A couple of points for discussion. As a kid (I’m bang on the cusp of millennial and gen x) Australia Day was not really much of a big deal. My observation was that we were a far more apathetic society. There wasn’t really such a concept as “celebrating” Australia Day (at least not in my neck of the woods) It was kind of just a shoulder shrug, day off. If someone asked me how I was “celebrating” Australia Day it might have been met with a baffled expression.
Sometime in the early 2000s during the Howard years it all became a wanky and jingoistic. About the time ANZAC Day took on an uncomfortably quasi-religious, jingoistic life form, rather than the more appropriately marked Remembrance Day.
What happened about then was an equal and opposite reaction by the activists types, who take the art of self flagellation and white guilt also to quasi-religious extremes.
So what do I think of Australia Day? I always felt it a peculiar day to mark. A day that marked the beginning of Sydney basically (and even that is debatable). Very little if any relevance to the concept of Australia. It surprises me that all of the other States of the Commonwealth ever agreed to have ‘Sydney Day’ masquerading as Australia Day. Cementing a *smile* Sydney-centric view of Australia that nothing of relevance exists north of Hornsby, south of Sutherland and west of Penrith. As well, of course, with the obvious other connotations which make it kind of defending the indefensible.
Hence I always felt (even before it became a trending discussion) that it should have been an extra day added to the new year break (2nd Jan) to mark the beginning of ‘Australia’. That being, Federation.
And not like Australia Day is some kind of ancient revered tradition. It really came only 25-30 years ago.
Thing is. By dragging our heels so long, even if it does get changed there will be demands to keep the 26th as self flagellation....errr sorry, ‘Invasion Day’ with all manner of quasi religious rituals. Where as if the more pig headed conservatives had proactively changed it early on in the piece, it would have simply changed and people would have shrugged their shoulders and got on with things. Once again by digging their heels in disproportionately over something that wasn’t actually that important to defend, they have created an equal and opposite reaction and entrenched a divide that will now stay with us into perpetuity.
I’m closer to the conservative side of the spectrum on cultural issues. But pragmatically so. This is what annoys me about the Political conservatives. Totally tone def and dogmatic as to what are important issues to die in the ditch over and what really isn’t that important to defend. It means they use up any credibility and good will when it comes to actual worthy issues.