BOAZ_David, all you are really doing is downplaying the existence of culturally prescribed and equally horrendous acts of violence against women in White Western communities. Don't descend into illusions of false virtue, Christians are equally as violent.

kactuz writes... "They talk of peace and tolerance, and then kill and oppress. Look at Muslim societies."

kactuz, look at what's going on in New Orleans; rape, gang war, looting, shooting; at civilians and government personel etc. Did we get the same reports from Indonesia during the Tsunami disaster where 80% of the population is Muslim?

ISSAN
in order to respond meaningfully to your post I need to make reference to a couple of key words in it. "painting with a broad brush".

On that point, I'm not sure, but I suspect you are understanding my attack on the fundamental roots of Islam as meaning something of the order "Paint them black and send them back" to coin a phrase used here. Or.. 'all muslims are evil and bad'....

That has not been my contention, please re-examine my 'actual' contention and then we can proceed. I'm arguing that a knowledgable Muslim, (such as the author) who is aware of the behavior of the founder, must rationalise or justify some very awful acts, which I listed.

The 'average cultural muslim' who was simply born into the faith/tradition is on the surface no better or worse than you and I.... until... the pressure is applied against their faith, just as you are seeing a 'wasp' reaction to a percieved attack against the prevailing culture of Australia which is Anglo/Eurpean.
Pressure doesn't really change people, like money and power, it just shows what we are really like.

In psychological terms, this is the point where all people look back to their foundations, roots, scriptures, constitution etc. They seek comfort and support.

Now that, is the point which is critical in terms of social compatability and cohesian. When 2 groups find they are diametrically opposed, and become increasingly entrenched, it fuels disharmony which leads to aggression.

The only solution to this is pro-active government policy to minimise the likelihood.

You should be able to grapple with this without 'stonewalling' your opponent.

Xena... bless u .. defender of those who would regard you as "slut, trash,evil" because of your own public confession(here) of bisexuality. At least your a good 'aussie' in the sense of defending the underdog, but beware mate... the dog on the bottom also has teeth, which may end up biting 'you'.

Waleed, I must question the wisdom of selecting migrants from countries who don't have any understanding of our history or how we in Australia try to live up to the ideals of a democracy.

Our traditional allies are countries that are located in the West and we are more likely to side with those countries should hostilities demand it. Therefore, we are more likely to take action in Afghanistan fighting with the USA. It is most unlikely that we will fight alongside Afghanistan against the USA.

If I enter a mosque I will be required to remove my shoes. They are the rules I am asked to respect them even if I disagree. When people try and arrive here unlawfully they will go into a detention. That is a rule of ours which people should respect. By the way, people other than muslims are in our detention centres.

The dog wags the tail. The tail doesn't wag the dog.

Part 1
Kenny, spendocrat (keep on wincing, or is that mincing?), plantagenet (he's confident!), strayan ( he believes.....in over-complicated, pretentious tosser-speak), ranier (you seem to have developed the bad habit of cultural self-loathing) and Shoshana (wrapped in a mantle of righteousness).
[Deleted for being merely abusive.]
Taqiyya and smokescreens from the man who brought us the 2 Dannys (who fled here from Pakistan because of persecution by Muslims, only to have state sanctioned persecution by Muslims here) debacle and Salam Cafe ( here's a tip Waleed - try to stop everyone talking at once - and at least make an attempt to be interesting).
Waleed Ali displays the usual "we are the victims" mentality with "... forged by a series of negative images: Tampa, the mandatory detention of asylum seekers, ASIO raids that led to no arrests, draconian anti-terror legislation and wars with Afghanistan and Iraq." Draconian? I wonder what word he uses to describe stoning, public beheading, FGM, real torture, ie - teeth-pulling, electrodes in the eye of one's dick, amputation, eye-gouging etc.
The people most stressed out by the July 7 mass murder attacks in Britain?- Muslim Londoners. "We are the victims" strategy again.
"....featuring a mind-boggling number of different cultures and languages." Is this what we want for Australia?
Make it as complicated as possible and turn a vibrant culture into a mad scientist's nightmare? Mix lots of conflicting cultures and tribalism together and see what happens?-- Lebanon and the Balkans is what happens.
"...the Afghan cameleers who built so much of this country"- What a load of bollocks! Once again we have a Muslim re-writing history.... CONT. NEXT POST.

Part 2
".... the Muslim community is a vital ally, and a source of intelligence, in this struggle...... Muslims have demonstrated this repeatedly." - ASIO raids that led to no arrests? What we need is ASIO raids that lead to bulk arrests.
And why isn't John Howard having meetings with Buddhist, Atheist, Hindu, Christian or Jewish "leaders"?
Because none of them are grievance-mongers and have terror cells, hate speeches in mosques, religiously sanctioned deception, raping, murder of critics and apostates, bombings, honor-killings, FGM, forced marriages, discrimination against non-Muslims, calls for sharia law and global caliphate, drug-rings etc etc in nearly every country on this planet, except maybe Greenland and Iceland.
Also, the above religions/philosophies ALL have a "Golden Rule" -- Do unto others .... etc.
Islam and Satanism do not!
Any organization whose primary manual encourages the murder of non-believers is not a religion, it is (at best) a cult and it adherants should be treated accordingly. The Qur'an is such a book and contains no less than 19 separate passages REQUIRING its followers to kill non-believers.
Islamic terrorism cannot be defeated by sugarcoating the violent teachings of the Qur'an.We have to tell the truth and expose the Qur'an, not dissimulate the truth and play the game of taqiyya. Islam cannot be reformed, as Nazism cannot be reformed. The only way to combat Islamic terrorism is to denounce the Qur'an that teaches violence, hate and terrorism.
We who are opposed to the global jihad, HATE racist/totalitarian ideologies and our catchcry is the paradoxical "DEATH TO ALL FANATICS!"

Skid Marx, the majority of 250 000 Muslims Australian manage to go about their day without acting on the Qur'ans teachings that according to you are lessons on "violence, hate and terrorism." How do explain that? If the Qur'an has such explanatory and determining power over the lives of Muslim people, how do explain that only a handful of people in the Muslim community are behaving violently?

When you refer to the "primary manual [which] encourages the murder of non-believers", are you aware that the vast majority of Muslim Australians don't take that literally? Are you aware that the comments by fundamentalist Muslim clerics when they make a distinction between 'non-believers' and 'believers' aren't necessarily making a distinction between people who define themselves as Muslim and people who define themselves as Christian?