Paul Basha is a 19-ish TAFE student filming a 5-8 minute movie for his class. He’s all smiles, attempting to coax conversation out of our awkwardly silent class, while our teacher runs around printing various things off. His friends stand in the corner, filming this interview, and they joke around, relaxed. "Are you a terrorist?" one mockingly asks Paul, who laughs heartily. Oh, and Paul is Lebanese. Don’t worry though, this isn’t going to be another "What is the problem with our Middle Eastern youth?" paranoia-infested article. Quite the opposite, in fact. Paul is filming a movie about his Lebanese family, in an attempt to disprove the prevalent all-Lebs-are-violent stereotype running rampant in Australia’s media.
The stereotype of the aggressive Lebanese gang has been around for a while, long before the Cronulla riots, but it was the riots which really sparked things up. It would be a hot day in July when the newspapers don’t present some story or another about a crime committed by someone of "Middle Eastern appearance." Yet when the perpetrator is Caucasian, his description of race in the papers goes mysteriously missing. There is a problem in many Sydney suburbs, with the Lebanese demographic being worryingly overrepresented in crime, yet the problem, caused by the media, is that this results in people assuming all Lebanese people are out to get you. Which, when you look at people like Paul, is obviously not the case. As he puts it, "There are some who ruin it for the rest of us, who are honest and hardworking." He maintains he and his family are not the "fully sick ones with the doof doof music."
Paul’s grandparents migrated to Australia before the civil war began tearing Lebanon apart. They moved because they wanted a change: "To raise the family in a non-third world country was probably good," says Paul. Paul himself wants one day to visit Lebanon, calling it the "Paris of the Middle East."
"It’s a very picturesque country," he says – but don’t worry, he has his priorities straight, citing the food as a good reason for visiting his grandparents homeland.
Paul believes the stereotyping of Lebanese in the media is due to a bad attitude by the media – they must have a story in their minds before they go out there, he says. A fair point, and somewhat true – journalists are often told their angle before they go to investigate a news item. How many times do you think one has been told, oh, it’s a Lebanese crime, go for that? He also says that his culture is an easy target, especially after the neurosis-inducing riots.
Paul himself has been relatively free from racism growing up – he attended Stannies (St. Stanislaus College) in Bathurst, and says he only ever received anything race orientated from friends, as a joke. Still, sometimes people will ask him where he’s from, and when he replies that he’s Lebanese, the reactions can be starkly different. The majority will be cool with it, but there are the occasional bad apples who will treat him with him a disdainful "oh," and walk away. "Sometimes it’s ok to say you’re Lebanese, but sometimes you’re ashamed," he says. "Most of the time, I’m ok with it." Since he is generation Y, Paul believes he has escaped much of the racism of earlier times. His uncles and grandparents however, received some trouble fitting in in a new country. "Too Aussie to be Lebanese, too Lebanese to be Aussie," Paul says.
His movie is a documentary about his family and Lebanese culture, which he has been working on for about a term. His migrant grandparents will be a particular focus of the movie. "I wanted to do something completely different," says Paul. The movie can be viewed on December 3, 2009 at the TAF Campus on Panorama Avenue, Bathurst, as part of the Bathurst Information, Arts and Technology Showcase.
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