Life of Riley: Mates always

Issue 

Life of Riley

Mates always

No matter where you go within the four walls of Australia, the games will be upon you. The nation is saturated. "I still call Australia home" has moved in for the duration, occupying musical fragments inside the head of every mother's son and daughter. Suddenly "our" and "we" — all the first person plurals you can think of — mean John Howard and Bruce Ruxton and Pauline Hanson and you and I. We are one, although we are many. I am. You are. We are all Aust-tral-lian.

Makes you think, doesn't it? I guess this is what consensus is all about: we agree to disagree. Such and such may be the biggest bastard in the world, but if they're from Oz, underneath they're sure to be true blue.

Mind you, some are a truer blue than others. It takes effort to become a bona fide Aussie. You don't become one by sneaking into the country, for instance. That's un-Australian. And it's un-Australian to blockade the World Economic Forum or to protest against the Olympic Games.

No. To become one you gotta play by the rules. Just because you are Aboriginal doesn't make you Australian. That's no excuse. Just being born here won't do either. You have to possess that special something to pass muster.

If you want to call yourself Aust — tral — lian you need to play by the rules. We dinky-di Aussies possesses certain qualities that cannot, for instance, be found among the peoples of other lands: a taste for Vegemite, a preference for beer and an inordinate confidence in the spirit of mateship.

Perhaps this last item warrants further explanation. In Australia it is considered proper behaviour to stand by one's mates. A mate — for all intents and purposes — is another Australian who has a taste for Vegemite, a preference for beer and an inordinate confidence in the spirit of mateship. At the end of the day, no matter who you are, so long as you're a "mate", you must be fair dinkum.

So when it comes down to the wire, Kieran Perkins is a mate. Cathy Freeman is one too. And it wouldn't be stretching a mateship too far to include Kerry Packer, the board of directors of BHP, the federal cabinet and Joh Bjelke-Petersen. All for one. One for all. Mates always. Aussie! Aussie! Aussie!

So next time you break into a song — and it doesn't have to be "Advance Australia Fair" or "Waltzing Matilda", not nowadays — give a thought to all the other mates you've got. The battler mates. The true blue ones. The boss cocky mates. The mates in higher places. All the mates who in this wide brown land do dwell.

So when you get the sack or you're asked to work a few hours extra, don't come the whingeing pom. For you it's different. For you it's personal. You're Aust-tral-lian and come hell or high water you're sticking by your mates. That's the main thing. Oi! Oi! Oi!

BY DAVE RILEY
<http://www.ozemail.com.au/~dhell>

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