THIRD WORLD WAR ANALYSIS: MULTICULTURALISM, RACISM AND CULTURAL SEPARATISM 2002 Dr Romesh Senewiratne (MD) 19.9.

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Multiculturalism is part of official government policy in Australia and has been so for many years. The Department of Immigration, Multicultural and Indigenous Affairs (DIMIA), headed by Minister Phillip Ruddock, is responsible for the application of the governments multicultural policy in the areas of immigration, including mandatory detention of unauthorised arrivals by boat, granting of Temporary Protection Visas, and contracting the American private prisons corporation Wackenhut Corrections Corporation to run all the DIMIA detention centres in Australia. This department is also responsible for implementation of the dubious deterrent policy where refugees are deliberately mistreated in Australia to supposedly send a message back home that Australia is not a soft target for refugees, boat people and asylum seekers.

It is worrying that one of the most blatantly racist members of John Howards cabinet has been given responsibility for treating other races and cultures through the Department of Immigration, Multicultural and Indigenous Affairs. This racism is evidenced in the fact that a vastly disproportionate number of Indigenous people are incarcerated in Australian jails (over 10 times the proportion of whites in jail), and the racial

demographics of men, women and children in DIMIA detention centres/concentration camps. A vastly disproportionate number of imprisoned asylum seekers are dark skinned and are adherents of the Moslem religion, while Buddhists and Hindus are also over-represented compared to the general population of would-be migrants to the country.

Racism is anathema to most people, including most Australian people, regardless of skin colour, social class, gender, religion or age. Institutional racism is also against international law. Yet the Australian government has separate laws and rules for Indigenous and Torres Strait Islanders, something that became possible, legally, only after the 1967 referendum, when the vast majority of Australians voted to remove clauses 127 and the amendment to 51 from the 1901 Constitution under the impression that this would improve the lives of Aboriginal Australians. Thirty years later, Indigenous Australians have a life expectancy twenty years less than the white population, while also suffering from a range of curable health problems, including infectious diseases that are rare in the non-Indigenous population. Aboriginal children still die of malnutrition and exposure, as well as from easily-treated infectious diseases.

Separate development of different cultures is the antithesis of genuine multiculturalism and closer to the abhorrent policy of apartheid (meaning, literally, separate development). One should not be fooled by the government opening official functions with Aboriginal dancing and welcoming ceremonies and the fact that Aboriginal art is

now given pride of place in a number of Australian art galleries (though it is still vastly under-represented). Various reconciliation committees and events have regularly given voice to a select group of Aboriginal elders but the agenda itself has been politically controlled by white, middle-aged men and (much fewer) women in corporate offices and corporate-style political offices. A show of racial tolerance and public assertions about the governments commitment to multiculturalism are not the same thing as lack of racism.

Government and media-promoted racism has been evident against successive waves of migrants to Australia, including against Italians, Greeks, Turks and Eastern Europeans during the decades of the White Australia Policy. Subsequent racism against Vietnamese and other South-East Asian boat people in the 1970s and 1980s was shown by the governments of Malcolm Fraser and Bob Hawke and their policies of imprisoning refugees. These were fleeing the aftermath of the Vietnam War, which the Australian governments of the day supported, and sent troops and weapons to.

To understand the Howard governments vision of multiculturalism it is worth looking closely at South Africas apartheid regime and strategy. Separate development of different races in South Africa was promoted under the guise of human rights and civil rights for all by a blatantly racist South African regime. This separate development included substandard housing, education, pay and other conditions for blacks and coloureds while blacks were encouraged to identify themselves as members of separate homelands and

nations. This was clearly a divide and rule policy implemented by a minority culture against a majority culture in an attempt to maintain political, social and military control over South Africas multicultural society.

Following the fall of the white supremacy apartheid regime in South Africa there were much-vaunted Truth and Reconciliation hearings. Blacks were encouraged to forgive and forget, while the American Wackenhut Corrections Corporation (WCC) was contracted by the new black South African Government to build a new 3000-cell high security private prison in South Africa. At the Truth and Reconciliation hearings in South Africa there were disturbing admissions of research into race-targetting chemical weapons in South Africa, while foreign mining and chemical companies, including those based in Australia, Britain and the USA, continued to exploit the dwindling natural resources of Southern Africa (More on this can be found in Eugenics and Genocide in the Modern World).

From the time of the Federation of Australia in 1901, the Commonwealth white supremacy movement was predictably centred in Britains white colonies Australia, New Zealand, Canada and South Africa. In all these countries the Indigenous population was oppressed, enslaved and otherwise dominated by the white population. In Australia and South Africa the situation amounted to blatant black-white racism, based entirely on skin colour. The so-called colour bar in these countries meant that blacks were not allowed to associate with whites except as subservient menials.

There is a direct connection between Nazi philosophy, eugenics, racism, separatism and multiculturalism. Buffons term race was developed by the German Anthropologist Otto Blumenbach (late 18th Century) into 5 races based on skin colour white, black, brown, yellow and red, before scientific racism focused on the mental and physical differences between black and white races.

Francis Galton, the founder of the first Eugenics society, who opposed the liberation of black slaves by the British Empire, wrote in Hereditary Genius (1869) that negroes possessed a slavish instinct and were naturally suited to slavery, and presented statistical evidence to justify his assertion that black Africans were two grades less intelligent than the white race. Predictably, his racist theories were warmly embraced in the British White Colonies, including in Australia, Canada and South Africa, while also receiving considerable support from corporate America (including the Rockefeller, Carnegie and Kellogg corporations) as well as from academics at Australian, American and British Universities, even prior to the philosophy being exported to Germany (where it provided the scientific rationale for genocide of millions of Jews, Communists, Blacks, political dissidents and disabled people).

The economic face of racist eugenic theories was developed into a capitalist theory called Social Darwinism. Social Darwinists argued that the rich deserved to be rich because they were better adapted genetically than the people they

exploited. Social Darwinism was always closely connected with Capitalism it was a capitalist theory, arguing that if the rich were given financial and other supports by the government, there would be general, though gradual, improvement in the conditions of the whole country (and world). This was described as the trickle-down effect that economic rationalists such as John Howard continue to claim as a solution to the widening gap between rich and poor in Australia and around the world.

In Australia there have always been selective migration opportunities for rich people. After the official abandonment of the White Australia Policy in the early 1970s, there was a new category of migration opportunities for dark-skinned people to Australia professional migration, whereby dark-skinned professionals (especially doctors and health care workers, engineers and lawyers) were actively recruited from other Commonwealth nations and provided employment by the Australian government. There was then discrimination based on difficulties with recognition of professional qualifications gained in other countries. Meanwhile British, New Zealander and American specialists and academics were given a free ride and status jobs in the Australian University system, something that continues to this day.

In terms of blatant racism by the Australian establishment, the differential treatment of white and black Africans is a case in point. Many black Africans with tertiary qualifications are driving taxis in Australia, while white Africans (mainly from South Africa and Zimbabwe) have been given preferential

treatment by successive Australian governments and within the private sector. They are employed in schools as teachers rather than cleaners, and in hospitals as doctors rather than domestics.

One of the strategies routinely employed by the multicultural policy in Australia is the undemocratic appointment and promotion of various community representatives for ethnic communities. There are Greek, Italian, Vietnamese, Sri Lankan, Indian, Maltese, Turkish, Russian and Chinese representatives amongst others. These are encouraged to speak on behalf of their communities and negotiate with the government for better conditions for those they represent. There are also nominated Indigenous leaders who are lent the governments patronising ear. If their demands are too strong, in the judgment of the governments representatives, their opinion is not asked for again, and a different community representative is sought.

An example of how discriminatory class structures can be imported into Australia can be seen in the Hindu Indian community in Australia which is fundamentally divided into high and low caste Hindus. The government selectively employs high-caste Hindus and oppresses low-caste Hindus merely by selectively listening to the demands of rich Indians (businessmen, lawyers, doctors and senior public servants) most of who are high-caste due to the outrageously discriminatory caste system prevalent in Indian communities (and Sri Lankan communities) around the world. It does not require travel to India or Sri Lanka to make a judgment about

callous treatment by the rich and powerful of their subordinates, especially when they have an army of servants at their beck and call. The Australian governments favouritism of the rich over the poor, for several decades, has seriously damaged the once more egalitarian nature of Australian society, by importing people who regard themselves as masters into positions of authority in the Australian Public Service and in business. Meanwhile the poor from Asian nations are routinely locked up in remote detention centres in the harshest parts of the continent, where they are called by number and treated with systematic denigration and cruelty, for months, or even years.

The Australian Governments immigration policy thus runs the risk of worsening class divisions in Australia and oppression of the working class by the professional class. Categories of business migration, skilled migration and professional migration exemplify the stratified system, based on Social Darwinism that has been employed in Australia since the years of the racist Assimilation Policy. Xenophobic, racist and professional-class-supremacist migrants have been routinely given employment in the public service, especially in public hospital system, where they treat other migrants, poor people and Indigenous people, especially in the sensitive are of mental health treatment (psychiatry).

RELIGIOUS WARS AND RACISM

The hundred-year-old war between the political and ideological enemies of Capitalism and Communism pale into insignificance when one considers the war for converts, adherents and congregations (and money) between different religious organisations. Religious warfare is as serious and widespread today as it has ever been in the past. Religious organisations, including various churches are now structured as massive corporations, complete with publicity departments, executive officers, and advertising budgets. Religious iconography is sold by churches and an army of businesses selling religious books, videos, T-shirts and music. Meanwhile the biggest Christian Churches are also among the biggest landowners in the world. Their majestic buildings contain priceless treasures, while the pomp and ceremony of their rituals is unrivalled except by each other.

Religious organisations compete with each other for peoples belief, trust and respect. Religion is also a key aspect of culture although not all people have a religion. Certainly many, indeed most people, do not agree with the behaviour of even their own church in certain respects, at least. Some regard organised religion as harmful generally, for a range of reasons. Others feel that all religions teach the same general message, and that therefore all religions should be supported. Most believe that some religions and religious organisations should be supported more than others. In Australia, John Howard was criticised for appointing the former Archbishop of the Anglican Church in Australia, Peter Hollingworth, to the

position of Governor General. It was argued that the separation of church and state was compromised by this appointment, but this charade demonstrates more than that. It shows John Howards fundamental lack of understanding as to what multiculturalism really means. It also demonstrates his fundamental lack of concern for the opinion and votes of people who do not venerate the Church of England.

John Howard is a loyal Royalist. He supports the ridiculous situation where the Queen of England is also the Queen of Australia, and also supports the idea of hereditary monarchy, whereby Prince Charles will become King of England and also of Australia, not based on skills, talents or ability, but because, and solely because, he is the eldest son of Queen Elizabeth II. Meanwhile the legitimacy of the British crown is maintained by the English Church (the Anglican Church), and the Queen herself was crowned, in the 1950s, by the head of the Anglican Church in Westminister Abbey.

The history of the Anglican Church over the past five centuries demonstrates an appalling lack of concern for human rights abuses by the British Empire, ranging from kidnapping and forced transportation of African slaves to the United States to the sending of young Africans, Indians, Pacific Islanders, Ceylonese and Australians to die for the Empire during the First and Second World Wars. In Australia, the Anglican Church actively supported the sending of troops for the British Empire during both world wars, and every war since, as long as the government of the day has supported the war. Meanwhile the property of the church has grown considerably as the

long-suffering congregation donates land and houses to the church, when they die, or before it, hoping for a place in the heaven described from pulpits around the country.

If the Anglican and Catholic Churches are genuinely concerned about homeless people in Australia, including refugees and asylum seekers, could not some of the immense resources in the hands of the churches be used to build free houses for those who have none?

A close study of the various churches, priests and multiculturalism suggests that the government has enlisted the assistance of various Christian and some non-Christian religious organizations to legitimise its policy. At the same time the Churches have embraced the opportunity to gain more converts. Anglican, Methodist and Catholic priests are invited to regularly visit public hospitals, especially to psychiatric wards, and literature inviting vulnerable and traumatised young people to visit Christian Missions is left, with hospital and government approval, in psychiatric wards and mental health clinics. The same situation exists in the prisons Anglican, Methodist (Uniting Church) priests and Catholic priests are afforded much more freedom to come and go as they please than other, especially non-Christian organisations, with the possible exception of rabbis in the Jewish areas of Melbourne and Sydney.

In Howard and Ruddocks vision of multiculturalism, and that of Ariel Sharon and George Bush, Jews and rabbis are afforded

a special position. In it Jews are provided with opportunities and respect denied to most other cultures and religions. This has a lot to do with business, economics, the media and the military-industrial complex.

There is an important distinction to be made between Jewish people and the Jewish religion. Many people who regard themselves as Jews do not regard themselves as practising Jews. This is slightly different to the distinction between practising and non-practising Christians, because being Jewish is both a racial and a religious distinction. It is also a distinction that has deep political significance in the modern world, including the treatment of Moslem refugees in Australia. The Jewish religion promotes love for other Jews. It also teaches that non-Jews, or gentiles are unclean. Specifically, the Jewish religion does not advocate love for all people regardless of religion or race. At the same time Mohammed, the founder of the Islamic religion was a warrior and military conquerer. His code, while suggesting tolerance for other people of the Book (Jews and Christians) also teaches that non-Moslems are sinful infidels, and that he himself was in direct touch with the One True God, Allah. It was obligatory, according to his teachings, for good Moslems to wage jihad against the sinful infidels. Meanwhile, the Christian Bible states that anyone who disbelieves its version of The Truth is guilty of unforgiveable sin, and will be condemned to eternal damnation, unless they repent and preferably leave their earthly possessions to the bulging coffers of the Church (with various permutations between the different sects of Christianity). It is not surprising

that Christians, Jews and Moslems have been at war for so long.

There has long been a three-way war between Christianity, Judaism and Islam, reflected in considerable hostility between religious organisations affiliated with these religions, with corresponding hostility between nations and societies. Different sects within these major religions have long been in conflict, sometimes violently, with each other. There has also been hostility between Moslems and Hindus in India and outside India, and between Buddhists, Hindus, Christians and Moslems in Sri Lanka and between Christians and Moslems in various other parts of Asia. Meanwhile, the different Christian Churches, though frequently claiming to have resolved their differences, continue to compete for converts and for public trust and status. This is exemplified by the centuries-old battle between Protestants and Catholics in Ireland. On a more materialistic plane the different churches compete on the stockmarket and property markets, as well as in terms of media and propaganda.

The three-way conflict between Christianity, Judaism and Islam has been at boiling point for a long time, and is centred on the Middle-East which is said to contain the bones of Jesus, Moses and Abraham, the remains of the most ancient civilizations on the planet - and the worlds dominant reserves of crude oil. Henry Kissinger once stated that the Middle-East oil was too important to leave in the hands of the Arabs. The

Bush family made their money in oil, and Iraq has the worlds second largest reservoirs of crude oil. One wonders how much more evidence is needed to convince the American populace that their president is motivated by greed, selfishness and racist and religious prejudice in his so-called War on Terrorism and proposed further attacks on Iraq and Afghanistan.

The President of the United States, like every president before him, claims to be A Christian and goes to church regularly to prove his faith, with the media in attendance. He also, in line with the Christian and Buddhist ethic of compassion, claimed to be a compassionate conservative when running for the presidency. Immediately prior to his run for the presidency George W. Bush was Governor of Texas, where he personally authorised the execution of about 200 people, denying pleas for leniency in his role as governor. A disproportionate number of these people were Blacks in his eyes. It is evident from his speeches that George Bush sees the human race in terms of black and white races. So do his colleagues. All agree that blacks may pose a threat to whites if there are too many of them. To give the semblance of racial equality, therefore, Bush appointed conservative blacks to political positions with media prominence notably those of Colin Powell and Condaleesa Rice. This should not fool people into thinking that the US Government is not deeply racist against dark-skinned people.

The supposedly Christian churches ultimately project the image of a white God. Church iconography over the ages has consistently portrayed this God as a wise old man with white skin and a beard. It is no coincidence that this image of God was supported by white, English kings with beards. Most of the black churches in the USA also ultimately worship a white god, specifically the white god of the English/European Churches. Jesus of Nazareth, presumably a brown-skinned man, is portrayed in numerous Catholic and Anglican murals and icons as a light-skinned man, often with blue eyes and blonde hair.

A Jewish man who was killed by the Jewish clergy and Roman Empire, was brought back to life, according to the British King James version of Christian Bible of 1611, and was himself one with God. He was God the Son as previously enshrined in the Roman concept of a trinity of Father, Son and Holy Ghost. This same concept of the Trinity, was accepted by the Anglican Church when Henry the VIII, Defender of the Faith, Emperor of the British Empire was nominated, at his own insistence, to be head of the new Church of England, back in 1533. This he achieved after executing numerous opponents (and several of his wives). This was also during the early years of the African Slave trade. Over the next 300 years, the Church of England, now called the Anglican Church, played an active role in training black slaves for the British Empire.

The Buddhist clergy has played a small part in Australian multiculturalism. Also, many young people in Australia have embraced ideas from Buddhism and Hinduism about

reincarnation, karma, chakras and supra-normal mental and psychic powers. If young people adopt such beliefs they can, however, be diagnosed with serious mental illness in multicultural Australia. The commonest diagnoses for unusual thoughts about such matters are schizophrenia, mania and psychosis. Specifically, belief in telepathy, a special relationship with God (or unusual ideas about God or gods), synchronicity, special psychic or physical abilities, giving away possessions and talking too much (or too little) are regarded, in psychiatric texts and university and hospital teaching environments as indicative of psychosis in Australia and the USA this teaching being repeated in a range of undergraduate and post-graduate texts and journals, as well as by the mainstream (corporate) media. Belief that the church, or government, is corrupt, if strongly held and voiced, can also be diagnosed as indicative of mental illness in Australia, as can belief that the CIA, FBI or American government is corrupt. The same goes for strongly voiced concerns about the behaviour of big corporations. Such psychotic or deluded young people are routinely treated by locking them up and forcing them (under threat of injection) to take neurotransmitter-blocking drugs that rob them of their enthusiasm and zest for life (at the very least the drugs routinely used in the treatment of mania and schizophrenia have many more crippling side-effects, including some that are permanent).

Religious wars have long centred on competition for converts, congregations and adherents. Regular, and sustained

inquisitions by the Catholic Church enabled the Roman religion to be carried far and wide in the Roman Empire, in which priests became political leaders as well as military leaders of large armies. This system was directly adopted by subsequent European governments, including that of the British Empire and British Commonwealth. This connection between politics, the armed forces, Christian priests and the civil police is still evident in the remnants of the British Empire including the USA, Canada, Australia and the rest of the Commonwealth. The army in Australia has chaplains and priests to look after the spiritual needs of the soldiers, while the same soldiers are trained to ignore all the teachings of Jesus of Nazareth, along with the Jewish Commandment of Moses, thou shalt not kill.

We are currently facing a war spearheaded by the President of the United States, George W. Bush. He has sought the support of the Australian Government and people to support yet another attack on the people of Iraq, most of whom are Moslems, unlike himself. Most of the people in Iraq are dark skinned, unlike himself. Most of the people in Iraq are also poor, unlike himself. They speak a different language, eat different food, and listen to different music to George W. Bush and his colleagues in the US Government. They have, in other words, a fundamentally different culture. The same can be said for John Howard and his colleagues. Despite his rhetoric about Saddam Hussein being a tyrant and bully, War President George Bush has not challenged the President of Iraq to a duel (a time-honoured way of settling such disputes between would-be kings). He is unlikely to have the courage for such

chivalry instead he plans to send young men and women with bombs and missiles to attack the much-traumatised and malnourished people of Iraq. Just like his father did a decade ago, and the American Government have done around the world since the end of the Second World War and the simultaneous beginning of the Third World War (starting with the so-called Cold War).

CONCLUSION
Multiculturalism is a wonderful idea if that means equal respect for different cultures and cultural sharing, as equals, between different nationalities, races religions and cultures. It is a wonderful strategy if all people are respected regardless of their philosophical and political beliefs, and regardless of their skin colour, gender or age. This is clearly not what the Australian Government means by multiculturalism, so we would be wise to think more carefully about racism and cultural separatism that might pass notice in the guise of multiculturalism.

Dr Romesh Senewiratne (MBBS, Qld, 1983) 19.9.02 RomeshSenewiratne@gmail.com www.youtube.com/romeshsenewiratne www.hub76.com.au