83 Ms Cherian also gave evidence of her experiences of racism in Australia. Those include experiences as a young member of the cast of the iconic Australian television series Neighbours – there was racist backlash to the idea of people of Indian background living on the show's "Ramsay Street." That included being told that she and her fellow cast members of Indian heritage should go back to where they came from and that the show should only feature "real Australians." Such sentiments caused Ms Cherian to question whether she did in fact belong in Australia or had a right to be cast in Neighbours. She also started to hate her race and hate that part of her that is Indian. She recalls not liking her skin and not feeling comfortable in it.
Daniel Jacob Levy
84 Daniel Jacob Levy is a student. He was born in Australia in 1989. He identifies as being culturally Jewish, although he does not practice the Jewish faith. Mr Levy also identifies as a person with migrant heritage because his four grandparents were born in Lithuania, Poland, Germany and Latvia before migrating to Australia. They fled Europe before and after World War II as Holocaust survivors.
85 Mr Levy saw Senator Hanson's tweet on 9 September 2022 on his personal Twitter account. Mr Levy understood the tweet to be telling Senator Faruqi to go back to where she came from, and that it conveyed the notion that if someone from a migrant background does not like living in Australia (because, for example, they have criticised certain aspects of Australian life, politics or history) then they should leave Australia. He understood the phrase "piss off back to Pakistan" to convey the same message as, to him, the common racist phrase "fuck off, we're full."
86 Mr Levy said that he felt offended, insulted, humiliated and intimidated by Senator Hanson's tweet. He felt that the words used by Senator Hanson were xenophobic, and he is deeply offended by xenophobia. He believes that the sentiments conveyed by Senator Hanson in her tweet are the same as have previously been used against Jewish people. Because of that, even though the tweet was not directed at him, he felt personally insulted by it because he is Jewish.
87 Mr Levy said that his strongest reaction to the tweet was that he felt intimidated. That is because the tweet evoked a deep sense of intergenerational trauma that he believes that he suffers from as a result of being a descendant of Holocaust survivors. The intimidation was heightened because of Senator Hanson's position of political leadership and because Senator Faruqi is part of a racial minority in Australia.
