Racism begins at home

I ran into a neighbour at the shops today. Lovely bloke, very chatty. Told me the guy a couple of doors down from us died suddenly last week. He was only young and apparently had a heart attack. He has/had a relatively young family, and I feel so awful for them. So my neighbour was telling me the story - at this point, it should be pointed out that these neighbours are clearly practising Muslims, as the bloke's wife wears a hijab - and he says, "they really keep to themselves, don't really talk to the Aussies." and then he went on to say that "she talks just like us" with an element of real surprise in his voice. Of course she does, she's a bloody Aussie too!

It was this incident and a number of conversations I've had with people recently which has jolted me out of my idea that Australia isn't a terribly racist country. It pretends it isn't, but scratch the surface, and people's prejudices aren't buried particularly deeply.

Someone relatively enlightened mentioned the other day that there were a lot of Asian people in Australia. Well derr... Asia is our closest neighbour geographically, if not culturally, and the statistics actually show that Brits and Kiwis are still the most numerous immigrants to Australia. It's just that they look like "us" and "Asians" don't, apparently, so you notice "them" more.

When you really start to think about it, it's quite confronting to start to think about your own in built prejudices. Are you more likely to lock your doors in the car if a swarthy man walks by? Or do you make assumptions about a woman because she wears a hijab?

We have such a long way to go.

Don't be a hater, be a celebrator... in a sec

So, I posted a little while ago about people who have hurt me in the past. I've been very good and been quite creative with my writing. Not today.
I had lost contact with a friend who was very close and with whom I always picked up from where we left off, no matter how much time had passed.
After probably two years of not much contact, I found her blog which I was mentioned in. Not only was I mentioned, but I was a thinly veiled character in a story about her turning 30 crisis - how I was a rebel, but now I had the "perfect" life, married, child, good job, so somehow I had turned my back on all the values she associated with me. That, by my life having taken this particular path, it was a personal slight against her.
Perhaps she always thought that she would be the one to "succeed" (and I use the term loosely, because I don't define my life as particularly successful or otherwise, it just is). That I would always be the chubby one, intellectually challenging, but perennially awkward. And she could always perceive herself as the superior one.
It's interesting, because I didn't peg her for someone who would think like that. But her blog was telling.
I put it to her directly to see if I had done something to offend her, but she claimed no.
However, she has since not taken up many passive opportunities to get back in contact with me. So I guess that's it. I spent a long, long time grieving for that friendship. And actually spent some time (in a very Woody Allen-esque way) talking to my therapist about it, until I finally realised it wasn't my problem. It's her problem.
So at the risk of devolving, I'd like to say to this person: Fuck you. Fuck you for thinking it's OK to be so pass agg to blog about me. And fuck you for lacking the courage to talk to me about it instead of talking to the world about it. And fuck you for using me and my life story to assuage your insecurities about your perceived inadequacies. I didn't make you choose what you chose, so don't blame me and don't use me and my life as psychological fodder for your narcissistic psychobabble. In short: fuck you.
Aaah, I feel better. Now back to my perfect life.