"It's Australian to do such things because, however uncivilised they may seem, it's human to do them"
About this Quote
Hugh Mackay is a patient observer of how Australians talk about themselves, and his line cuts through the mythology. When people label certain behaviors as distinctively Australian, especially the rough, cheeky, or rowdy ones, they are usually pointing to habits that spring from universal human motives. The tension lives in the word uncivilised. It hints at a gap between our polished ideals and the unruly pressures of human nature: the need to belong, to show loyalty to the tribe, to blow off steam, to resist pretension, to test boundaries. Australians often wrap these impulses in the folklore of the larrikin, mateship, and a fair go; Mackay reminds us they are not uniquely antipodean.
That reframing serves two purposes. It punctures both national exceptionalism and national self-loathing. We are not special because we sometimes act roughly, and we are not especially bad when we do. We are human. Civility, then, is not a natural default but a cultural discipline layered over primal drives. Seeing it this way does not excuse harmful conduct; it makes responsibility clearer. Instead of dismissing lapses as just who we are, or condemning them as proof of national decay, we can design better norms, rituals, and institutions to channel those impulses. Loyalty can widen from mateship to hospitality; irreverence can become satire instead of cruelty; rivalry can harden into fair play rather than spite.
Mackay’s social research often exposes this paradox: identity stories work best when they admit our common humanity. The more a community owns the human engine beneath civility, the more deliberately it can cultivate the virtues it prizes. What reads as a comment on Australian character is, finally, a call to maturity. Name the impulse, understand it, and then choose the civilized response not as denial of our nature, but as a wiser expression of it.
That reframing serves two purposes. It punctures both national exceptionalism and national self-loathing. We are not special because we sometimes act roughly, and we are not especially bad when we do. We are human. Civility, then, is not a natural default but a cultural discipline layered over primal drives. Seeing it this way does not excuse harmful conduct; it makes responsibility clearer. Instead of dismissing lapses as just who we are, or condemning them as proof of national decay, we can design better norms, rituals, and institutions to channel those impulses. Loyalty can widen from mateship to hospitality; irreverence can become satire instead of cruelty; rivalry can harden into fair play rather than spite.
Mackay’s social research often exposes this paradox: identity stories work best when they admit our common humanity. The more a community owns the human engine beneath civility, the more deliberately it can cultivate the virtues it prizes. What reads as a comment on Australian character is, finally, a call to maturity. Name the impulse, understand it, and then choose the civilized response not as denial of our nature, but as a wiser expression of it.
Quote Details
| Topic | Ethics & Morality |
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