If Australia saw fit to let muslims, or any other reffo remain and these peoplebecome Aust citizens then they should start living up to the oath they sware by under our flag. Its not about them but about there actions. You come to a new country and we accept you and then you crap here. Trying to make it so much like the home you just left.Well it aint. so conform to uor ways. Learn to drink beer, eat pies, lie on the beach and ogle woman in swim suits. This is what I expect from a imgriant, not walking around in national dress and speaking your own jibberish. This is how suspissions are raised. The way to beat this is if every one deals with the terroist, but two many people in this country are sheep and wont do anything that the others wont do.

Donnie: I note you are surprised that this forum is used as a spring board for all maner of extremism - especially anti islamic and rascist rhetoric: get used to it.
Scan the list of articles and do a quick calculation of the responses - religion ( Islamism ) migration ( anti muslim )and at times sex all get the greatest hits ; the debate on Intelligent design scored well also and strongly points to a gross lack of intelligence amongst its proponents.
Welcome to Australian prejudice.

Shakira Hussein: Great little article! Hope you can write more.

I too am fed up with Muslims being in the media all the time. I hate hearing the media and others talk about Islam and the Muslim community like they are actually authorities in the religion and that they actually have a clue what is going on inside the various communities.

I am fed up with seeing pictures of bearded old men being painted as terrorist masterminds (who cant speak English mind you) and young bearded yobbos being painted as extremely dangerous terrorists. There's plenty of them around me here, but they blow nothing but hot air (usually from exhausts). I hope that if there are any real ones around that they get dealt with.

Most of the Muslims around me just want to get on with their lives - pay the mortgage, get their kids through school and so on, yet the media constantly thrusts itself on them and their beliefs.

Kactuz and others expects every Muslim (regardless of age and experience) to be able to either know about or answer complex questions on hadith and so on. I hardly think it's as easy as googling up websites and grabbing whatever takes your fancy. Infact, to me, it stinks of arrogance that these kind of people presume to be able to do so about another religion, while ignoring what the Muslim orthodoxy do regarding these things.

People like these extremists posting above and others like Shaykh Feiz, Muhammad Omran and so on make me sick. They all show the same attitudes regardless of creed.

Robert (& Boaz David),

Thanks for your encouragement.
No need to jump into conclusions so quickly.
The answer is simple: the legal system in Egypt does not allow mockery of any religious figure either Muslim or Christian. You can't wake up a sleeping person with a hammer.

If Muslims there will make a mockery of a priest, national security guards will be knocking on their doors 3:00am. It happened many times in the past. Making fun of any religion is seen as disrespectful, unethical and illegal.

How people react to jokes depends on their education, for example the Muslims - Christians joke would be exchanged between us in Cairo and other Christians. For the un-educated majority on both sides its seen as a personal threat on their faith.

mahatma, it appears that either you have misunderstood my intent or (unthinkable) BD and friends have been speaking more of the truth than I had thought the case.

If my quote is out of context please explain the context you think it sits in. I accept that the article was a call to tolerance. There is a story from christian history which I probably have the details wrong on. The story as I recall it goes something like.

The followers of Calvin were very upset at the comments of another believer, "The wrong Kind of Christian" and wanted to burn him at the stake for his heresy. Calvin reportedly urged tolerance and suggested that he be hanged instead.

True or not it paints a picture. Maybe in his time and place the views attributed to Calvin were tolerant and moderate, in this time and place they are extremist.

If tolerant, moderate muslims believe those who speak ill of a "prophet" should be punished it is an issue of concern to the rest of us.

I try to take posters at face value on these forums. You have noticed that I am generally moderate, please take my questions at face value and feel free to give your answers to them.

BD - please don't assume that those who don't join in the attacks on muslims are not watching what is happening and paying attention to the questions being asked and the answers given (or not given). I'm willing to assume that the muslim community has a similar broadness in views to that within the christian community. Some christians have no respect for views not their own, others live as peacefull members of the community. Some christians would insist on saying grace and preaching at you if you went around to their place for a BBQ, others would be willing to meet on common ground. Some christains want christain political parties to hold significant power in this country, others realise that political power generally damages the christian message. I've seen nothing yet to suggest muslims don't have similar diversity.

R0bert

Shakira - fabulous article - you wear whatever makes you happy!

Great point that the majority of Muslims are under as much, if not more, threat as non-Muslims.

However, as with other Muslim topics this will devolve into a "islam is evil" stoush with the usual culprits quoting bits of religious text and other googled up stats - which I will continue to skip until I find something intelligently written.

R0bert - thanks for your clarifying last post - thought you'd gone over to the dark side....

Have (briefly) checked out FH's blogspot - from what I had time to peruse looks very enlightening and informative - hope a plethora of young people (both Muslim and non) access your site. Of course there are those who will read your site with a warped magnifying glass in search of 'evil'.

Funny how those who look for faults invariably end up finding them - perhaps they should focus on themselves first.

(formerly Trinity)