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Dear ALGOREisRICH,

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I wrote "thread" not "web". Four fibres intimately woven into one, very thick thread. The fibres are: national law, Shariah, traditional culture,religion.

The Islamic flock is incapable of distinguishing the individual fibres that compose the thread. They see no difference. Possibly because there is no difference, or so little.

As previously stated, imposing a burqa ban is like chopping the thread with an axe.

It can hardly be called laser precision and we might chop our foot off at the same time.

A finer analysis of the problem would seem more appropriate.

Muslim is the generic term for six different obediences: Sunni, Shia, Sufi, Salafi, Ismaili and Druze. Each has its own beliefs,cultures and practices.

Compared to the 38,000 different Christian denominations in the world, it should not be difficult to identify the differences and narrow our focus to the few that pose problem.

The Arabic Peninsular, where both Islam and Muslim fundamentalism were born, is still very much a mixture of sedentary populations and nomadic tribes. We need to understand the historical, cultural and political factors that determine the mentalities of these people.

Knowledge and understanding are powerful tools. If our Australian law, culture and religion are so much better than those of the Muslim world, we should not have too much difficulty devising a strategy to convince our Muslim friends that they are, effectively, so much better, beyond all reasonable doubt.

Hopefully, we could all learn something from the effort and work out a satisfactory modus operandi that allows us all to live together intelligently.

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Banjo Paterson,

Do all the "finer analysis of the problem" you like. Don't forget to figure out just whose "problem" it is, theirs or yours.

Any findings of this "analysis" might be of interest to social services, health workers, and Muslim-Christian friendship organisations.

Just don't imagine that creating custom-made criminal offences is a suitable solution to every social issue that you happen to think would improve Australian society.

Believe it or not, society does have other less coercive ways of empowering citizens to make their own personal choices.

federalist, "Believe it or not, society does have other less coercive ways of empowering citizens to make their own personal choices."

Which is why the push is on from Islamic fundamentalists, men and women, to legitimise and shore up the fashion and the cultural practises linked with it by obtaining lasting concessions for wearers of the burqa and niqab.

Harmful cultural traditions that have been imported do not wilt of their own accord, in fact there is evidence that the opposite can easily happen, that such traditions become even more rigid in the adopted country. Two examples are kidnap marriage and honour killing, which are imports and have existed in Australia for many years.

It is irresponsible of authorities if known harmful cultural practices are not discouraged from the start, although it would be rarely be necessary to invoke new laws for that purpose.

For health and body image reasons alone these fashions should be discouraged from ever being passed on to young women.

One of the sad things about the niqab and burqa is that you cannot ever use the useful come-on line"Excuse me.Where have i seen you before?"

socratease

All of you with your "first it's burqas, next it's an Islamist state" paranoia, why don't you try reading back your own posts, substituting "Jews" for "Muslims". See if it reminds you of anything.

federalist,

The liberals you insult with your personal attack in lieu of facts are in good company with Professor Richard Dawkins.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1301750/Fury-Richard-Dawkinss-burka-jibe-atheist-tells-revulsion-Muslim-dress.html#ixzz0y8aLw9dS