http://www.news.com.au/adelaidenow/story/0,22606,24423463-2682,00.html

The “disappointing” results are from a 10-year survey called Challenging Racism, to be released at the 4Rs (rights, reconciliation, respect and responsibility) International Conference in Sydney this week.

A cultural gap yes,

but we’re not racist

ONE in two South Australians do not like the idea of a close relative marrying a Muslim, while one in three are against marriage to Aborigines or black Africans.

Despite this, only one in 10 actually admits to being racist.

Project leader Professor Kevin Dunn, from the University of Western Sydney, said yesterday the levels of intolerance in SA were “too high”.

“It is too high and we ought to be concerned,” he said.

“It does point to what many of us know, which is that there’s a strong level of Islamophobia – and that’s the same from state to state.

“It’s a really disappointing result, and it’s to do with representations. The anti-indigenous sentiment is shared across cultural groups and in many localities and regions, so it is nothing to do with actual contact.”

The study also found 40 per cent of South Australians believed there were cultural or ethnic groups that did not fit into Australian society and almost that many thought the country was “weakened” by ethnic groups “sticking to their old ways”. However, 85 per cent believe all races of people are equal and only 12.4 per cent said they were prejudiced against other cultures.

The results show that, overall, SA is less tolerant than Victoria but more tolerant than NSW.

Older people were slightly less tolerant and women were slightly more tolerant than men, except when it came to marrying a Muslim.

West Croydon author and cross-cultural educator Janine Evans converted to Islam about 16 years ago after meeting her future husband Yazeed and she said she was saddened but not surprised by the results. “Sixteen years ago, before I became a Muslim, I would have been shocked, but now it doesn’t surprise me at all,” she said.

“It saddens me, but only because not enough work is being done. Education is a powerful thing.”

Professor Dunn said education in schools and in communities was the key to fighting racism.

The 4Rs International Conference will include a debate on the social impact of the first 300 days of the Rudd Government, a review of the NT intervention and the premiere of a documentary called Intervention, looking at life under intervention in the town camps of Alice Springs.

Comment:
I stand by yesterday’s comment on the same topic.

This report could show a number things. Amongst them it reveals that Australians are less impacted by the politically correct efforts of successive governments and media agencies than previously thought by politically incorrect disidents such as myself, and are quite capable of separating the truth from politically correct propaganda. [more ...]

Read comments by other readers on the article’s comments page.

Cailen.

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http://www.news.com.au/adelaidenow/story/0,22606,24415273-5005962,00.html

FORTY per cent of Australians believe some ethnic groups do not belong in the country with one in 10 having outwardly racist views, a new study shows.

New South Wales tops the list with racist views, but lead researcher on the project Kevin Dunn puts it down to Sydney being the focus of international migration to Australia.

The study, led by human geography and urban studies Professor Dunn and his team from the University of Western Sydney, reveals racism in Australia has waned over the years but the figures remain high.

He will unveil the state-by-state statistics on Friday at the 4Rs international conference – Rights, Reconciliation, Respect and Responsibility – at Sydney’s University of Technology.

Challenging Racism: The Anti-Racism Research Project has randomly surveyed about 12,500 people in different studies during the past eight years.

Prof Dunn attributes the results to people’s overarching views.

“It’s an indicator of a narrow view of what constitutes Australianism,” he told AAP.

People were asked which cultural/ethnic groups do not fit into Australian society. NSW topped the list with 46 per cent of survey respondents saying some ethnic groups should not be in the country. The ACT had the lowest such response with 28 per cent.

Prof Dunn said people also revealed who they singled out the most.

“The most often-mentioned groups were Muslims or people from the Middle East.”

The overall figures surge to 65 per cent for people over 65 but drop to 31 per cent for those aged 18 to 34.

“It’s too high, isn’t it,” Prof Dunn said.

“We’ve got to bring that down.”

On average, about one in 10 people said it was not good for people of different cultures to marry and about the same number said not all races are equal.

“It’s only about one in 10 people now in Australia across the different states that would have that sort of view – the racial supremacists for instance,” Prof Dunn said.

“That’s still quite high I suppose – there’s a lot of concern that comes out of that.”

He said NSW ranked highest in most categories but attributed that to Sydney being the country’s focus for immigration.

“There’s just more cultural diversity here – there’s more opportunity for cross-cultural contact and that means some of them will not be positive ones.”

Prof Dunn and his team will release regional results within each state sometime early next year.

They will also recommend strategies to lower Australia’s level of racist views, which he said remain low by international standards.

On the other hand, the report does not give racial based statistics of those surveyed. A casual reading of the report would lead the average reader to think that “The Anti-Racism Research Project has randomly surveyed about 12,500″ White Australian people. For all we know, a large percentage of those interviewed may be of at least four distinct racial and cultural groups. How many who claim to be/or claim descent from Australian Aboriginals and Arabs were interviewed? Out of those interviewed, how many declared that White people don’t belong here? How many “Jewish Australians” were interviewed who declared that “Muslims or people from the Middle East” don’t belong here? Ignoring any further potential impact on the survey by other racial groups, how many White Australians really were surveyed?

The real question left begging to be asked is: Which racially based group of people within Australia contains the highest percentage of racially biased thoughts, speech and behaviour?

Cailen.

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