We will be treated to another round of the gloom as the year draws to a close and Australia Day comes around. There will be another bout of "Invasion Day" misery casting a pall over what should be celebrations of what we have collectively achieved.

I have no particular affection for the date. My heritage is predominantly Irish with a splash of German. My ancestors didn't come here as colonialists or conquerors. They came to escape poverty and persecution. They wanted a better world for their kids and they were prepared to work hard and take risks to get it. If you were a 47-year-old hat maker in Bremen you were not a young man. Travelling by sea in the late 1800s to an unseen land on the other side of the world would have been a desperate move for you and your family. Australia gave them the chance as it has to hundreds of thousands, probably millions of others to build a better life. To me that is worth celebrating.

The date is not important to me. The achievement is what we celebrate. Being one of the top three immigration countries in the world means we have offered opportunity and a better future to people from all around the world. They are from different nationalities, ethnicities, colours, and religions. We and they are richer for it.

What if we wound back the clock? What if no British, Dutch or French explorers ever set foot here, let alone claimed it. Would that have been better? That there was a very grim side to the settlement of Australia is not in doubt. That story should be told, and clearly. That grim story should not be the whole story, but a part of it. The good story should be told as well.

There's a mistaken impression among many that pointing out badness in the past is particularly helpful and even insightful. It is neither. The reason it's the past is because we have moved on. Both through the work of talented individuals and a somewhat nebulous collective wisdom we have in so many ways found a better path. Now some would-be intellectuals as activists seek to advance their humanity credentials by prattling at us what we already know. The past was not the best way so we found a better one. Hopefully we will all keep doing that.

Across the ditch in New Zealand they have found a new way of rubbishing the past. Funding to a Shakespeare festival of 30 years standing has been cut. It is undoubtedly true that arts bodies need to be cognisant of the rich Indigenous culture and the contribution it can make to the rest of us. That means funding. But to discard Shakespeare, translated (not always perfectly) into a hundred languages because it's "just another part of the Western canon" seems particularly stupid. Tragedy, love, treachery, ambition ... the themes of Shakespeare transcend his ethnicity.

There's a particular in-vogue movement to "decolonise" everything. As if that in some way would add to the sum total of world knowledge. The Western canon now appears a bit on the nose to many in the arts and academia. As with the settlement of Australia I think it is fair to ask of the Western canon "Where would we be without it?"

It is true that the spread of western colonial empires is relatively recent. There's a rich history of global affairs well before then. If the summer break proves to be relaxing I might master a new 1000-page history that should clue me in to the Johnny-come-lately status of the West. However the picture is there for all to see. The rise of the West has brought phenomenal benefit to humanity. People are living longer, starving less, more educated and more connected across the globe. Pointing out only the negative aspects of this development is churlish and shallow.

MORE AMANDA VANSTONE:

Have we eradicated poverty and disease? No. But we have reduced them in a very substantial way. It shouldn't be a news flash but perhaps it should be to today's milieu of complainers. Life is tough.

Mother nature is brutal. Parents and herds abandon the weak, tracking and slaughtering is a daily routine to survive. Human life is tough. Marriages break up, kids are hurt, people are homeless and hungry. Bad people do bad things to others. In large part the hand of cards you are dealt shapes your fate. That's unfair but that's how it is. Hard work will play a part, but only a part. We can aim for the ideal world as we see it but need to accept that it just doesn't exist.

Despite the litany of gloom that surrounds us we do find a way to look for the good things in life. Our lives are enhanced by stories of hard work, determination, heroism and humility. Most of us genuinely want to help make the world a better place.

We can only do that by building a better future. We cannot do it by just rubbishing our past. Rubbishing the past was once the idle past time of a few dilettantes. It is now an industry. We should shut it down. These people add nothing.