Freakazoid Times

By Malcolm Fraser
February 10, 2006

In 1997, there was an exhibition of photographs by American artist Andres Serrano at the National Gallery of Victoria. Many regarded the exhibition as offensive to Christ. Churches and others objected. The Catholic Church sought a court injunction. The objections were strong. A youngster eventually damaged Piss Christ with a hammer, violence was involved. The exhibition was closed.

That was our reaction to an exhibition that many people regarded as offensive to their religion. The reactions to the Danish cartoons have clearly been much more widespread and violent, that must be condemned. But those cartoons were published in a highly charged political atmosphere.

We have a right to free speech and expression but that right is in some instances circumscribed by law. The worst excesses are covered by defamation laws or laws relating to racial or religious vilification. These set the bar very high and most of us understand that if we wish to live in a civil society where there are broadly harmonious relationships between different groups, races and religions, we must exercise that right with common sense and, hopefully, with a degree of wisdom.

Today we know that Islamic fundamentalists, who won't be changed by logical argument, will use any excuse to stir their supporters to encourage the view that Christian nations vilify and degrade Muslims. Thus the fundamentalists gain new recruits. If terrorism is to be overcome we need to make it much harder for the fundamentalists to use arguments, however superficial, that attract potential suicide bombers.

Unfortunately, in the years since 9/11, the United States and its closest allies have done many things which make it easier for the fundamentalists to attract recruits. The war against Afghanistan was supported, but not the war against Iraq. Iraq had not housed al-Qaeda, it didn't have weapons of mass destruction, it was a secular regime. Saddam Hussein was a terrible dictator but so are a number of others, some of whom at times have been called "ally" by the US.

If the resources poured into that war had gone to fight terrorism and extremism, while maintaining a broad-based, international coalition, terrorism would have been significantly blunted, maybe overcome.

But America wanted an emphatic demonstration of American power.

Insurgents in Iraq have all been regarded as terrorists, even though it appears a majority are Iraqi.

The arguments about weapons of mass destruction were false. The decision to go to war was made months before American people were told. Hans Blix was never going to be allowed to finish his report. It would have taken away the main reason for the war. These actions and the falsehoods that accompanied them fractured worldwide support and sympathy for the US.

There is a perception also in the Middle East that the US, in particular, is prejudiced in favour of Israel. This may or may not be true but, while that perception exists, it becomes a reality that infects the politics of the region.

The US has promoted democracy in many parts of the world. In Egypt this has given a platform for extremists. In Iraq it has brought a Shiite regime to power, with close links to Iran. In Palestinian territories, Hamas has won. The United States and others have said they cannot talk to Hamas. Islamic countries are now saying democracy is all right for America if it gives the result America wants.

It would have been possible to say to Hamas: if there is to be peace between Israel and Palestine, your policies are going to have to change but you have been democratically elected and we will talk to you and judge you on your actions from the day of your election.

That would not have violated Western principles. For Islamic countries, all this demonstrates a double standard.

We said we believe in the rule of law, in due process, in the principles of liberty. What about people in Guantanamo Bay, designed specifically to deny access to the law. What about Abu Ghraib? What about the Torture Papers, published by New York University's Centre on Law and Security, which demonstrates that the highest authorities in the US were seeking to find ways in which invasive questioning of detainees could be undertaken with impunity. What about the military tribunals that, from their nature, cannot provide justice?

The British Government has condemned these tribunals. The Australian Government has been prepared to condemn David Hicks, whether innocent or guilty, and renounce its own citizen.

America pursues the rendition program. Individuals are captured, taken from the streets, from America, perhaps South Asia or parts of Europe, flown to a country that will allow questioning under torture.

Our leaders talk of the principles of freedom and democracy and of liberty. But Islamic fundamentalists can point to example after example where Western governments have failed to apply those standards to their own actions.

The great failure, even sin, of the coalition of the willing is the belief that we in the West cannot fight terrorism and adhere to our own principles. Even in Australia, many of these principles have been abrogated. The onus of truth has been reversed, due process abolished and there are provisions that allow the detention in secret of people the authorities know to be innocent of any crime.

Our leaders believe we must adopt tactics and practices too often used by our opponents if we are to beat them. Their faith in democracy is shallow and inadequate.

Terrorism will only be overcome if we adhere to our own principles and destroy the arguments that the extremists can use so ably to attract new recruits.

Malcolm Fraser was prime minister of Australia from 1975 to 1983. This article was originally published in The Age.

By Waleed Aly

The push for change must come from within the Muslim world.

On occasions such as International Women's Day, which was marked around the world yesterday, the Muslim world never escapes negative attention. Nor should it. As a Muslim who is deeply troubled by the kinds of abuses that women infamously endure in some parts of the Muslim world, i think it would be profoundly immoral to ignore such injustice. It should be unapologetically confronted. Reform is badly needed.

To this end, it is vital that any discourse seeking to initiate change in the Muslim world has some traction among mainstream Muslims. It is otherwise doomed to irrelevance.

This is where Western discussions in general, and Western secular feminist discourses in particular, hit a mighty roadblock. Even among Muslims seriously committed to gender reform, Western feminism has often presented more of a hindrance than a help.

In simple terms this is because, to the Muslim ear, feminist discourse smacks of colonial imperialism. It echoes a broader historical polemic between the Muslim world and the West in which Western prescriptions for Muslim reform were often egocentric and hypocritical. Here one would site Lord Cromer, the 19th century British consul-general in Egypt who advocated women's unveiling while simultaneously being president of the men's league for opposing women's suffrage in England.

Alternatively, there was the International Alliance of Women, which left many Eastern feminists disillusioned in 1939 when it appealed for the release of a Czech member held by the Nazis, but refused to do the same for a Palestinian member imprisoned by the British.

Feminism and imperialism seemed to have some kind of undisclosed memorandum of understanding.

This perceived link with cultural hegemony continues to the present day. Many Muslims agreed with the Western feminist criticisms of the Taliban forcing Afghan women to wear the burqa. Such denial of choice is indeed oppressive, and deserves opposition. But nary a squawk was heard from those same Western voices in opposition to laws in Turkey that denied women the choice o wear head-scares in educational and political institutions.

This leaves many Muslim women wondering whether their feminist sisters only defend a woman’s right to choose when she chooses to renounce Islamic norms, but not when she chooses to adopt them. Being forced to abandon Islamic behaviour does not seem to matter.

The belligerent attitude towards Islam exhibited in particularly by second-wave Western feminists didn’t help. Arguments seeking gender equality by prising Islam’s fingers off social norms and constructing a society on secular foundations were profoundly offensive to many in the Muslim world, where religion is still so central to identity. To attack Islam was not to attack the tool of patriarchal oppressors; it was also to attack the identity of the oppressed.

Third-wave feminism has changed this approach radically, but the damage has already been done. Feminism has already become the f-word. Only a few Muslims would dare use it.

Unsurprisingly then that any Western attempt at gender reform in the Muslim world meets tremendous suspicion. Feminism – often appallingly stereotyped and misunderstood – is imagined as the West’s Trojan horse, intended for Islam’s destruction. Its mere mention creates a kind of invisible paranoia that captures the resonance of colonialism and imperialism in the collective Muslim mind.

Accordingly, the more Western feminism speaks didactically about Muslim gender reform, the more damage it does to the plight of Muslim women. It becomes easier to dismiss any women’s right discourse as the Western corruption of Muslim societies. I have seen this time and again, where valid objections are derided on this basis and avoided, rather than engaged.

So what is one concerned by gender injustice in the Muslim world do?

The solution must be indigenous to the societies seeking change. Perhaps in cognisance of this, Western feminists often support local groups agitating for change. The problem is that the Western activists tend to be enamoured of their own reflection, and often support groups that are hostile to Islam as they are. Such attitudes will always be viewed as foreign and become irrelevant.

The only effective path to reform will locate itself within the dominant cultural paradigm. In the case of the Muslim world, this means collectives that fight for gender justice from within the Islamic framework will stand the best chance of success. Such movements certainly exist throughout the Muslim world, and are sometimes maligned, but because they speak the language of Islam, they cannot be ignored.

We should not ignore them either.

Originally appeared in The Age Newspaper March 9, 2005. Waleed Aly is an executive member of the Islamic Council of Victoria.

By Mathew Murphy

PREMIER Steve Bracks has indicated he is likely to water down his tough new anti-terrorism legislation amid a community outcry that the laws go too far — especially on strip-searching children.

His comments came as law bodies told a committee yesterday that the legislation unduly trespassed on fundamental rights and freedoms.

Mr Bracks said he was prepared to change part of the legislation that related to strip-searching children as young as 10 by police officers of the opposite sex and without their parent's knowledge. Mr Bracks said it would be clear in the legislation that it would only be conducted under extreme circumstances.

"(The powers) would be used when there was an imminent terrorist attack happening on our soil, so it can't be anything more dramatic than that," he said. "Some debate is coming now, that's good, and we will account for that debate and if there needs to be some fine-tuning we will do it."

The Bracks Government has copied NSW legislation that says strip-searches of children aged 10 to 18 would not be conducted by a police officer of the opposite sex or without parental knowledge "unless it is not reasonably practicable in the circumstances".

Acting Attorney-General John Lenders said the Government would be flexible in responding to concerns.

"Clearly there are discretionary issues between (strip-searching) someone who's 10 and someone who is 17 years and 364 days, but again we will take this on board," he said.

He said the Government would look at whether the laws were in line with what was agreed between state and federal governments, "is it the most appropriate response and what are the protections and mechanisms in there".

Opposition attorney-general spokesman Andrew McIntosh said Mr Bracks had introduced "shonky legislation" into the Parliament that was not consistent with the Commonwealth legislation or what was agreed to by the premiers at the Council Of Australian Governments meeting that thrashed out terrorism issues.

The Law Institute of Victoria told the parliamentary Scrutiny of Acts and Regulations Committee that the powers "go beyond what is required to prevent or protect the community from a terrorist attack".

Victoria Legal Aid said the bill was a "disproportionate response to the threat of terrorism in Victoria". The Victorian Bar Council argued it was not right to detain a person who had not been charged with a crime.

The legislation will be debated when Parliament resumes next week.

The idiots are finally realising just how stupid parts of the bill are.