As many Neos Kosmos readers know, I am the son of a Greek father and a Jewish mother, and a former member of the Victorian Parliament. So, I’m well placed to comment on one of the most troubling aspects of the current COVID crisis – the scapegoating of ethnic and religious communities by malicious and ignorant people looking for someone to blame.
Fortunately, the racist element in our Australian community is small, but they are loud. Racists and bigots don’t care who they attack –Greeks, Italians, Chinese, Vietnamese, Arabs, Muslims, Africans, Irish – have all been the targets of racist abuse and sometimes violence. At the last state election, we saw a racist campaign about “African gangs”, which the Victorian community rightly rejected.
But the oldest form of racism is anti-Semitism, and it is making a comeback, as the militant extreme right seek to exploit the COVID crisis to gain publicity and win recruits. We have seen a wave of anti-Semitic online abuse, and vandalism of Jewish schools, synagogues, and cemeteries, here in Australia, across Europe and the US.
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The COVID crisis is creating new challenges for all of us, but particularly in our multicultural communities. We have seen an outbreaks in a Greek nursing home, in which 45 elderly members of Greek families died; we have seen outbreaks in Muslim schools in western and northern Melbourne; we have seen the impact of COVID on the most vulnerable. Among hard working South Asians, Africans, and other new immigrant communities across the north-west; amongst people who must work four or five jobs to survive.
Most worryingly, we are seeing lower rates of COVID vaccination in some multicultural communities. We all hate repeated lockdowns, but we will not escape from them until we get at least 70 per cent, and 80 per cent, of our population vaccinated. That must include every ethnic, religious and language community.
With as many as 400,000 people of Greek heritage, the Greek community is the largest ethnic community in Victoria. That puts a particular responsibility on all our community leaders to fight against COVID vaccine misinformation and make sure that every eligible Greek Victorian gets vaccinated.
If we don’t want to see racist scapegoating of our community, the Victorian public must see that Greek Victorians are doing our part to reach that vaccination target. And I am heartened to note that the Greek Community of Melbourne, Victoria has announced Vaccine clinics for the community.
That same applies to the other side of my family tree, the Jewish community. Neo-Nazis and other anti-Semites are always waiting for any opportunity to blame the Jews for any misfortune. Last year in the US we saw a politician blame “Jewish space lasers” for bushfires in California. The same thing could easily happen in Australia.
That’s why I have been particularly angry to see examples of some elements of the Jewish community not following the rules about physical distancing and staying at home during this latest lockdown. I have the greatest respect for the Orthodox Jewish community, in which I have many friends. However, they have no right to conduct secret religious services in violation of the rules, any more than do Greek Orthodox Christians, Muslims, or Catholics.
Even worse was the selfishness shown by the 69 people who were caught attending an engagement party in East St Kilda. One thing Jews and Greeks have in common is that we love big family gatherings, particularly for special occasions, like engagements. But there is no excuse for breaking the rules about large gatherings in private homes, when we have the highly infections Delta strain of COVID spreading rapidly in Melbourne.
The people at that party have been heavily fined, and quite rightly so. Jewish community leaders have rightly condemned their behaviour. The party attendees have expressed remorse. However, the wave of anti-Semitic abuse that followed this event has been traumatic for all of us in the Jewish community.
Whether we are of Hindu, Jewish, Buddhist, Christian or Muslim we are suffering the economic, social, and psychological damage caused by prolonged lockdowns. We all miss our friends, family, community, religious events, and life outside the home.
However we all have a civic duty to put the health and welfare of our wider Victorian community before our own interests. Until we can get everyone vaccinated, lockdowns are the only defence against COVID we have. That means following the rules on staying at home, avoiding large gatherings, and wearing a mask when outside. There are no exceptions, for me, for you, or for anyone else.
Philip Dalidakis is a former Australian politician. He was a minister and Labor member of the Victorian Legislative Council, representing the Southern Metropolitan Region from 2014 until 2019.