Has Australia still got that national sized chip on it's shoulder?

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Annje

What do we have to be resentful of? Some make fun of the poms but thats all in good fun! We - most - love them really! lol I think they are cute and funny and great to talk to! : )

Ken E

I'd say not so much any more. I'm just old enough to remember the later 50s and a lot of attitudes have changed. As for the UK, that is a a friendly nation on the other side of the world. More important to us than say Denmark or Sweden, but essentially of less interest than Indonesia or the Philippines.

There was a fair bit of resentment against the British (government) over the collapse at Singapore. Specially when it became known that the Japanese were almost on their last legs when they got to the end of the Malay peninsula and some real resistance there might have changed the course of the war in the Pacific. There was also the "Brisbane Line" and the assumption by Churchill that during the war Australia would sell wool to the UK at lower than the cost of production.

Later when Australia was threatened by the Japanese from the north, the British were reluctant to release Australian troops from North Africa. They were not the only things by the way, but that will do for now.

As for the USA, feelings were mixed as well. "Overpaid, oversexed and over here" was the joke formulation but I think the same thing was felt in the UK too. There was also the tendency for dear old Doug Macarthur to credit victories to the US army when a lot of the hard slog in New Guinea had been done by Australian troops (or the US marines who also seemed to get little credit from Macarthur). A few incidents in New Guinea became known too. I won't go into details here as I don't remember them exactly enough.

It goes back further than that. Right from the start of the 20th century both the UK and the USA had a tendency to dump manufactured goods at knockdown prices here and in some cases it looked deliberately calculated to squash start-up manufacturers in this country. That led in the 1920s to a fairly tough tariff regime for imported goods of most kinds.

In the earlier 1930s both Boeing and Lockheed were having great success with their first "all metal" aircraft. Qantas was co-founded by Hudson Fysh and held the mail contract from Singapore to Australia. It also assembled De Haviland aircraft at it's Longreach facility using local and imported materials. Fysh saw that the Boeing and Lockheed planes were faster, safer and more economical than the fabric and wood De Haviland ones. He wanted to buy one or two. He was told that if Qantas bought either he would lose the contract, which was with the UK, not Australian government.

This is a typical story. There were several others in much the same vein. The Australian film industry of the 1920s was suppressed by US studios buying a few of the larger cinemas in the larger cities and towns (with implied threats of refusing to supply product if the owners did not sell) and then not buying Australian productions.

A few of these stories were in wide circulation, even before WW2. Some might have been exaggerated, but the Qantas and film industry ones are true, as far as I know.

frantic

I lived in Australia in the 50s. There was a certain amount of teasing of the "poms" and they were generally called "whinging poms". This was because at that time, and earlier, they had been able to go there on some special scheme that cost them next to nothing. Then when they arrived, a great percentage of them moaned and groaned about how much better UK was. Australians have no chip on THEIR shoulders, they only retaliated to immigrants or visitors who either looked down their noses at Aussies, or who complained that "life was much better" where they came from. In the seventies I was not aware of this attitute any longer and my best friends were all English. I am an Australian and I love the "poms".

Imelda

I wasn't around in the 50's so I'm not aware of this "resentment" but I think it would be fair to say that no one I've met in the last few decades seems to have any kind of resentment towards "much of the world" - if anything, a huge number of Aussies embrace it and demonstrate this by the amount of overseas travel they undertake. I for one (among thousands of my Aussie colleagues) lived in England for a number of years, I loved those moaning pommies and their pound stirling, and any banter between the Aussies and the English that I've heard has all been meant in fun - and the participants know so. In sixty years though, I guess most countries perspectives and attitudes would experience some sort of shift, or we'd all be stuck in a time warp.

dapach

1950's is a long time ago. Australia is a very different country these days. In many ways it is similar to Canada. When I stayed in Vancouver a few years back, it felt very much like Sydney (Australia) to me.

Jay

The 50's was along time ago and things have certainly changed, Australians are a lot more excepting of other countries because we are such a multicultural country. We don't resent our 'Mother Country' you may have found a few people who didn't like the English but those people do not represent the entire countries beliefs.

Joanne A

i dont know dont .dont know any1 from there

But Why??

EHH????

jennifer h

No of course not we are a multi cultural society and have grown up a lot now.

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