By LINDSAY TANNER
A few weeks ago, I took my two teenage kids to see The Kings of Mykonos. They're of Greek-Australian origin, so they're well versed in the offbeat humour of the Wogs Out of Work crew. On one level, it's a silly movie but I laughed a lot and my kids loved it.
Some time later, I thought a bit more about the film's content. I realised it actually has a serious message. I'm not exactly sure whether it's intended, but it's there, and it's important.
The humour in the movie is driven by a clash of cultures. Not between Greeks and Australians, but between Greek-Australians and Greeks. When you step back a bit from all the silliness, you realise how totally Aussie Greek-Australians really are, and how much they have influenced the evolution of our overall Australian identity.
Of course, one of the central characters is Italian-Australian, played by Vince Colosimo. But this merely serves to underline the point. Irrespective of origins and prefixes, the central characters are profoundly Australian. They're the contemporary equivalents of Barry McKenzie, and their quirks and idiosyncrasies are just as much part of our collective identity as those satirised brilliantly by Barry Humphries 40 years ago.
Australia has been remarkably effective in absorbing an amazingly diverse range of people into our society and collective identity. We've changed, and so has each wave of new arrivals.
I thought about this, and The Kings of Mykonos, when I launched a Human Rights Commission report on discrimination against African-Australians recently.
The messages in this report are strikingly similar to those I hear regularly in my electorate, Melbourne, where there are many African-Australian refugees.
While they are enormously grateful for the chance to become Australians, African-Australians routinely experience discrimination in their daily lives. They find it hard to get jobs fitting their qualifications gained in Australia. They encounter petty racism on a regular basis. They find it hard to adapt from a more communal and family culture to the individualistic culture of Western society.
Turn the clock back 40 or 50 years, and the Greek-Australian experience of that time looks very similar. Now they're making movies sending up their Greek-Australian identity. And for Anglos like me, the prefix is almost irrelevant. The comic characters you're laughing at are quintessentially Australian.
What part will African-Australians play in the Australian community in 50 years' time?
That largely depends on what the rest of us do. We've managed to integrate numerous groups of increasingly different people from all over the world, with results of which we can all be proud. Is there any reason African-Australians should be any different?
And that largely depends on how much of an effort we make to include them. In many cases they face challenges even bigger than some earlier refugees. If we allow invisible barriers to their participation in our society to isolate them, they may not integrate like other migrant groups have.
Integration is a two-way process. New migrants have to adapt to our laws and customs. Established Australians have to allow some space for them to maintain their culture and identity, and ensure they enjoy the opportunities everyone else does. The process is inevitably complex and messy.
The core Australian ethos is to have a go. We will accept anyone if they're prepared to have a go. Over many years of dealing with African-Australian refugees, I've always been conscious that's why they're here. They want to have a go.
The question for the rest of us is this: are we going to allow them to? We've done it before, and we're much better for it. I believe we'll do it again, and in 20 years time, there'll be Sudanese-Australian comedians making movies about mutual incomprehension between Sudanese-Australians and Sudanese in Sudan.
Lindsay Tanner is the federal Minister for Finance.