What do you really know about Australia?

[InfiniteSingularity]

The government hates it's people there(more than everywhere else). Don't even let them own .22s from what I hear. With the wildlife they have, I would feel safe with nothing less than an AK-47, .308 sniper rifle, 12 guage shotgun(the animals could fly, you know), grenades, and several people watching my back for when I(somehow) go to sleep.

My reasoning: http://www.cracked.com/funny-163-australia/

This made me laugh

 

[Mister Swift]

6. It was a part of the British Commonwealth until the mid-20th century.
13. During the World Wars, Australian troops fought tenaciously and made great sacrifices.

Australia still is part of the Commonwealth. If you're thinking when we became our own nation, that's 1901.

And the ANZAC's (Australian and New Zealand Army Corp) have some of the most heroic stories I've ever heard. They also have awesome cookies named after them. Go figure.

 

[Eisenfaust]

8. The government tends to lean more conservative than the United States.

except for the completely open stance on prostitution and abortion, which everyone just gets around by not saying anything about them... i suppose we're more "conservative" in the same way as a middle-aged 1950's housewife hiding a sorta scary sex dungeon in the basement...


beyond that, our first prime minister was Sir Edmund Barton, who was a racist bastard (i suppose you could say everyone was in the early 1900's, but saying, loudly, "the doctrine of equality of man was never meant to include racial equality" seems a little bit much)

 

[Count Igor]

Australia is a Death World. 90% of the wildlife has some way to kill you, and REALLY wants to do so.

The other 10% merely want to cripple you for life.

OT: Err. Was a big prison.
You're going to get rid of the monarchy after Elizabeth
You've got an awesome accent, probably the worlds best.
You're the only country that doesn't take racism over the top. (For example, I made a joke about the French, and a guy next to me started shouting at me and went to tell a teacher...)
Yer Hawt.

 

[Bobbity]

Our economy relies almost entirely upon that of China, but our media outlets don't seem to understand that; they try to antagonize the Chinese, and strain relations for the sake of ratings every five minutes.
Also, we have totally unique wildlife - a result of a roughly eighty million years of separation from any other continent, lots and lots of which is deadly. We also had the bright idea of introducing Cane Toads (highly poisonous) a while back, and now we spend tens of millions every year trying to kill them off.
Our uranium deposits are the largest in the world, but we have no commercial or military nuclear programs, and instead sell all of our uranium off.
Our prime minister is a complete idiot. No one likes her, in case you were wondering. She used to be a lawyer. /shiver
Our country is home to this chap called Paul Hogan, and thanks to him and the Simpsons, the rest of the world thinks of us as a nation of bogans (Australian hicks).
What else? What else? Oh yes, we have funny accents and people from the rest of the world get excited when we speak. We're a part of the British Commonwealth, because we haven't got around to seceding yet.
Our proudest military moment came during World War 1, when we were defeated over a long and bloody campaign. Our minds work in funny ways.

 

[trying to hide my account]

I live in New Zealand and I have relatives who live there........so I know lots I guess

 

[RhombusHatesYou]

And the ANZAC's (Australian and New Zealand Army Corp) have some of the most heroic stories I've ever heard. They also have awesome cookies named after them.

BISCUITS. THEY'RE FUCKING ANZAC BISCUITS!

My great grandfather didn't kill a bunch of Turks and Arabs in World War One just so kids today could get culturally polluted to the point they started calling biscuits 'cookies'. No, he did it for shit and giggles because he was a violent, alcoholic German immigrant.

 

[Gnarynhar]

I'm an Aussie that hated Steve Irwin, not for his accent or for his child, but for the fact that the man was a FREAKIN' MORON! You do not go around grabbing wild and deadly animals then commenting on how feisty they are. Of course those animals did the best they could to get away, hurting if possible, some bloody idiot with a camera crew just jumped on them.

As for all our deadly wildlife, you really don't see much in the urban (or semi-urban) areas. There was a brown snake on the oval one at primary school ("Stand back! Brown snake! *whoom* large crowd of kids immediately forms.....) and a pair of Spurwing Plovers (aka Masked Lapwings) nested two years in a row on the same oval and had to have a fence around them for safety reasons.

I did once get to play with a pair of baby wombats at a special event at a local wildlife sanctuary, and they were all cute and friendly, just avoid the adults people- they have huge claws and and the teeth and all in all are stroppy buggers. (But still so cute!)

......We have a lot of cute native animals, just.... don't get too close to most of them.
Oh, and a call out to all the Aussies here- http://www.tassiedevil.com.au/tasdevil.nsf Have you made a donation to save the Tassie Devil yet? (Save the cute native animals that can bite through your arm!)

 

[Trolldor]

And the ANZAC's (Australian and New Zealand Army Corp) have some of the most heroic stories I've ever heard. They also have awesome cookies named after them.

BISCUITS. THEY'RE FUCKING ANZAC BISCUITS!

My great grandfather didn't kill a bunch of Turks and Arabs in World War One just so kids today could get culturally polluted to the point they started calling biscuits 'cookies'. No, he did it for shit and giggles because he was a violent, alcoholic German immigrant.

Like all true Australians he was from overseas.

 

[trophykiller]

The government hates it's people there(more than everywhere else). Don't even let them own .22s from what I hear. With the wildlife they have, I would feel safe with nothing less than an AK-47, .308 sniper rifle, 12 guage shotgun(the animals could fly, you know), grenades, and several people watching my back for when I(somehow) go to sleep.

My reasoning: http://www.cracked.com/funny-163-australia/

This made me laugh

I own many guns, and I don't even feel safe being on the same planet as sydney funnel web spiders. Let's hope they can't get me when I eventually go to live on the moon. Wait a minute, space travelling sydney funnel web spiders? Sounds like something out of the scary thread(capable of giving you just as many nightmares).

I'm sorry for making you think of that, here's some kittens:

Spoiler

Everyone OK now?

 

[RhombusHatesYou]

NEVER attempt an Aussie accent in the presence of an Aussie. No one can do it right (with two exceptions) and rather than taking the 'imitation is the sincerest form of flattery' school of thought most Aussies will assume you're taking the piss and start to get a bit hostile.

Agreed, it's about as offensive as it gets. But who are the two exceptions? I've never done it heard right before, the closest I've ever heard was the Aussie soldier in Halo 2 and even he made a ton of mistakes.

One was a British comedian... he was one of the guys from The Fast Show. The other, and I fucking shit you not, was a Malaysian zookeeper.

 

[RhombusHatesYou]

Like all true Australians he was from overseas.

Fuck oath he was.

Which is why I've never understood the anti-immigration fucksticks. Unless you're an Aboriginal it's the height of fucking hypocrisy to say immigrants shouldn't come here.

 

[Axzarious]

I like how they select their king by fighting kangaroos in kickboxing. Completley Awsome.

 

[Lotet]

about 90% of Australias population lives on the coast so naturally you'd expect us to spend a lot of time in the water which puts us at risk of shark attacks. but the chances of being biten are greatly exagerated, some Australians go for weeks without an attack.

 

[RhombusHatesYou]

Australia, it has the most uranium of all countries in the world and has no nuclear weapons program.

23% of the world's uranium reserves are in Australia.

We had a nuclear program back in the day, a joint program with the UK. Irradiated a big chunk of desert, then the poms decided it was better to buy nukes of the US instead of building their own so they lost interest and the Australian government just lost interest in the whole thing.

Australia was also the 3rd nation to put a object into orbit. Lost interest in that as well.

We had all the know-how and materials to become a first tier nuclear armed state but, you know... effort.

 

[rabidmidget]

Adam Hills is one of my favorite comedians, so Oz is cool by me.

Plus an Aussie mate of mine grew up near this little town in the outback where a load of people ended up on smack, and in a rare show of liberalism the local government effectively stopped enforcing laws against softer drugs like dope and psychedelics in order to curb this problem. It worked. Kinda. Now it's full of hippie types, has an annual joint-rolling festival and the police station has an elaborate hallucinogenic mural on the front that they can't be bothered to take down. Sounds like fun.

I think the town you are referring to is called "Nimbin", it's pretty much filled with pot-smoking hippies.

 

[Sproingy]

Everyone inevitably mentions the Sydney Funnell Web. If you don't want to meet it don't go to Sydney...seriously though we've had funnell webs in our garage (we currently have a red back problem there) they've popped up around our yard as far back as I remember. I have never been bitten. They tend to stick to their webs (LOL) I'm not an idiot and don't stick my hands in the webs. As long as you check shoes and you pay attention to where webs pop up and spray often you're not gonna be hassled by our spiders...

I've been attacked by a Wombat and chased by a Kangaroo though. Nothing too scary you just run like hell and hope there's a tree or a car you can hide in before they get you. Both were when camping and we'd mistakenly camped near an animal trail so i don't blame them...

Also Cassowary FTW!!

 

[GrizzlerBorno]

I heard of that event some time ago when the Australian Navy dragged a captured Korean Drug running ship, out into the middle of the pacific........and subsequently bombed it with B-1B Lancer's armed with JDAMs.
On LIVE Television, no less! (as a warning to Drug-cartels trying to get drugs into the country)
That made me fall in love with Australia.

Also, Street sharks.

What else do i NEED to know!

 

[RhombusHatesYou]

Plus an Aussie mate of mine grew up near this little town in the outback where a load of people ended up on smack, and in a rare show of liberalism the local government effectively stopped enforcing laws against softer drugs like dope and psychedelics in order to curb this problem. It worked. Kinda. Now it's full of hippie types, has an annual joint-rolling festival and the police station has an elaborate hallucinogenic mural on the front that they can't be bothered to take down. Sounds like fun.

Nimbin was a hippy haven since the early 70s... the smack problem they had was in the 90s and had mostly to do with the 'feral' movement (weird combination of enviromentalism and punk stuff).