Race Riots, Down Under

For our next post let us take a trip to the cool-blue-blessed waters of Australia, the teeniest, tiniest of the continents, to examine the recent race riots held in Sydney in an apparent parody (and reversal of fortune) of the semi-recent race riots held in France:

Background:

That fear and mistrust exploded Sunday afternoon, when as many as 5,000 white
Australians took to the streets of the mostly white Sydney beach suburb of
Cronulla and attacked people of Middle Eastern appearance. Many wore T-shirts
bearing slogans such as "Ethnic cleansing unit" and "We grew here, you flew
here." The attackers were drawn by e-mails and text messages that employed
racial slurs and read, "Come to Cronulla this weekend to take revenge."

Aftermath:

An additional 450 heavily armed police officers patrolled Sydney's
relatively quiet streets last night as the violence that had consumed parts of
the city for the previous two nights appeared to subside.
Politicians and ordinary citizens are now questioning how one of the ugliest manifestations of racism in Australia's history came about in a country that has a reputation for espousing multiculturalism and diversity.
"If you scratch Australians deep
down, you discover a racist and you see this deep-down fear and ethnic mistrust
and hatred of anyone that is different," said Labour member of Parliament Harry
Quick. "It's very sad."

Harry Quick went on to detail the government's answer to the 'sitch' which he, and other Parliament Labour makers feel will allow the people to get back to the much more stimulating activities of hunting 'Roo and listening to CDS consisting of "cosmic yet medieval-festival sounding" didgeridoo music.

"People, The key here is getting another comedy-action pic out there, someone needs to bring Australia's Rambo out of retirement, Paul Hogan."
Quick went on to discuss a possible Dundee IV in patriotic tones: "we need him to get out there and throw together a sloppy, hamfisted potboiler about how we care for aboriginal babies as though they were our own, embrace the Middle-Easterns, and...whatever."
"Just get that Hogan fella' in the Cineplex and we're gonna' be right back on track. It's all publicity, folks. We get Hogan punching his custom compass-handled knife through Croc viscera, and we not only put this sorry episode behind us, we get to revel in the positive-feedback-tourism. I even have a title. It's called ... get this.. The Island."

Australia grapples with aftermath of riots (Globe&Mail)