2FAST4U said:
Huh? Are you Steve baby? or are you Steve booger...Boooger steve?...Just wandering since I asked him not you...or..are you two one and the same....
In fact...you were responding to DBs post and you asked him,not me.You really are confused,aren't you?
However...I'm quite happy to educate you about the "White Australia" policy.
The policy of excluding migrants of non-european origin arose from the large influx of chinese diggers to the australian gold fields in the mid 19thC.It continued in one form or another until 1973 when the last discriminatory provisions of the Immigration Act were removed.Despite the policy,many asians were allowed entry and there are many chinese families who can trace their ancestry back 5-6 generations in australia.They have proven to be excellent citizens who value hard work and education and IMO have been the most successful migrants to this country.
You may understand the policy a little better by looking at the situation in the us over the same period.The california gold rush produced similar tensions between europeans and asians and the australian policy was copied from the response of the us govt. to those tensions.The australian policy did not specifically discriminate against asians as the Johnson-Reed Act of 1924 did in the us.It was rather a "catch-all" policy allowing the australian govt.to exclude anyone it deemed unacceptable.The notorious language test (whereby intending emigrants were required to demonstrate proficiency in a language of the govt.s choice), was also used to exclude europeans.In one notorious case a european communist fluent in 8 (?) european languages and confident of passing the test was tested in Gaelic.
Australia has far greater ethnic diversity than the us with 30% of the population either born overseas or being the children of migrants.There are also many other australians who are descended from Greek and Italian migrants and many of them can trace their family history back 3-4 generations,
The majority of australians are of British and Irish descent.Many of the Irish immigrants came here after the potato famine and many australian visitors to Ireland remark how similar in appearance the Irish are to anglo-celtic
aussies.
There are few racial problems in australia,despite recent publicity about anti lebanese riots.I know the area where the riots occurred.It is perhaps the least ethnically diverse part of sydney and the residents have long had a reputation of excluding "outsiders" from other parts of sydney.It is not typical of sydney or australia.
Some indication of australia's ethnic diversity can be seen in australia's sporting teams such as rugby and football.
