Australia doesn’t really exist, it was the name of a fictional continent invented by Plato, but it was allegorical, an imagined country that had unbridled growth until it engulfed an entire continent. The giant sharks, giant pythons, spiders, huge flies, poisonous centipedes, wallabies, flying foxes, dingoes, giant crocodiles, it was all just a metaphor for the horrors of a big government growing out of control.
Despite its completely metaphorical nature in Plato’s work, it has maintained itself in the public imagination for centuries, having considerable impact on literature, art, music, and especially film makers and Internet tricksters. Because of this, many people have come to believe it is a real place, but that is only due to the tendency for gullible people to literalize legends, metaphor, and myth, causing them to engage in pseudoscientific speculation and fantasy. If you investigate it seriously, you find that nobody is really from Australia, but many people claim to “know a guy” or “have a friend” that either visited or lived there, but nobody has actually been there themselves. Over the years it’s become one of the most popular forms of modern folklore, having its existence in urban legends, wives tales, and “put ons” for gullible people’s benefit, much like the legendary Snipe, Jackalope, and Big Foot. Today the so called “existence” of Australia is all in good fun and most people are glad to “play along” with a nod and a wink.
