Discussion of racism on Australia

Keyword tags: #Racism  #Australia society  #Chinese  #immigrant

Australia, as an immigrant state, is frequently labeled of racism in recent years. What’s reason cause this phenomenon?

Arthur does the master in the university of Macquarie in Australia. he loved this country, because the environment and culture for learning and life.

One day, he was smoking outside the shopping mall with friends (it was marked as smoking area). A female dressed in uniform came to told Arthur and his friends they can not smoke in this area.

‘I immediately stubbed his cigarette, I thought there might be some rule I didn’t know even though it is labeled ‘smoking area’, Arthur said.

At the same time, there were a few white people with smoking next to Arthur. ‘the staff ignored these white people, and gone’ Arthur said. He was very unhappy to be discriminatory treated.

Arthur expressed that he never experienced racism before that, and the only way to know this are from media.

Chinese (immigrants and international students), as a main part of extraneous population of Australia, is the main objective of discussion in the topic of racism.

Chinese people waiting for the train in Eastwood station     Photo by: Yanxi Li

Historical, geographical, cultural… when we are careful to distinguish the internal factors of racism, what is the primary cause leading to racism? Maybe due to cultural diversity lead to different behavior.

After several-year development, immigrants from all around the world, headed by white people, flocked to Australia where is becoming a typical multi-ethnic and multi-cultural country.

As an immigrant nation, Australia is very tolerant to different races. In fact, since the reports from the media, the problem of racism is often concerning by the public.

We can consider of these reasons:

The first one is related to real estate. For example, in Sydney, due to overseas buyers are flooded with Australia real estate market, many communities have built a large number of real estate: Asian people are mainly part of buyers, especially Chinese.

In recent years, there are many examples related to Chinese investors who spent a lot of money to buy property in Australia. According to analysis of Australian Bureau of Statistics and Foreign Investment Review Board data by Credit Suisse showed in 2014: $24 billion was spent by Chinese buyers on Australian housing in the past seven years.

Many natives think that is one of the reasons causing house prices rising. Objectively speaking, housing prices has brought huge life pressure, including increasing rent and housing price for ordinary people who are living in Australia.

Therefore, the phenomenon of Chinese people who crazy to buy houses leads to rising housing prices, which maybe become the reason why Australian have a negative impression of Chinese.

However, these voices are dismissed by a senior Turnbull government minister recently, Trade Minister Steve Ciobo indicated that some Chinese buyers were not foreign nationals, but rather Chinese Born-Australians or immigrants.

house prices were “absolutely not” contributed by overseas buyers, Ciobo said.

In the context of economic globalization and cultural exchange, the second reason of racism is related to economy.

On one hand, Chinese investors contributed to economic development of Australia.

When a large number of Chinese come to Australia, their industrious attitude and willing to do hard work was welcomed by employers. But in some Australians’ opinions, this is an aggressive action: Chinese occupy their living space. Under the influence of competitive pressure, some local people have the speech and behavior of racism to Chinese.

Some Chinese people suffered words and actions of racism in Australian society, for some examples:

On Sydney train, a woman verbally abuse at young children and an Asian woman ‘Go back to China’.

A Chinese-Australian couple was shouted by a white woman in a central Sydney park.

Although these events of racism are just examples, media reports will make people produce a stereotype: white people have a racism for Chinese.

On the other hand, we discuss behaviors of some Chinese. In the aspect of employment: Chinese employers often give a very low wage, and they prefer to compensate by cash for tax evasion and save cost. Chinese employees does not care these terms and accept these works, especially Chinese international students.

The street all of Chinese restaurant, Eastwood     Picture by: Yanxi Li

These actions make most of Australians lost a lot of competitiveness who comply with minimum wage under law in Australia.

For example, trade union issued a series of warnings about cheap Chinese labor undercutting Australians’ wages.

In terms of some Chinese who live in Australia, we can find some reasons: such as legal consciousness and poor public awareness, some Chinese behavior has brought negative impact to local people’s living.

Racism is listed in the section of social issues on Australian government official website. Dr Helen Szoke said: ‘Racism does exist in Australia. We know this is a fact,’ from Australian Human Rights Commission.

Racism involved a person be treated unfairly or viciously because their race, color, national or belief. Racism is a negative phenomenon, it should be taken seriously, and be reduced in the society.

In 1966, International Convention on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (ICERD) were signed by Australia, and ICERD were ratified in 1975. Also in 1975, Australia passed the Racial Discrimination Act (RDA). At the same time, Australia added commissioners for RDA, the work functions of commissioners were still increasing in 2011.

Interviewee: Sissi Xiao

Get rid of these efforts of government, we can discuss some individual attitude to racism.

We could appeal to people who had been suffered racism, do not be afraid and learn to protect themselves.

We could appeal to foreigners who came to Australia, when they decided to live, travel or study here, please respect all elements of this country: such as humanities, culture and law.

Overall, in a diverse society, we share a common humanity, all of rights should be respected and equal used.