AUSTRALIA DAY IS 26TH JANUARY

AUSTRALIA DAY - 26TH JANUARY

Congratulations to Fremantle.  They have single handedly alienated themselves from the rest of Australia because of their narrow minded decision to move Australia Day celebrations to the 28th of January so as not to offend anyone.  They used the banner of being culturally sensitive.

What a load of bullshit.

Australia Day is the 26th of January, just like Christmas Day is 25th December and Anzac Day 25th April.  The flogs at Fremantle who have made this decision supposedly on behalf of their community, are misguided to say the least.  Did they canvas the community?

It is un-Australian to not celebrate Australia Day on the 26th of January.  Whether you agree with it or not, this is our national day.  I feel for the Aboriginal community as they were persecuted beyond belief by many European settlers.  On the other side of the coin, and this is often over looked was the fact that the country from this date in 1788 was settled by convicts from England.  Many of the convicts were sent here without their families or friends from back home and many of them were convicted of relatively minor offences, compared with today's standards.  There is the key words 'Today's Standards'.

Today, we naturally find the historical events of 1788 and the persecusion of the Aboriginal communities to be totally abhorrent.  Just as dumb founding was the removal from their home country, thousands of convicts and sent to a foreign land and then left to effectively fend for themselves.  How bloody cruel.

Since settlement of this great country of our's we as a Nation have evolved into a country that is the envy of many, especially the 'home' country.  Yes, our leaders have made mistakes over the 228 years with the treatment of Aboriginals, Children, Mental Health, English migrants, Migrants in general, assylum seekers and as a country, just like us in our personnal lives, we find some of our most heinous mistakes quite embarrassing.

I feel that from these mistakes our Nation has learned and grown as a result.  Comapred to many other countries around the world in Australia the closest we come to civil war is on the football field when Adelaide play Collingwood or in the NRL Queensland take on New South Wales.  Our crowds at these sporting events are largely well behaved, we don't have weekly riots.  We have never had a Prime Minister assassinated, although we all like to hate our politicians we a free to sling crap at them in the media or face to face when we disagree with their policies.

In our personnal lives we are a Nation that prides itself on giving people a second chance.  Countries, just like people do make mistakes.  It's when we keep making the same mistakes is when it becomes a real issue.  I really feel for the 'stolen generation', I also could not imagine the anguish back in 1788 and the years that followed for the Aboriginal people, but we cannot constantly blame the country for mistakes made over 200 years ago, when back then that was 'Standard Practice' just like slavery in the U.S and beheading's in the Queen Victoria years.  Just imagine you lose your drivers license for drink driving when you are 22 years old, then still having the system continuing to mention your indiscretion when you are 80.  We would feel that this is somewhat unfair.

So Fremantle you go and celebrate 'Fremantle Day' because you sure as hell are not celebrating Australia Day.  Here is a thought, maybe Fremantle has decided to help South Australia celebrate it's Procolamtion Day!  Oh how kind of you Fremantle, hope you can get enough supplies of South Aussie Flags.

Can we please as a whole rise up against these flogs in our society who have nothing better to do with their time than run around raining on everyone's parade for fear of offending someone.  The fact that Fremantle have gone down this rocky road, offends me as a proud Aussie and I assume most other Australian's.

Just imagine people suggesting that the USA move Independence Day, India move Republic Day or Saudi Arabia move Unification of the Kingdom day just so they didn't offend 'some' people, they would be laughed out of the country at least.

AUSTRALIA DAY IS 26TH JANUARY 

AND THAT IS THAT