"Dr Faruqi said:
“We live in a society where people have the right to wear what they want. Muslim women have the right to freedom of choice, just like every other Australian.
“No one in Australia has the right to tell a woman how to dress, least of all the Government. It is a woman’s right to choose what she wears.
“In NSW, women who cover their faces can simply ask to be identified by a female officer in a private place showing that the national security argument doesn’t stack up."

First, we do not live in a society where people have the right to wear whatever they want, and second, the proposed ban is in a building in the ACT; the ACT is "in" NSW but is not a part of NSW, so NSW law does not apply.

No one should be allowed to appear in public with their face covered so that identity is impossible.
The burqa is a threat simply because it is a disguise and can used as a disguise by men or women to avoid recognition.

As the burqa is not religious dress, then why wear it?
It would seem (on the hidden face of it) to be prompted by a paranoid fear of men.

JOM: It's debatable whether "social cohesion" is possible with Muslims or whether it's even desirable but nobody wants things to be worse than they already are.

You are right, but that is not the fault of non moslems.

Foxy: without the full knowledge of its significance.

The only significance is that it is, in Australia, is a statement of defiance.

The meaning being, "if you condemn the Burka you are against Islam therefore we have the right to defend Islam by any means possible in Australia. Therefore acts of Terrorism are called for."

runner: Greens were forced to wear burqa's every time they make an idiotic statement.

They'd have to wear one all the time if that was the case. It would have no eye holes though, because they run around like headless chooks.

Is Mise: As the burqa is not religious dress, then why wear it?
It would seem (on the hidden face of it) to be prompted by a paranoid fear of men.

& their men's fear that other men will want to rape their wives because they are their property.

I wonder. Did these women where a Berka, etc when they arrived on their leaky boat? or is this a defiance statement, for Islam, now they are in Australia. Is it a statement by converts to Islam? Is it a defiance statement by most moslem men in making their wives wear the Burka?

Just to clarify:

* the ban, now lifted, was in relation to the Senate. Abbott is not in the Senate. There appears not to be any ban in the lower house, where he sits.

* if anybody in a balaklava, or full-face motor-cycle helmet, or surgical face-mask, wanted to sit in the public gallery of either House, I wouldn't be surprised if they were asked by security to bare their faces. But it appears they wouldn't be: is that so ?

* not being Catholic, I don't know of any orders which require nuns to wear full-dace covering.

Just trying to avoid the usual hysteria, and the stick-up-the-@rse politics of people who will seize on anything to try to embarrass the government, and to stick to the issues here.

Joe

Reading all the various comments is interesting.

And it seems this has become such an emotional issue.

However I still stand by my personal objection to
the burqa. In our society there are things that we
are not allowed to do. For example - we drive on the
left-side of the street not the right side. And even
though I might be from the US (as an example) where
they drive on the right-side - I won't be able to do that
here, even though I might feel more comfortabe doing it
being accustomed to my usual practices.

The same goes for female genital mutilation (FGM),
child-brides, polygamy, fire-works in suburbia, lighting
fires during fire-bans or funeral-pires in the backyard.
These are all illegal in this country and everyone is
expected to obey the laws despite what goes on in other
countries where this is common practice.

The wearing of burqas has been raised as a security-issue,
particularly in the light of terrorist threats to a number
of Western countries, including Australia. And it is on
record that burqas have been used as a disguise by terrorists
in the past.

I see nothing wrong with this issue being discussed in
Parliament. And if need be of a Referendum being held to
let the Australian voters decide on this matter. As I
stated previously, there are other choices that Muslim women
can wear - but total concealment is as I see it problematic
in a country such as ours - especially when our security
may be at risk.

The biggest danger to Australia's security is a bloke in 'Budgie Smugglers'! Ban the 'Budgie Smugglers'. Okay I've just started, no one is to appear in public in a disguise, get rid of 'Pepper Pig' people, get Santa Close, nothing to do with Christianity anyway! And of course my favorite, get Ronald McDonald! Nuns in habits, clowns in circuses. Okay, my new law has not gone far enough! ban people named Tony. I don't like Tony's or Fred's or Barney's. Ban people who eat chocolate on a Tuesday, it has nothing to do with religion, besides its bad for your health!
I found it interesting that the burqa wearing terrorists were going to be locked up in parliament, with that other group of terrors, school children, in the bomb proof glass room. my only request is could they throw Jacqui Lambie into the same room, I believe it is also sound proof, in that way the only one who would have to listen to her melodic nonsense would be the burqa wearers and noisy school children.
Is Mise, Dr Faruqi is a member of the NSW Parliament and is only saying what presently applies in that state.

I am wondering if there is such a thing as 'moderate' Islam. There was a thread recently, but here again there is an inexplicable failure of the claimed majority of 'moderate' Muslims in Australia to create clean air between themselves and their peaceful, wholesome Islam, and the Islam of fundamentalists who rigidly demand that girl children wear an uncomfortable symbol of their oppression. What about children's rights?

Then again, maybe the clamour is from the opportunists like the lunar Greens, crazy-enough-to-bite-themselves radical feminists and suchlike, who are riding the 'Protect-the-Burka' bandwagon with fundamentalist Islam.

As is typical of a grubby media that always puts sensationalism and winning an audience ahead of facts and serving the public (which they claim to do!), any beat-up is a good beat-up.

Last, when will the public clamour for logic and philosophy to be included in the secondary school curriculum? It is simple astonishing that a sizeable wad of the public, enough to affect win or lose in marginal seats, cannot immediately recognise the obvious, fatal flaws in the protest rhetoric of the headline hunting Greens and others who claim the Burka as the 'right' of women and deliberately conflate that with the usual, reasonable expectation that persons accessing the chambers of the Parliaments would be readily identifiable at all times.

However, as the Greens Protest Party and others will very soon learn, there is a very large majority of voters out there who will remember this and vote accordingly.

The government is looking weak and foolish through not being able to discern and put the facts to the public and generally lacking the courage of its convictions.

The government has again backed down to shore up the ethnic vote in a few marginal seats (as it did over the foul Section 18). It too must expect some loss of its presumed authority to lead. The credibility and authority of the Parliament itself has been eroded again.