No need to shout Suzanne.
Despite Lindsay’s cut-and-paste from some US e mail, no one has ever seriously proposed that we do not have a day celebrating Australia. Indigenous people have issues with the 26th January, since they regard the day Philip landed at Sydney Cove to be the beginning of their dispossession.
Also the 26th January 1788 is not really relevant to the founding of colonies other than NSW. The other states have their own Foundation anniversaries.
But perhaps Suzanne would like to tell us how the first European settlers got here in 1788.
???
you said it... 
Us Aussie whites sprung from a hole in the ground, in the same manner as Gimli chronicling about dwarf women.
Speechless…
I came here by aeroplane. The rest of you swam here.
It’s all very simple really. Australia Day should be celebrated, no question about it. I love this country, I love its people and there is much to celebrate. I think the best day to celebrtae Australia Day is when we become a republic and get rid of the (as Jerry Seinfeild called it) Britain by night flag. I want a flag that demonstartes the fact that we are a nation with a diversity, with people coming virtually every country on the planet.
Sure, the foundations built on the pain of invading this country to its original people, the British system of government, serves us well. I have no beef with the Westminster system as I have no beef with the democratic system we live under. Sure things can be improved but it is a different story with the fact that the current Australia Day date celebrates the pain of invasion which the Original Peoples suffered.
While waiting for a republic we can use the day that Kevin Rudd, the Prime Minister, said sorry to aboriginal people on behalf of all of us.
Yes, a lot of the stuff happened before I arrived in Australia as a Greek boy on a boat BUT I am geninely sorry that the Original People of Australia suffered and are suffering so much.
stavros
The problem with Australia day in these times is that it has been hijacked by the right as a day when it’s deemed okay to go out and bash anyone that’s that’s not white. It further serves to bring out a lot of the ugliness in this nation by hordes of people celebrating what they consider to a way of “life”, such way consisting of sinking piss, swerving their Commodores all over the road without so much as indicating, expanding their already inflated waistlines and further raising their cholesterol levels whilst simultaneously endorsing (through proxy) inhumane animal husbandry practices by eating mountains of meat, spurting meaningless and mindless jingoisms, calling on the government to send more troops to fight a meaningless war in a country they know nothing of while blaming Julia Gillard for it when it was their favourite fucking sugar daddy Johnny Howard who was one of the ones to have started it, and, of course, engaging in more mindless acts of violence against anyone even vaguely brown. Only once Australians as a whole have embraced humanitarian values and their worth, only then, will I feel comfortable celebrating Australia Day.
I understand where you are coming from but I don’t think we will ever achieve a state – of – the – nation where Australians as a whole will embrace humanitarian values – love that to happen, but I don’t think that every one of us will do it.
So, to wait for that to happen before you can celebrate Australia Day means that you never will. However, if the country as a whole votes to have a new flag and a republic, it means that there will be a move closer to the humanitarian values because of the acceptance of the real culturally diverse country that Australia is.
Australians will have finally cut the mamma strings of Brittania. AND if we decide in a referendum to celebrate Australia Day on a day significant for the Original People of Australia, then we have moved ever so much closer to humanitarian values.
O.o Convict ships?
r they the one’s full of muslum criminnels?
…I don’t… can’t even work out… WTF. I hope these morons don’t breed.
Have you seen the movie Idiocracy? They do breed…a lot.
A movie that is, sadly, most prophetic.
Hatched out of the egg of the rainbow serpent.
Well, she is right actually. Australian’s didn’t come here by boat, The British did, it took hundreds of years to form the identity of “Australians”…
I think Australians may have used some sort of landbridge or other. I dunno. Go ask a geologist.
Such a bitch & moron.
Jessica Watson came here by boat. But prior to that she also left on a boat so I think the two cancel each other out so she can stay.
I think some people will try to convince themselves nothing before 1788 counts and so it is as if white people have been in Australia since the beginning of time. The European settlers must have been amazing swimmers if they didn’t get here by boat.
I think this just highlights the need for better “Australian History” education.
I was NOT taught anything about Aboriginal Culture or what actually happened when Australia was first colonised. All I remember was it was by the British with Boats and Convicts was what I took from the school
As “Forrest Gump” would say… “Stupid is as stupid does”
Note for Ms Mason – Forrest Gump IS a fictional character
The stupid…. it burns.
I cant believe some people, The first australians were aboriginals who walked over from africa. then came the first white australians from britian, but lets remember they weren’t just british people sent here, there were irish, english, american, scottish, french, asian and african just to name a few. So when we celebrate “Australia Day” we are actually celebrating the day all those countries and peoples got together and created the Australia we live in today. I am a first generation Australian (my parents were born in scotland) married into a Greek family and I pride myself as an Australian. To me, being Australian means accepting people for who they are, lending a helping hand for no reason other than you can and caring for your fellow man as you should. I don’t look at the flag and see Britains influence, I just see the Australian flag. I don’t see immigrants, I see fellow Australians. Come this Australia day, I’ll have the BBQ cranked, the beer will be cold, all my friends will be around and we will be watching the cricket on t.v. I wont be out hating on my fellow man because that ain’t Australian. I won’t be on here bagging out everyone and everything I don’t like because that ain’t Australian. People like Ms Lindsay Mason need to get a life and a real perspective on how the world works.