Is telling the truth about Islamic teaching vilifying Islam? Many Muslims would say so. And in the State of Victoria. It is law. We covered the first trial in this case at some length. Here is an update on the appeal. "Religion in the dock in Muslim vilification appeal," from The Age, with thanks to Rosie:
IT IS impossible to vilify Islam without also vilifying Muslims, because the two are indistinguishable, the Victorian Court of Appeal was told yesterday."If one vilifies Islam, one is by necessary consequence vilifying people who hold that religious belief," Brind Woinarski, QC, told the court.
Mr Woinarski was appearing for the Islamic Council of Victoria in the appeal by Christian group Catch the Fire Ministries and pastors Danny Nalliah and Daniel Scot against a finding under Victoria's religious hatred law that they vilified Muslims in 2002. The Racial and Religious Tolerance Act defines vilification as inciting hatred, serious contempt, revulsion or severe ridicule against a person or class of persons.
Cameron Macaulay, for the pastors, argued that the act explicitly confined the prohibition to vilifying persons, not the religion — otherwise it could operate as a law against blasphemy. Instead, it recognised one could hate the idea without hating the person.
Justice Geoffrey Nettle asked Mr Woinarski: "There must be intellectually a distinction between the ideas and those who hold them?" "We don't agree with that," Mr Woinarski said. "But in this case it's an irrelevant distinction, because Muslims and Islam were mishmashed up together."
Justice Nettle: "Are you saying it's impossible to incite hatred against a religion without also inciting hatred against people who hold it?" Mr Woinarski: "Yes."
Mr Macaulay said orders by Judge Michael Higgins against the pastors to take out a newspaper advertisement apologising and not to repeat certain teachings were too wide, and beyond his powers under the act.
He said it was surprising that the pastors could hold the beliefs but not express them. "They are restrained by law from suggesting or implying a number of things about what in their view the Koran teaches: that it preaches violence and killing, that women are of little value, that the God of Islam, Allah, is not merciful, that there is a practice of 'silent jihad' for spreading Islam, or that the Koran says Allah will remit the sins of martyrs.
"Contentious or otherwise, these are opinions about Islam's doctrines and teaching. Statements of this kind are likely to offend and insult Muslims but their feelings are not relevant under the act." Mr Macaulay said the act burdened free speech, contravened international treaties Australia had signed and breached the Australian constitution....
Mr McCauley is calling it the correct way. To point out the truth about Islam is not to villify those who are Muslim but do not accept such attitudes and behaviours.
I hope that the outcome will be that the pastors are exonertated. I agree that the Victorian laws are draconian and that they are being used in the wrong way. In other words Muslims have been using these laws in such a way that they maintain their perceived victim status.
People just don't get it yet. It's okay to vilify Nazism, but it is not okay to vilify the Nazis themselves?
Again, muslims hide behind religion to shield themselves. It's as if people can not be evil, only ideology, so they put the ideology in front of them and say, "You can't vilify me as a person".
People are evil. It was an evil man that created this ideology, and it is evil people that follow it. Look at the families that murder their own children? Are they not evil?
But that could apply to any group of people that hold an opinion one disagrees with, from the inconsequential to the significant.
What if I disagreed with Hitler's final solution? Could I be held accountable under this law for speaking out against the Nazis?
Are the Victorian judges really that blind (or stupid)?
"They are restrained by law from suggesting or implying a number of things about what in their view the Koran teaches..."
This is sick. Are you allowed to print excerpts?
The alternative to civil debate will quickly devolve to the lowest common denominator. To interesting times...
All the pastors have to do is present to the court a couple of the hate books available at Islamic bookstores. If those books are approved for distribution by the Commonwealth Office of Film and Literature Classification I can't see why these two pastors are in court. The books which preach hate invite the readers to conduct jihad and other unpleasantries. The stupid part about this is that if the two pastors crossed the border into NSW they would be allowed to say what they think.
I just don't get this. Any bloke from Oz care to
explain to a dumb Yank why you don't have
anything close to free speech in Victoria? Or are
you Aussies as dumbfounded as I am?
What's wrong with vilifying Islam?
One should have a right to describe what the texts of Islam -- the Qur'an, and the Hadith, taking for the later the collections of the six most authoritative muhaddithin, and with al-Bukhari and Muslim given pride of place, and their assignation of level of authenticity, based on their own study of the relevant isnad-chains, and on their decades of winnowing gneuine wheat, as they saw it, from apocryphal chaff, and finally, on the Sira, that is on the sacralized biographies of Muhammad by the early Muslims, the ones which they take to be the most authoritative. One should have a further right to comment on those texts.
Finally, why should one be prevented from expressing an opinion as to those people, not who call themselves "Muslims" but who call themselves "Muslims" and further are willing to believe, or do believe, in the truth of these texts, or if they do not fully believe, still lend their support to those who do, and believe so much of it as to reasonably alarm those whose wellbeing is threatened by those who would take such texts seriously, or at least support those who do, and not to distance oneself obviously from, and denounce, the troubling contents.
If someone tells me that a 56 year old man once married a girl and had sexual intercourse with her when she was nine years old, and further tells me that he believes this man to have been the Perfect Man, the man whose words and deeds and even silences are the surest guide to the meaning of the Qur'an, the book revealed to him, and if further this man, uswa hasana, al-insan al-kamil, is respected for all that he did, for his evident pleasure as a military leader, taking part in 77 offensive campaigns, in attacking the entirely innocent Jewish farmers of the Khaybar Oasis, returning from their fields, or watching the decapitation of 600-900 prisoners of the Banu Qurayza, or learning of the murder of those who had mocked him, such as Abu Akaf, and Asma bint Marwan -- is one not entitled to express an opinion about those who, knowing all this about this man (whether he did these things or not, whether he even existed at the time and the place to which he has been assigned, whether he even existed at all, does not matter -- what matters is what Believers in Islam believe about him, about what he did, and said, and whether, knowing this, they still regard him as the Perfect Man, as the Ayatollah Khomeini so obviously did, for almost his first act was to change, in the Iranian legal code, the marriageable age of grils, reducing it to nine years, because the example of Muhammad had to be followed.
If one cannot express, must suppress, any opinion on this, then there is no free speech in Australia. It's over. That's it.
I'm working in Victoriastan right now, and I can see why the government wants to avoid upsetting this multicultural melting pot they've got happening here. I walk around here and feel like I'm part of a grand (suicidal) social experiment created by some faceless buerocrats somewhere.
Leaving friday.
No Hugh, it's only in the State of Victoria that this ridiculous law is in place. Brought in by the Labor Premier, Steve Bracks. Not in the other States of Australia.
Ah, "Labor": that's Eurospeak for "Leftist".
Would this be applicable to all other religions too, or just Islam?
Or the question does not even arise?
Should this work in reverse?
Answers on a postcard...
In the traditional Catholic view, ideas have no rights. ONLY PEOPLE have rights.
And it is well to recall that tolerance is ALWAYS an expedience. BUT tolerance doesn't mean that the TRUTH about certain creeds and ideologies should not be told.
I agree with Brind Woinarski, but not in the way he'd imagine. Islam deserves to be vilified, and Muslims who actually know what it all is, deserve to be vilified along with it.
How odd.
Is it now similarly illegal for muslims - either here or in the 'ummah' - to vilify Christianity?
Strangely, I imagine the latter will continue unabated.
Prophet Geoff
Many people don't understand that the law in Victoria was passed almost in secret by a very few people. They tried the same thing in South Australia but were caught in the act by an Member going along to the midnight session to discuss what the bill was supposed to be and found that it did not match was was listed.
The 'vilification council' is populated by mostly Muslims so trying to apply the act to anyone else e.g. Muslims villifying Chrsitianity would be almost impossible. The two Muslims who brought the original complaints were send by the 'vilification council' to the meeting where the pastors were talking. What chance was/is there for any kind of fair hearing under those circumstances?
This was a law brought in by Muslims for Muslims not for any sense of fairness or balance and it was brought in without any popular consent. It has however also been sucessfully used by a peadophile 'warock' to defend his particular lifestyle against criticism. Go figure.
Stuff like this unjust law is why I am thankful for the internet.
Takiyya! You've been taught well my young jihadi.
Islam, the ideology, is basically software. It is no more improper to criticize Islam than some other defective software. By defective, I mean it, taken as a whole package, is loaded with contradictions, factual errors, ambiguities, and of course instructs the user to engage in activities that are illegal, unconstitutional, subversive, and treasonous in western societies. To the extent that a person chooses to continue running that defective software, it is certainly appropriate to criticize that person. The person is either negligent or malicious for running that software. To accuse someone of being negligent or malicious, however, does not necessarily mean to villify the person. Such an accusation may villify, but it would be incorrect to assume that a person, in total, is a villian because of one mistake or ill-intended act, or area of their life. Nevertheless, the whole person is held responsible, and if the whole package of elements of the software is used, then it is fair to say that person is a villain.
Curiously, the court in Victoria has chosen to villify and indeed criminalize these pastors for their publicly stated beliefs. (In fact, these pastors were criticizing the criminal behaviour that is advocated in the Koran). Consequently, applying this principle consistently, the judge must sentence himself to jail for villifying the pastors.
Subriah,
"This site evidently is one site which ignites the flame of hatred toward the religion of Islam."
Therefore you must go to jail for vilifying people on this site. I will be contacting the Victoria police immediately.
The best description of islam I've heard;
" something profoundly evil, masquerading as something profoundly holy."
That would also apply to your website Subriah.
The first thing we have to understand is "the courts " are not about truth.Victoria is governed by a Labor Government(the left).These are the same bastards that rallied against the Vietnam War and made it hard for "DIGGERS".When you have FAT FUCK BEAZLEY crying about a letter a veteran wrote when these are the same blokes that wanted to deny letters going to the Diggers in the first place.Any filthy leftist dickhead wants to go a couple of rounds with me I will take them on.I dont get it?These low lifes pretend they care but they dont.I am of Australian Aboriginal descent but by fuck my country is never going to be ruled by stinking filthy ARABS!
Fuck the left.
When are the left going to wake up?
Please dont take offense, but when are we going to wake up to the disaster that is in front of us ?
Justice Nettle: "Are you saying it's impossible to incite hatred against a religion without also inciting hatred against people who hold it?" Mr Woinarski: "Yes."
Incredible. Islam is nothing but a 'religiious' sanction to incite hate against all non-believers via DEMOGRAPHICS, DAWA, DHIMMITUDE, or DEATH. And that is legally sound?
By this logic, mohammedans calling non-believers sons of apes and pigs - or - strike at unbelievers necks, etc. is legally protected speech because it is said in the form of a religous sermon?
Suicidal nonsense!
No law in any land can stop people from thinking what they want. It's common knowledge that our politcians are completely dettatched from reality and it will not be long now where it's everyone for themselves...
The sermon at my church last Sunday was about walking in the spirit vs. walking in the truth. The analogy was as per Forest Gump. Truth is as Truth does.
The proof is in the pudding. If they don't like the negative criticism in public, maybe they should fix the cause of the problem (islam, literal interpretation of violence and discrimination in the koran/sunna/hadith vs. non-muslims).
Orwell lives in the land of Oz. Legislation against thought crime!Who'd have thought it? That humming sound is the noise of thousands of ANZAC dead spinning in their graves. I maintain that I have the right to love and hate at my discretion, not that of the state. Somewhere there must be a religion that allows ritual child abuse .... say permitting a middle aged married man to take a pre-pubescent girl as his second (third or fourth) wife... wonder what the law in Victoria would say about that? Could you hate both that religion and its practitioners without being hauled into court? Australians - please fight to overturn this travesty!
A very unsettling law.
The judge must not have seen the Irish movie "Cal," in which a Northern Irish Protestant (who willingly hires Catholics to work for him, and gives them no grief) says, "I've got nothin' against Catholics. It's just the damn religion I can't stand."
Whatever you think of his attitude, it's a pretty clear distinction to me. But some Muslims have been using the faulty and illogical equation of cricitism of religion and personal attack for quite some time. Several groups have tried (unsuccessfully, so far) to get "The Satantic Verses" banned on the grounds that it legally constitutes "hate literature."
Why, I ask myself, do these legal challenges almost exclusively come from Muslims these days? There are irreverent, insulting, disrespectful, erroneous and/or even hateful portrayals of all the other world religions AND their adherants published all the time. No person of faith likes it, but most are grown up enough to take it, faith intact. Why do Muslims, alone of all religions, get in such a flap when their religion is disrespected?
Another idea: maybe what members of other faiths (including Wiccans, atheists, agnostics,and humanists, who could conceivably argue in court that these too are religions) in Victoria, Australia can start doing is sending moles into all the mosques to monitor exactly what is being said about THEIR religions by Islamic preachers, and getting it on tape if possible, also monitoring Islamic radio programs, TV talk shows, books, pamphlets, posters, websites, everything, for speech or propaganda promoting hatred or violence against ANY other religon. Then they could present this evidence to the police and demand that arrests and charges be made, or, failing that, they could "bomb" the legal system with thousands of civil lawsuits. Perhaps this is the only way the injustice of this ridiculous law could be brought to light. Unfortunately, it not likely to happen, because with the exception of Muslims, who seem to have an unbounded amount of energy, time and money to cynically manipulate the legal system, adherants to other religions, and non-believers, generally have other priorities...such as raising, feeding, and educating their children, doing their jobs, helping their friends, families, and communities, etc... You know. Human things.
First of all, apologies for the lack of links.
Treehugger, yes, the judges down here are that stupid.
As for this abomination of a "law", and how its area of application, one of the first cases using it was brought by the Church of Scientology here in Vic against a woman in Queensland who had a website about different cults, and Scientology was noted on one page. I don't recall the outcome, but if it had gone to court it would have been all over alt.religion.scientology, so I don't think it made it that far.
Then there was the paedophile 'warlock' as previously mentioned, another case against the Salvation Army course run in prisons and, of course, the two Dannys.
All against anything relating to a Judeo/Christian morality, it seems.
A few months back, there was one case thrown out by HREOC (Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission) where the principal of a Catholic high school complained about history textbooks referring to the religion as evil and presented in an extremely negative way. Apparently that wasn't considered worthy of complaint.
And in the latest news, a highschool girl was suspended because she refused to take off her cross.
The school has a policy of no visible jewellery, piercings and such, although apparently there is room for negotiation in the case of religious symbols. Except in this case, according to the new principal.
This is of interest because according the Helen Szoke, who is the go-to person from HREOC, there would be no justification for bringing a case against the school under the R&RT Act. (She got her face all over the news on the weekend, and I was thoroughly gobsmacked).
So, basically, anyone can use this law, against anyone in Australia, so long as you're not Christian, or by extension, Jewish.
L.Drummond.
Apologies for the broken link.
Trying again.
Preview is my friend.
I would venture to guess this law will be overturned by the High Court of Australia on the grounds that it denies the defendants equal protection under the law as articulated in article 26 of the UN's International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
How can it be illegal for one person (a christian) to stand on a street corner and read aloud passages from a book (koran) while it is perfectly legal for another person (a muslim) to read the same passages from the same book at the same street corner? It's really that simple. Get to work counsel!
"The Racial and Religious Tolerance Act defines vilification as inciting hatred, serious contempt, revulsion or severe ridicule against a person or class of persons."
OK, whenever a person recites the shahada, s/he endorses the palpable spite, contempt & whatnot expressed in al-Qur'an, Hadith, &c. towards non-Muslims. Likewise, s/he knows, or should know, what his or her obligations as a Muslim are, i.e. Dhimmify the kafirs, "seize them...and do away with them" (4:89), &c. Only the dissembler argues, "yes, I believe in al-Qur'an, but oh, no, I don't share the intolerance and malice it counsels the Muslim to harbour for those who reject Submission."
So would somebody please explain to a guy from Chicago why the RRTA isn't being used to prosecute any Imam who encourages recitation of shahada, if not all Muslims, too?
savitch, professor Jerzy Zubrzycki, a post-war Polish settler is credited with being the father of our multiculturalism. He studied the theory of multiculturalism being developed in Canada, then without any proof that the theory would work in practice he convinced our politicians to use multiculturalism to shape our society. In 1971, 91% of Australian people were against multicultural ideals. So to make it work legislation was needed to cow the public. And so it is with the lunacy surrounding Islam. Victoria has introduced laws to protect it because the so-called religion of Islam has copped a blistering attack from many people in Oz. One Sydney radio station, 2GB, is monitored daily by muslims (they monitor other radio stations) who then run off to the communications watchdog with complaints.
Should we place our faith in the judge to hand down a thoughtful judgement in the matter of the two pastors? It depends on the medication he’s taking. For instance, in the state of Victoria a father, despite 349 previous convictions, was sentenced to two-and-a-half-years in the slammer for beating his infant son. That’s what is euphemistically referred to as justice in Victoria.
What is happening in Victoria and Oz is being replicated around the world. The USA has CAIR, ACLU and others. The UK has the quiescent and impuissant Tony Blair. And on and on it goes.
Anyone who thinks we in Australia have unfettered free speech knows little about Australian law and customs.
There is no guarantee of free speech in Australia. There are plenty of laws that restrict it.
I am suprised people don't know this?
"professor Jerzy Zubrzycki, a post-war Polish settler is credited with being the father of our multiculturalism. He studied the theory of multiculturalism being developed in Canada, then without any proof that the theory would work in practice he convinced our politicians to use multiculturalism to shape our society."
While PC Multiculturalism has been to a great extent tooled and propagated by certain more or less machinating individuals here and there (other infamous "Patres" have been noted as Marcuse and Gramsci), and from there levered into spheres of public influence among "elites", both Academic and political, I think it's a mistake to locate the source of all -- or even most -- of its hegemony to such philosophical Bond villains and their cabal of elites.
For one thing, it fails to account for the widespread -- indeed, nearly universal -- consensus that has been achieved by PC Multiculturalism among the vast majority of ordinary Westerners. The only way to account for this, and still hold on to the theory of shadowy "fathers" and their elitist cabals, is to assert that
a) there really is no democracy throughout the modern West, that everything is really being controlled and manipulated by these megalomaniac cabals
and that
b) the vast majority of ordinary people are easily manipulable idiots.
I don't think (a) or (b) are tenable. Particularly (a) is repellant to rationality and, frankly, smells of neo-Gnosticism with its alienation from the reality of noetic structures in the West and consequent indulgence in conspiracy theories and easily detachable evil localized in certain types of people, in order to explain this alienation.
The other way to account for the disparity noted above is to simply assert, without any evidence, that the vast majority of ordinary people in the West are in fact untainted by PC Multiculturalism (or at least so superficially tainted as to be easily recoverable to sense).
No, it seems more reasonable to conclude that PC Multiculturalism is a far deeper and more complex sociopolitical process, organically part of the larger Progress of the West (a Progress with obvious imperfections) than some "project" able to be spearheaded by Marxist eggheads, then foisted onto smoky backrooms of "elites", and from there to control the lives of the vast majority of hapless, yet "furious", ordinary Western citizens.