"It is quite time that our children were taught a little more about their country, for shame's sake"
About this Quote
Lawson lands the jab with that deceptively polite opener: "It is quite time..". The phrase sounds like a schoolmaster clearing his throat, but it’s really a warning shot. He isn’t asking for a curriculum tweak; he’s indicting a culture that’s let ignorance become respectable. The kicker is the moral clause at the end - "for shame's sake" - which turns civic education into an ethical obligation. Not knowing your country isn’t just unfortunate, it’s embarrassing.
The intent sits squarely in Lawson’s nationalist, anti-bullshit tradition: Australia can’t keep importing its self-image from elsewhere (especially Britain) and still pretend to be growing up. Lawson wrote at a moment when the nation was trying to narrate itself into coherence - Federation-era pride, class tension, bush myth-making, and an unease about who counted as "Australian". In that climate, "taught a little more" reads as strategic understatement. He’s not advocating chest-thumping patriotism; he’s pushing for literacy about the lived country: its labor, its distances, its failures, its people.
Subtext: the adults are the real students. If children don’t know their country, it’s because institutions - schools, press, politicians - prefer sentimental legends or imperial trivia over inconvenient realities. Lawson’s shame isn’t sentimental; it’s disciplinary. He uses embarrassment as leverage, implying that a nation that can’t teach itself honestly will keep mistaking myth for maturity.
The intent sits squarely in Lawson’s nationalist, anti-bullshit tradition: Australia can’t keep importing its self-image from elsewhere (especially Britain) and still pretend to be growing up. Lawson wrote at a moment when the nation was trying to narrate itself into coherence - Federation-era pride, class tension, bush myth-making, and an unease about who counted as "Australian". In that climate, "taught a little more" reads as strategic understatement. He’s not advocating chest-thumping patriotism; he’s pushing for literacy about the lived country: its labor, its distances, its failures, its people.
Subtext: the adults are the real students. If children don’t know their country, it’s because institutions - schools, press, politicians - prefer sentimental legends or imperial trivia over inconvenient realities. Lawson’s shame isn’t sentimental; it’s disciplinary. He uses embarrassment as leverage, implying that a nation that can’t teach itself honestly will keep mistaking myth for maturity.
Quote Details
| Topic | Teaching |
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