Hold the back page! The detailed scoop on the QSociety’s links can be read in New Matilda.
The full version, edited down because of space limitations, includes a discussion of the ‘quite interesting views’ of Bill Muehlenberg of the Australian Family Association and Senator Cory Bernardi (html file, with links).
I don’t know if you can call it a conspiracy, but..be on the alert for this stuff. It reminds me of the propaganda put out by the League of Rights many years ago, ‘reason’ cloaking intolerance that is easy to find, once you scratch the surface. They say they are not racist, just against Muslim extremism, but it all collapses into stereotyping that translates as hatred of the strange and different other. All too familiar.
The academic Paul Gardner spoke of the League of Rights, an ancestor of many right-wing organisations in Australia as using “self-serving definitions, idealistic appeals, obfuscation, innuendo, illogic, blaming (or accusing) the victim, distortion and group libel”, and QSociety like other groups (including the Christian Democratic Party), seems to be using quite the same tactic. [see the excellent survey of the history of the right in Australia by Andrew Moore, from where Gardner’s quote is taken. The League too, had some strong links to conservative churchmen and theology]
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The Melbourne Age has an account of the events surrounding the Alma Road Community House, as well as an editorial in which the AJDS gets a guernsey for its work.
As the Age says, “Encouragingly, this racist campaign has led some members of the Jewish community to support the prayer group (the Alma Road house is in the heart of a Jewish precinct). The prayer group’s supporters include the Jewish Community Council of Victoria, the Jewish Christian Muslim Association, the Australian Jewish Democratic Society and the B’nai B’rith Anti-Defamation Commission (ADC).”
Sign the petition in support of freedom of religion and in support of tolerance.
The Liberty Victoria’s President Spencer Zivcak said that Q Society’s campaign against a Muslim prayer group in St Kilda “bears all the hallmarks of a deliberate attempt to deny to one religion the freedom of religious belief accorded to every other religion”.
Criticism and critical (‘higher criticism’) scholarship about religion and religious texts is par for the course, and expected in an educated, liberal, and secular society.
[The attached image is taken from the Australian Islamist Monitor Website just to provide some ‘flavour’and it is obviously not endorsed my me or AJDS]
Criticism and critical (‘higher criticism’) scholarship about religion and religious texts is par for the course, and expected in an educated, liberal, and secular society.
[The attached image is taken from the Australian Islamist Monitor Website just to provide some ‘flavour’and it is obviously not endorsed my me or AJDS]
This is all very local politics, but another test for diversity and freedom of peaceful association.
There is a planning application to increase the size of meetings so that a Muslim prayer group can meet for a couple of hours a week in St Kilda, Victoria at a community centre.
Opposition is being led by a group not from St Kilda. They are strong anti-Muslims, making all sorts of outrageous accusations.
Fortunately, responsible Jewish organisations have denounced the campaign, as outlined here and here.
The lead person in the anti-Community House campaign (Vickie Janson) was the number 1 candidate for the right wing Christian Democratic Party in the last Victorian elections, and she has also been a Senate candidate. The party is led by the Rev. Fred Nile, a well-known partisan preacher of intolerance in New South Wales. While the QSociety (the anti-Muslim group) claims to be speaking in support of Judeo-Christian values, the CDP makes it quite clear that Australia is a Christian, not any other nation.
Sign the petition in support of freedom of religion and in support of tolerance.
Everyone has an opinion, and there was a recent event at the Wheeler Centre for Books, Writing and Ideas at the State Library of Victoria. You can watch the video/podcast via this link.
Of course, all view expressed are those of the individuals who participated, including Dr Sally Totman, Dr Larry Stillman and Professor Fethi Mansouri, two specialists on the Arab Middle East, and one with expertise in social media and knowledge of Israel.
This time, Antony Loewenstein has had an unfair go at the NZ Prime Minister John Key in his blog, labeling him as Jewish and then being critical of his views on the Middle East.
This time, Antony Loewenstein has had an unfair go at the NZ Prime Minister John Key in his blog, labeling him as Jewish and then being critical of his views on the Middle East.
The Palestine Papers, as revealed by Al-Jazeerah and the Guardian, are explosive evidence about the state of negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority, leaning over backwards to break a deal—a deal that never went ahead and has even less chance of doing so with Netanyahu still in power.
For the full article, go to Galus Australis