Things I’d like to know...
Some things I’d like to know.
Who are these women and children trying to leave Syria?
What were the exact circumstances that took them there?
How much agency did they have?
What have they been through since?
Is there any question about their Australian citizenship?
Is there any precedent for doing what people like James Paterson are demanding and banning their re-entry en masse?
Has the government offered support to these citizens attempting to make a return? If not why not?
If a national newspaper like The Australian has an online lineup (today) that begins with coalition ‘demands’ for the demonising of these ‘ISIS Brides’, moves on to Pauline Hanson’s racist rhetoric on ‘good muslims’ and attempts to stir yet more controversy over Randa Abdel Fattah’s inclusion in the Sydney Writers Festival, could its news choices be construed as either racist, inflammatory, intentionally divisive or all three?
If people within government pay attention to outlets like The Australian and shape their responses accordingly, are they in fact ignoring majority sentiment in the country?
How does a coalition with 43 seats in 150 seat lower house get to ‘demand’ anything?
How does a coalition with a polling primary of 23 percent get to ‘demand’ anything?
How is it that those demands of a largely unwanted coalition, combined with the noxious rumblings of a racist hard right rump all amplified by right-wing propagandist media seem to constitute the most pandered-to elements of the national political conversation?
How must it feel to be a Muslim Australian right now?
How must it feel to be any fair-minded Australian right now?
What does it take for a Government to take some kind of moral lead in the face of what are clearly malicious campaigns by politicians and press aimed solely at creating division and anxiety based on religion and race?
What happened to its commitment to cohesion?
Because for most of us, that cohesion is represented by fairness, acceptance, and the benefit of the doubt.
I can tell you how it feels to be a Muslim Australian right now. It is exhausting. It feels like the post 9/11 period all over again but on steroids.
The one silver lining of the Christchurch attack was that, for a time, Australia pulled its head in, and started treating us like people. Not exactly equal people, but refreshingly closer to it.
And now all of that is unravelling and we are becoming un-people again. Our grief is criminalised and ostracised. Our organisations are subject to being labelled “prohibited hate groups” and treated in law as being the same as literal terrorist organisations who kill people.
Bomb threats against mosques are a passing news article.
One guy showed up to my local mosque with a machete to attack the worshippers: this was a non-event. Because who really cares if Muslims die? We have watched a whole nation of Muslims being exterminated with no real consequences - what would a few dead Australian Muslims matter?
But being an Australian Muslim also means carrying on. Because our Prophet taught us that, in the end, whatever happens is good for one who follows their faith. If something we like happens, we are grateful and that is good for us. If something we don’t like happens, we patiently persevere, and that is also good for us. In the end we go back to a Lord who is forgiving and kind, and in whom we place our ultimate trust.
So I don’t fear for us as Muslims. I fear for Australians as a whole: we are losing our country just as America has lost theirs. We are following in the footsteps of the US - and the people of this country are not equipped to cope.