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Muslims, Pauline Hanson and John Howard's racism

"Let's say immediately what it seems Prime Minister John Howard cannot say: to the extent that they follow their religion, Australian Muslims are good citizens. They don't gamble or drink or steal, they are family-minded, community-minded — particularly within their own ethnic/religious community — and they are civic-minded too."

So writes Barney Zwartz, Religion Editor, in The Age yesterday, here, in a nuanced and balanced op-ed piece on Muslims in the Australian community. And he goes on to say:

"The one thing Muslims want is the same automatic acceptance Australians of other religions and races have gained. Catholics, Jews, Greeks, Italians and Vietnamese, among others, were once in their shoes. Albanians, Turks, and Indonesians today are pretty thoroughly integrated, though still thoroughly Muslim. They see no conflict between Islam and democracy or "Australian values".

The racism-card Howard & Co are running - shades of Tampa II? - is a disgrace and an effront to decent people. But then again Howard has a track-record of being a racist and bigot.

As Emma Dawson - a fellow at the OzProspect think tank and a PhD candidate at the National Centre for Australian Studies, Monash University - points out in an op-ed piece in The Age today under the headline "What the PM owes to Hansonism" it is 10 years ago on 10 September that Pauline Hanson jumped onto the national agenda after making her maiden speech in the Federal Parliament.

As Dawson writes:

"...... because Hanson and her subsequent political outfit, One Nation, proved to be the Trojan Horse by which Howard and his fellow reactionaries, the driest of the Liberal dries, smuggled their decades-old prejudices and grievances into the national consciousness."

Read the complete Dawson piece here.

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