Every cultural group has a mixture of people in it: people who are well, people who are not, people who are thriving and those that are struggling. People whose mental health is good and those who wish it was. And in every group there are those who feel empowered and live a healthy well balanced life and those who feel so disempowered that they choose to adopt the kind of extreme ideology that causes unforgivable harm.

No one cultural group has all the good people in it and no one cultural group has all the bad people in it.

In Italy, my country of birth the Mafia are an extreme group that cause immense harm globally.

In many countries of the world including Australia Nazi groups cause extreme harm.

The Taliban in parts of the world cause extreme harm.

Zionism causes extreme harm.

No one group has all the bad people in it and no one group can claim it has all the good people. Racism is a narrative that tries to convince us that there exist cultural groups where every single individual in it is bad and that lie causes extreme harm.

I would not want to be judged by the actions of the Mafia and expect my Muslim friends not to be judged by the actions of extremists in their culture. I would never say ‘there are no good Australians’ as you would never say ‘there are no good Italians’.

I love the diversity of cultures in Australia. I know that skin colour does not determine extremism: do we need to reflect on the Port Arthur or Christchurch Mosque events to remind ourselves that no single cultural group can claim to be better than another?

Australia please don’t let racism cause unrestrained harm.

Below international visitors and locals at ORTO farm: Taiwan, Sweden, Australia, Japan, Latin America, China, Daylesford.