DEAR News Of The Area,

I share an optimistic outlook voiced in the opinion article ‘Undermining hope in society’ published 10 January 2025.

I too hold hope and faith in this country and its citizens, I too live in the most beautiful part of the best nation in the world, and I too believe in the shared values (and prosperity) of this community.

However, unlike the fallacious narrative in the article which is ambiguous and attempts to create a ‘myth’ of its own, I also acknowledge that hope is only an expectation of positive outcomes in relation to circumstances based around one’s own situation.

Optimism without realism is idealism.

I too live in ‘the lucky country’ but again this is a fallacy that fits directly into the current woke elitist movement that strives to hoodwink the greater population in its idealistic pursuit of unachievable ambitions.

Donald Horne who coined the expression in his book published in 1964 writes “Australia is a lucky country run by mainly second-rate people who share its luck” and goes on to state that “most of its leaders so lack curiosity about the events that surround them that they are often taken by surprise”.

In decades following his book’s publication he commented, “I have had to sit through the most appalling rubbish as successive generations misapplied this phrase”.

An outside commentator remarked that the book was like “a bucket of cold saltwater emptied onto the belly of a dreaming sunbather”.

The misconception of Australia’s luck hasn’t changed.

If the author of the referenced opinion piece truly wants to call out the ‘myth makers’ and recognise truth from fantasy, then they should start with the current standing political leadership that is leading us down a rabbit hole of economic hardship and national insecurity.

Australia has never been more socially divided than it is today and as the problems of the wider world inch closer to our shores and onto our streets, eventually luck will run out.

Regards,
Adam FULLER,
Mid North Coast.