The following statement was
prepared by a group of Australian women (community workers & academics) in
response to the latest anti-Muslim comments made by the Prime Minister.
They are seeking support from
Australian women & women's organisations to publicly express condemnation
of such bigoted views & the ongoing race baiting of the Muslim Australian
community.
’We are a group of Australian women from diverse ethnic & cultural backgrounds
who stand together in condemning the Prime Minister for the peddling of his
Islamophobic views.
After ten years of playing the race card, the Prime Minister's inflammatory comments
about Muslim Australians this week represent a new low for community relations.
Last week, it was Federal Coalition member Danna Vale demonising Muslim women as
little more than breeders. This week the Prime Minister racially sledges the
Muslim community by singling them out as antagonistic to Australian culture.
Howard is unambiguous in his racialised message when he states:
'It is not a problem that we
have ever faced with other immigrant communities who become easily absorbed by
Australia's mainstream.'
The Prime Minister fails to show
any knowledge of either the history of immigration in Australia or the
experiences of waves of immigrants who have suffered similar racialised views
& assaults by his own ethnic group.
His comments demonstrate both
prejudice & ignorance writ large.
We take particular issue with the
Prime Minister's remark that:
'the Islamic community's
attitudes towards women is out of line with mainstream Australian
society'.
The very same accusation that a
'culture' has 'poor attitudes to women' was used by Anglo settlers in Australia
to attack Aboriginal communities from the earliest days of colonisation. Such
accusations were made against each new group of incoming migrants as a way to
assert superiority, to whip up the fears of the existing population & to
keep control over the latest arrivals.
Extreme attitudes towards women
are not unique to Muslims, or to any other group for that matter. To say so is
playing tawdry politics. Respect for women in both the public & private
sphere has never been high in any society & Anglo Australia is no different.
If the Prime Minister seriously believes traditional Aussie beach culture respects
women, then he needs to revisit the classic Australian text Puberty Blues for a
reality check.
While the Prime Minister publicly
demonstrates his ignorance about history & wilfully whitewashes his own
ethnic group's attitudes towards women, he shows even less knowledge about
Islam. His comments display a serious ignorance of the religion itself & of
the diversity of practices & views of thousands of its followers. The ongoing
Islamophobic views being expressed through the media via politicians like John Howard
directly feed & propel the attacks on the Australian Muslim community: the Cronulla
race riots being the end result.
Where is the Prime Minister's
concern for the countless Muslim Australian women & girls who have been
attacked, abused, spat upon & had their scarves pulled off by mainstream
Anglo Australians? Why doesn't this extreme form of violence against women
& girls warrant his special attention?
Finally, the Prime Minister
asserts that it is his 'right & duty to express his thoughts'.
As Prime Minister of a
multi-racial, multi-faith nation, we believe it is the duty of a Prime Minister
to show political & moral leadership & not to pander to the lowest common
denominators: those being ignorance, fear & prejudice. Sexist &
misogynist views are widespread throughout the entirety of the Australian
population. No one community has a monopoly on poor attitudes to women. It
crosses party lines.
How ironic that these latest
comments coincide with the public release of a Sydney Morning Herald
commissioned poll of voter attitudes that has found that half of voters believe
Australia has become a meaner place in the ten years since John Howard became
Prime Minister.
Is it any wonder with a sledger
for a Prime Minister?
What a legacy!’
Heather Goodall
Christina Ho
Vivi Koutsounadis
If you agree with this statement,
we would like to invite you to endorse the sentiments expressed here by putting
your name and/or your organisation to it.
Please send your details - name
(individual and/or organisation) & relevant contacts details to christina.ho@uts.edu.au
We need to hear from you by 5pm
Sunday 26 February, 2006.
Unambiguous deconstructionism
An explosion shatters the golden dome of one of Iraq's most revered Shiite shrines setting off sectarian fury across Iraq. Mobs take to the streets to chant for revenge and set fire to dozens of Sunni mosques.
President Boosh gives his sympathy to Iraqis for the bombing.
"The United States condemns this cowardly act in the strongest possible terms," Mr. Bush said in Washington. "I ask all Iraqis to exercise restraint in the wake of this tragedy, and to pursue justice in accordance with the laws and constitution of Iraq." He forgot to add: "Restraint like we did when we proudly flaunted international laws and cowardly bombed your country from 30,000 feet, killing and maiming many of your citizens..." He also forgot to mention that the most popular law in Iraq is an eye for an eye, etc...
Most Iraqi leaders attribute the bombing of the Shrine to terrorists bent on exploiting sectarianism. But the leader of Iraq's main Shiite Alliance said Zalmay Khalilzad, the American ambassador, had to be partly blamed when he pointed to death squads operating within Iraq's Shiite-led Interior Ministry. these comments were a provocation.
Muqtada al Sadr placed some blame on the "occupation forces" for the bombing, He called on the new Iraqi Parliament, which includes 32 of his followers, to vote for coalition forces to leave Iraq.
No group claims responsibility, but some Iraqi officials conveniently suspect Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, the jihadist group is responsible for many of the attacks on Shiite civilians and mosques in the past two years.
Samarra, a haven for Sunni "insurgents" until 2004, when American and Iraqi troops carried out a major operation to retake the city (with the Golden Mosque) from guerrilla fighters has been re-infiltrated by insurgents, and American troops in and around the city are now regularly attacked...
Ah, Thank You, Mr Boosh, Mr Johnee, Mr Blur.....for having shown the way to humble rubble... Unambiguous deconstructionism with a dash of corrupt reconstructionism. Jacobinite charity that paves the floors of Hell with many a good deed. But you knew that would happen when launching your crusade for petroleum freedom.
more bushit .....
‘British officials investigating July's
London suicide bombings have received no useful intelligence from detainees
held at the United States military camp at Guantanamo Bay.
Whitehall officials yesterday disputed
suggestions from the US military that interrogation of detainees at the Cuban
camp showed some were in contact with the bombers before the attacks.’
Guantanamo 7/7 link
'nonsense'
migrant history repeats .....
From Waleed Aly’s Opinion
piece published in today’s Australian …..
‘This week, Prime Minister John Howard spoke of "a
fragment" of Muslim Australia that militates against successful
integration because it "is utterly antagonistic to our kind of society".
This, he insisted, is unique in the history of Australian immigration:
"You can't find any equivalent in Italian or Greek or [presumably
non-Muslim] Lebanese or Chinese or Baltic immigration to Australia. There is no
equivalent of raving on about jihad, but that is the major problem."
Welcome
to the doctrine of Muslim exceptionalism. Yet we have seen this all before. The
Greeks, with their mysterious condition, Mediterranean Back, were welfare
bludgers, addicted to the dubious business practices of the cash economy. The
Vietnamese had imported Triad culture's noxious mix of drugs and gang violence.
Before them, Catholics were untrustworthy misfits: their allegiance was
unshakably to Rome, and not to Australia. This was ostensibly a uniquely
Catholic problem for 50 years.’
For those too young to know, those too old to remember or
those who find it more convenient to ignore, please read this article at the
following link.
Migrant
History Repeats
What about the...
Could not agree more...
What about the Irish, the Chinese on the gold fields... And many others who were vilified by the establishment..
Johnnee keeps re-writing history daily to suit the colour of his underpants
a family memory .....
‘When I was at Currabubula (near
Tamworth) in 1937) there was an Indian (Sikh) tobacco grower - turban and
all. In spite of his wonderful friendliness and hospitality towards
visitors (such as Dad and I) the locals resented his presence in the bush
Aussie environment. One night they burnt his shack and tobacco ready for
picking and marched him out of town. No police action that I can recall
and we lived next door to the Police Station.
In 1938 at Spring Hill (near
Orange) at my first morning at the local Public School the son of the local
Methodist Parson fronted up to me in the playground pushing me in the chest and
saying " you don't pray to God, you pray to a dirty old dago in
Rome". I felt justification in giving him some whereupon his dozen
or so mates stepped in forcing me to the ground and kicking the bejasus out of
me.
Upon return to class, battered
and bruised, the Teacher told me that I was a disgrace and he would not have me
in his class room. I had to sit on the balcony till school end for the
day.
My mother got it out of me what
happened and fronted the Teacher who came up with the words still in my mind,
"Mrs Ryan, we have not ever had trouble at this school until your son
started today".
Bigotry, whether religious or
racial is often stirred up in otherwise decent people for reasons of diversion
from reality. I believe that Howard is a master of this trick. The
question is what and why? Ask uncle Sam!
Our security services would have
identified any potential problems in migrants very early in the piece - why no
action the before the "sh*t" hit the fan?
Who threw the first stone?’