Given the terrible actions against innocent Muslims in our community of late, I joined a social media group of everyday Australians supporting our Muslim brothers and sisters. Through my participation in this group I became aware of the #WISH campaign, Women in Solidarity with Hijabis.
Following on from previous articles in relation to the terror alert and the social ramifications in Australia:
I would like to draw readers’ attention to examples of Muslims speaking out. The first is a video of Reza Aslan on CNN. The full Media Matters report can be found HERE.
In The Age, Reem Sweid writes (please do read Reem’s full article):
No matter how much I hear that Islam is a religion of violence and oppression, I think my faith is beautiful and has shaped me in every way. I have Muslim friends who are kind, generous and loving. So it saddens and angers me to see my religion defiled by the self-titled Islamic State. But what stings even more is seeing the wider Australian community so willing to believe that these barbarians represent Islam and Muslims.
We need to listen.
Feel free to add links to other examples in the comments.
A story fluttered into my view on Facebook, that repository of factual information. I noticed a few other similar reports of the same incident and given the Here’s A Quick Recap Of All The Times Australia Treated Muslims Like Complete Garbage This Week I had read not long ago, together with the reports I was hearing on the radio about an attack on a woman on a train in Melbourne, later reported in The Age, there was little reason to disbelieve the incident had taken place. Let’s look at these two reports in a little more detail.
From the first link above:
… the last week or so has seen so much Muslim-bashing it’s almost like we’re back in 2001 again. Or 2005. Or 2006 — look, the point is, we’ve fallen back really, really hard into our nasty old habit of treating Muslims — or anyone we think is a Muslim — like the aliens in District 9.
From The Age:
A woman has been left traumatised after her head was smashed into the side of train carriage during an apparent racial attack in Melbourne’s north.
The 26-year-old victim was on an Upfield line train outbound on Thursday night when she was approached by another woman, who began hurling abusive and racist remarks.
WA Today recently reported:
A mother has been spat on, a baby’s pram kicked, a pig’s head has been impaled on a cross and mosques vandalised in a worrying escalation of attacks against Australian Muslims.
I’d like to draw your attention to a very interesting article on The Guardian by Katherine Murphy.
Given The Guardian doesn’t have the WordPress “reblog” feature, this is the best I can do!
Given that parliament seems to be on a path to deliver a bigger surveillance state and less means for whistleblowers to expose its abuses or for journalists to scrutinise it, a bit of push back from the community might have been expected. This is, after all, a pretty important principle: public interest disclosure and press freedom.
Click through to read the full article at The Guardian. Even if you are not Australian you might find parallels in your own country.
Katherine’s profile lists other articles you may find interesting.
Now for something completely different. Technology.
I have a new laptop with Windows 8 and Office 2013/Office 365. Very fancy. I like the backlit keyboard.
The Start button has gone! I hear Microsoft have brought it back with Windows 9 – good move.
The Office themes are too white. Whiter than white. Oh, there is a Dark Gray and a Light Gray option. Not very artistic choices, sadly.
First let us look at the default White option. I had to put a border around the screen snip or you’d never see it!
Let’s get one thing perfectly clear. Terrorists are terrorists. Regular readers know as an atheist I don’t have a lot of tolerance for religions. I acknowledge there are a lot of very good religious people but I believe those people are good people with or without religion: they would be great humanists. Religion didn’t make them good people.
Since the terror alert was raised by Mr Abbott some Australians seem to think that is a licence to attack innocent people. This has to stop. Here are just two examples of what is happening now.
Or this on Facebook:
For quite some time I have been concerned about the commercial drive to move roles off-shore. I’m an accountant, I understand the business drivers to reduce costs and maximise profit. I am sure the concerns I express here were expressed in a similar fashion during the industrial revolution.
The High Court of Australia has dealt another blow to the Australian Governments who have been implementing or trying to implement processes now ruled unconstitutional. Yes, that is governments (plural) because the beginnings of much of the current situation were under the previous Labor Government.
Source: Diac Image Library
Jan Dobson commented:
Miss O 1 and Miss O 2 and I don’t often get “girl time” together. When we all liked the ads on TV for the movie “Lucy” I invited them to some mother and daughter movie time. I am very interested in the scientific debate about how much of our brain we really use and loved the concept of a strong woman staring down the baddies, thinking it would be good for the girls, so off we went. The director, Luc Besson, has a track record of strong female characters.
The start of the movie is pretty good. Suspense is built up well in the opening scenes, although why Lucy was dating a creep is beyond me. Girl lesson number 1 – don’t date creeps!
Continued from Blood spurted from the ripped flesh. If you have just joined this story and wish to start from the beginning, go to What goes around comes around.
Jones came to in excruciating pain.
“Good, you’re awake.” Jones heard the familiar Australian accent and for a moment thought he was back in Canberra.
“Pain”, he croaked, “Give me something for the pain.”
“Sorry, mate. No drugs available. You were lucky you stayed out of it while I stitched you up. No surgical thread either, that’s sewing cotton holding your throat together.”
His reality flashed before Jones’ eyes. He remembered something had happened.
He looked up at the doctor. “Were you here before all this started?”
“No, I’m just like you. Arrived with nothing but the clothes I was wearing.”
“How do they let you practice?”
“With so many people here there is much sickness and injury. They needed doctors. The local doctors put me through an ad-hoc “exam” to verify my knowledge as much as they could because they need the extra hands. So I’m patching up fellow asylum seekers like you.”
Oh God, thought Jones, the pain, the pain.
Random Observations of Life 