The Sun-Herald

Given America is now pretty much broke, and US pop cultural influence somewhat fading...do we really care what they think any more?
Just saying.
I mean when you go to India they think Australia=Kangaroos and Australian cricketers....when you go to China they think...I dunno Lu Kewen and Iron ore?
Maybe we should put that on our coat of arms as well?

• by Ryano on January 17, 2009 at 09:55 PM

You really need to go and live in the UK or Ireland to get an idea of what the native and world view are about and where they meet or conflict.
Aren't the Dingoes on Fraser Island the only pure genetic strain remaining?
Nobody knows or cares about Numbats, Potteroos, Stick Nest Rats or Dingoes.
If we really want to do something about our disappearing species, erosion, weed dispersal, rabbits, foxes, camels and goats...we should get on with it. What people in other countries would think if they knew how much we have already ruined is anyone's guess. But it's our responsibility to deal with it at home.

• by Edward Jones on January 18, 2009 at 06:16 AM

that is the most stupid idea i have ever heard,,what a lot of rot,national icon,how about national pest,do you realise how much damage dogs cause the agricultural industry get a grip

• by s. mccarthy on January 18, 2009 at 06:36 AM

I don't know David ... I may be old fashioned but I still find all this stuff in bad taste. Sure the dngo jokes would be funny if the original story had proved to be a giant hoax or, in a black humour way perhaps, if it had actually turned out to be infanticide. But since a dingo did kill Azaria, it doesn't take a huge leap of imagination to think how I'd feel if my baby's death was treated as an endless comedy opportunity.

• by James Phillips on January 18, 2009 at 07:08 AM

I do believe the original line was "a dingo took my baby", not "the dingo ate my baby" - and it turned out to be the truth, though the baby's mother was wrongfully persecuted for years. There really isn't anything very funny about the entire situation. It's articles like this that keep the stupid joke alive in the first place and further stereotype Australia and its citizens in the eyes of the world.
Worse still, the actress who played the Australian mother who lost her child wasn't even Australian - and sported the worst bunged on Australian accent I've ever heard. Funny that you mention Robert Downey, Jr., another non-Australian playing an Australian character, in your article. Sad trend, wouldn't you say, considering Australia does produce actors who are capable of much more than throwing a shrimp on the barbie and flashing a knife around?
Azaria Chamberlain is dead. Can't we drop that stupid line and all the associated jokes and let her, and her parents, who are still very much alive and live with their pain every day, rest in peace?

• by FT on January 18, 2009 at 09:40 AM

Too right we're not making enough of our National assets!!
Sadly; Mr Dale's blog 'starter' is the usual rather flippant, mildly derogatory and even self-derisive appraisal of 'Australian-ness' that has become fashionable of late.
For two hundred years, there've been blinkered "Euro" minded drones running around this continent with 'minds' that are so totally closed to the possibilities of using Australian native flora and fauna in the ways that the imported 'Euro' products have been.
The missed opportunities in terms of products that harmonise with the land rather than fighting it are vast...
We'd much rather try and grow rice (for instance) in the middle of the driest continent on Earth, 'cause for the majority of "Aussies" doing so makes more sense than using thousands of years of local knowledge to determine crops that'd be much more effective.
The insanity of declaring that we "can't exploit Australian flora and fauna"... whilst we set about denuding the landscape to make it easier to exploit imported European-based 'domestic' crops and stock is something that needs to be redressed - or our Continent's uniqueness will go the way of our supposedly unique 'Aussie' character: i.e. diluted and polluted by the current drive for international homogeneity.
We aren't even legally allowed to keep native animals as pets!
No bloody wonder there's so many members of our culture who have such a 'fear' of things that come from the Aussie 'bush'...
I've encountered enough 'fellow aussies' over the years who are so convinced that the Aussie bush is a place of alien putrescence and unspeakable horrors and nasties; that for them, a nuclear strike against the Aussie bush is totally warranted.
Should the dingo be on the Coat of Arms?
Maybe what should be on the coat of arms is a representation of the morons who live in a land that is so alien and anathema to them, that they'd prefer to change it into a vast and dessicated reflection of a place that they'd feel more at home in. These folks are too limited in mentality to realise that if Australia needs to be turned into a pseudo-Europe or Middle East or Asia for them to be comfortable living in - then they would be better off going back to where they feel most at home rather than blowing resources on making here feel just like there... but oh no; the current crop of bleeding heart apologists for "all things Aussie" expect the rest of us to just bend bloody over to help them.
I'll be glad when it's a dingo that brings the stick to the guy who's painting his house in that ad on tele, rather than some innapropriately shaggy English bloody sheep dog - because it'll be then and only then, that I'll be able to say we've recognised that we don't have to measure ourselves by imposed foreign standards - but we can stand on our own two feet and be proud of our Australian-ness in every possible way.
How bloody long is it going to take for such a simple fact to be recog-bloddy-nised?! We don't need the approval of the U.S. or the Poms or the U-bloody-N or any other nation on the planet to become a nation that has respect for itself and it's uniqueness...

• by Steve C on January 18, 2009 at 10:53 AM

seems all these media people dominate what is people's interest on the idea's of one continent, THERE IS A WHOLE PLANET OUT THERE. with a TOTALLY different and far more creative and intelligent idea, not to mention a much higher regard and respect for the people in contrast to been referred to as Americas bitch/"Johny Howard" another one of Americas street hooker's rolling in the cash.

• by ryan on January 18, 2009 at 11:10 AM

Maybe the poor dingo has been wrongly convicted in a kangaroo court.
There was no final verdict from the Azaria Chamberlain case and not enough proof to decide either way what happened. Dozens of dingos were culled in an effort to find the culprit to no avail.

• by Benny Hill on January 18, 2009 at 01:13 PM

Oocy, I think Tim Flannery puts the Dingo in Australia at around 46,000 years - when the extinction of the megafauna occurred. Not 5,000 years.

• by zopie on January 18, 2009 at 02:47 PM

Given they are just about extinct as a breed, it would seem a bit of a silly thing to do.

• by b on January 18, 2009 at 06:05 PM

"that is the most stupid idea i have ever heard,,what a lot of rot,national icon,how about national pest,do you realise how much damage dogs cause the agricultural industry get a grip"
On the flip side, do you realise how much damage the Ag' Industry wreaks upon our environment.
The Dogs are part of the eco-system, so YOU should learn to work around and , dare I say it, with them.
Kind of pointless even writing this as right now you are probably atop a Cat D9 dragging a ruddy great chain accross some "useless" Malleee.

• by Mike Piastri on January 18, 2009 at 08:41 PM

Geez I dunno about any of this tourism stuff, never having actually met one. But that photo of the dingo on the front page of the Herald is a dead ringer for the star of Wombat Stew!

• by George of Patonga on January 18, 2009 at 10:07 PM

dingo's are feral animals, they might be australia's first feral animal, but they are feral animals

• by jamie martin on January 19, 2009 at 08:20 AM

Hell, they dont even taste good! Keep the roo

• by Martin on January 19, 2009 at 09:33 AM

Rangers at Fraser Island give a comprehensive overview of the Dingo, and argue that the Dingo is not really a dog. Unfortunately, many Dingoes have been culled from Fraser Is, due to the risk of attack. Of course if people taught their children that this native animal is in its own environment and should not be fed, this would seriously lessen the risk. Twelve years after our last visit, we were lucky to see one Dingo, as Dingo-proof fences have been erected. Previously Dingoes roamed happily throughout the island. Incidentally, we owned a part-dingo for 14 years, and she was amazing for her ability to escape from our secure yard and would sometimes return with stolen chooks and guinea pigs (not that we condoned it).

• by Suzan on January 19, 2009 at 10:02 AM

Maybe dingoes can occupy the place in the 'What Makes Australia the Bestest Place in the World Wot to Live In' list that was previously occupied by 'the Australian sense of humour'.
Honestly people, lighten up.
Americans remember 'dingo' because it sounds funny. Like 'kangaroo'. And 'cockatoo'. And Nicole Kidman's English accent.
Just don't tell them about quokkas.

• by darren on January 19, 2009 at 10:38 AM

I believe the first & best resuse of the line was 'Doug Anthony Allstars' who on a show in 90's had a character jump from the shadows to grab a doll being carried by 'Flacco' who turned & said 'a dingo stole my baby' as Ernie Dingo appeared from the shadows!
Tastless but funny & ingenious

• by Chaz on January 19, 2009 at 11:03 AM

Kind of a shame they're not ferrous - then they'd be treated as a national treasure and exported to China.
In the original column, it stated "All this suggests Australia is not making enough of a national asset." based on 5 U.S. references.
I disagree - what this suggests is that American movie and TV writers are too lazy to do any new research and rely on stock laughs from a thin catalog of Australian jokes. Now every one will get confused in the US after George W called Mr Howard "the Man of Steel" and they'll think Australia is "Krypton" (yes I know Superman was born on Krypton and didn't "live" there.....) and there is a another ferrous reference.

• by Gibbo on January 19, 2009 at 12:02 PM

grow up david. there's nothing wrong with the kangaroo and the emu. a thylacine could be OK. you don't believe a dingo took the baby at uluru. have you ever seen a dingo crunch a rabbit? i have.

DD asks: Who said there was anything wrong with kangaroo or emu? Both are delicious, properly cooked.

• by bill bell on January 19, 2009 at 12:53 PM

Given that pure-bred dingoes are just about gone, we might as well put it on a mainland-coat-of-arms (they never reached Tasmania).

That's what the island state of Tasmania did with its native dog-like thylacine.

"You don't know what you've got 'til it's gone / paint paradise and put up a parking lot."

• by Chris on January 19, 2009 at 04:00 PM

As an American who was sent a copy of the column by a local reader who knows I'm interested in such things, I might comment that the line "The dingoes took my baby" is considered funny by many people who DO know that it rises from true events. The movie "Evil Angels" (released here as "A Cry In The Dark"), while only modestly successful at the box office, was a high-profile film and while people who haven't seen it might not know that the events are true, it was common knowledge that Meryll Streep played an Australian woman who claimed that the dingoes had, in fact, taken her baby. The "Seinfeld" episode was the first time I can recall that the situation (with Elaine's patently exaggerated accent) was explicitly played for a laugh. The humo(u)r on "Seinfeld" was OFTEN mean-spirited, and the joke which was targeted to the small audience familiar with the film was picked up as a broad, all-purpose "Aussie" punchline by the much larger audience who watched "Seinfeld." I imagine that most of the subsequent use of the joke is NOT making light of Lindy Chamberlain's tribulations (although it reinforces our view of Australia as a strange, exotic, upside-down land where all SORTS of odd things are likely to happen), but are simply having a laugh at a pretentious, Oscar-baiting film.
One further use of the joke which undercuts this theory, however, can be found in the atlas put out by the writers of The Onion (a satirical newspaper parody), entitled "Our Dumb World." On the page devoted to Australia, a spot is marked on the map with the explanation "Woman here blaming all her failings as a mother on dingoes."
A final note: The bird depicted on the U.S. great seal is not simply an eagle, such as might be seen on sundry European ensignia, but a Bald Eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus), a particularly striking species which is native to North America (and which we likewise hunted nearly to extinction).

• by Fritz on February 06, 2009 at 09:37 AM

You can't put dingoes as an emblem, there not even originally from here. That's right dingoes were originally asian hunting dogs that somehow adapted to the Ozzy desert. So there a nice pet so what? next thing you know we'll have a jack russell as an australian emblem. Besides why would we want to highlight the fact that the chamberlain case is way to acclaimed for such a tragedy, it doesn't exactly paint a striking example of australians.

DD wonders: Well how about an octopus then?

• by Gargoyle on November 03, 2009 at 08:44 PM