There are four good reasons to change the date

WHEN it comes to Australia Day, I’ve got lots of good reasons it should move, but not one for why it should stay, writes Jill Poulsen.

I USED to think anyone who opposed changing the date of Australia Day was racist.

You see it’s easy to pop a label on a group of people and chuck them in the corner when their point of view is totally opposite to yours.

For example, because I believe quotas can help address inequality between sexes in the workplace and I don’t think a young woman deserved to have her boob grabbed by a stranger at a music festival, I’m labelled a Feminazi by those who don’t agree.

But if labels really bothered me I wouldn’t click on every Buzzfeed quiz that promised to tell me what kind of biscuit I would be.

Now, I’ve come to the conclusion that anyone who opposes the date is wilfully ignorant at worst and just plain ignorant at best.

The old label habit dies hard, I guess.

I understand that I’ve had the privilege of calling lots of less privileged people than I a friend.

I’m convinced that the large majority of people who support Australia Day staying on the same date have never really spoken to more than one aboriginal person about what it means to them.

Not that every aboriginal person supports the date changing, just like not every non-aboriginal person supports it staying the same.

It’s not enough to just have an opinion, particularly on such an important issue, so I’ve spent a solid ten years pondering the topic and asking both sides of the divide why? Why is it important to you that it changes and why is it important to you that it doesn’t?

I am firmly in the #changethedate gang and have been here for the last decade or so, and am yet to hear one compelling argument as to why the date shouldn’t be changed.

Don’t worry, a change in date won’t rob you of your Australian flag and swagman paraphernalia. (Pic: Quinn Rooney)

Here, I’ll show you.

1. If we change the date some other group of people will take offence to the date it’s changed to and it will just keep going.

That’s pretty unlikely. There are 365 days in the year and millions of clever people in the country.

I’m sure if we put our heads together it would be super easy to find a new date.

Let’s face it, the day was probably supposed to be on January 1, but because most of us are hung-over from New Year’s Eve and it’s already a public holiday, the powers that be decided against it.

But just imagine a double public holiday — a mega weekend of fun. I’ve had worse ideas.

2. It’s just political correctness gone mad.

Every now and then a buzz word will really take hold.

When I was younger it was “sick”.

Them: “How was your night?”

Me: “So sick”.

It doesn’t mean that I was violently ill (although if it was truly a good night I probably would have been), it actually means fun.

Just like saying wanting the date changed is just political correctness gone mad, it makes absolutely no sense.

A date change is probably, by the definition of the phrase, considered politically correct, and doesn’t mean it’s gone mad.

Unless they mean mad like as in good — like “mad haircut, dude”.

I have no idea, I’m confused.

3. It’s a day for unity and celebrating what’s great about being Australian.

This day is about as unifying as a cup of tea between Donald Trump and Kim Jong Un.

It divides us and in the gap that continues to grow hate springs up like a weed strangling any sensible, intelligent debate.

People calling for change aren’t a noisy minority like some, including our Prime Minister, would have you believe.

We’re coming for you — just kidding.

We’re coming for the date — not you, ya big bogan.

Those hats will be just as shady on a different public holiday. (Pic: Cameron Spencer)

4. It’s rewriting history — January 26 wasn’t even the day the English arrived.

You’re right — it isn’t. But it is the day Captain Arthur Phillip, commander of the First Fleet of eleven convict ships from Great Britain, and the first Governor of New South Wales, arrived at Sydney Cove and raised the Union Jack to signal the beginning of the colony.

There was no sausage sizzle or Australian flag tattoos but it remains a symbolic date that marks the attempted genocide of our nation’s first people.

Fairly big deal.

You don’t have to agree with me.

You don’t even have to read what I say — as much as I’ve tried to convince the government that my columns should be mandatory reading they absolutely aren’t.

But I would appreciate it if you could keep the death threats to a minimum this year.

Mum is still getting over last year.

So until next year when I will write about exactly the same thing my pair of Australia flag Havaianas will sit gathering dust at the back of my closet, dreaming of the day they have a blowout after getting too sweaty at an Australia Day party.

Jill Poulsen is a NewsQueensland journalist.