What decides nationality? Nativity or Photo Identification?

Fundamentalists claim that I am not Australian because I am not born here. I shout from the rooftop declaring that I am. Although frustrated, I am sympathetic towards those who flaunt their ignorance. Few seconds of labour could bring them from the darkness of benightedness to the light of wisdom. Gone are the days when the ignoramus had to spend meticulous hours immersed in books trying to enlighten themselves in one of the unfrequented corners of the library. In this digital age, with the click of a switch and slight pressure on the power button of the throbbing machine, we are able to clarify all kinds of doubts or illusions that plague us relentlessly.  Why would the ultraconservative then choose to labour under ignus fatuus?

As the bone of contention is about nationality status, I satisfied my curiosity by perusing the varied definitions of nationality offered by dictionaries and other reliable sources of information. Some interesting connotations that I stumbled on were “official right to belong to a particular country”, “legal relationship between an individual and the state or country” and this also implies protection of the individual’s rights, property etc., by the country. The widely accepted meaning of nationality is a person belonging to a place by birth. Citizenship, on the other hand, is granted by the government once the legal formalities are fulfilled. Even though there is a notable difference between the two, a citizen acquires the nationality status through citizenship and hence it becomes mandatory to record the place of birth besides the acquired nationality as in passports. If we take the aforementioned definitions into consideration, then people who are born here and citizens, both have the official right to belong to a country and both have a functioning legal relationship with the country. 

I am not only beautiful in my mind but am also bold to assertively state that I am an Australian and you cannot do a damn about it. Dare not challenge me, for I am armed with substantiated evidence. See for yourself. Apologies for presenting a distorted face, for the post office where I had the photo taken, had a machine that, as stated by Carl Barron (Australian stand-up comedian), made me look like a dickhead. Unfortunately, as pointed out by Stephen Leacock in his essay ‘With the Photographer’ it is my face, ” I’ve lived with it for forty ( +four) years and I know its faults. I know it’s out of drawing. I know it wasn’t made for me, but it’s my face, the only one I have–”  Before I prove my argument, I would like to share my observation that even a selfie taken with a mobile phone did not look deformed as my passport photo.