I was in India recently, and the subject of racism against Indian students in Australia came up a fair bit. It's a huge issue there - headline news in most newspapers and TV news.

Indians don't understand it, and I had to say that I don't get it either. Before the recent news of the 2 Indian murders, I was saying that it was just a media beat-up. Two indian medical students told me that it's dangerous for young Indians in Australia and I said I thought this was overrated. I told them that the big cities are totally safe.

Now I'm not too sure - especially after the Victorian Police commissioner has come out to say that the Victorian police had identified a phenomenon of racist crimes against Indians in Melbourne 2 years ago - well before the recent media attention and protests.

Indians see it as a "complexion issue" - referring to the colour of their skin. I see the problem more as a cultural issue. If it was simply about skin colour, surely we'd be attacking Africans.

Australia is not an Aparteid state - we don't discriminate against "half-castes", "quarter-castes" or "quadroons."

We used to, of course. Up until the 1970s such ideas were written down in immigration and Aboriginal Affairs legislation. The White Australia Policy existed to keep Australia white as well as mono-cultural. We can hardly say that Australia has never been a racist country. Since federation, Australia has been explicitly racist.

But curry bashing? Why? And why now?

Indians don't get it. They don't understand it because, racially, India is a very accepting country. In a country of such a diverse population, you have to be. No matter what you might have heard, Indians are tolerant of other faiths and cultures. On the whole, Hindus and Muslims get on well in India, and Indians see this as one of their enduring strengths.

Indian emmigrants are, on the whole, extremely well educated and hard-working. Indian students in Australia consistently top exam results. In many fields, Indians are over-achievers, and globally, India is starting to make its presence felt as a burgeoning superpower.

Could this have something to do with the violence?

Culturally, there are differences. Indians are not laid-back. Their culture is loud, and often, Indians come across as overexcited and pushy. Try forming an orderly queue in India - almost impossible.

But setting someone on fire because of their race? I find this extremely hard to understand. If this is a race crime, it highlights a hatred of Ku Klu Klan proportions, and I can't see any obvious reason for Australians to hate Indians. We've faught on the same side in war. We play cricket together. Maybe I'm missing something. Still...

So my question is this: is there an underlying resentment towards Indians in Australia right now? And what causes it?

If not, is all the media attention just another tabloid frenzy?

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Yeh, except for when Hindu mobs rampage through cities in Gujaraat, cleansing entire suburbs of Muslims... apart from that, yeh it's fairly peaceful I guess.

They're Australians. Whether they have a Lebanese background or not is irrelevant.

I don't think an Indian whose being attacked would really care what ethnic background the person originally had, they are an Australian, in Australia, attacking them. Simple as that.

Yes some attacks have involved Lebanese, and probably many other backgrounds. When are Anglo Australians going to accept that people born, raised, educated, cultured here ARE Australians, no matter what their historical background. I'm sure when Arab Australians are great sporting heroes or other such things, you won't mind taking credit for their Aussieness...

Yeah there's always going to be problems with people of different nationalities and cultures.
However, the political truth is that if their skin is a dark, then it's a racist issue, but if their skin is fair, then it's an international issue.

I suppose we can somewhat blame corporate greed for resentments against Indians. Corporations are the ones who pay for cheap Indian labour, Indian people to persistently phone people at meal times and to make it hard for Australians to get a university place.
I've registered my phone number to stop Indians calling me, now they come to my door at meal times with their les.

This may have something to do with the repercussions, but there are more reasons involved.
Indian students most often choose the cheapest areas to live where crimes more often occur. They also often seem oblivious to dangers in the jobs they choose, and the places and times that they travel.
The Indian student recently murdered (was this the only Indian student murder?) was walking through an area which I know very well. There is no way that I would take this path late at night as it is full of recent African immigrants and gangs. It seems that this guy took that path most nights, ...just ridiculous in my book.

Now we have the Indian media drumming up the situation. It's easy work for them to take the stories reported here and put their own spin on it.
But do they report that India's murder rate is more than twice ours?
Do they report on the 8000+ dowry murders which happen in india every year?
Do they report on the Austrlians murdered in India? There are currently about ten "unsolved" murders of Australians in India in recent years.
Do they report that India won't extradite the drunken Indian motorist who killed a bystander and fled the country?
Murder doesn't make the news in India unless it's somebody of note.

The pathetic reporting by the Indian media will do nothing but inflame the situation. So too will Indian ministers who try to tell our government what to do when their own backyard is filth.
Is this a bit of sour grapes about our government's decision to overturn the Howard agreement to sell uranium to India because they haven't signed the non-proliferation treaty?
The uranium deal would've far exceeded the money that we get from arrogant whinging Indian students. I'd be happy to do without both.

Nope, India knows not about general opinions. They are an infantile democracy that will take thousands of years to mature.
The caste system, the dowry, the colour of neighbors, lives on as part of it's culture.
Hopefully that attitude will always be rejected here, although there are big signs that we are now accepting this caste system approach, which can only lead to a society of lies and filth such as India's.

There is no other perspectie to put it into other than Indians are vehemently trying to dupe us with their lies. They need out.

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Interesting that race is a non-issue in racism.

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Of course they do. If they didn't, they wouldn't label it racist. Being targetted for your race adds to the level of fear you experience.

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How so? Foreign students support our universities financially.

helian,

I very much doubt it has anything to do with religion. Lebanese youth who go out marauding in the streets usually have no idea, nor care for religion, and will often be of mixed christian/muslim backgrounds anyway.

Relating everything back to Islam, when this issue clearly has nothing to do with Islam, is just becoming petty, really.

Nope, I've just seen the trend...

Less religious -> more likely to be racist.
More religious -> pretty much no chance of being racist.

As someone practises Islam more, he'd have to realise racism is an extremely opposite concept to Islam, and could not maintain his racism.