Has Australia become the butt of Asia’s jokes? Gottliebsen

I never thought it could happen, but it seems that Australians have become the Irish of Asia. Australians have enjoyed Irish jokes for decades, but as we become the Asian Irish there is a touch of the sinister in jokes about Australians coming from China and India.

I have been aware of the Chinese and Indians making fun of Australians for some time, but Josh Gordon, writing in the Fairfax media, has really underlined what is happening.

He shares a joke currently doing the rounds in India: a Muslim was seated next to an Australian on a flight from London to Melbourne and when drink orders were taken the Aussie asked for rum and coke which was placed before him. The attendant then asked the Muslim whether he would like a drink. He replied in disgust that he would rather be ravished by a dozen whores than let liquor touch his lips. The Aussie handed back his drink and said: “Me too, I didn’t know we had a choice.”

It would be funny if it wasn’t happening so often, as China and India are the major customers of our raw materials. Our currency is linked to Chinese power production and our enterprises need to expand in China.

When I think back to the election of Kevin Rudd as Prime Minister, I was among many who forecast much closer relations with China because he could speak Mandarin. But instead of closer relations, we are now the butt of their jokes.

You can’t blame Kevin Rudd for all the events that fuelled this decline in relations, however. The simple fact is that since he spoke to Chinese students in Mandarin about Tibet there have not been many invitations asking him back. I guess if the Chinese President came to Australia and lectured us about Indigenous Australians we would not be handing around invitations either.

When we pass our climate change “GST from hell” – which taxes exports but lets in carbon-rich imports tax free – there will be a rise in Asian humour.

The first step in overcoming the problem is to realise that China is our major trading partner and will be the most powerful nation on earth in a decade or two. The only way I know how to deal with the problem is to increase contacts between Australians and Chinese and Australians and Indians. And essential to that process is to encourage tourism.

Our wooden-headed tourism people have recently promoted a film that showed Australians as racists and now keep aiming promotions at the US and Europe when the market to aim for is clearly China. The tourism people are backed by the equally dumb visa people who make it very hard for Chinese and Indians to come here.

Prime Minister Rudd needs to work harder to get to China and talk to the Chinese in Mandarin – not about Tibet, but about Australia and China. If we don’t, then with America in decline we will become more and more isolated. Long-term, this is serious.

This article first appeared on Business Spectator.