Has the problem of Halali’s outburst really been solved? Or will he, as in the past, lie quietly for a while, and then come out with more of his outrageous, vicious Islamic nonsense? Our weak PM, as usual, has done nothing useful, and expects the Muslim “community” – whatever that is – to come up with answers.

Fat chance of that!

Attempts to mollify sheik al-Hilali by telling him that ultimately, when he is civilised, he’ll be included in this amorphous nirvana known as a tolerant and virtuous democratic culture are destined to fail. The expertise to manage an artificial society is non-existent in Australia. The lunacy of bringing someone from a very strict society where one religion, one thought and one lifestyle prevails and putting them in a multicultural setting shows how widespread that lunacy is.

Sheik al-Hilali dislikes our men, he dislikes our women, he dislikes our lifestyle, he dislikes our country and he hates secularism. Given his recent misogynistic statements and knowing how he is wedded to his misanthropic treatment of those who live outside islam the question must be asked: just why did the sheik come here?

Jennifer highlights that she believes everyone has a right to an opinion. NO doubt she believes this absolutely making her a fundamentalist along with those she accuses. Or maybe she does not believe absolutely that everyone has a right to an opinion. A smart person will think before they speak but truth never changes.

I was going to make a response to this article but I was reminded that the author had written "[T]he practice of tolerance involves self-restraint and thinking carefully before speaking in public".

I see that Leigh had already shot one off so I'll wait a while and think a bit more carefully about the issues.

The really scary part of all this is how the religious intolerance movements feed off each other at their most fundamental level.

This is an extract from a recent book on religious extremism.

"In many parts of [deleted], within the various extremists sects of [deleted], women are denied education, they are forced to marry at a young age, they are victims of horrific cycles of abuse- physical and emotional, and they live in absolute poverty dependent on the state or their spouse for support."

I invite contributors to fill in the blanks in a manner consistent with their own prejudices.

And then reconsider whether we are really talking about "tolerance" here, or about one bunch of intemperate holy-rollers taking a free hit at another bunch of fanatical god-botherers.

Why is the author so intolerant of people who disagree with her views on tolerance?

Self-contradictory statements and concepts like 'tolerance' are nonsense. Only useful for propaganda.

Wow. A rather hostile response to what I thought was a reasonable, well considered article.

I suppose that at least you're 'tolerating' it, though I suspect some would rather have read an article that was along the lines of their own views.

For my two bob, I agree.
A pox on those who take their theistic attitudes too seriously. Whatever brand of god you adhere to, unless you recognise that others have made their choice and that works for them, you're going to either be a troublemaker or sympathetic to troublemakers.

A pox I say!

The word intolerance is thrown about like the word racist. They no longer hold their original value and in some kind of reverse logic point to the ineffectual reasoning of the accuser.
Anger, spite, narrow-mindedness, self-loathing bigotry, hatred, spiritual indifference, self-righteousness, are all expressions of the tyrant groping in the dank of human corruption proclaiming the one true path to the glory of God, and if you don't submit to his will, you will pay the price of mans terror, instead of gods grace.
There should be a hunting season for tyrants. Once a year the world should get together and kill four or five just for sport.
And please don't ask me to be tolerant and understanding. Enough is enough. Time for a little common sense to assert itself and the "everything is equal and all the same crowd" to take a nap.
Discernment needs to be exercised with out being belittled and suppressed by words like racism and intolerance.

I second TurnRightThenLeft's pox.

YOUR (anybodies) god is not welcome and has no place in my life and quite frankly I am sick of hearing about beliefs. To push beliefs is intolerant in itself. I cannot fathom on what grounds Christianity and Islam expect to be tolerated on. Superstitions as harmful and as intolerant as those two which have both given rise to a horrific history (up until 2006 and still counting) should not be tolerated. Before those who speak for and believe themselves to be god throw up their arms whinging keep in mind you worship prejudice and exclusion, you believe non-Christians or non-Muslims are punished for not worshipping your idols.
These days religion is the new pornography, and despite only a few who actually believe it - it is everywhere.
Children are being terrorised being told their life is almost over with the coming of Christ , or rapture or Armageddon , Others are being recruited as suicide bombers.
At some point we as a society have to say “Enough” to this lunacy.

A small digression - to those who believe in the end of days, where is your credibility? If you truly believe it is the end of time why do you make money and send kids to school?

I received an email as a response to a challenge I gave to anyone, concerning the political assassination of kaab bin al Ashraf by Mohammed and the general idea of Islamic piety. My challenge formed part of a published comment in the Daily Telegraph.

The response was as follows:

"My initial comment to you is that every person's view of history depends on the perspective from which he sees it.....

Hence while you might view the political assasinations of Kaab bin Al Ashraf at odds with the concept of Islamic piety, it could be argued that this was a strategic political necessity with justifiable cause ... The simple reason is to eliminate a threat to your society, whether it be 7th century Arabia or present day."

COMMENT
That is from a friendly, articulate polite Muslim in Sydney in 2006. Now clearly, if we actually adopted his reasoning. Hilali would be a headless corpse right now as he is perceived as a 'threat to our community' as also the 11 Sydney terrorism suspects and the 13 in Melbourne. The evidence would be about the same strength.(as for Kaab)

So, tolerance.... has to be intelligent, thoughtful and mindful of real threats. (rather than imaginary ones)

Of course.. if this friendly, polite obviously educated Muslim in Sydney in 2006 regards political assasination as quite reasonable when it is to protect the Muslim community...where does that leave our 'tolerance' ?

One of the points which came out in the media re the 13 in Melbourne, included reference to an alleged plot to Assasinate John Howard and his family !

*thinking caps on* people

Jennifer,

Good well thought article.

West,

Your comment had the effect of a wake up call.
Apart from a genuinely concerned secular posters, everyone else seem to be about militant christianity disguised wearing the 'secular freedom' mask (No offence intended Boazy!)
Interesting.

Sage,

There is merit to your comment.
I guess the question in my mind is if a person doesn't like the country why bother coming? Also, why letting him in if we know they don't like the country or its values anyway? It takes two to tango.

West writes 'To push beliefs is intolerant in itself. ' Do you really believe that West?

BD. You read the daily Terror, that explains a great deal on the contents of your postings!

From a recent article on Islamic fundamentalism and 'terrorism'...

" Since the 1970s, a diffuse fundamentalism has developed in Arab-Muslim societies. But that may be beginning to ebb away. The terrorist attacks in several Muslim countries have shocked the public. The challenge now is to separate Islam from Islamism. We must make sure that Islam plays a role in the war against fundamentalism."

For further insight into Islamic fundamentalism check out the following

http://portal.unesco.org/en/ev.php-URL_ID=14320&URL_DO=DO_TOPIC&URL_SECTION=201.html

Kippy....I also read the Age, Australian and SMH along with the Herald Sun and Jerusalem Post. So I gain a good idea of who is saying what and why.

Clearly to me there is a degree of exploitation of the clash of cultures/Islam issue by NewsCorp, and yes, I believe it is partly related to "ratings and ad revenue". But I've also noted that sometimes the Daily Terror has nothing at all about this stuff, yet the SMH does.

Regardless of this, I urge you in the strongest terms to have a look at "Obsession: The threat of Radical Islam" currently being shown on FoxNews (yes..I know..NewsCorp, and yes..'timing' US elections... I knowwwww :) and its produced by a Jew (is that 2 strikes ?) but apart from that, the material is very powerful, as its taken from Arab News casts.

It shows the 'friendly' face of radical Muslims when speaking to Western Media and their 'TRUE' face when speaking to their own. (often in English)
The do 'A' and 'B' comparisons.. same bloke..different venue.

Failure to appreciate this trend and reality will see us all in serious trouble if nothing is done.
cheers

Boaz,

I usually find you funny but this one tops it all:
boaz said
"Regardless of this, I urge you in the strongest terms to have a look at "Obsession: The threat of Radical Islam" currently being shown on FoxNews (yes..I know..NewsCorp, and yes..'timing' US elections... I knowwwww :) and its produced by a Jew (is that 2 strikes ?) but apart from that, the material is very powerful, as its taken from Arab News casts"

Sounds like me asking you to watch a balanced and fair article on the history of Israel aired on "Al Jazeerah" produced by hezbollah!
PS: and will be aired during the anniversary of the Palestinian uprising! :):)

Can you attempt to be objective for once?

Peace,

Yes Runner I believe pushing beliefs/ ideologies is intolerance. I think the exclusionary group of ideologies; Christianity, Islam, Communism and Fascism are especially intolerant. All offer no justification other than a fraudulent basis of justification.

Christianity and Islam justify their persecution and intolerance of others by a God that not one member has any true knowledge of and so is made up for the purpose to mislead. That is there is not a shred of truth concerning such a god, all is conjecture, all are lies.

Communism justifies itself that the welfare of the community is supreme over the welfare of the individual. Communism is a moralist movement and like religion has no basis in truth and so has no true justification in persecution and exclusion of those outside of the community. The community is a construct of the party and not an evolving organic social organisation.

Fascism the love of oneself through the love of the state is also a moralist movement and has no basis in truth to justify itself in its persecution and exclusion of those who fascists deem not of the state.

It is all the same, not of God, Not of the community, not of the state. Yes ideologies offer the choice of wether to join them or not. To accept Jesus or Hitler or Allah or the revolution all ideologists spout that choice.

The persecution and exclusion those groups conduct are not only in terms of violence and having exclusionary laws passed but also the persecution and exclusion of ideas.

Christianity, Islam, Communism and Fascism are manifestations of intolerance in its purest forms.

Why are Christians and Muslims who can provide no True confirmation and proof of their god to support the knowledge they claim of a god, so intimate only that god could know about so active in opinion and the media when there is millions of ideologies that do not get a mention? Trying to convince others that a God a claimant has no proof of is intolerant not only of other people’s beliefs but also intolerant of truth.

Once I read the research of W G Perry, based on the development of thinking in a cohort of medical students as they progressed through their studies. But possibly it applies much more widely. Truncating and simplifying it a bit, people typically develop through 3 stages. The first stage, black and white thinking in which we are white and they are black and everything that our leaders and authorities and source documents say is true and white. The second stage, when some glimmers of reality penetrate and we discover that reality isn't always black and white and that sometimes our revered leaders and opinion makers are just wrong. This leads to a lack of faith and a despair of relativism where any point of view is tolerated as being equally likely to be true. And stage 3, something called committment, where out of all the relativities one comes to prefer, believe, or have faith in one particular point of view - but remains open to the evidence and the possible validities of other systems of understanding. It seems to me that fundamentalism and ideology are too much stuck in an early phase of development. That has certainly been descriptive of my religious odessy.

I think of Islam more as a political movement than a religious one and that is the basis of my objection to it.

There are other 'religions' in Australia that are sometimes, or in the case of the Catholic church, more often than not, political movements.

Australia is a secular state and can do without these intrusions upon our democratic processes and liberty.

Taking the two examples I have given, it is most exasperating where adherents to these so-called religions pledge loyalty to the leaders of those 'religious' movements instead of to Australia.

This was the case recently where some Muslims came forward to say that whilst they personally disagreed with what Mufti said, they would nonetheless support him because 'he was their leader'. To me and to many other Australians that implied a political conflict that ought not be there in the first place. There is no middle ground and no place in Australia for practices and creeds that challenge and encourage non-compliance with our laws and democratic institutions.

Either Australian Muslims will take urgent steps to secularise their 'religion' - as some Christians have had to do to limit priests who would limit their freedoms - or they will face increasing challenges to their migration and citizenship.

Yes, let's all tolerate. Let's be considerate and and discuss first whatever we feel so when we we actually say it we don't offend anyone. Then in 20 years time we can all congratulate each other when our society mirrors Britain (which is currently facing 30 terrorist plots according to M15 director general).

trueassie

You don't have to wait, it's here. The problem is that "tolerance" is being held up as a panacea and the social engineers among us are aiding the general society towards submission. These lefties hate their society. They hate and blame and are willingly aiding Muslims and Islam as fifth columnist. You have been invaded it's just that Muslims and friends of Islam don't want to promote that awareness. Be tolerant. Submit. Islam knows best. Or your a bloody minded intolerant racist.

OOOPs...they did it AGAIN !

Leaders of the BNP in UK have finally been cleared of 'Incitement_to_hate_Muslims'

They described Islam as a ""wicked vicious faith".

and the key issue in the trial was:

"The truth or falsehood of the statements is not relevant to the charge of 'likely to incite to hate"

The defense for the 2 Dannies took a similar line:

"Truth is not a defense"

My first reading/hearing of these points totally incensed me. TRUTH.. is "not"...a defence ?

Well, although kicking and screaming I now do have to agree...to a point.

Mainly because it is possible to make known such atrocious and inhuman actions of the so-called Prophet of Islam with 2 purposes, and those purposes will determine the nature of public speech.

We can say that same things with a view to 'informing' or to 'inciting'.

Unfortuantely, its a matter of perspective.

If I make a public statement "Mohammed, prophet of Islam, tortured some prisoners worse than the Americans did to the Muslim prisoners at Abu Graib"....this is a true statement of historical fact.

EVEN...if I say so in a subdued monotonic boring verbal discourse, some (not all) Muslims who heard it would claim:

1/ Death to those who insult the prophet.
2/ Inciting hate against Muslims by making misleading statements.

It may well be the case in future that I have a web site which includes such information, and even be making public statements to this effect.

The question will be..... would I be TOLERATED by Muslims for speaking truth ? (I'd happily tolerate and welcome references to the Crusades and the Inquisition)

I would be happy to goto trial on the basis of such things, but I would be guarding my tone so that the clear purpose was to:

a) Inform Muslims of things they should know...in good faith.
b) To warn fence sitters who may be attracted to the 'sugar coated' version of Islam (where u never hear of these acts of horror) of what they are getting themselves into.

Cornflower is right religion is politics. To believe in a god is to put personal fantasy before others. That is to say God does not exist , the only activity that ever happens in society is human evoked, motivated, provoked based on personal politics. If a god existed of course there would be no need for religious literature, ritual, so called religious based morality, clergy or faith. Reality would suffice. In essence then there is no justification for Islam , Christianity, Voodoo fetishists or any so called religion to ask let alone dictate their ideology of or on to anybody.
Boaz it is Christians who must carry the blame for the crusades and the inquistition. To chose to be Christian is to agree with all acts committed in the name of Jesus and God. To choose to be Islamic is to to agree with all acts committed in the name of Allah. To choose to be Nazi to agree with all acts committed in the name of Hitler.
Religion is politics.
Religion is also a choice to be ignorant. An amusing example is that Muslim terrorists use the crusades as justification , the crusades were a response to the islamic invasion of Spain. The Middle East and North Africa were converted by the sword. Islamist have nothing to complain about. People in glass houses........

Cornflower,

Given that this topic asserts that "tolerance means thinking carefully before speaking", it has to be observed that either your posts are proof of this assertion, or that you are unconsciously thoughtful, courteous and tolerant by nature. Your posts consistently display thoughtfulness, and if that is a mandatory accompaniment of tolerance, then it could be said that they also positively ooze tolerance.

They also show courage and restraint. In your post in this thread you have encapsulated the defining characteristics of our Australian polity, the heritage of the nigh on 500 year British experience of the Reformation and its crystallization in Australia into our tolerant secular constitutional monarchy, into just a few courteous but accurate words. You have charted the only safe course for the future for those who, probably mostly by circumstance of birth, have unquestioningly accepted the claims of organised Islam or Roman Catholicism over their political expression.

A major weapon of those who have sought to suppress our real Australian identity as an independent part of the British realm is that of branding any public acknowledgement of the heritage of this reformation odyssey as 'sectarian bigotry'. There is no way that your posts could be accused of showing bigotry. You have simply told it the way it is in such a way that any labelled at birth in the above categories could ponder without requiring to take offence. You describe the destination many nominally Islamic migrants have (barely daring to hope it) come here to attain, but which they dare not even mouth on pain of death, even here. Integration and the slow recession of the demands of their old culture. You speak for them, whether you know it or not.

You seem to know a bit about raising boys. On this day we remember a lot of other boys who have grown not too old, but are no longer able to speak for themselves. From my somewhat limited knowledge of some of them, you can probably safely speak for most of them also. More power to your pen.

PS. I always enjoy reading your posts.

Forrest Gumpp
Thank you for your kind words.
C

Boaz,

You missed the point.
Truth is relative and can be easily manipulated by any individual to make a point.
In my previous comment to you, if Sheikh Ahmed Deedat used his previous religious debates to prove his 'truth' that Christianity and the bible is fraud, I am sure he will fall under the same law.

Everyone have his/ her own version of the truth which they should be happy with. The issue arises when a truth believer A does not like Truth believerB. 99% of Muslims don't know about Wahhabism and Nasekh wal mansoukh. The same goes for 99% of christians who don't know the history of the bible, how the gospels were collected and how the trinity was created.

How is it that educating muslim majority on Wahhabism or Christians on the bloody history of what they were told to be a peaceful religion will help human causes in the future?

It can only lead to chaos.

Peace,

To tolerate means 'to put up with'!

The problem is that there is no requirement or obligation when tolerating that we be respectful, polite or nice.

Trueaussie: you argued that this tolerance will lead to terrorism problems like Britain:

You're drawing a parallel without anything to really back it up.

For starters, I could just as easily argue that it is simply western targets that are targeted for terrorism.

Which are the three most 'western' western nations right now? the US, Britain and Australia. So logically, Britain is bigger and it would therefore draw more terrorist plots... not necessarily a result of multicultural policies, but perhaps as a result of a hatred of western society within fundamentalist islam sects.

Or, I could just as easily draw your conclusion based on geographic boundaries. Britain is located in Europe, and is more accessible.

Fair enough, some of the alleged terrorist activity has been laid at the feet of migrants - that could go to back up your argument, but it wouldn't be taking into account a multitude of factors.

If you're going to chalk terrorist acts up to tolerance, you've got one hell of a lot of convincing to do.

I believe the West is sleepwalking to its destruction.
I am an agnostic, but I would rather live in a Christian society than an Islamic one, any day.
We are hampered in dealing with Islam because of our democracy and sense of fairness and justice.
Please read the following:
http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/story.html?id=c20b67cc-a21a-46bc-a6cf-986896e99acd

Froggie for all intents and purposes Islam and Christianity are the same thing. Both are superstition based cults and both seek power over others. The thought of living under Christian rule is horrific given its lack of good values, its lust for violence and its greed for misery as well as its dishonesty. Theocratism is fascism. The dogma of the superstition aside Christians can not be trusted to be in control because they believe in magic and deny nature and reality.
Christianity if anything is anti fairness and anti justice because it is judgemental based on the worship of the ego and it is exclusionary and biggoted (what do Christians believe happen to non Christians). Christians have proved they are incapable of fairness and justice throughout their history. We have been saved from Christianity by secular democracy.

I am not sleepwalking to my peril , that is utterly ridiculous , you have no knowledge of a god , your denial of the rainbow serpent or little red ridinghood may be at your own peril for all you know. You cannot claim those who will not be conned are damned unless you have proof of god.