February 05, 2017

I am fully in favour of my country admitting as refugees people who are in danger for their lives elsewhere

But they really do have to be refugees and their average standards of behaviour must be at least as good as the average of the host population. One expects gratitude, not hostility, from those who have been rescued. So, broadly, that excludes Muslims and Africans.

Australia does admit many refugees and has been admitting refugees for a long time. It started before WWII when thousands of Jews fleeing Hitler were admitted.

Then immediately after WWII, large numbers of "displaced persons" in Europe were admitted.  Then in the aftermath of the Vietnam war, large numbers of Asian "boat people" were admitted.

And in between, large numbers of economic migrants from rural Greece and Southern Italy were admitted.

And all those European and East Asian immigrants have blended in to the Australian peoplescape with minimal friction.  Their children act and speak much as other Australians do and their children tend to have a high rate of educational and economic success.  There were a couple of occasions when Yugoslavs bombed one-another but not one Jihadi indulging in random killing has emerged from them.  They have been of clear benefit to the country, bringing new ideas, skills and improved services.

And Leftists use that undoubted fact to argue that ALL immigration is desirable.  But that is just another manifestation of their manic and obviously wrong insistence that all men are equal.  All men are NOT equal and groups of men are also  therefore not equal.

Africans have brought their normal high rate of violent crime to Australia and many of the Australian host population have had much suffering inflicted on them as a result.  And many Australians have also died at the hands of Muslim fanatics.  Had we kept those two groups out, all that suffering would have been avoided.

So I heartily endorse Donald Trump's moves to protect Americans from hostile sub-groups.  And I support Pauline Hanson's calls to do the same for Australians.  Opinion polls have shown that around 50% of the Australian population support Pauline's ideas in that regard so my thoughts on the issue are perfectly mainstream, not "racist", "xenophobic", "white supremacist" or any of the other insults that Leftists normally hurl at people who support selective immigration.

A coda

I get the impression that most people who have relocated to Australia are in fact grateful for the life they have here but I want to close this essay with a story about how powerful gratitude can be.

Persians appear to be particularly energetic people and that would appear to be why they have over the centuries created three great empires.  Once an empire declines, that is normally the end of it.  But not so Persia.  Hundreds of years later a new Persian empire will arise.  But it was in one of their weaker periods that the Muslims swept through and took control of them.  And in their usual kindly way the Muslims gave them a choice:  Convert or die.

Most converted but there were a few who clung to the native Persian religion of Zoroastrianism.  Zoroastrianism is a rather sensible religion that make a much better job of explaining the problem of evil than Christianity does.

But when they found that living in Muslim Persia was going to be very dangerous to Zoroastrians, the strong believers fled to Gujurat, in nearby India.  They were received there with tolerance by the local Hindus.  There is a great variety of religious devotions in India so one more was no great problem.

And the Persians (Parsees) were very grateful for the refuge India had given them.  And they expressed that both in words and later in deeds.  With their Persian energies, the Parsees prospered mightily in India and many became quite rich.  So what did rich Parsees do with their money?  They gave most of it away, initially to poor Parsees but also to other Indians.  They became a major source of charity in India.

So the Parsees did not share the fate of the Jews, with people becoming envious of their success.  There are of course always grumbles but Indians saw that Parsee success benefited them too and Parsees highlighted their giving as a act of gratitude so Indians felt that they had earned the charitable support.

So Parsee gratitude for refuge sustained their welcome and even protected them when they became an economic elite.  Being grateful is as powerful as ingratitude is contemptible -- JR.





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