Mention ‘Multicultural Day’ to any adult Australian who grew up in a city and the first thing that’ll come to their mind is that one day where everyone came to school dressed in the traditional attire of their respective cultural backgrounds.
I, for one, certainly can’t forget the time my primary school first held its first Multicultural Day. I was in Grade 6, and it was 1997—two years before the government of then-Prime Minister John Howard made Harmony Day an annual national event.
It wasn’t unforgettable because I came to school with my head draped in the black and white Palestinian keffiyeh which I had borrowed from my uncle. It wasn’t unforgettable because of the impassioned, pro-multicultural speech the school principal made.
No, what made the day unforgettable was an incident during morning recess.
A classmate—a known bully who was also vocally racist towards the Asian students in our grade—was mocking a Grade 5 kid of Pakistani background for the sultan turban headdress, white sherwani and gold pointy shoes he wore. (For the record, the Pakistani kid looked amazing.)
A teacher on playground duty noticed and intervened quickly, but his intervention was merely to tell the bully to move on and leave his victim alone. Which the bully did, running off with a friend, laughing and pointing at other kids on the playground who were dressed in an array of colours.
There was no punishment. “He was only joking,” the teacher told the victim, then turned away and carried on with his playground duty.
The facial expression of the Pakistani student is something I remember to this day: he was visibly shaken and humiliated. I was too young to understand at the time, but he had been othered in an awful way; a core part of his identity had just been mocked and belittled. And to have a school teacher treat the incident like it was no big deal was adding salt to the wound.
In retrospect, based on what I had witnessed, the school’s Multicultural Day quite tokenistic. And as I’ve grown older I’ve come to realise that Harmony Day itself is the same—the symbolism is nice, but there’s no substance. It’s a day for people like myself to feel othered, and to take part in a warm and fuzzy event that does not actually do anything about the prevalent issue of racial discrimination and xenophobia in our increasingly multicultural country.
Harmony Day first started in 1999 under the conservative Howard government, and it just so happens to fall on the United Nation’s International Day of Eliminating Racial Discrimination. This is no coincidence; it was done on purpose as many political leaders refused—and continue to refuse—to acknowledge that any form of racism and racial discrimination exists in Australia. They created a national day that essentially swept Australia’s racism problem under the rug and watered down the UN’s original purpose by focusing on ‘harmonious’ multiculturalism: ethnic festivals and international cuisine. It’s a day that essentially encourages people to wear orange and to sit around and eat different cuisines just to give themselves that metaphorical pat on the back for being so cosmopolitan.
Indeed, it’s hard to argue against the idea of a harmonious, multicultural society. I’ll be one of the first to admit that I love the idea of celebrating our differences and shedding light on the many facets of our vibrant multicultural and multiracial society. Much of Australia’s successes and strengths as a nation is because of its diversity: this is a fact we cannot deny. Migration has contributed to making Australia a richer, better place to live, and of that I am genuinely proud.
But this doesn’t mean we should be complacent when it comes to tackling racism and racial discrimination. Whether you like it or not, Harmony Day blatantly depoliticises the challenges set by the UN’s International Day of Eliminating Racial Discrimination.
The use of the word ‘harmony’ is intentional: it connotes friendliness, cooperation and mutual understanding. One can’t help but feel positive vibes from it. The marketing around Harmony Day is carefully done without airing any negativity or implying that anyone is racist, lest the implication hurts people’s feelings—especially White Australia’s.
This annual event builds an idea of harmony that subsequently narrows the parameters of debate on racism and discrimination, thus restricting freedom of speech. Anyone who attempts a nuanced discussion about the realities or dares to mention racism would be immediately viewed as a perpetrator of division and community dissonance.
In contrast, the UN’s marketing and naming of International Day of Eliminating Racial Discrimination states plainly that there is a problem, and that it’s everyone’s responsibility to address it. In fact, the day was created after police in South Africa opened fire on anti-apartheid protesters in Sharpeville on March 21, 1960, killing 69 people. Since 1966, countries around the world have marked this day by renewing their commitment to eliminating racial discrimination. The UN’s offering is quite precise, and probably makes the people who don’t experience racism—like white Australians—quite uncomfortable.
For the record, I’m not saying every white Australian is a racist. Certainly not. But one can argue that the kumbaya approach to Harmony Day contributes to and exacerbates the denial of racism that already exists in our country.
You only need to go back to the Stolen Generations* and the infamous White Australia policy to see that racism is a common theme in our country’s history [editor’s note: more like starting from the moment of colonisation in 1788 and continuing to this day]. I acknowledge that Australia has come a long way since the social upheaval of the 1970s, but history ultimately informs a society, and we need to do more to acknowledge, address, and learn from it.
How do we celebrate Harmony Day while racism continues to be perpetrated against non-white immigrants and refugees, who have often endured the most to forge a new and better life? How do we celebrate Harmony Day while Australia continues to lock up innocent asylum seekers in offshore detention centres? While little is being done to address the impact of racism and colonial legacies towards Indigenous peoples in the criminal justice and health systems? While microaggressions and casual racism towards Australian-born children of migrants continues unabated? And how do we celebrate Harmony Day while Australia does nothing to help displaced Rohingya refugees, yet Immigration Minister Peter Dutton is willing to drop everything for so-called persecuted white South African farmers?
Harmony Day is also a reminder to culturally and linguistically diverse Australians about an Orwellian-like status quo, in that we must appease the majority by being on our best behaviour in order to be treated equally. Our Australianness suddenly becomes intensely questioned the moment we challenge or merely even question the systemic discrimination and microaggressions we continue to face. We’re accused of stepping out of line, of “overreacting” and of being “unAustralian” —all because we raised an uncomfortable truth that somehow offends people who have never experienced racism and refuse to accept that it exists. The media furore surrounding Yassmin Abdel-Magied and Adam Goodes in recent years are shining examples of this.
Engaging in responsible and nuanced discussion on race, history and culture could be a good start to achieving genuine harmony in Australia. It’s high time we properly face the demons of our country’s past and find ways to actually tackle systemic racial discrimination and microaggressions that continue to exist as a result. It may lead to uncomfortable conversations about our differences, but we’d soon learn to properly navigate and celebrate these differences meaningfully. It’s no secret that multiculturalism is absolutely vital to Australia’s stability and security, but until we take those steps, we’d be delusional to celebrate Harmony Day.
*CORRECTION: The text originally referred to a ‘Stolen Generation’, singular. This is incorrect; it wasn’t a single occurrence, but is an ongoing one. To learn more, click here.
Cover image © Mosman Library
About the author
Elias Jahshan is an editor and freelance journalist. Born and raised in Parramatta, Sydney, he is the son of Lebanese and Palestinian immigrants. He was the editor of Star Observer, Australia’s most prolific and only national LGBT media outlet, for two and a half years. He is also the only editor so far from a non-English speaking background in the publication’s 39-year history. He previously worked for News Corp, and his work has been published in SBS and The New Arab. Elias is also a former board member of Arab Council Australia. Follow him on Twitter: @Elias_Jahshan