The Australian record of violent protest generally concerns tangible social issues. Religious issues are neither tangible or even existential, concerning as they do non-existent entities. Violence concerning these matters are worrisome regardless of the level of that violence, in that reconciliation is logically impossible.

While the violence in Sydney may have been 'over-exaggerated,' the incitement to violence, killing by beheading, is deeply disturbing, reasonably receiving a lot of attention and, i would have thought, prosecution.

If it doesn't rate, it does worry!
It's a sign of deeply held resentment by young radical Muslim males, against something or someone, and a cancer that needs to be excised before it becomes malignant and spreads!
It's also a sign of massive levels of blame shifting!
Blame shifting that allows people not born yet, to carry the can for the "sins" of forbears or ethnicity?
Meaning, for the intellectually challenged, a few rioting Muslims, means all Muslims must be the same, or just as illogical in directing their also often mindless anger?
Were there no issue to rail against, these thugs and brutes, with this fundamental flaw or inability to think or reason for themselves, would invent one?
Just so they can express their mindless rage!
The shock jocks have got a lot to answer for, be it a spittle flecked hate-filled sermon/evocation, pounded out from the pulpit or over the airwaves!
The end result and mindless radicalisation is invariably one and the same?
Yes, there are issues and any amount of inequity throughout our social structure!
But we should be using the brains we were born with, to seek to solve these and other issues, in a truly just and fair-minded way, rather than simply amplify them, to whip up some political or socialistic outcome or agenda?
We've had Muslims in our midst, since we started exploring and opening up the arid interior, using Afghans and their camels to run freight lines.
Their great great grandchildren can sit beside you at the footy, munching a meat pie, or a lamb burger, washed down with a beer and exhorting greater effort from their favourite, in typical strine!
They would be just as disturbed as any other fair dinkum Aussie, at the recent mindless display in Sydney.
As already noted, given it was just a few hundred, and our Muslim neighbours number around half a million; therefore, hardly representative.
A bit of an overblown storm in a teacup, and seized on by another intellectually challenged minority element, as an excuse to give vent to equally despicable xenophobia or blood-lust!
Rhrosty.

The author says this:

"While we are Christian based and a liberal democratic society those Muslim communities have adapted over time and have tended to accept our over-riding culture while maintaining their religious practice."

That is unreasonable optimism; demands for sharia are strident:

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/features/full-bred-aussie-with-a-longing-for-sharia-law/story-e6frg6z6-1225991941740

And soothing:

http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/2718918.html#comments

Generally, the author's comparison with other examples of violent protest in Australia's past is inadequate because the reasons for those protests are completely different from the muslim protests; if you view the islamic protests as being part of a wider world view, as Tabbaa has conceded on another thread, then their importance takes on a far more urgent context.

Just because we have had no deaths from islamic activity in this nation yet is not a cause for complacency.

Rhrosty:

"The shock jocks have got a lot to answer for, be it a spittle flecked hate-filled sermon/evocation, pounded out from the pulpit or over the airwaves!"

Have a bex mate, and a good lie down.

The lesson of history is to look at incidents in their networked CONTEXTS.

German goons storming the Rhineland. No worries – only an incident. Sudetenland. A blip. Austria. None of our business. Their holy texts promised to expunge freedom all over the world in a thousand year caliphate – er, sorry, Reich. Full of whining about Germany being hard done by. But no, the likes of Winston Churchill, then warning everyone from the back bench, were dismissed as hate filled xenophobes. The thing was to apologise, again and again. To walk on eggshells. Next step Poland and Mein Kampf didn’t look so funny after all.

And now? All of a sudden a worldwide Moslem howl of rage focused on disrespect from us kafirs for their “prophet”, and far from the first time (Salman Rushdie, Danish cartoons etc etc). That’s context. And Martin Place was part of it with its overt calls to murder dissenters who insult their “prophet”. Nothing remotely like kerfuffles on the wharves. The jihad didn’t end when the imams shushed the protesters. They’re still around, deeply entrenched and widely connected.

Sound advice from President Truman: when a finger comes under the door jump on it or it’s followed by a hand clawing for your throat.

The Legal Affairs section of today's 'Australian' reports a call by the former head of the Islamic Council of Victoria, Hyder Gulam for the introduction of sharia law in Australia. Mr Gulam characterises this as 'legal plualism' and argues that it is a hallmark of a mature system of law.

This is exactly the sort of arogance that underlies the violence in Sydney and elsewhere around the world. It's the wilful blindness of those calling for the UN to adopt a universal law against blasphemy.

Those who choose to migrate to Australia or to any other country enter into an unspoken but still binding contract to abide by the laws, the institutions and values of that country. If Muslims want to be trusted by the Australia that has welcomed them and given them a chance for a new start in life, then, while they may practise their religion as freely as may any other Australian religious believers, they will do so within the framework and values of Australian democracy and Australian law.

Australians are also entitled to expect that Muslims will express respect and support for Australian democracy and for Australian law. To call constantly for the introduction of sharia law is to thumb your nose at the country that shelters you.