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Keywords: Islam

  • RELIGION

    Community fear feeds Fox News Muslim bashing

    • Ruby Hamad
    • 02 August 2013
    10 Comments

    The now notorious Fox News interview in which host Lauren Green quizzes academic Reza Aslan as to why he, a Muslim, 'would be interested in the founder of Christianity', is mind-boggling in its casual persecution. A similar mistrust of Muslims is evident in Australia, as the Ed Husic debacle demonstrated. Even I, a non-practising Muslim at best, encounter hostility when I write on certain issues.

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  • RELIGION

    Another round of Ramadan lunar-cy

    • Irfan Yusuf
    • 09 July 2013
    17 Comments

    Ramadan is supposed to fine tune your soul, weaken the ties binding you to your physical appetites and test your religiosity. This month unites Muslims around the globe in an envelope of piety and mercy. At least that's the theory. In reality, for most of us Muslims Ramadan is the month of massive weight gain.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Husic feels the chill of Australia's racist winter

    • Ellena Savage
    • 05 July 2013
    11 Comments

    The media response to the racial abuse Ed Husic suffered after the Qur'an affair in Parliament was as troubling as the abuse itself. Labor MP Stephen Jones called Husic an immigration success story. I wonder what an immigration disaster story would look like. Perhaps the British-descendent bullies who spat on a 14-year-old, headscarved girl in 2004.

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    'Naked Jihad' sacrifices feminism to racism

    • Ellena Savage
    • 12 April 2013
    9 Comments

    The phrase 'white men saving brown women from brown men' derides the use of western feminist tropes to further colonial expansion. The anti-Islamic reaction of some feminist activists to the death threats suffered by Tunisian 'naked protestor' Amina Tyler does nothing to promote global solidarity among women.

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  • RELIGION

    A Muslim, a Buddhist, a Catholic and two atheists walked into the ABC

    • Irfan Yusuf
    • 03 April 2013
    27 Comments

    Many must have wondered if it was an April Fools joke. An episode of Q&A worth watching? One without a single pompous pundit or partisan politician? Despite the presence of two atheists, religion dominated, perhaps because the most articulate spokesperson for atheism was herself representing a faith.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Shariah-compliant swimming in Geert Wilders' world

    • Irfan Yusuf
    • 22 February 2013
    27 Comments

    Suddenly some young lads started swimming across us. One even swam under me, and joined his friends at the other end of the pool. They were giggling and speaking to each other in Dari. In a few weeks, these kids will join other Hazara Australians for a massive 'new year's' festival. Should Wilders and his friends be afraid?

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    Stories about God and monsters

    • Tim Kroenert
    • 17 January 2013
    4 Comments

    Life of Pi offers two stories. Both concern a boy who survives a shipwreck and spends months adrift in a lifeboat. One is constructed from mundane albeit horrific facts; the other, from visual and mystical wonders, scenes of terror and transcendence that seek no less than to better understand God. Which do you prefer?

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  • RELIGION

    Best of 2012: Who is the loudest and ugliest religious donkey?

    • Irfan Yusuf
    • 10 January 2013
    2 Comments

    Donkeys are gorgeous but make an ugly sound. Sadly, religious discussion in Australia too often sounds like donkeys competing to see whose braying is the loudest and ugliest. Recently Christian lobbyists spread misinformed messages about sexual orientation. Loud braying was heard on Saturday too when a group of louts hijacked what should have been a peaceful Muslim protest. Tuesday 18 September 

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  • RELIGION

    Religious persecution is not a contest

    • Andrew Hamilton
    • 08 November 2012
    11 Comments

    Research into the persecution of Christians brings to notice abuses that could otherwise remain hidden. But the persecution of Christians is often compared with that undergone by other groups, like Muslims. The discussion takes on a competitive and proprietorial edge. This has unfortunate consequences.

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  • RELIGION

    A feminist reading of the Koran

    • Ruby Hamad
    • 23 October 2012
    33 Comments

    For centuries, Muslim women have accepted the fallacy that they are inferior to men. Sadly, the jahaliyyah (ignorance and irascibility) Mohammed railed against is alive in the Muslim world, notably in the mentality that sees the Taliban try to justify shooting a 14-year-old child for supporting women's education. 

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  • RELIGION

    Who is the loudest and ugliest religious donkey?

    • Irfan Yusuf
    • 18 September 2012
    34 Comments

    Donkeys are gorgeous but make an ugly sound. Sadly, religious discussion in Australia too often sounds like donkeys competing to see whose braying is the loudest and ugliest. Recently Christian lobbyists spread misinformed messages about sexual orientation. Loud braying was heard on Saturday too when a group of louts hijacked what should have been a peaceful Muslim protest.

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  • INTERNATIONAL

    Anders Breivik and the insanity question

    • Binoy Kampmark
    • 29 August 2012
    27 Comments

    Sanity assumes purpose and responsibility; insanity its absence. This is hardly applicable to Breivik. His critique of Islam suggests a radical and violent conservative response. Conservative, Christian radicalism, that is not anti-Semitic, is on the rise in Europe, and Breivik is its foremost proponent.

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