Comments on: Singling out Muslims for shock value

By: james mcdonald

james mcdonald — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 22:55:54 +0000

Jess, I’m not necessarily suggesting that the sheik crossed the line between exercising his own freedom and abridging someone else’s.

But I do maintain there is such a line. Like most (not all) liberties, the liberty of speech is not absolute; there is a need to restrain people from misusing their liberties to invade the liberties of others.

The shiek’s statements may be fair if he said them in public. However, using deception to get inside a widow’s defences, before directing a torrent of hatred at her family personally, is somewhat different from using colourful arguments in public debate.

Those who think there should be no limit at all should remember that words can be used to incite crowd acts of violence and racial hatred, and very few liberal states have been game to guarantee absolutely free speech. Including, most notably, the USA.

By: jess

jess — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 14:45:25 +0000

James McDonald:

I wholeheartedly support Yasmin’s statement above. Freedom of speech must remain sacred otherwise our world will crumble around us. It reminds me of the case of Noam Chomsky supporting a French Professor who refused to believe that the Nazi holocaust had occurred. Chomsky’s point was not that he supported the other person’s argument, but that he supported the other person’s right to argue:
Chomsky: Faurisson & Liberte d’expression

By: jess

jess — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 14:28:34 +0000

It seems noone is particularly interested in Haron Monis’s message – whatever that might be. As usual with the Australian media there’s been a lot of huff and puff over this man’s actions and no real meaty reporting about what it is he is saying. Commentators are so eager to judge both Monis, and to a lesser extent ‘the Muslim community’ for not condemning him, that (apart from at least some attempt at objective reporting) I would like to see the media presenting a little more background on Monis and shedding at least some light on his point. Channel Nine’s atrociously bad coverage of Monis’s court day theatre could have been a scene from Team America: World Police. The ‘news reporter’ whose role might more appropriately have been described as ‘patronising hate-mongerer’ might as well have been a puppet with visible strings. He was doing the very thing he would have us accuse Monis of – waving his arms about childishly in order to gain attention and instigate an emotional response from his audience. I suspect that Monis has a more virtuous objective – peace – if ever we were allowed to hear it.

By: james mcdonald

james mcdonald — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 03:27:10 +0000

Good article Yasmin. Are you sure about this statement? “Regardless of all that he has a right to say what he wants no matter how abhorrent, hateful or stupid his remarks.”

At what point do abhorrent, hateful remarks become personal assaults on the freedom of their targets? It’s not a trivial question. A lot of work has gone into trying to find the right limits of free speech in the racial hatred laws.

By: Roy Travis

Roy Travis — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 22:50:41 +0000

Some well made points in the article, except for “the details of the case are fairly inocuous”
I wonder if that opinion is shared by the widows receiving the letters?

By: James Bennett

James Bennett — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 06:50:23 +0000

Now hold on Mustafa,

The Sheik had a crack at free speech, then Smith and his listeners and now you and your mates. Everyone gets a go.

So i think you’re Christian analogy is a bit far fetched. As i understand it this blokes religion is the basis for his objection to the Iraq conflict, ( Something about the dead soldiers murdering his brothers and sisters ) so his beliefs are not incidental to the alleged offence as would be the case with a Christian rapist ( unless we are talking Priest- young boy ?).

As a recent convert to the Christopher Hitchens school of theology i think that you are stupid to define yourself and your associates as a muslim community.
On the one hand you seem happy to to revel in the power and status of being a representative for the ’ muslim community’ as if religious bond is valid.
Then when a knucklehead pops his head up you want to define him as a nut even though his point of difference is simply being more muslim than the rest of the group.

We as Aussies (of all derivitative nationalities ) should get offended when people push their religion forward as if it defines them as a person or a group then want to protest when the same comparison is thrown back at them in a less favorable light.

By: Rena Zurawel

Rena Zurawel — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 04:52:57 +0000

The anti-Islam sentiments have been drummed up for quite some time. I think people like Smith should be blamed for ‘hate speech’.
Australia is no different to other countries and many communities around the world. And we are all tribal and very territorial.
That is why some people worked out laws and constitutions to help the people live together and the social ‘traffic lights’ have been introduced to most countries.
After the Bush’s infamous speech about his ‘crusade’ against the ‘Islamists’ (what a stupid, and viscious expression) I was always worried about the interpretation of the word ’ democracy’ and ‘free speech’.
I strongly believe that a dictionary of ‘hate speech’ does include words like islamofascist, islamists, ‘fundamentalist’ extremist, kike, fascist, nazi, and some other nasty words that contain that ‘element of hatred’.
Overusing offensive words, like calling a Nazi someone who happens to have a different opinion to ours is also very offensive and it does belong to the category of ‘hate speech’.
We are no different to other people. If an Australian gets killed overseas we are all very upset. It applies to other nations, too.
Just imagine for a second, that i.e. Indonesian army invades Australia just because they have a ‘different life style’. According to people like Smith we should all then suffer in silence and praise our ‘reformers’.
I am particularly sensitive to the issue. As a child I was called ‘a kike’, a ‘Gypsy’, a ‘German germ’ although I am not German, and the ‘one that Germans’ bullets missed by mistake’.
Other children did not want to play with me and avoided me like a leper. I was on my own most of the time.
At the uni I met some students from former Yugoslavia. They were from Sinj and Sarajevo. We became friends. One of my best holidays in my life I spent in the pre-war Bosnia.
I wonder whether my friends survived the war in Bosnia I lost contact. .
At Leeds university in England, I met a very ‘liberated’ girl from Turkey. We became good friends. I still have friends from Turkey.
In Australia, one of my best friends is Amira, and Anglo-Saxon Muslim girl. She is a very good, true-blue Australian lawyer. And it makes me wonder: according to Mr. Smith I, a migrant, can go out with my Australian friends to protest against the costly wars. What about my friend Amira, of British English Muslim parents? Would she get hurt?

It was not my fault that I was born in a German concentration camp. Not my choice. But, at the time I thought, it was my fault that I survived.
It was long time ago. I usually do not dwell on it. But each time another Smith rants about better and worse culture or religion I want to curl up and die.

By: skink

skink — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 03:19:59 +0000

have a look at this:

http://blogs.watoday.com.au/madashell/2009/11/free_speech_doe.html

local shockjock and the Shame of Perth, Howard Sattler, who goes one step further a makes a link between the Sydney sheik, free speech, and the Fort Hood massacre.