My view and thoughts on everything!

There has been a lot of debate recently over the Australian Government’s decision to look at amending section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act.   The amendments proposed include removing the provisions making it unlawful to “offend, insult or humiliate” based on a person’s race.   This would be replaced with a new clause that bans racial vilification.   In brief, a large number of Australian’s feel that the proposed changes will, in effect, allow people to be more racist to others. Since the debate about section 18C has started there has been a couple of incidents, most particularly in multi-cultural Ryde, where a poster was displayed with the words “No more Asians.   It’s not the face of Australia.   We speak English.   Save our Aussie culture”. Under the proposed amendments a number of migrant groups fear that they will incur more racist incidences like this one. Before I move on, I would point out that every country has elements of racism. ...

When I heard that a friend of mine, Sabiha, was working on an hijab article/documentary I asked whether I could give a perspective from a westerners (my) point of view.   So, without further ado, here it is.   What is my view on women who wear hijab (headscarf) and dress moderately? Do I think they are treated as lesser beings for doing so? Or are they generally passionate about their role as Muslim women in respect to their faith? Read on and I will put forward my own unique western view on this rather, at times, over-debated topic. I suppose like most westerners, I didn’t really think a great deal about Muslim women who wore the veil prior to the events of 9/11.   Then Islam became front page news for all of the wrong type of reasons.   Sabiha herself was attacked on a bus as strangers kicked and punched her whilst trying to remove her veil.   Thankfully for her she survived this brutal attack with headscarf still intact. To hear about this more th...