Letter to The Editor - Australia should have opened its arms to white South African farmers

To The Age        Jacqueline Maley is insensitive in claiming that "the idea of white persecution is not worth debating on its merits." ("Close window on prejudice", 19/3). I would have thought it is obvious that under black majority rule whites in South Africa have been wickedly and cruelly persecuted. Count the number of deaths and cases of brutal torture, to say nothing of property confiscations without compensation. There is hypocrisy in a world where in the recent past huge influence was brought to bear against the white minorities in southern Africa on the grounds of alleged unjust treatment of blacks, but almost no effort is made today to protect those minorities from unjust treatment by black triumphalists. Australia should have opened its arms to white South African farmers for ethical reasons based on extended family. Care for one's own ethnic group does not necessarily mean "hatred and fear of non-white people". And honesty is even more important than civility in our public debate.
  Nigel Jackson, Belgrave, Vic