Both CW and Tom have posts deriding Australia day. And fair enough too, it's a bloody joke. According to the website It is "...the biggest day of celebration in the country... On Australia Day we come together as a nation to celebrate what's great about Australia and being Australian."
What a crock of shite, celebrating what is great about Australia is bloody unaustralian. Although saying that is dangerous because there is nothing more unaustralian than saying something is unaustralian.
Australia day was once a nice excuse for a day off work at the right time of year to duck down to the beach or a convenient river for a BBQ with some mates. When did it all change? Probably in 1988 things started to go bad, since then the jingoistic bullshit has increased and increased and the laid back Aussie Australia day is dying. Or at least in the popular press it is. In fact I think that the laid back, public holiday in summer attitude is still the prevailing one but somehow government web pages and the like are trying to make us patriotic and the press is following along.
But on with the Nationalism, a group of total plonkers calling themselves British People Against Racial Discrimination are trying to get the use of the word Pom banned. What a pile of old horseshit! Firstly this is in no way racial discrimination because racially the Poms are the same as many if not most Aussies. There are much better ways of dealing with this, the Wogs decided to take control of the word and we got Wogs out of Work, The Wogboy and a whole host of fantastic TV, film and stage productions which made fun of the cultural clash of Aussies and Mediterranean immigrants (skips and wogs).
Now, I'm not bashing the Poms here, most British immigrants are more than able to accept a little light hearted ribbing and give it back. Usually giving it back along the lines of 'your mother was a convict' or 'we won the world cup'.
So to David Thomason, spokesperson from British People Against Racial Discrimination I say. "Stop your bloody whingeing. It's Poms like you who keep the image alive. This is Australia and you'll get a bit of ribbing about where you come from be it New Zealand, Pommyland, France or Queensland and if you think that this is some sort of racist attack then you're a dickhead.
Oh and as for the moral high ground, just live here a few more years then hop back on a plane to the old dart. You'll soon find that you're neither fish nor fowl as your new Aussie accent makes you the but of all the convict jokes.
3 comments:
For those of us who are neither British nor Australian, could you please explain why "Pom?"
Why a POM? Good God man, does there need to be a reason?
Umm, in fact I don't know.
The common (and incorrect) reason is that British Convicts arriving in Australia had the letters POME recorded on the ships logs to indicate they were a Prisoner Of Mother England. As I said, this is a load of old cobblers.
Rhyming slang for an immigrant was Jimmy Grant and it has been suggested that this was adapted to Pomegranate because of the bright red colour the British turn the instant they see real sunlight for the first time. And from there (as with all Aussie words, we just shortened it and shortened it. Even in the late 1970s Pommy was the more common term.)
'we won the world cup'
Easy comeback for that. "Once. A long time ago. And probably never again."
Can't argue with that! We'll be taking that cup home before the English ever do it again.
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