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Australian Exceptionalism

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barbarian

Phil Kearns (64)
Staff member
Thought I would start a new thread to discuss this article I saw today on Crikey. It is pretty long so I won't post in full here.

I suggest you take a look, but here are some excerpts though if you don't want to read the whole thing.

We’ll often laugh at the cognitive dissonance displayed by our American cousins when they start banging on about American Exceptionalism – waxing lyrical about the assumed ascendancy of their national exploits while they’re forced to take out a second mortgage to pay for a run of the mill medical procedure. That talk of exceptionalism has become little more than an exceptional disregard for the truth of their own comparative circumstances.

But in truth, we both share that common ignorance – we share a common state of denial about the hard realities of our own accomplishments compared to those of the rest of the world. While the Americans so often manifest it as a belief that they and they alone are the global benchmark for all human achievement, we simply refuse to acknowledge our own affluence and privilege – denialists of own hard won triumphs, often hysterically so.

Never before has there been a nation so completely oblivious to not just their own successes, but the sheer enormity of them, than Australia today.

We see instead a distorted, self absorbed cliché of ourselves bordering on parody – struggling victims of tough social and economic circumstances that are not just entirely fictional, but comically separated from the reality of the world around us.

So preoccupied have we become with our own imagined hardships, so oblivious are we to the reality of our privileged circumstances, that when households earning over $150,000 a year complain about having government welfare payments scaled back, many of us treat it as a legitimate grievance.

Somewhere along the highway to prosperity – and an eight lane highway it has been – far too many of us somehow managed to confuse Cost Of Lifestyle with Cost Of Living. We managed to confuse government assistance as a means to enable the less well off to achieve a better standard of living and greater opportunity, with government assistance being a god given right to fund the self indulgences of an aspirational lifestyle choice beyond our income means. Too many of us have demanded our dreams be handed to us on a plate, and if our income couldn’t provide for them, we demanded that government should give us handouts to make up the difference.

He then proves our situation by a series of graphs using OECD economic numbers. Then:

So this is our economic reality – we are the wealthiest nation in the world with 75.5% of our adult population making it into the global top 10%, our economy has grown faster than nearly all others (certainly faster than all other developed countries), our household income growth has been one of the fastest in the world (including our poor having income growth larger than everyone else’s rich!), we have the highest minimum wages in the world, the third lowest debt and the 6th lowest taxes in the OECD and are ranked 2nd on the United Nations Human Development Index.


It might be time that Australia grew its reality based community – perhaps acknowledging maybe not Australian Exceptionalism, but certainly our exceptional results and what has actually caused them. Maybe a little pride in our achievements, a recognition of our triumphs, a grasp of where we indeed sit in a global context – if for no other reason than to crystalise out exactly what it is that we need to solve next, free from the noise of the drum bangers and their oxygen thieving ways when it comes to what passes for our national public debate.

Basically my point is do we really have it that good? Should people take a step back and compare our situation to other countries?


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Ali's Choice

Jimmy Flynn (14)
Yeah - having just come back from 6 years OS ... we really do have it soooo good.

Certainly the Coalition has done a fantastic job over the past four years of talking down our economy, and promoting the financial difficulties some Aussies face, to the point where many Australians cannot see how lucky we really are economically. Middle class welfare is now seen as a right not a privilege and people feel they have been let down by their government when they can't take an overseas holiday every year.
 

Scarfman

Knitter of the Scarf
I completely agree with this article - I feel (economically) very lucky. Australia is a rich and beautiful country. The only reason I ever feel like leaving is the low aspirations of the people, beyond wide screen TVs. I'm in the culture and writing business and Australia is ranked pretty low in those fields. It's a country where to call someone an intellectual is to insult them. Our political culture is just stupid.

I suppose that's why I shun the concentration of effort on economic success. I'm more interested in social and cultural success, which involves access to education and health for all Australians, including Aborigines. I also want Australia to acknowledge our wealth and to be more generous (well, at least less punitive) with refugees and the economic/social underclass.
 

Ruggo

Mark Ella (57)
We are young and still trying to find our identity. In the bigger picture we are very lucky but we have work to do within our society. It saddens me to see a lot of people in Australia living hopeless lives with little hope for the future. Indigenous poverty is a big issue.
 

Ali's Choice

Jimmy Flynn (14)
We are young and still trying to find our identity. In the bigger picture we are very lucky but we have work to do within our society. It saddens me to see a lot of people in Australia living hopeless lives with little hope for the future. Indigenous poverty is a big issue.

Indigenous poverty and crime is actually getting worse in many areas. In Queensland, Indigenous people make up just 3.5 per cent of the population but represented 29.9 per cent of Queensland’s prison population at June 2010. Moreover, Indigenous youth make up 53 per cent of the young people in juvenile detention centres across the state.
 

Karl

Bill McLean (32)
Certainly the Coalition has done a fantastic job over the past four years of talking down our economy, and promoting the financial difficulties some Aussies face, to the point where many Australians cannot see how lucky we really are economically. Middle class welfare is now seen as a right not a privilege and people feel they have been let down by their government when they can't take an overseas holiday every year.

I agree with the article, but not the quote above. It's not certain, it's highly debateable to outright nonsense - blaming an Opposition Government (another "Blame Abbott for everything" reaction from Labor is what this looks like) for a national perception or attitude and level of confidence/lack thereof is just silly. And how the LNP is to blame for middle class welfare is beyond me - explain that in the circumstances of a Labor Government that has been throwing money at people like confetti for 4 years and calling it an economic stimulus.
 

MajorlyRagerly

Trevor Allan (34)
Basically my point is do we really have it that good? Should people take a step back and compare our situation to other countries?

Honest to god, not shit stirring, do you really think the general popuation of Aus thinks you have it shit?

Australians that I know are far and away the most patriotic people I've met. And almost all without exception, will happily tell you that Australia is the best place on earth & fight to the tooth if you disagree with them.

My intial thought (which proved incorrect) upon reading the thread title was "Here goes yet another aussie talking about how good aussie is", so I'm genuinely surprised that the article, and some of the responses here.

I should add that I've never lived in Aussie, but have visted about 25 times and worked solidly with majority Australians the last 10 years.
 

Cutter

Nicholas Shehadie (39)
I've only read what is posted above, but I agree entirely with the thrust of the article. Australians are incredibly fortunate and should recognise that. We should also recognise that our economic good fortune won't last to the extent it is built on mining and resources. In this context we should be setting ourselves up for the future by having a sovereign wealth fund financed in part by the mining super profits tax. The watering down of that legislation is the weakest most counter intuitive populist politics I've ever encountered and for that I blame the Coalition and Labour equally.

Our negative politics is to blame for the perception that we're hard done by. MR I don't disagree with your perception and experience of Australians. However, politics in Australia appeals to irrational fears meaning that opinion polls are likely to show "concerns" about the price of electricity under the carbon tax because Tony Abbott tells people they need to be worried and the government supports those fears by saying "don't worry, we'll compensate you".

Finally, in our fortunate position, we should be more responsible for global aid (in the form of infrastructure not hand outs) and we should be taking a lead on combatting global warming.
 

Scarfman

Knitter of the Scarf
Australians that I know are far and away the most patriotic people I've met. And almost all without exception, will happily tell you that Australia is the best place on earth & fight to the tooth if you disagree with them.

Do you only know bogans draped in the Aussie flag? Have you not ever met an American, or an Italian?

Australia has a long and proud history of taking the piss out of ourselves and for being embarrassed by explicit patriotism. That only began to change with the Howard / Hansen era in which the long boom of toleration, extending from Whitlam through Fraser, Hawke and Keating got violently turned on its head.
 

Sully

Tim Horan (67)
Staff member
Healthy, well off, large houses, nice climate, friendly, lots of opportunities, and quite racist.
I really don't think we/they are racist. Just completely ignorant to the plight of people in circumstances they can't comprehend. Both here and abroad.

I believe we do live in a very lucky country. As for the government that's our fault. we voted for them.
 

Schadenfreude

John Solomon (38)
I really don't think we/they are racist. Just completely ignorant to the plight of people in circumstances they can't comprehend. Both here and abroad.

Actually I once tried to make that distinction to someone myself.

And sure that's a large component. But I've since realised, actually there's a lot of old fashioned racism here too. Just look at the immigration debate.
 

Scotty

David Codey (61)
I agree with a lot of what scarfman said. The biggest issue I have with our culture is that if you are smart or work hard, particularly at school you are talked down rather than held aloft. It really is poor and from the school age then it feeds into the culture of deserving to be given hand outs rather than working hard and earning an improved quality of life.

If a government is to give benefits for the reason of stimulating the economy, culture or population then I believe they should be given to all.

Welfare on the other hand should just be used a safety net to helpnthose who can't help themselves or to help people get back on their own feet.
 

mark_s

Chilla Wilson (44)
The biggest issue I have with our culture is that if you are smart or work hard, particularly at school you are talked down rather than held aloft.

I disagree, tall poppies (whether by talent or through hard work) are lopped down in all aspects of Aus society including sport, education and so on. To succeed here in any field, you need to deal with the tall poppy syndrome. It aint easy but its part of who we are and I don't see it changing.

As to the original question, we have no idea how lucky we are. We judge ourselves by what we don't have (usually material things which are largely irrelevant in the grand scheme of things) rather than by what we do.
 

Scotty

David Codey (61)
I disagree, tall poppies (whether by talent or through hard work) are lopped down in all aspects of Aus society including sport, education and so on. To succeed here in any field, you need to deal with the tall poppy syndrome. It aint easy but its part of who we are and I don't see it changing.

As to the original question, we have no idea how lucky we are. We judge ourselves by what we don't have (usually material things which are largely irrelevant in the grand scheme of things) rather than by what we do.

Did sporting stars at your school really get lopped down? Not at mine (albeit it a fair while ago now).
 

Karl

Bill McLean (32)
Tall Poppy Syndrome is selective too. And I don't think any worse here on the whole than elsewhere although we tend to dislike conspicuous consumerism of the Geoffrey Edelsten variety.

I never see anyone trying to bring John Eales down. Or Pat Rafter. Or Hugh Jackman (not seriously anyway). There are plenty of tall poppies who aren't arrogant idiots who continue to command respect and don't have people trying to cut them down.
 

Ruggo

Mark Ella (57)
Tall Poppy Syndrome is selective too. And I don't think any worse here on the whole than elsewhere although we tend to dislike conspicuous consumerism of the Geoffrey Edelsten variety.

I never see anyone trying to bring John Eales down. Or Pat Rafter. Or Hugh Jackman (not seriously anyway). There are plenty of tall poppies who aren't arrogant idiots who continue to command respect and don't have people trying to cut them down.

Agree. The examples you sight are people who carry themselves with huge amounts of integrity and the Australian public respects them for it. Peoples conduct tends to bring them down moreso. Tall poppy syndrome is more like the little mans syndrome for the privillaged. What Australians beleive in most is a fair go for all. They appreciate success but if you obtain your success by stomping on somebody elses chance at success they won't hesitate to label you.

I think what you will find is most Australians believe in opportunity for all. What they make of it is up to them.

These I think are traditional values but they are being tested in modern times through a more consumer driven social trend.

We also should be very clear to define success as progressive achievment from the base one starts from. The base people start from can differ enormously and that needs to be acknowledged.
 
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