet yesterday after a call for a full day's
curfew by Lebanese community leaders. Mohammed Elriche, 19, said he and
his friends would have enjoyed nothing more than their regular swim at
Cronulla Beach, but their parents had asked him to stay at home.
"His parents, Eddy and Samira, who have lived in Australia since 1972,
said their five children would be allowed to go to the beach again only
when the 'conflict is resolved and peace is restored' in the Sutherland
shire region. 'If there's no more conflict, I will let him go,' Samira,
42, told the Australian in Arabic."
In Arabic? Let's suppose that Cate Blanchett got her wish and a tidal
wave of tolerance washed into all those "dark corners of Australian
society" taking the chill off the chilling glimpse Squires got. How are
even the most impeccably diverse multicultural types supposed to
welcome into the bosom of their boundlessly tolerant family a woman who
prefers to speak the language of the land she left at nine? When it
comes to "racism by exclusion", who's excluding whom?
There are no doubt "white racists" down under, but, as an explanation
of what's going on, it's almost quaintly absurd. "People of Middle
Eastern background" have prospered in Australia. The governor of New
South Wales, Marie Bashir, is Lebanese, as is her husband, Sir Nicholas
Shehadie, as is the premier of Victoria, Steve Bracks. Likewise, in my
own state of New Hampshire, one of the least racially diverse
jurisdictions in North America, the last Senate race was nevertheless
fought between a Republican, John Sununu, and a Democrat, Jeanne
Shaheen, both from Lebanese families.
All these successful politicians are of Lebanese Christian stock:
that's to say, after a third of a century in their new countries, they
weren't conversing with reporters in Arabic. It's not racial, it's
cultural. And the cries of "Racist!" are intended to make any
discussion of that cultural problem beyond the pale. In that sense,
Sydney's beach riots are a logical sequel to what happened in France.
>From opposite ends of the planet, there are nevertheless many
similarities: non-Muslim women are hectored and insulted in the streets
of both Clichy-sous-Bois and Brighton-le-Sands. The only difference is
that, in Oz, the "white youths" decided to have a go back.
These days, whenever something goofy turns up on the news, chances are
it involves a fellow called Mohammed. A plane flies into the World
Trade Centre? Mohammed Atta. A gunman shoots up the El Al counter at
Los Angeles airport? Hesham Mohamed Hedayet. A sniper starts killing
petrol station customers around Washington, DC? John Allen Muhammed. A
guy fatally stabs a Dutch movie director? Mohammed Bouyeri. A terrorist
slaughters dozens in Bali? Noordin Mohamed. A gang-rapist in Sydney?
Mohammed Skaf.
Maybe all these Mohammeds are victims of Australian white racists and
American white racists and Dutch white racists and Balinese white
racists and Beslan schoolgirl white racists.
But the eagerness of the Aussie and British and Canadian and European
media, week in, week out, to attribute each outbreak of an apparently
universal phenomenon to strictly local factors is starting to look
pathological. "Violence and racism are bad", but so is self-delusion.
Racism is bad - so is self-delusion
By Mark Steyn
(Filed: 20/12/2005)
What's the deal with these riots in Sydney? You switch on the
television and there's scenes of urban conflagration and you think,
"Hang on, I saw this story last month." But no. They were French riots.
These are Australian riots. Entirely different. The French riots were
perpetrated by - what's the word? - "youths". The Australian riots were
perpetrated by "white youths". Same age cohort, but adjectivally
enhanced.
And, being "white youths", they thus offered "a chilling glimpse into
the darker corners of Australian society", as Nick Squires put it last
week, "with thousands of white youths rampaging through a well-known
beach suburb, attacking people of Middle Eastern background. They were
egged on by white supremacists and neo-Nazis."
Gotcha. White youths egged on by white supremacists. You can't make a
racist omelette without egged whites. Cate Blanchett also subscribes to
the Squires line and, no disrespect to our man down under, she does it
rather more fetchingly. I'm goo-goo for Miss Blanchett in just about
every movie she's made and I'd cut her an awful lot of slack.
But on Friday she toddled along to Dolphin Point on Coogee Beach
wearing a white T-shirt showing the outline of Australia with the
single word "THINK" inside and stood in front of a banner calling for
"a wave of tolerance" to sweep the country (which sounds more like a
tsunami of tolerance). And, even as I was still drooling like a
schoolboy, I could feel myself starting to roll my eyes. At that point,
Miss Blanchett unburdened herself of this great insight: "It's actually
very clear and simple. Violence and racism are bad."
Thank God somebody had the courage to say it, eh? But isn't the
problem, in Australia and elsewhere, that it's not quite that "clear
and simple"?
Take "tolerance", for example. Wave-of-tolerance-wise, Australia for
years has looked like New Orleans the day after Katrina hit. The
broader Blanchett-Squires culture has been tolerant to a fault. In
Sydney in 2002, the leader of a group of Lebanese-Australian Muslim
gang-rapists was sentenced to 55 years (halved on appeal).
The lads liked to tell the lucky lady that she was about to be "fucked
Leb-style" and that she deserved it because she was an "Australian
pig". It was the sentence that was "controversial". As Monroe Reimers
wrote to the Sydney Morning Herald: "As terrible as the crime was, we
must not confuse justice with revenge. Where has this hatred come from?
How have we contributed to it? Perhaps it's time to take a good hard
look at the racism by exclusion practised with such a vengeance by our
community and cultural institutions."
After 9/11, a friend in London said to me she couldn't stand all the
America-needs-to-ask-itself-what-it-did-to-provoke-this-anger stuff
because she used to work at a rape crisis centre and she'd heard this
blame-the-victim routine far too often: the Great Satan, like the dolly
bird in the low-cut top and mini-skirt, was asking for it. Even so,
it's still a surprise to hear the multiculti apologists apply the
argument to actual rape victims.
So suppose we do as Mr Reimers suggests and "take a good hard look" at
"racism by exclusion". As Monday's Australian reported: "Sydney's
western suburbs remained quiet yesterday after a call for a full day's
curfew by Lebanese community leaders. Mohammed Elriche, 19, said he and
his friends would have enjoyed nothing more than their regular swim at
Cronulla Beach, but their parents had asked him to stay at home.
"His parents, Eddy and Samira, who have lived in Australia since 1972,
said their five children would be allowed to go to the beach again only
when the 'conflict is resolved and peace is restored' in the Sutherland
shire region. 'If there's no more conflict, I will let him go,' Samira,
42, told the Australian in Arabic."
In Arabic? Let's suppose that Cate Blanchett got her wish and a tidal
wave of tolerance washed into all those "dark corners of Australian
society" taking the chill off the chilling glimpse Squires got. How are
even the most impeccably diverse multicultural types supposed to
welcome into the bosom of their boundlessly tolerant family a woman who
prefers to speak the language of the land she left at nine? When it
comes to "racism by exclusion", who's excluding whom?
There are no doubt "white racists" down under, but, as an explanation
of what's going on, it's almost quaintly absurd. "People of Middle
Eastern background" have prospered in Australia. The governor of New
South Wales, Marie Bashir, is Lebanese, as is her husband, Sir Nicholas
Shehadie, as is the premier of Victoria, Steve Bracks. Likewise, in my
own state of New Hampshire, one of the least racially diverse
jurisdictions in North America, the last Senate race was nevertheless
fought between a Republican, John Sununu, and a Democrat, Jeanne
Shaheen, both from Lebanese families.
All these successful politicians are of Lebanese Christian stock:
that's to say, after a third of a century in their new countries, they
weren't conversing with reporters in Arabic. It's not racial, it's
cultural. And the cries of "Racist!" are intended to make any
discussion of that cultural problem beyond the pale. In that sense,
Sydney's beach riots are a logical sequel to what happened in France.
>From opposite ends of the planet, there are nevertheless many
similarities: non-Muslim women are hectored and insulted in the streets
of both Clichy-sous-Bois and Brighton-le-Sands. The only difference is
that, in Oz, the "white youths" decided to have a go back.
These days, whenever something goofy turns up on the news, chances are
it involves a fellow called Mohammed. A plane flies into the World
Trade Centre? Mohammed Atta. A gunman shoots up the El Al counter at
Los Angeles airport? Hesham Mohamed Hedayet. A sniper starts killing
petrol station customers around Washington, DC? John Allen Muhammed. A
guy fatally stabs a Dutch movie director? Mohammed Bouyeri. A terrorist
slaughters dozens in Bali? Noordin Mohamed. A gang-rapist in Sydney?
Mohammed Skaf.
Maybe all these Mohammeds are victims of Australian white racists and
American white racists and Dutch white racists and Balinese white
racists and Beslan schoolgirl white racists.
But the eagerness of the Aussie and British and Canadian and European
media, week in, week out, to attribute each outbreak of an apparently
universal phenomenon to strictly local factors is starting to look
pathological. "Violence and racism are bad", but so is self-delusion.