But the Australian Communications and Media Authority has been too gutless to act. Not ACMA didn't even give the presenter nor 2GB a slap on the wrist.
It deemed the apology sufficient and 2GBs discplining of the Presenter as adequate- this from the station which led the way for misinformation and provided the hysteria in the lead up to the Cronulla Riots.
It seems if a Muslim makes a stupid comment it is in the news for days and the person is bashed and vilified by the media- but a radio presenter who does the same receives virtually zero punishment.
It's about time regulatory bodies showed more guts.
First off apologies for the title but I got a little jealous of the trashy tabloids and the sensationalist current affairs show having all the fun with the headlines, so I thought I'd give it ago.
Predictably the media hasn't let us down with divisive islamophobic material, and instead of focusing on a wonderful Australia Day weekend they have turned on a young Imam who gave a sermon in place of SheikhTaj.
YahyaSafi, a young Australian Muslim, gave a sermon on Friday which included the following: "God destroy the oppressors, destroy the aggressors, destroy the hypocrites, destroy the despotic tyrants."
He also made dua'a (a Muslim prayer) for God to destroy the enemies of Islam.
So now how do you think the Australian media drama queens took this? Well according to them this was urging attacks on coalition and Australian forces in Iraq.
How do we know whether or not he was talking about Australian troops, easy, we take what he said and see if that is a description of our troops, so- Are Australian troops enemies of Islam? Are they oppressors? Are they aggressors? Are they hypocrites? Are they despotic tyrants?
If you answered NO to all the above then you can simply dismiss what these media ratbags are saying.
But for divisive elements of the media to come to that conclusion it means that they must think that are troops are those things- shame on them. How dare they question the ethics of the worlds most honorable military men.
This is an Australia Day weekend and these people need to think long and hard about what sort of Australia they are creating. If we sit silent and allow these people to continue with this rubbish then the future for our country is going to become an "Us vs Them", we will not be a united nation and the Australian we have known and loved will be no more.
The deliberate misinformation being sent out is a disgrace, these people are deliberately infiltrating every sermon at Lakemba Mosque looking for that next quote that they can twist to suit their hate filled agendas.
Another week, another load of hysterical sensationalised articles by the so-called media.
Predictably Sheik Taj has been in the news again, this time for saying that Muslims who chose to become Australians have more right to be here than convicts- a comment which though silly- no Australian has more right to be here than anyother Australian- isn't as offensive as News Ltd and the right wing shock jocks would have us believe.
In fact many articles and talkback shows feature some of the most horrific things about Muslims- articles by Piers Akerman, Andrew Bolt, Janet Albrechtson are consistent in their offensive comments towards Islam and Muslims whilst people like Alan Jones and Jim Ball have had people on their shows advocating violence and even the bombing of mosques.
The most offensive of the Sheiks comments- "....Westerners are liars, especially the English..." wasn't bad enough for News Ltd and their cronies, they had to deliberately lie about what he said, even when they showed the true quote the article would still say that the Sheik called White Australians liars- which he never did.
Not to be outdone the Daily Telegraphs anti-Muslim attack dog, Luke McIlveen, then dug up a 3 year old DVD of Sheik Feiz urging Muslims to bring up their children with a devotion and passion for God. The media went rabid about this claiming that the Sheik advocated violence, when he in fact said no such thing. He never urged suicide bombings or anything like that but again the media has no interests in the truth.
Now watch this video from Fox News- the presenter comments that THIS IS HUGE- so what's so huge????? The fact that a presidential candidate may have been raised as a Muslim- that's the guys crime.
Now I'm not going to excuse Sheik Feiz or Sheik Taj about what they said. Their comments were silly and offensive to some people, but what we did not need was the predictable hysterical rantings of the media drama queens twisting the words. The comments were offensive in their original form there was no need to reinterpret and add new meanings to the words.
The media has now moved onto Sheik Taj wanting to run for Parliament, however no media organisation has provided a quote from the Sheik that he wants to run nor have any of his spokespeople said that. The closet we've got is that the Sheik may endorse some candidates to run in the election, but this didn't stop the reactionary politicians like Morris Iemma trying to get their bit of action.
Guess what guys this is a democracy, people are free to run for election if they so choose, I mean if people like Pauline Hanson, David Oldfield and Jim Saleam can run then so can the Sheik.
Who knows what next week will bring- either way you can bet there is more sensationalised nonsense coming from the usual channels.
Before I leave you here is just a small sampling of comments from the Daily Telegraph website- a website which states it will not publish offensive comments- as well as the personal blog of the Telegraphs Opinion Editor Tim Blair- well you can be the judge, are these comments at the very least as offensive as anything the Sheiks have said?
"Let’s not beat around the bush. Muslims in every Western nation refuse to integrate, to assimilate or to participate. Unlike all the other religious groups such as Jews, Buddhists, Hindus and Skiks for instance, Muslims immigrate to Western nations and practise a regime of virtually absolute intolerance to the peoples of their host nations, while stridently demanding that their barbaric, mysogynistic medieval creed that masquerades as a religion, is accepted.
When a “religion” is based upon the dictates of a holy book that exhorts its followers to “Kill all Christians and Jews wherever you find them”, then we know what Muslims really stand for. I for one do not tolerate such a hate-filled creed or the fanatics that follow it.
I feel very sorry for Ms Hage-Ali and the best thing she could do for herself is to renounce the evil that is Islam and just live her life as a normal young Australian girl. As for the Muslim fanatics that condemn her, if they don’t like what goes on in Australia, they can emigrate to one of their Islamic paradises, such as Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Libya etc, instead of burdening us with their hatred." Posted by Anti-Muslim of Sydney on Wed 06 Dec 06 at 09:43am
"24 is pretty spot on. If they want to be accurate with today's world well Islamic Terror is the biggest threat to the Free world. I can't remember the last time a Christian walked into a train of plane and blew himself and others I the name of Jesus. Muslims must face facts that Islam is a violent religion which encourages death. Its founder was a mass murder and paedophile can we expect anything less?" Posted by: Mickstar of Sydney 3:55pm January 19, 2007
"It has just been proved that the morality and tolerance of Islam has not moved one iota in the last 600 years. Islamic Fanatics can justify any claims, but any criticism is rejected as hateful, discriminatory and evil. It is OK to preach genocide, promote murder, entrench female slavery and prohibit free speech, as longs as you are Islamic. In Islamic countries it is dangerous (if not illegal) for some one to preach any other faith. Often it is just as dangerous o preach a different type of Islam. Yet Islam demands that the can freely preach in non-Muslim countries. Why do their leaders fear freedom, education and criticism? Perhaps they rightly fear these things because then their followers might realise that the faith they are following is not one of love and tolerance, but hatred, hypocrisy, murder and repression. To recant your faith in Islam is punishable by death. A religion that not only would condemn your soul, but also encourage your murder. There must be many millions of Muslims that would wish to leave this blood thirsty religion, but only stay for fear of their life. Each individual religious teacher can say what ever they want. The way that Islamic sects seem to debate is by murdering their critics (both Muslims and non-Muslim) in a most indiscriminate way, also killing hundreds of bystanders. This religion of hate, intolerance and murder should be prohibited. No civilised person could even consider this to be a religion. The puppet leaders of Islamic countriues that wish to retain this dead religion, should not have any of the amenities of modern society. They wish to live with 14th Century leaders and philosophy then they should also have similar medicine, weapons and education." Posted by: Angus 1:31pm September 18, 2006
"It's not just El-Hilali who is deranged - it's his thousands of followers who genuinely and happily agree with him. Islam should be banned in Australia, and if people want to practice worshipping the Islamic cult, they will HAVE to leave - and good riddance to them all. Howard ,stop beating around the bush and take some drastic action before we're all sucked into a Baghdad style civil war with these lunatics." Posted by: tony 8:56am January 13, 2007
" ... Often I’d gaze across the street from the coffee shop and think about throwing a brick through the window" Posted by aussiemagpie on 2007 01 17 at 09:56 AM
" ... This is why their women should be considered nothing more than breeders of weapons and their children as weapons.
There is no “innocent civilian” in the islamist world. All us infidel are considered legitimate targets by them and all their men, women and children are weapons to use against us.
They are, and have been, waging a genocidal war against us, and we’re imprisoning our own Soldiers for being rude or impolite to their murder/death cultists." Posted by Grimmy on 2007 01 17 at 06:42 PM
"I’d like to take these guys round the back of their context and “educate” them." Posted by Wimpy Canadian on 2007 01 17 at 07:54 PM
"Actually, mareeS, apart from oil, the only useful thing Arabs have given us are thoroughbred horses. Legend has it, that the reason Arabian horses are so fast is because they’ve seen what happens to the goats." Posted by Infidel Tiger on 2007 01 17 at 09:17 PM
"... there are only two types of Muslim: inpatient and outpatient." Posted by Dminor on 2007 01 17 at 11:17 PM
There is no question that Saddam Hussein was a tyrant, who inflicted misery upon many people in Iraq- he was a thug, a murderer, and may even have been a war criminal.
In saying that though there is no excuse for the revenge murder of Saddam Hussein that happened on the morning of one of the holiest days in Islam- Eid Al Adha.
The execution of Saddam was a stunt, whose motivation was revenge- the trial which has been condemned by Human Rights groups, was as unfair as a trial could get. It was motivated by revenge not by justice.
The Nazi murderers who were responsible for the execution of 6 million Jews had a fair trial, but Saddam was condemned to death on the day of his capture.
It is evident that the US puppet regime in Iraq is weak, and has no interest in justice for the Iraqi people- Saddam should've been tried for ALL of his atrocities.
The truth about who was involved, who funded Saddam, and who provided him with weapons has now died with him and those people will never be held to account.
To top this off we had people dancing in the streets, celebrating this murder- but what is there to celebrate? Everyday more and more Iraqis are dying under this illegal invasion, if the execution of Saddam meant it would all end, then by all means celebrate, but the sad reality is many more Iraqis will die.
The USA used to stand for truth and justice- but under George W Bush it stands for lies, corruption and murder.
