Australia Day Is Back! (Kind Of)

This is the City of Unley in inner-city Adelaide, South Australia. Last year, the council, in their infinite wisdom, decided that they would be scrapping Australia Day events and citizenship ceremonies held on Australia Day, of course, without public consultation. I don’t know why we think councils should have this amount of power. Remembering that Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s Government back in 2022 changed the law to allow councils to conduct citizenship ceremonies three days before or after Australia Day. But good news to all of you who are keen supporters of Australia Day! The City of Unley council have backflipped this year and decided to reverse their decision. According to the ABC, “City of Unley council votes to reverse decision to hold Australia Day ceremonies”. It seems like these woke decisions are reversible after all.

Specifically, a survey conducted by the council found that 60% of residents surveyed thought citizenship and awards ceremonies should be held on January 26. Mayor Michael Hewitson stated, “Our community has made their views clear. Additionally, 72% expressed their desire for a community event, with 80% of those respondents preferring it be held on 26 January. We appreciate the feedback from all those who participated in the consultation, and while we recognise that not everyone will agree with this outcome, we believe it reflects the majority sentiment of our community.” Isn’t it funny how when you actually ask regular people what they want, most people are against all this woke, divisive nonsense, which leads me to believe that the only way “woke” can survive is if they force it upon us, completely undemocratic of course, but thank goodness democracy has prevailed in this case.

Councillor Rebekah Rogers who proposed the reversal of the decision commented, “We cannot ask our community for their opinion and then not listen to the result. The community wanted a say and we gave them a say.” Yes, that’s pretty much how democracy works. Anybody who suggests that we should not be doing this and listening to the minority instead of the majority should probably not be in power in a democratic country such as Australia.

Of course, there were detractors of this decision. Some Australians just hate modern-day Australia and what it stands for. Indigenous Elder Major ‘Moogy’ Sumner spoke out against reversing the decision. He said, “We can all enjoy another day. Why change it back? To rub salt into a wound? Or to say, ‘well, we’re going to have it whether you like it or not’. I don’t think anyone would like to celebrate on the date that all the Jews died in the prison camps, on that day. That’s how we feel. We feel the hurt within us.” Personally, I don’t think holding a citizenship ceremony on January 26 is the same thing as celebrating the Holocaust, but I get his point.

Look, I appreciate Uncle Moogy loves his Aboriginal heritage. Awesome. I appreciate he doesn’t want to celebrate Australia Day, and that’s fine too. Nobody is forcing anybody to do so. But in a democratic country, the majority rules. Yes, that means many decisions are made that we don’t like, but that’s democracy. If it wasn’t for democracy, what else is there? Authoritarianism. Dictatorship. Totalitarianism. Democracy. Despite having its issues and cringe-worthy moments, I can tell you which one I prefer.

And in a bit of breaking news for Australia Day enthusiasts, Rockingham City Council in the south of Perth, Western Australia, has also apparently backflipped and reversed its decision moving its Australia Day celebrations back to January 26.

The tides are turning my friends, the tides are turning.

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Allégro by Emmit Fenn