- The European settlement of the continent was by occupying a 'terra nullius', i.e. an empty land. The indigenous population were conveniently ignored, until they started stealing cattle – whereupon they were shot. That the settlers called them “aboriginies” (the Latin for from the beginning) harmed their case, but no one out here spoke Latin anyway.
- The great myth of the Bush, the place where the Aussie character was refined and defined - when 80% of our population live on the coast.
- Christmas decorations, all visions of snow, holly and sleighs, pinned up in the middle of summer.
- The British monarch being our monarch.
Why do I include the last point? In 1985 our constitution was repatriated from its origin as a Bill of the U.K. parliament to the Australia Act, which converted Elizabeth II, Queen of the United Kingdom (etc. etc.) into the Queen of Australia. A historic opportunity to forge our own system was passed up for the tried-and-true method of twisting local society to match foreign systems. The "bunyip aristocracy", envisaged by William Charles Wentworth when the colonies struggled for their own representation, at last had their own royal house. So the House of Windsor was colonised by political expediency.
When we had a national referendum in 1998 to decide whether to become a particular type of republic, the monarchist side of the debate had to rely on history. "If it ain't broke, don't fix it" was their catch-cry. Their appeal was to our historical heritage, of generations going to war under an imperial flag, of the British roots of European settlement here, of our fellowship with the mother parliament and its constitutional system.
Our failure to rouse ourselves from this nostalgia and recognize our peculiar situation, caused the vote to be lost, for the status quo to remain untouched. The Prime Minister, a vocal campaigner for the monarch, admitted the inevitability of a republic, but "just not yet." It is seemly for everyone who was a British subject to die off, before the republic is proclaimed by the Australian citizens who remain.
The referendum was lost, even though polls show a majority wanted a republic. The people wanted to elect their leader, but were offered the method of presidential selection by their political masters. The egalitarian nature our society, currently under threat as the divide between rich and poor widens, wanted the symbol of being able to elect a symbolic leader.
Just as our place in the western world is illusory (constantly trying to measure up to our allies, and get them to listen to us, even though they are on the other side of the world to us), so we crave this illusion of selecting our leader, our destiny, without interference from Old World struggles.
