Dear Bazz,

Thanks for that.

Dear Foxy,

Do you consider the concept/belief that "some people or groups of people may legitimately control the lives of others, tell them how to live, then apply threats and violence as necessary to ensure that they comply" to be radical? Is it sufficiently radical that we ought to try to prevent this as best we can?

Or is it no longer radical because we have now become so used to it, because for centuries we could not remember any other way to live, other than as sheep?

Australia has very few cultural and so-called-religious extremist terrorists, it is practically non-existent here, not really an issue. Rather, our home-grown violent radicalists who subscribe to the above concept, have the seats of power in this country.

They don't hear a bad word from their families, because these are well fed with the proceeds of violence; they listen not to religious leaders because they consider themselves to be God; they do not hear any reproach from the other "community leaders" who are in their same clique; and they laugh at law-enforcement because they are their own employees and it is themselves who make the laws.

You then ask: «how we can
prevent violent extremism and help people (especially our
young vulnerable people) disengage from violent ideologies?»

I am not quite sure exactly how, but certainly the first step is that we all, or at least as many of us, recognise our predicament clearly for what it is!

Yuyutsu,

Frankly I don't understand what you are talking about.
You'll have to be more specific.

Foxy,
We are lucky that our extremists are dimwits, had they a fraction of the cunning and intelligence of the Irish plotters who blew up the hotel in Brighton and really frightened the English Conservatives then we’d really have a problem.
The great problem that we have is sleeping Islam.

Is Mise,

As individuals there's much we can learn from
each other's cultures. I think all things
considered, when we hear about the problems in
the US and Europe, we can only trust that this
won't happen here.

Dear Foxy,

«Frankly I don't understand what you are talking about.
You'll have to be more specific.»

I was referring to the state and its government, which attempt to control our lives, legislate what we may or may not do, then use threats and violence as needed to enforce their laws - and then consider that violence as legitimate.

Such concepts/beliefs (i.e. that the state's violence is legitimate) are radical and violent, even though we tend to forget it because we have been used to it for centuries and never had a chance to be free of them, neither even our parents or grandparents. Violent behaviour based on such concepts is far more rampant in Australia (and in most of the world) than cultural or so-called-"religious" (such as Islamic) extremism. Yet what do we do about it?