In a tolerant society, racists hear this: your race is run (Australia)

[pampango]

http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/society-and-culture/in-a-tolerant-society-racists-hear-this-your-race-is-run-20110225-1b8hz.html

Saddened and galled. That's how I felt when I read this week's news about Australians' attitudes to racial and cultural minorities, their prejudices against Muslims, Jews, Asians, and, most ludicrously of all, the original inhabitants of this country, the Aboriginal people. I wasn't even consoled by the fact that anti-British, Italian and Christian sentiments across Australia were recorded at less than 10 per cent. With so many different cultures and nationalities being distrusted, who was there left to detest? And who were all these ''Australians'' doing the detesting?

The university found that ''Australians are largely tolerant people who are accepting and welcoming of other cultures. The survey data indicates that a large majority of Australians are positive about living in a multicultural society. Most Australians feel secure and comfortable with cultural difference''. (My emphases.) When asked ''is it a good thing for a society to be made up of people from different cultures?'', 86.8 per cent of Australians agreed it was (in Victoria, 89.5 per cent agreed). When asked ''do you feel secure when you are with people of different ethnic backgrounds?'', 78.1 per cent of Australians said they did. (In Victoria, 81.4 per cent responded positively.)

''Racists'', it emerged, were the real minorities in this country: ''about one in 10 Australians have very problematic views on diversity and on ethnic differences. They believe that some races are naturally inferior or superior, and they believe in the need to keep groups separated. These separatists and supremacists are a destructive minority.'' (Interestingly, those most likely to hold racist attitudes tend to be older, non-tertiary educated, do not speak a language other than English, are Australian-born, and male.)

He and his team had asked this very question, and comparative studies confirmed that Australia did indeed fare well. In parts of western Europe, three in 10 people were racists, and the figure was higher in parts of eastern Europe. The only place Dunn had found that was less racist than Australia (and then only a little less so), was Canada.

Significantly, research into racism shows that if people with racist views are made to feel as though their views are ''mainstream'', they are emboldened in their racist behaviour (and, let's be clear, it's not just people of ''Anglo'' backgrounds who may hold racist views). Politicians who insist on denying that racism exists and who pass it off as ''normal'' or even ''patriotic'' to be intolerant, are playing an ugly and dangerous game. Is this ringing any bells?

The 10-15% of Australians who do not uneasy with a multicultural society tend to be "older, non-tertiary educated, do not speak a language other than English, are Australian-born, and male". Sounds like the makings of an Australian Tea Party. (We want our country back from all these "alien" cultures.) :)

It seems unarguable that "(p)oliticians who insist on denying that racism exists and who pass it off as ''normal'' or even ''patriotic'' to be intolerant, are playing an ugly and dangerous game." Still that is an "ugly and dangerous game" that the right plays constantly in the US.

[Jmaxfie1]

1. I wonder where the US ranks? anybody got any data? n/t

[Cirque du So-What]

2. It seems that Dunn's study is already being interpreted in different ways

as shown in this blurb preceding a link to audio of an interview with Dunn himself:

Largest ever racism study
February 26, 2011 03:27 AM PST
Nearly half of Australia is racist according to a major new university study.

The survey of more than 12 thousand people is believed to be one of the largest ever.

The 12-year study found some level of racist feelings against the indigenous people, as well as noted that half of Australians hold anti-Muslim views.

Kevin Dunn, is a geographer at the University of Western Sydney and lead researcher in the challenging racism project.

He spoke with 2SER’s John Gibb.

http://2ser.podomatic.com/entry/index/2011-02-26T03_31_05-08_00

'Nearly half' is considerably more than slightly more than 1 in 10, as the SMH article suggests. I hope that different groups, each with a different agenda, don't distort the data in this study to suit their own purposes.