viking13 - The only real Australians are the indigenous people. One in 4 Australians were born overseas - we're all boat or plane people? HOw did you come here,and why should your nationality take precedence. I find it quite annoying to listen to people criticising our intake of asylum seekers, and it's obvious that english is their second language. My family is made up of people from 16 different countries, which has given us a wide experience of peoples and languages and cultures. There were at least 23 nationalities on the first fleet. So what is our 'Australian-ess'?
Pip is not condoning the fundamentalists or war lords in the Middle eastern countries that are committing atrocities against women, nor is she condoning men in this country who do the same - many of them are not from the ME and have english as their first language. It's the right to wear what you wish that she supports I believe, as I do!

Liz45 writes

'The only real Australians are the indigenous people. ' Really! Then what are you doing here? Why don't you go home wherever that might be.

Dear Liz,
A catastropic natural disaster in Papua has killed hundreds and displaced tens of thousands of people, many of whom live 'traditional' lifestyles.

Australia, being a good neighbour and recognising GENUINE need offers to take five thousand survivors.

When the new arrivals reach Australia they spend time being processed and learning about their new surrounds. They observe the dress and customs of their new environment and are provided with western clothing. However many of these people are uncomfortable with the change and very resistant to any cultural restraints.

So Liz - do you defend to the death the RIGHT of these people to go about in public dressed in little more than a penis sheath or grass skirt and various bodily ornaments consisting mainly of bits of deceased bird and plant material? What about the traditional weapons the men carry? It's their culture. Do we have the right to insist they adapt to Australian mores?

I think we know the answer.

So how different is it that the average Australian wants to see a ban on clothing that completely obliterates the identity of the wearer? I've said it several times before in this forum: the burqa is NOT a religious garment. It 'protects' the wearer from public view and the gaze of every person outside the wearers immediate family. The male members of such cultures believe that to show her face outside of these constraints brings DISHONOUR to the family/tribe. Female children are taught that they are and always will be under the rule of MAN - first father, then husband and in absence of either another male relative and must obey his commands. That, dear reader is the CULTURE, not religion.

How big a compromise if the 'walking tents' were to adjust their garb to reveal just their faces? That's all most of us want - an identifiable PERSON. It's our country, our culture and we have a right to reject what isn't acceptable here.

"The only real Australians are the indigenous people."

Really, and this has what to do with burqas, exactly? Did your indigenous friends form a nation, or were they a disparate group of tribes (who came here by boat, I might add)? If you think "precedence" is important, you might tell the Turks to leave Turkey- they from come a long way east of the modern country.

"One in 4 Australians were born overseas"

Speaks volumes for an overheated immigrant intake, doesn't it? especially with those who show utter contempt for Australia and its values.

"we're all boat or plane people? HOw did you come here,and why should your nationality take precedence".

I came here out of my mother's birth canal. You? Flying saucer?

"I find it quite annoying to listen to people criticising our intake of asylum seekers, and it's obvious that english is their second language."

I find it a lot more than "annoying" to have "refugees" from immiscible cultures come here and demand that our culture change to suit them, while sponging off taxpayers like myself for years.

"My family..." Bully for you. As my name suggests, I'm of Scandinavian descent (as are most English people). My wife is Asian, from a fascinating culture, doesn't mean I want Australia to become like them.

" So what is our 'Australian-ess'?" Dunno, you tell us, would you prefer we all went Somali?

Daniel Pipes provides a long list of incidents in which burqas were used to aid criminals and terrorists:

"Niqabs and Burqas as Security Threats"
http://www.danielpipes.org/blog/2006/11/niqabs-and-burqas-as-security-threats

Niqabs and burqas are a self-evident security threat.

Niqabs and burqas are a political statement when worn in Western countries.

Nevertheless, women who wear niqabs or burqas are entitled to exercise their freedom of choice.

That choice should be, remove the bedouin bedsheet or go back to the Middle East.

Now you're just being silly.The reality is, that aboriginal people were occupying this country for at least 40,000 up to 200,000 years in some areas. My ancestors were of Irish descent; I'm a third generation Australian, but I don't OWN this country - I live here. I reject the anglo-saxon so called values of the catholic church that physically and/or sexually abused kids at school, in their homes and in other places where they should've been safe. I don't recall anytime in my life, when there's been the same sort of hysteria over the 'funny clothes' the nuns and priests wore/wear. I say this to emphasize the zenophobic and irrational nonsense over the people from the middle east and the burqa? Why didn't people rise up over kids who as adults are shadows of humanity, non-trusting and traumatised? I put it to you who carry on about my former post to reflect on this. Even now as we speak the catholic church is still acting in a manner of at best denial, and at worst, castigating the abused and destroying their lives, while they insist on protecting the perpetrators. How has wearing the burqa in Australia brought about anything resembling these horrors?
I do not find a woman wearing a burqa confronting. I'd support her if she was forced to wear it; I'd support her if it was her personal choice. That's what living in a democracy is supposed to be about. If people really want a 'hobby horse' to get angry about, do some research about the ango-saxon repugnant human beings who are still being protected!