Talk about naivette !!
Salam, bless your Islamic heart - not only have you and 20 million Ozzie battlers been forlornly duped by ML's antics, she outwitted her Indonesian captors, Judges and the Indonesian Nation et al !
For openers, ( if you followed the Sunday Mail ) she confessed, then relented, then proclaimed she was misinterpreted, said her 'confession' was a forgery, then took to the 'cloth' her Islamic personna..the rest is pure fictional gossip.
She raised a few heckles at Keroboken Jail when she morphed into the burka, but then from all accounts, she was granted 'celebrity status' with her jailers because she embraced 'allah', and was instantly 'one of them'. Overnight, she was granted a single cell on her lonesome, whereas our other celebrant Shapel C, still languishes with druggies, prostitutes, lesbians and assorted flotsam - sharing her dismal plight, because she still professes her Christianity ?
So Salam, in the short term, it pays to denounce one's Religion, one's intergity, one's National pride, whatever - if it means 'FREEDOM', at any price.
Now, in the aftermath, she is offering her 'story' to media tycoons - pity 'sixty minutes' has gone into hibernation for the Yule tide, otherwise Kerry Packer's checkbook news scoop, will undoubtably rule the roost, and we will witness an 'expurgated version of how ML was misled,denied justice, framed, coherced, starved, tortured.. ad nauseaum. Yes, ho hum, isn't it sickening !
It may be, I have a jaundiced view of the shenaggians in Bali, but whatever her demeanor, she has 'class' and ' style', and at the end of the Day, she should profit from her 'ill gotten' story, and enjoy the 'space'- she really earned it after 3 months in HELL.
For those other inmates at Kerobokan, take heart. K Packer is waiting in the wings for your story - it may make all the suffering seem 'worth while'at the end of your ordeal !
Cheers.

Leigh: The article was about Michelle Leslie specifically - no mention of terrorism there. Why even bother bringing it up when you keep mentioning that Australia isn't concerned with religion?

The editor's, and other comments on the letter pages of various press obviously were, or else it would not have been published.

I thought it was a good piece, as were some of the other comments by Dalma and others.

I wear red underpants. Maybe I'm joining the communist part? Or perhaps I attend the Ascham School? I will never reveal the truth. You will never know. How does it feel?

Quick Reminder, Salam: our Aussie democratic society is not a derivative of Islam.
Its roots lie elsewhere.
In Islamic society, a person does gain preferential treatment by converting.
That is how the teaching works.

Q. Would you like preferential treatment?
A. Then, convert.
Q. Did Michelle need preferential treatment?
A. Yes, she was facing very severe treatment.

Lacking integrity? Perhaps.
But then, so too was the 'system' she found herself in.

Salam, you may want issue your 'please explain'?
The public will be interested in the reply, as far as gossip value goes.
And as far as feeding cynicism goes.

However, if we are speaking of inconsistencies, then many of them lie elsewhere.

There is one huge question for the Muslim community to 'please explain'.

Is the Australian Muslim community prepared, forever and a day, to honor the Aussie separation between "church" and state?

If so, have the aims of Islam changed somewhere along the way?
If so, can this ever be authentic Islam?
Please explain?

I think you guys need to read the article again... your anti-Islamic smack-talking comments are not even related to the content of it.

1) Bali is majority non-Muslim.
2) The Judge (as far as I know) was Christian, or at least non-Muslim.
3) Indonesia is not an Islamic State, especilally not Bali.

This is just a piece from a Muslim writer wondering the same thing as many other Australians have either said or felt - was it all a sham? Even moreso, because the writer wears a scarf, and along with other professional women who choose to wear the scarf, may have felt a little slighted by the publicity stunt.

It's a valid opinion, and one many people share - Muslim or not. The letters sections of the dailies show this clearly, as well as the headlines.

Take a step back and look at the core reasons:

A) She is muslim, be it non practicing or whatever at the time, but she is still a muslim regardless
B) She is in a prison with a number of practicing Muslim women, and in an environment more sympathetic to them.
C) When there are drugs to come down from, or a drug addiction which she is also dealing with whilst in prison, what is wrong with her turning to her spirituality as a means to help with her presonal demons and get through?
D) There is no advantage, in fact, severe disdvantage being a pretty girl like her in prison, thus exposure to this when she can choose otherwise is not a stupid or disrespectful decision.

Does every Muslim woman in Australia wear the recommended attire? Of course not, this is the wonderful thing About Australia over some fundamentalist Muslim countries....they have a right to do so.

Who's business is it of ours? It is her personal choice and i think it would be a much easier integration if Muslims perhaps followed miss Leslie's lead at times.

Horses for courses. When in Rome..

Stop judging her. I hope she makes good money from it, it is a capatalist society, she has a right to. No one would agree it was a money making excersise (risk Vs return just does not cut it) and it happenned overseas, what right do we have, she broke none of OUR laws.

Get over it folks. Muslims take note if you were able to have a right to choose when you wear the appropriate clothing, i am sure it would be much easier to assimilate. Non Muslims, leave her be, go into any dance nightclub in any city and your sons, daughters, nieces, nephews etc doing much more than Michelle did. She nearly lost 15 years, but i bet it was the best learning experience she ever had.