Piers Akerman: Giants being replaced by whining snowflakes

As we remember Prince Philip, Carla Zampatti, Tommy Raudonikis and Andrew Peacock, there is a noteworthy link which ties them — none of them were snowflakes.

As we remember Prince Philip, Carla Zampatti, Tommy Raudonikis and Andrew Peacock among the more notable to have died within days, there is a noteworthy link which ties them — none of them were snowflakes.

None of them were whiners, whingers or bludgers.

They were all outstanding individuals who suffered the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune pondered by Hamlet, and each in their own way rose above and conquered the disadvantages fate dealt them.

Prince Philip gave up a promising naval career to marry the queen.

What a contrast between the manner in which they boldly approached life and overcame the challenges they faced and the manner in which so many of the Millennial generation volunteer to display their appalling weaknesses in the sewer of social media today.

Members of Philip’s family were assassinated and his mother placed in an asylum suffering from severe depression. He was stateless and assisted to attend school in the UK by a sister, Cecilie, the only one of his four sisters not to marry a Nazi.

Aged 18 in 1939, Prince Philip was serving as a midshipman on the battleship HMS Ramillies when he made the first of more than 20 visits to Australia.

He served throughout the war with bravery and distinction, and barely out of his teens married the young Princess Elizabeth and surrendered a promising naval career to be her husband, companion and counsel.

More than 775,000 young Australians have participated in the Duke of Edinburgh Award he established nearly 60 years ago.

Carla Zampatti worked hard to build her eponymous fashion label. Picture: Bob Barker

Nine-year-old Carla Zampatti arrived in the Western Australian gold mining town of Bullfinch from northern Italy in 1950 unable to speak English, in a period when migrants were called New Australians. It was not a derogatory term or any sort of approbation, but a signifier of the genuine willingness of our young nation to accept those who were prepared to accept our way of life.

There were not the abundant handouts now available to migrants, none of the resources and counselling on tap today were thought necessary, and from this outpost the determined young girl set her sights on fashion design and went on to build a much admired label and a hugely admired business career.

The same year she landed on a migrant ship at Fremantle, young Tommy Raudonikis was born in Bathurst, the son of a Lithuanian immigrant father and Swiss immigrant mother. He became a true legend in the ranks of rugby league’s greats.

Rugby league legend Tommy Raudonikis.

Prince Philip, Carla Zampatti and Tommy Raudonikis all knew what it was to be different within a prevailing culture, and each overcame the strangeness and embraced their new nations, becoming huge influences on the lives of others.

Andrew Peacock, by comparison, was born into a successful Melbourne family and didn’t have to struggle as a child, but he chose a career in the very willing world of politics, and fought and lost his first campaign for the seat of Yarra in 1961 — though he did buck the national trend by increasing the Liberal primary vote.

In 1966 he won Kooyong in the by-election brought on by Sir Robert Menzies’ resignation, and went on to have a long and varied political career — though not all easy by any means.

He was twice Liberal Party leader in opposition, never an easy task, and doubly difficult when faced with a popular Prime Minister like Labor’s Bob Hawke.

Andrew Peacock was a dignified politician.

But it is the measure of the man that Peacock didn’t give up politics after losing the 1991 election. He held various shadow portfolios until he was offered the role of deputy to possibly the weakest Liberal leader, John Hewson, and quit but didn’t complain.

The old saw has it that wealth is created by the first generation, enjoyed by the second and squandered by the third. It would seem that the immigrant experience follows the same trajectory.

Those who came to Australia from other nations until recently sought opportunities and didn’t need handouts. Their children enjoyed the comforts their parents provided through their hard work, and the third generation seems less inclined to put in the hard yakka and more inclined to see what they can get from governments increasingly eager to buy votes.

As we lose the leaders of the generation that gave us these individuals, we are at risk of losing a critical institutional and cultural memory.