"Amen" Roberto :)

Pericles
true to form :)
Without adding more at this point. This article is probably of such huge social importance, and that we debate /disuss it here, that I urge all of use to stick with it for some time.

He is describing typical socio/political approaches to and responses to 'others' .. and what we need to do is go to a deeper level than allowing ourselves (and our communities) to simply function AS those typical members of society, and address ways of changing such behavior. i.e the knee jerk hateful reaction to the demonizing of 'others'. Pls see my previous post for more about that.

Boaz, 2 Things
1 We could all stick to our own paddocks and stare at each other menacingly across the fence.
2. Some intermingling or cultural exchange can take place across the fence.

Certainly western culture has its flaws, and we could learn from Muslim culture, as the Muslim culture can learn from ours. We are all born the same, it is what we are taught and conditioned to believe that creates the “other ones”.

Is this guy for real? What a complete load of pseudo-intellectual baloney!

Has this first year journalism student ever been to a Muslim country? He mentions Salmon Rushdie, but has it ever occurred to him to ask why Rushdie had a death order placed on his head? Is not plotting to murder someone at all (let alone because they simply criticise our beliefs) universally regarded as evil? Is not flying planes into buildings, killings thousands evil? Is not strapping explosives on a down-syndrome boy and forcing him to blow himself up evil? etc etc

Pure post-modernist pseudo-intellecual philo-babble!

AK

Timkins,

Muslims are not interested in learning from us. They think we are all depraved (well at least they are right on that point in many cases). They intend to conquer us - if not by war then by demographics and immigration. Their history attests to this. Their own leaders attest to this. Indeed, the very name "Islam" which means "submission" attests to this...

Any notion of cultural exchange or mutual understanding is delusional wishful thinking.

AK

Boaz, I can't let you get away with that.

"Examining the differences in another culture does NOT imply that they are inferior"

A noble sentiment.

But hold. You go on to say "their loyalty is more to Islam than Australia" and "its social and political prescriptions which are diametrically opposed to many of ours", the net effect of which is to let us all know that You Don't Think Much of Islam.

Where the article gently hints that this might actually be nothing more than a knee-jerk "I'm an Us so I must have a Them", you are saying no, it's simply stating the bleedin' obvious.

Have another look through your piece and tell me where it reeks of tolerance, drips with compassion and is suffused with love. 'Cos I can't see it.

I was honestly expecting the debate on this article to be about the extent to which we are conditioned as human beings to justify our actions with reference to "the other", and the sidebar to this being the extent to which that "other" is defined, drawn and coloured-in by the media. Instead, we seem to be naming names and writing tickets.

People, this is all of us. There are one or two people in Baghdad right now who might have a view of "us" that is identical to our view of "them". And they would be as "right" as we. Surely this is not difficult to understand and accept.

Maybe this could bring us back on track, a quote from Scott's piece:

"Refusal to succumb to cultural polarisation and awareness of the power of language to construct and determine our view of reality allows us to make more logical choices about the issues presented to us and to accept the possibility that we as human beings cannot necessarily be identified through easy categories and broad labels."