Is Australia a Racist Country?

Many people believe that Australia is a racist country, but when asked to explain what racism is, they struggle. So, what is racism? I have looked at various resources including dictionaries and websites and have found that the most common, most agreed upon definition of ‘racism’ is the prejudice or discrimination directed against someone of a different race based on such a belief. Racism to the vast majority is a touchy subject and even though Australia as a whole has elements of racism, I believe that an entire country shouldn’t be labelled or categorised as ‘racist’ just because there is a minority of its citizens who are. I will be exploring some aspects on how Australia isn’t racist including how our future shouldn’t be affected by our past, the reasons behind why we have policies for immigrants (including refugees) and how Australia in fact supports foreign culture, including the Aboriginal culture of Australia.
Unfortunately racism has occurred in the history of our country, there is no denying this. The ‘White Australia Policy’ and the ‘Stolen Generation’ policies are examples of this and examples that most, if not all Australian's would be ashamed of and embarrassed about now. 1909 to 1969 was the era of the Stolen Generation, the children of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders were forcefully removed from their homes because of the Australian government, our government. Not only did this end more than forty years ago, but Kevin Rudd (the Prime Minister of Australia at the time), made the long-awaited apology to the generations affected on the 13th February 2008. Our actions in the past shouldn’t label us as who we are today. The Australian society today, the Australia I have grown up with and loved is a evidently a very multicultural country with more than twenty-five percent of our population born overseas. Do we still call the USA racist for enslaving the blacks and do we still call the Deutsch Nazis? No. Although history will always remember these...