Am I “Racist” : I Think Not
Yesterday afternoon I set up an appointment for an electrician to arrive at about 3pm to give us a quote on some electrical work that needs doing. Soon after 3pm 2 tall African men stood at my door. I’m going to attempt to dissect my response.
Superficially there was nothing much going on and we both had what could be looked upon as a good experience. I have grown up in a very, very white country. We even had a government ruling called “The White Australia Policy” which was officially implemented in 1901. The first 4 decades of the 20th century saw immigration to Australia essentially restricted to people of UK descent. Initially the movement was fired by trade unions attempting to protect the jobs of British immigrants from cheap labour from Asia and the South Pacific but up until WW2 we were essentially “Vanilla”. The Menzies and Holt governments made some small efforts to undo the “WAP” but it wasn’t until the labour Government came to power in the early 70s that racial discrimination was frowned upon.
I grew up in a white, english speaking outpost of Britain. The seeds of the society that spawned me were those of lower class immigrants from Ireland, Wales, Scotland and England. In the 50s when I was young Australia started allowing more “exotic” Europeans to enter. Italians, Turks, Greeks …. we called them WOGS or New Australians. They spoke in strange tongues and their food smelt different. Being in close proximity didn’t feel safe. I even recall going to a birthday party of a Jewish boy from school when I was about 7 years old. I was wary. The food tasted different, even down to the sickly unsalted butter on the sprinkled bread that was served. I thought I had been poisoned.
As you would expect, each new wave of immigrants had their own “ghettos”. I hate to admit it but looking back now, even in the 70s there was still a predominately white flavour to Australia. After the Americans and Australians conceded defeat in Vietnam we had an influx of Asians. By now the Italians and Greeks had integrated into the general society and their children developed Aussie accents. The new ‘aliens” were from Asia.
For reasons unknown to me I do not recall ever meeting a person of aboriginal descent when I was young. I may have without being aware but it just didn’t enter my mind that I was living in a country that had been overrun by Europeans only a little more than 100 years earlier. The images that were conjured up of aboriginals were this manufactured by white artists and photographers showing primitive black people with large foreheads and flat noses waving boomerangs and wearing loin cloths. Just to make it clear, I had never really seen a kangaroo or a koala either until I went to Healesville Sanctuary.
My first exposure to black people was during the 60s. American musicians and protesters against discrimination. It all happened from afar. Australia was still white.
The question that I ask myself now is whether the unfamiliarity of seeing a black person in real life is some form of discrimination or is it just a lack of knowledge and familiarity with something that I haven’t had a great deal of experience with. Is the overcompensation that I make to be polite and natural, inquisitive and eager to please with references to African musicians and little titbits about what I know about the geography of Africa condescending?
I think not.
