Lord Herbert wrote on Apr 21
st, 2017 at 10:32am:
That's precisely what we do have, as derived from Britain and Ireland.
The bones of Australia's core culture came over from the UK and is many hundreds of years old, and is pretty much why countries of the Anglo-sphere are the success story that they are today, and why over 300 different foreign nationalities have for the past 100 years or so been abandoning their ancient homelands to join the Brits in their various colonies.
So we have a borrowed culture then? Doesn't that mean we're still in the process of shaping who we are? I believe I know what it means to "be Australian" and I'm proud of that, but it's hardly "culture". I've seen what culture is from the various places I've lived around the world and in many cases it dates back thousands of years. We have a couple of centuries and like any colonial settlement born nation, there is a lot sweep under the rug.
Quote:I see you bought the whole package - the whole nine yards of self-negation, self-belittlement, self-immolation, self-effacement, and self-flagellation as a White generational Australian, and most probably have cultivated this nihilist Anglo-Australian posture in order to ingratiate with, and garner the gratitude of, the Third World foreigners who now live among us in their millions.
It may have come off that way reading it all back, but that wasn't my intention. It's an honest question. From my personal experience, I'm the second generation of my family born here with my grandparents migrating in the early 1900's with English, Irish, Scottish and a dash of Greek (which upon arrival here was quickly shed to the point of even changing surnames stand out less) heritage .
Much of what I understand to be "Australian Culture" isn't so much Australian but borrowed mainly from the above. Perhaps our cultural identity is still being formed? We clearly already identify aspects of others we like then call it our own? Maybe that is the natural progression?
Quote:Instead of rhetorically asking others to explain what Australian culture is and what is our cuisine, why not go one better and work these things out for yourself with a positive attitude rather than with a defeatist attitude that you would very well know will win you the gratitude and smiling approval of your ethnic friends?
Well it wasn't a rhetorical question.
Out in the real world and even in the media, I see people demanding that immigrants adopt our culture or even go as far as to be forced to shed their own and replace it with ours, but when those making these demands are asked what that means, what is our culture that they have to adopt, they cannot answer it. Sure some jokingly (I hope) say they've got to eat meat pies and love the footy, and then?
I'm not alone in that, you just seem to take issue with me not having a rock solid answer because you think I'm a socialist leftie begging for the approval of my leftie and ethnic friends.
I certainly don't see you offering any answers to those questions. Rather cheap and hypocritical of you there.
If my problem is that I'm of "bent-knee", yours seems to be a stubbornness and pigheadedness spawned from a sense of superiority.
There has to be a middle ground which is what I'm trying to find.
If you can't or don't want to help me form my understanding of what our culture is that's fine, just be careful your high horse doesn't trample all over you in the process.