Soapbox

Yesterday, I visited the immigration museum. This in itself could merit a fine, if somewhat trite, blog post, because the museum is well put together, pleasingly designed and just plain interesting. It also had stuffed blackbirds in dickie bows:

You can't see it, but the sign pronounces that they're singing 'bye bye, blackbird', which is just the kind of inane detail I love in a museum. This was part of an exhibit about all the animals which were exported to Australia and also included artful arrangements of cockroaches:

The first one to say the guy in the reflection is a cockroach is a dead man,

 And rats:

It just needs Rik as a judge.

All of which is very charming and makes for a nice, if somewhat trite, anecdote. However, the main reason I wanted to talk about the immigration museum was because of the context in which I saw it: I had just read in The Age that Julia Gillard was going to continue to allow employers to discriminate against people because of their sexuality and that she had previously declared that she wouldn't be implementing marriage equality.
And then I came across this display:

Which is about one of Australia's first mixed marriages in Australia between a greek immigrant and an aboriginal woman. The sign talked about the difficulties they faced as a mixed-ethnicity couple but then concluded that this was no longer an issue, and that the term 'mixed marriage' isn't even used anymore because Australia's just so damn progressive when it comes to love.

Ahem.

And then there was this display: 

Which touches on Jewish immigrants, and says how they weren't really accepted until the holocaust made people realise that anti-semitism isn't cool. There were other minority groups exterminated in the concentration camps, you know.
And then the entire second floor was dedicated to diversity and how great it is. In the interest of fairness, there was one instance of the word 'queer', thrown in amongst a bunch of other slurs which we were told can cause offence.

As I said, the museum was engaging and well-designed; I just wasn't feeling it. I don't know if I'll come back to Australia in my later life, but I certainly wouldn't consider moving here until some serious progress is made vis-a-vis equality. However, if that progress is ever made, I should have no problem coming back, because the museum included a replica of the Australian citizenry test, and I passed with flying colours.

Also of note: this is the only museum to have ever made me feel sea sick.