Final edit: Sorry guys, this got out of hand as I feared and it would take too long to answer everything properly and it would just offend more people.
I got some nice tips for finding places and learned more about Australian’s views on the subject. I should have been more careful with what I said. It changed my opinion somewhat but people here would still not like it, so I’ll keep it to myself.
Thanks for the very civilized and nice answers and I’m sorry if I didn’t answer. I would like to, but in private, or this could become a witch hunt. I do not wish to offend anyone or be attacked because of that. As someone commented, I am the problem here.
Hi everyone, I’ve been lurking for a long time and decided to try to ask something I can’t find out.
First, please be tolerant about the question. I am an Australian citizen, but from a foreign background, so cultural things that seem sacred and unquestionable here are not the same to me. I wouldn’t be crazy to post this on reddit (though I deleted my account ages ago) because I know all the posts would just be attacking me (if you don’t like it, leave, are you defending terrorists?, and so on), instead of helpful comments. Hopefully it will be different here.
The question is: is there any Australian town free from military worship? I mean monuments everywhere, pools and parks named after it and so on. Somewhere I can forget and pretend that this is not how the rest of Australia is.
I’ve been traveling around trying to find a place I would like to settle. I found many small towns I liked, but it seems that the smaller the town, the higher the military worship. They may not even have a public toilet, but they will have a military worship statue that seemed to have cost more than all the town to build.
I love Australia, specially the outback, but the military worship issue is so big that makes me think of looking for another country. I know my taxes are being used to send people to kill whoever the US doesn’t like, and the country prides itself with this history. But if I can ignore that, I can pretend to myself that it’s not true and live happy. I tried to fight the issue for a long time but it makes no difference except to me, sacrificing my well being for nothing. But if I keep being reminded every time I go to do groceries trough the park “invasion of foreign country divine pride park”, it will be impossible. I already try to avoid news and ABC, so it should be possible.
I’m sending a picture of some of the places I’ve been to, without much luck. Funny enough, the town I liked the most, Roma, is the worst, with military trees every 10 meters.
Anyway, that’s it. Maybe I’ll get downvoted to oblivion, but let’s try…
By the way, I don’t know if I am posting this correctly, on the right place and everything. It’s my first lemmy post as well. It’s very confusing to know the community to post. It shows everything everwhere!
Edit- I posted this before, thought it was in the wrong place, deleted and posted again. Now I see 2 of the posts and the deleted one has 2 upvotes. This is so confusing…
Edit2 - Before I get any comment, I dislike military worship from any country, not just Australia. Military may or not be necessary in modern societies, but worship and praise should never be acceptable and is specially dangerous when applied to a group with power. Citizens should always be skeptical of their military group, its uses, powers and permissions. It should be like owning a gun. You may be allowed to have one but should be constantly proving you are not doing anything wrong with it. The definition of what is “wrong” or “right” should be constantly questioned as well.
Edit3 - just a reminder, that I do not wish to change anyone’s point of view. It’s your tradition and culture and I respect, but I don’t have to like it and I would like to figure out how to avoid it. It is all. I would like to stop Australian involvment in American wars, but besides that I don’t mind if Australians like military or not, but I would like to avoid being exposed to that, assuming that is possible, which is the reason for the post, so I can find out.
You’re conflating worship and memorial.
Most small towns sent large portions of their populace to fight in both ww1 and ww2.
These towns wanted their sons remembered and it has become a tradition across Australia to remember the sacrifices made by our military personnel to ensure that our way of life is preserved and that you’re able to imegrate here and live how ever you like.
To answer your question I don’t think you will find many towns at all. Most Australians are proud of our history and want it celebrated and sacrifices remembered.
Thanks for the answer. I disagree with the opinion regarding “sacrifices”, “way of life” and so on, but it’s one shared by the majority of Australians I talked to, so I can’t really debate it. I do respect it however. It’s something you consider culturally important. I hope you understand I see it in a different way as someone who came from a foreign country that could as well be invaded and have the same rethoric.
You’re living on stolen land that was invaded by divine right. If you can ignore that, you can ignore a few war memorials.
To me, that part, just like the war, should be learned about, its consequences dealt with, and forgotten about and just shamed. This happened before anyone I know was born. We will live with the consequences but it’s not their fault.
But unlike the wars, I don’t see monuments for aboriginal genocide. Oddly enough, I don’t see monuments remembering the murdered aboriginals either. Even though most of the small towns I’ve been to had a rich history of aboriginal massacres.
As some other mentioned, the monuments were often built soon after the war by people who had recently lost their relatives. When there were massacres of Aboriginal peoples, they obviously didn’t have the authority and resources to build similar memorials in towns, and to be blunt, the towns probably had few people who cared enough to build anything on their behalf, even now there are few public memorials (and often small ones) of massacres and Aboriginal loss. And that difference you pointed out reveals a lot about we see the historical effects of who has power and who writes history.
Another user mentioned his town have monuments built in 80s. I believe a number of them built monuments just because there is a consensus that you have to do it. It became like an unwritten law (I think it’s actually a law). You have to build monuments, you have to keep remembering, you can’t question it. If you do you are a traitor and deserve consequences. The usual issue with patriotism of any kind. If you are not with us, you are with them.
And yes, the specific things that need to be remembered and all the rest that can be forgotten. It is the base of my problem with the memorials. “Remember this, don’t mind the rest” Police, doctors, every day people who give their lives for something don’t get monuments and the rules that defines what does troubles me.
In many towns, the RSL (Returned Servicemans League) was the only place a family could go that was licensed, but also family friendly. And where there is an RSL, there is ANZAC commemoration.
And on ANZAC day itself, most of Australia turns towards military commemoration, because ANZAC
So you’ll be hard pressed finding a town that doesn’t have any military commemoration. But in my experience growing up in country town Australia, outside of the RSLs and ANZAC day, most towns don’t really have much military interest or history.
Ah yes, many of the ones I went to didn’t have military history. Yet they made worship monuments just for the war in general. As a kind of obligation or something. I see RSL as just a place where people can go to gamble, so I don’t even really associate it with military. It was much later that I learned that it’s not just a gambling and drinking club, but something related to military which was a very weird mix to me.
ANZAC… yes… I dislike that a lot, but you can just avoid any event, unlike monuments everywhere.
Did your city not have any monument?
I can’t think of any such monuments (aside from Anzac ones) in my home town or the nearby towns. But I grew up in NSW, not QLD. I don’t know how they compare
Which town was it if you don’t mind me asking? Or maybe you could PM me if it’s sensitive information? Is it cold? It’s another thing I’m avoiding, which is why I’m all over Queensland. Thanks
I grew up around the Moree/Narrabri area
I see war memorials as a reminder of what we’re trying to avoid, not as a glorification.
Yes, that’s often what people tell me. But the actions and behavior in general tell a different story.
It’s not something someone can say “I’m proud because we killed people”, like many patriotic feelings, but the feeling is still there, just in different words. “I’m proud because we defended freedom”.
But the americans believe that about all the current invasions. And australians go to each one of them. So it seems the mistake keep being repeated, and glorified again and again. I see many memorials about vietnam, korea, even iraq and so on. So if people are supposed to learn a lesson, it just seem to be that it should be perpetuated.
Which is why it bothers me a lot.
I got to Anzac memorial services each year. And for me, it isnt worship, it is a memorial about those that did indeed sacrifice theirs lives and mental health to the atrocities of both world wars.
That said, what I take from it, and share with my child is that we must remember, so that we can avoid another one.
I have not seen worship in Australia, and your use of the word makes me think that you misunderstand the monuments. I expect there are some that worship, but it is exceedingly rare in everyday life.
I expect that you will be able to see past the memorial in the town the fits you.
(PS: thanks for the question, it is really interesting and written in such a way that I believe you are genuine in your search. Good luck!)
Thanks for respectfully disagreeing. Yes, as I said on other post, the term I use is not quite right, but it’s how I see it. I just fundamentally see these things in a different way. What you guys see as mourning I see as celebration. But I do understand the intention.
I believe I will learn to see past it (though for 10 years I haven’t yet). But if I found my objective it would be a nice bonus.
And thanks, it is genuine. I traveled dozens of thousands of km looking for my ideal town, which I still hope to find!
If you haven’t heard it before, please listen to the song “The Band Played Waltzing Matilda” by Scottish-Australian songwriter Eric Bogle. That song, as well as “I Was Only 19” by Redgum, perfectly encapsulates the reason for the memorials.
The songs do not glorify our success as a military nation, nor do they portray the soldiers they are about as grand heros or defenders of freedom. They are about very young men, sent away by their country to experience unimaginable horror and suffering, only to return to a home with, at best, minimal support and, at worst, the shame of the community they once were a part of.
Each name on each of those memorials- thousands of them- represent an experience of the unimaginable, and a family irreparably changed. They are a reminder of what was taken, and of the sorrow that was caused. I do not see them as prideful, celebratory or reverential, and I do not know of anyone who does. They are a commiseration.
With regards to ANZAC, and it’s place in Australian culture, you are essentially looking at modern Australia’s foundational myth. In the 1950s and 1960s when Australia was having its own civil rights moment, the original foundation myth of terra nullius and the “brave”, white settlers conquering an untamed land finally began to feel too untrue to most Australians, too much like a myth. Colonial Australia needed a new explanation for its existence and it is around that time that the Gallipoli campaign started to be promoted by various historians and authors as Australia’s “coming of age” as a nation.
The intention was to give (white) Australians a point of reference for themselves, something they could point to and say “the things that we are, this is where they came to be”. Qualities like mateship, camaraderie, larrakinism, hard work, disdain for authority or aristocracy and resilience in the face of adversity. Those were the qualities promoted as being cemented in the national psyche at ANZAC Cove. It is a manufactured narrative, but those writers were very successful, as you can see.
There’s more that can be said for Australia treats it’s narrative history, especially that of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders, but that’s better left for another (long) post. If you’re interested in how Australia viewed it’s two competing foundational stories in the 1990s and 2000s, and how it effects the way we talk about our history today, look up the History Wars. Let me know if you think there was a winner.
I haven’t really thought about this much, because military commemoration is just normal here and I thoughtlessly assumed it was similar around the world. And I didn’t really consider how unnecessarily big many of them are. Sure, it’s easy for me to point to the US and say ‘that’s what real military worship is!’ but you’re right that there are many reminders of war around, most obviously the monuments in parks and national ceremonies (ANZAC Day, Remembrance Day). You mention that you have a foreign background; do you mention this because the monuments are not normal where your background is, or is it because our wars are offensive and seem atrocious to have statues for?
It’s important to understand the intended purpose of many of these as similar to a gravestone, it’s meant to be a respectful reminder of the town’s loss rather than glorifying war, like Aussiemandeus said it’s the towns wanting future generations to be aware of their town’s sacrifice for the war effort. However, there is also the fact that national ceremonies are sometimes used as propaganda to glorify wars of invasion or imply they were all honourable: the only one of those ANZAC wars where Australia was actually invaded was WWII (various attacks), all the others were joining political allies (first UK, then US) in other continents in imperialist wars, and in many of the wars they were clearly invasive and Australia’s participation should be denounced (including the Korean War, Vietnam War and Middle Eastern conflicts).
So while I can tolerate (critically) the community monuments commemorating dead soldiers, especially those built after WWII when sacrifice was in the self-defense of the country, we must also be critical of those trying to glorify war and imperial conflicts, just as we should be critical of those who glorify or trivialize the colonial invasion of this continent.
Thank you for the very neutral answer. I would say it’s the most respectful position I ever heard an Australian saying.
The thing with gravestones is that; 1- They eventually get forgotten. You can’t remember every dead person forever, you can’t remember every war (what about with the aboriginals? why is that forgotten?). No “lest we forget” stuff, and it’s been long enough. 2- Any event related to it is almost always hurtful, said, and can’t be manipulated. You suffer visiting the grave of your loved ones. You don’t celebrate. And you don’t make one in every corner and ignore every other people who died. I have always heard Australians talking about pain regarding remembering, I have never seen anyone or any event even remotely giving that feeling. (RSL with gambling and drinking? whould you do that to remember you dead son?). So as I said before, if there noble intentions with these things, they don’t seem to have ever happened or everything I saw was an exception.
But regardless, it’s a war where you go to kill people. Your intentions are noble and so does the “enemy” thinks as well. I feel uncomfortable with any monuments to that, justified or not. But again, that’s just me. I understand the reasons even if they don’t seem to work in the end to me.
By all means defend yourself you’re invaded. Just never (to me) let you going there to kill the guy who invaded be celebrated.
Edit, ah, I didn’t want to say my country of origin because I didn’t want it to affect opinions (I could be from Iraq, who knows?) But it’s Brazil. Brazil did send people to the war, but it’s a very religious country, so most monuments are for religion, while here it’s war. In fact to me war seemed like Australian’s religion.
We had a period when I was a kid where the ANZAC stuff really started to wane as the WWI veterans were dying out. Somewhere along the line there was a movement to rekindle the ANZAC stuff and really stress that while it had its roots in WWI, it was about soldiers who died in all conflicts for their country.
Any town that was around in 1918 is going to have a war memorial. I’ve worked at a place that was over 100 years old and they had a shield on a wall remembering the staff who went to WWI. If you really want to find a town that doesn’t have a war memorial, you’ll be looking for a new settlement, Probably some place that didn’t exist before the 1950’s. I honestly can’t think of any.
That said, it’s really easy to avoid all the military stuff if it doesn’t work for you. Most town’s war memorials will only really come into relevance once a year and then go back to just being a feature of the place the other 364 days. A landmark maybe near a kids play ground. Just because every place has one, doesn’t mean you are under any obligation to pay it any attention.
Thanks! That seems like a very useful idea and I’ll look into it. I’ll research new towns tomorrow.
The thing is a mental gimnastics. Personally Australian view and involvement with war, very much specially the newer invasions, bother me a lot. I feel guilty living here and my taxes funding an american invasion. To me the fact they get away with it comes from the respect Australians have for the military. But if I do something about it (like going back) I’ll be the only affected and nothing changes. So I want to pretend it’s not true. Live a lie. And if I can find a town without names of it, it’s easier to lie to myself. But if I go to the park and it shows the military worship, I will inevitably remember the truth.
It’s far fetched, but I think it can work.
I dont think there is any military worship in any australian town or city? We do have respect for it, especially around the AZACS. But I couldnt tell you jack shit about the aussie military beyond we screwed the french on some subs a while back.
I thought it was the Turkish they mostly celebrate for killing? I met many people who don’t really know anything about the history, but say something against the military, monuments and so on and they will get very angry with you. Then again, a few I met don’t really care either way, maybe like you.
I just never met anyone who was against the war stuff. I saw some article on people wanting to change ANZAC day, but never met someone.
Nobody celebrates killing Turkish people. Quite the opposite, in fact. Australians have immense respect for the Turks. We recognise that neither the Anzacs nor the Turks had any direct quarrel with one another. We had no desire to conquer what is now Turkey, and the Turks weren’t really defending their homes. It was a stupid conflict that neither of us wanted to be at. Anzacs were there because they were sent there by the British. The Turks were there because they were sent by the Ottomans. The British were just trying to get through the Dardanelles and Bosporus so they could reach the Black Sea. The Ottomans were on the German side of WWI and wanted to stop that from happening. At the end of the day, that sums up the whole reason everyone was on that peninsular.
If you want to look into it, you’ll find that Mustafa Atatürk holds a very special place in Australia’s history. He has a personal memorial right next to the Australian War Memorial in Canberra, looking down Anzac avenue of war memorials that point to Parliament House. Depending on the direction you take of the memorials, he is either the first or last memorial. Either way, you are sure to remember him. Short of putting him on our money, we couldn’t really honour him closer. I know that over the last decade, President Erdoğan has been shifting Turkish perspective on Atatürk and the Gallipoli campaign, but no shifts are happening in Australia.
All the celebration of Anzac spirit you see is because this war in particular changed our nation. Until this point, our ancestors thought of themselves as British. Afterwards, they were Australians and New Zealanders. The cultural shift took a few decades, and didn’t really finish until WWII (some would argue it is still shifting). The Anzac story has never been about killing Turks.
You’re misunderstanding the intent. They are memorials for sons lost at war.
There is definitely no worship. I recommend contemplating your idea of worship, and considering what every person who’s respectfully replied to help.
It’s memorial. Lost sons. That’s it.
Nobody loves war. The memorials are out of respect to the communities that lost huge numbers of their men to needless war. That’s the all of it.
No worship. Consider that for a moment.
It may be a bad term I’m using. Maybe I can say respect, simply? In my view, it’s bad to respect wars. Lives were lost and I understand people want to remember, but they should fear and hate the idea that it happened and why.
Unlike what the other guy commented on me, it’s not pacifism. If someone hits you, you should defend yourself. But never celebrate, make memorials or things like that because you did it.
And while the guy hated me for thinking, I do believe that people sent to war, soldiers, and their deaths should be seen differently than other deaths. They went to another country to kill people and died. I know it sounds horrible that I have that opinion, but I just don’t see war the same way.
People who died in Australia killed by invaders I see in a very different way. People killed in any invasion for that matter. Australians killed invading another country is a different thing.
If you come to my house to kill me and I end up killing you, I see it as a very different thing from if I go to your house to kill you and end up dead. Even if everyone thought their reasons to go there kill the other was right and necessary.
But it’s just my opinion. I don’t want to offend anyone with that nor stop them from paying their respect to the dead. I just would like to avoid it.
That’s exactly the point.
These young men were told that invaders were coming. To hurt the kingdom.
That they must defend. They must protect their mothers, brothers, sisters and country.
They must be brave and face the incoming enemy.
They thought they were doing the right thing.
They were slaughtered. They’re dead. Their family grieved. They built memorials.
They didn’t go to murder. In their hearts, they were protecting their families. It’s worth studying some history on this. From a soldiers perspective. From a mother’s perspective.
Have you considered that you are the problem here?
Yes. And I’m considering that.
I thought it was the Turkish they mostly celebrate for killing?
This phrase illustrates how profoundly you misinterpret these war memorials. These are not celebrations of killing, they are memorials to those who died, markers of grief not celebrations of conquest.
I live in a small village in Tasmania and I’m not aware of any war memorial however there is a grove of trees commemorating WW1 at the nearby Port Arthur Historic Site. I think this is interesting because Port Arthur is itself a memorial to a brutal, horrific past, a past that isn’t celebrated but remembered. The same site also contains a memorial garden that marks the deadliest mass shooting in modern Australian history, remembrance of a tragedy not a celebration of it.
What do you think? How should a community treat the memories of those who die in tragic events? Should they be forgotten or remembered? For that matter, do you think that wars should be forgotten or remembered?
“Those who ignore the lesson of the past, will be doomed to repeat it.”
George Santayana
It’s not our tradition and culture, that’s a misunderstanding on your part. Most Australians do not give a shit about military memorials and barely acknowledge their existence. It’s a vocal minority who push the “worship” as you call it; the rest of us tolerate or ignore it.
Nah bud. those aren’t worship idols.
The first world war nearly wiped out an entire generation. And it coincided with Australia as a nation coming of age. It scarred the fuck out of our psyche, so we have memorials everywhere. Every small town has one for the people from just there who died. That’s how bad it was.
You don’t notice it as much in suburbs of the cities if you can afford housing there.
Where the hell are you going with military statues that cost “more than the town” to build?! Outside of the big cities I can’t think of many places with more than a small (less than 1m) statue and a plaque. And I’ve lived in every state and territory except Tasmania and New Zealand.
The only way you could have signed off better was to leave out Tasmania since we don’t want that and we claim nz
Haha couldn’t resist the NZ joke.
We do actually like our West Islands neighbours.
Anecdotally, the one in a park near where I lived was much large than that. Some examples of larger ones can be found just by searching images of
australia war monument in park(not including the huge ones in some cities, like the Anzac Memorial in Sydney or the Canberra Australian War Memorial)And the majority of small towns have a small memorial that you’d have to go hunting to find. Google searches will of course tend towards the bigger, more obvious ones.
I live in a country town. Our memorial is (literally) 1.2m tall, made of concrete and takes up less than 3m square. It has been there since the 80’s.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not a fan of fetishising the military. But the OP suggestion that they’re all massive monuments is patently absurd.
Sorry, I exagerated a lot. But yes, I’ve seen quite a few towns where it seems like the memorial was the biggest public investment in the town.
Exaggerations my search is still the same. But yes, as eureka says, there are some pretty big ones. Luckily some times some big ones that are unrelated to war, but very rare. Like Barcaldine I think, where there is a very big and beautiful monument to worker’s strikes. I was very surprised when I saw it and found it’s not military.
https://monumentaustralia.org.au/search Incredibly detailed info on monuments all over the country. Lots of non-conflict-related ones.
it seems that the smaller the town, the higher the military worship. They may not even have a public toilet, but they will have a military worship statue that seemed to have cost more than all the town to build.
That’s because the vast majority of our towns pre date WW2, and basically every area lost enough people in WW1/WW2 to affect multiple families and the broader local community. For example I grew up in a country village of a couple of hundred people (with several hundred more in the locality and upriver) and it has a war memorial listing what would have been ~50 people killed in WW2 and at least that again in WW1. I think it is understandable that towns (particularly smaller or more closely knit communities) would be in general support of the families and friends wanting a memorial to their dead given that level of losses.
I haven’t seen anywhere near the number of memorials for other conflicts, they definitely exist but are significantly less common. If you want to avoid war related stuff your best bet would be towns/suburbs built well after WW2, but these tend to be suburbs of existing centres (which are likely to have a war memorial) instead of completely new towns.
Edit: Also consider that many of our country towns/villages have either not grown significantly or have even shrunk in population in the last half century or so, so historical memorials are more likely to retain the prominence they were originally intended to have instead of being surrounded or crowded out by new development.
The loss of life from WWI and WW2 in particular had a huge impact on country towns. They planted avenues of trees, named roads, engraved the names of young people on walls.
None I can think of ? that shit is endemic. Best of luck in your search though.
I now live in a small bumfuck town in Tasmania, the big discussion is a bunch of trees that need trimming, memorial soldier trees lining the street.
Yep, it’d have to be a tiny town to not have a war memorial. If there’s no war memorial there’s probably an honour bord with the names of the fallen in the hall or RSL. Since ANZAC it’s been a part of Australian culture that those who died in service of their country is a sort of sacred thing. It’s significance has ebbed and flowed a bit over the years. Our pride in the services was especially damaged in the Vietnam war years, when ANZAC day crowds shrunk quite a bit and you could have imagined at the time that it might all die out. It’s had a bit of a resurgence since.
After most big wars, the federal government has put a bit of money into war memorials, and it was pretty much just a matter of the local RSL or town council writing a letter to get a decommissioned artillery piece of some sort, or an old torpedo for the local park as a centrepiece for your ANZAC day ceremony. Also, if you read the plaques on 1950’s or 60’s buildings in the bush, you’ll often see many of them are “War Memorials”. War Memorial swimming pools and sports grounds are common ones. The reason communities did this is that at the time donations to “war memorials” were tax deductible.
You’ve made an interesting observation. For Aussies this is probably something they’ve never noticed. It’s probably not an indication that we’re very war worshipping, just that for a small country, the deaths involved in the wars we’ve been part of were significant, and perhaps especially so for little country towns where the surnames on the honour board match some of the street names and the bloke you were just chatting to at the post office.
