Who Are We Becoming?

In the day and age in which we live, old ties with a waning empire are being replaced by new ties with the most powerful nation in the world – The United States. These ties do bring us great economic, political and social benefits but are these coming at an unseen cost?

We are constantly bombarded through the media about the events of the world, the joint invasion of Afghanistan and more recently Iraq have made headlines around the globe. But there is also another sort of invasion, one on the consumer level, which is breaching our shores preying on our minds and, ultimately, our identities.

Our existence began as a penal colony, a country that bowed to the commands of its motherly creator – The British Empire. This is why we entered the two great wars, losing over a million soldiers in battles for a cause unaffecting to us. After the end of the Second World War, we began to desire independence – we didn’t need Britain anymore, we had our own resources and interests to exist by. So during the 1950’s there was the beginning of an era in which we ‘disconnected’ our ties with the old Empire, which by then had waned from supremacy; and strove to become independent, without having to obey any higher governing body.

The first major move the government made was in 1999, when a model for the implementation of a republic in

Australia was put forward to the public in a national referendum. The amendment was defeated, though, with 45.13% of the vote, it showed that a large number of Australians are interested in becoming a republic. In the years preceding the 1999 referendum, there had been the greatest increase in the trend of becoming an independent nation, and in the years following it this idea of independence has been greatly practiced throughout our nation.

We are still part of the Commonwealth of Nations, the Queen is still our head of state, but the feeling of connection with the ‘Mother Country’ as it was affectionately called in the pioneering days is fading.

As our ties with a faded empire demise, our ties with another great world power increase. We no longer look to Britain for economic, political and military aid; we look across the Pacific to the world’s superpower – The United States.

As much as we deny it, we are becoming much like the ridiculed Americans, and through this process our identity as Australians is becoming estranged as we do something as simple as walking into our local fast food chain.

Mcdonald’s. The world’s biggest food chain store has expanded globally from its simple beginnings as a local restaurant in suburban Illinois. It is a fact that no country that has a Mcdonald’s store has openly invaded or threatened American shores. Though aren’t the familiar golden arches that rise into our skies another kind of invasion?

It is not only Australia that is falling victim to this global phenomenon of American fuelled consumerism that is

being dubbed ‘Mcdonaldization’. American businesses and corporations are present on every continent on Earth, including Antarctica.

So we must ask ourselves the question. Are we really becoming an independent country? Are we really leaving behind our colonial ties, where we answered to our founding country? More and more we are being influenced by American interests, we entered the Invasion in Iraq because of a treaty signed offering our assistance to the United States in return for assistance when we are in need. The reason for the invasion is of no benefit to us, other than to become in political favor with the American Government.

We are fighting a war of revenge, but ultimately we are fighting to secure a major oil resource, a resource which ensures the American domination in the world hierarchy.

It is not only politically in which we are being influenced, we are also being influenced by American media, and the affairs of the rich famous which adorn our glossy gossip magazines. A recent cover on the Australian (note Australian) Women’s Weekly was a bold striking headline announcing that Angelina Jolie was having twins, an exclusive fact which every inquisitive person in Australia just had to buy the magazine and read the facts for.

This is but one example of the American media influencing our culture. We care more about the lives of Hollywood stars than we do about local talent such as Australian Idol winner Casey Donovan’s next album release, if there ever is one. We only ever take great notice of one of our home grown talents after they have ‘made it big’ in America. The recent death of Heath Ledger was deemed a great loss to our nation, though he had resided in the United States for most of his life.

This loss of Ledger to the lure of Hollywood can be symbolized as the loss of something that is ours – our identity – to the lure of the influential American culture and way of life.

Regarding the media’s influence on our identity, ask yourself this. When was the last time you turned on your television during prime time and viewed a program which was made in Australia? Or if it was; the idea wasn’t a carbon copy of an American production? Australian Idol, So You Think You Can Dance; even Big Brother was an idea envisioned by an American. If it is not an Australian version of an American production it is usually an American sitcom portraying to us lives on which we sub consciously base our own upon, or change so we can relate to the lifestyle of the fictitious characters.

It is not only what we view that is affecting us, it is also what we listen to.

According to State Police Departments, gang related crime and violence is up ten fold within the last decade. This increase is being blamed on the effects the ‘glorification’ of gangs and violence through music on our youths.

American rappers have greatly influenced the minds of our children and teens, with lyrics promoting gangs, drugs and violence. Our kids, striving

to be accepted socially, become the product of a way of life influenced by the lyrics in the music they listen to. Most young listener’s who are dragged into this world of violence are lured in by their favorite singer constantly pointing out that being from the ‘shady’ side of life made them into a successful, rich artist.

as Australians for the simpler things in life. The barbeque is one of these simple Australian traditions which are beginning to fall into decline, though it is an experience of the senses which we strongly promote as our own. We can all relate at some point in our lives to sitting out back on a warm summer evening, the mixed aroma of meat cooking on a barbeque plate, beer and the faint, alluring fresh smell of the trees and the oncoming of twilight; bringing on a sense of relaxation and total belonging within your time and place. This experience, which we proudly call Australian, is being increasingly replaced by a trip to the local fast food outlet, a trip into American culture.

As Australians, we must fight for what we hold dear to our hearts – freedom. The cage from which me must break free from is not made of iron, but it’s bars are just as strong. We are being influenced culturally on a daily basis, and with each day that goes by we fall further into the trap of becoming the product of a nation which is corrupting our identity as Australian people.

So next time you think of going into a McDonald’s store, ask yourself this – is that burger and fries really worth my identity? If you come to the conclusion that it isn’t, go into the local deli for a club sandwich. Your children (and your thighs) will thank you for it.

Therefore this invasion of American cultural influences is not only through multi-national corporations, but also through the media, bringing the front into our homes through the television set and the radio.

What can we do about this? Well for starters, don’t get caught up in the hype. Advertising is the main weapon used in the onslaught on our identity. We see a product and, if the techniques used are right, we desire the product. It is the simplest way to draw in consumers craving the promises set by imagery or text. Americans are the greatest consumers in the world, and we as Australians if we continue to follow the trend set by the United States will continue to follow suit. We are beginning to lose our inner instincts

Obama Falls Short

If you were looking to President Barack Obama’s inaugural address for an escape from a gloomy January, you should have taken that flight to Bermuda.

If you wanted a low-cost respite from the slumping stock market, you should have gone to the movies.

Obama may have fallen a little short of all the stratospheric expectations for a moonshot inaugural address. But it still reached significant altitude as a somber, gut-check distillation of this all-too-treacherous moment for a nation still in denial.

That’s exactly what Obama promised. And it’s exactly what the speech should have been.

“Our nation is at war against a far-reaching network of violence and hatred,” Obama said early in his 18-minute address. “Our economy is badly weakened, a consequence of greed and irresponsibility on the part of some, but also our collective failure to make hard choices and prepare the nation for a new age.

“Homes have been lost; jobs shed; businesses shuttered. Our health care is too costly; our schools fail too many; and each day brings further evidence that the ways we use energy strengthen our adversaries and threaten our planet.”

It was, in short, an address for these times.

To reach for anything more dramatic, anything more Martin Luther King-like given the proximity to the site of the preacher’s most quoted speech, would have cast the spotlight too much on Obama, rather than the dire fix the nation is in.

At the same time, the speech was something else: a new president’s clarion call for patience, a theme that Obama and his top aides have returned to repeatedly in recent days.

Don’t expect miracles, Obama said in so many words. At least not overnight.

“Today I say to you that the challenges we face are real,” he said. “They are serious, and they are many. They will not be met easily or in a short span of time. But know this, America: They will be met.”

Consider Tuesday’s address an update of John F. Kennedy’s inaugural address 48 years ago and its most famous phrase — delivered on an even colder day, with threats on the horizon that were very different and yet every bit as serious as those today.

That day, Kennedy memorably urged Americans to “ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country.”

Obama, who sought help with his address from two of Kennedy’s old speechwriters, Ted Sorensen and Dick Goodwin, introduced the idea of shared sacrifice by honoring American soldiers “who, at this very hour, patrol far-off deserts and distant mountains.”

Continued the new president: “We honor them not only because they are guardians of our liberty, but because they embody the spirit of service; a willingness to find meaning in something greater than themselves.

“And yet, at this moment — a moment that will define a generation — it is precisely this spirit that must inhabit us all. For as much as government can do and must do, it is ultimately the faith and determination of the American people upon which this nation relies. It is the kindness to take in a stranger when the levees break, the selflessness of workers who would rather cut their hours than see a friend lose their job which sees us through our darkest hours.”

This movement of spirit must happen quickly, Obama said. The time to act has come. Big ideas must be embraced. Wrenching decisions must be made.

“Our time of standing pat, of protecting narrow interests and putting off unpleasant decisions — that time has surely passed,” Obama declared. “Starting today, we must pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and begin again the work of remaking America. For everywhere we look, there is work to be done.”

source: http://www.kansascity.com/news/politics/story/992926.html

Inauguration of President Barack Obama

Congratulations go to Mr Obama on this historic day for our nation. But congratulations too goes out to all citizens of the United States who voted, maybe being caught up in the hype of it all over the past few months, though surely there are some out there who agree, this change will hopefully spell the end of a United States which over the past few decades has been looked more sourly upon, through political scandals and the inequality that some today even see ravaging our states.

Let's hope this is the new beginning we've been asking for since Watergate