In Australia we’ve always celebrated Australia Day on January 26 every year. It’s been our countries National Day for longer than I’ve been alive and to most Australians it’s a day of Celebration for this great place we live. Growing up I always saw it as a day that brings our people together and it’s been the day where Citizenship Ceremonies were held to grant Citizenship to new migrants so I also see it as a diverse, tolerant and multicultural day too in many ways.
It was only a few short years ago that we were promoting Australia Day as a day to “Celebrate What’s Great” about Australia and people were encouraged to do whatever pleased them to recognize and acknowledge this place in their own way. However, it’s becoming an increasingly controversial day and every year it’s getting worse. There is a growing push to cancel this National Day and this year we’ve seen (so far) two significant developments on this front of the Culture War.
The first was from Woolworths, a big Corporation which dominates the Retail and Supermarket sector. They announced they were going to remove all Australia Day merchandise from their shelves and this kicked off a big uproar with many people including the Opposition Leader calling for a boycott of Woolworths. Ok, so don’t shop there and vote with your wallet. We’ll see where that goes...
The bigger one for me was just this week from Cricket Australia – one of our peak sporting bodies. Cricket has always been played on Australia Day. It’s one of the big days for the sport and usually it’s been a One Day International held on the Public Holiday January 26 and it’s often been one of the most watched sporting events of the year. This year there is a Test Match going on across January 26 and Cricket Australia has instructed people to not even use the term Australia Day on January 26. They seem to have decided to just Memory Hole the day and pretend it wasn’t a big deal for Cricket for so many decades.
All up I find it all pretty sad and disappointing. I do understand why some Indigenous Activists here don’t like the day but we’re really not celebrating any invasion or conquest here. There are lots of days where we celebrate our indigenous culture and history so can’t we just come together as a nation on this one day? The past isn’t going to change. One of my ancestors was on that First Fleet, but he wasn’t there by choice – he was brought here in chains and was certainly no invader. I refuse to be ashamed of my families culture and history and I wouldn’t expect anyone else to be either.