Links, Links, Links!! 12th May 2013

Happy Mother's Day all! Check out the links for the week...

Do you pay for newspapers or any news? Do you want to? News Limited has a paywall dilemma trying to deal with it...

[box] This announcement is their epitaph. It suggests that News Limited really sees little future in hard copy newspapers. They will continue until their revenue falls to a point where they are unprofitable. Then they will die. But don’t worry: you can always switch to news+.[/box]

Society seems obsessed with the concept of "happiness".  It would seem the "happiest people pursue the most difficult problems".  I think it comes to finding meaning in life... "For many social entrepreneurs, happiness comes from the feeling they are making a difference."

Has the Carbon Tax actually worked? I missed this earlier, but it seems Australia's emissions are at 10 year low...What does this mean for the industry? Stretching this out a little further, what does it mean for the thousands of engineering students training in Australia every year in response to the "engineering - skill - shortage"?

[box] Australia's greenhouse gas emissions from electricity generation have fallen to a 10-year low as coal-fired power slumped to its lowest level in a decade, a new report says. At the same time, the share of renewable energy in the National Electricity Market (NEM) has soared beyond 12 per cent and looks set to continue rising.[/box]

An amazingly honest piece about what Depression is like.  Many of us have family and friends who go through this, and it is a difficult thing as a bystander to understand.  It is really interesting to read a piece that provides an insight into a struggle that afflicts so many.

Anil Dash talks about privacy through identity control and asks the question, who owns your identity right now?  His blog is an interesting mix of technology and pop culture and worth a read.

Imran Khan - the Pakistani ex-Cricket Captain writes some interesting words on 'selective Islam' and the spiritual journey. 

[box] To understand why the west is so keen on secularism, one should go to places like Cordoba in Spain and see torture apparatus used during Spanish Inquisition. Also the persecution of scientists as heretics by the clergy and convinced the Europeans that all religions are regressive. However, the biggest factor that drove people like me away from religion was the selective Islam practised by most of its preachers. In other words, there was a huge difference between what they practised and what they preached. Also, rather than explaining the philosophy behind the religion, there was an over emphasis on rituals.  ... I feel there are certain western countries with far more Islamic traits than us, especially in the way they protect the rights of their citizens, or for that matter their justice system. In fact some of the finest individuals I know live there.[/box]

An interesting piece from the blogger at mamamia.com, Rosie Waterland on being fat and deciding to go on the self worth diet.  Worth a read! 

Tune of the day: Janelle Monae is a funky lady indeed.

Links, Links, Links!! 5th May 2013

A stunning way to tell a story. Check out this audition on the X Factor.

What have you been up to this week? It's been a crazy one on this end...I had this interview come out on Radio National about the piece in the Griffith Review, learnt a fair bit about training someone and read many analyses about the reaction to the Boston Bombings (a few of which I have included below).  Enough about me though...here are some of the bits and bobs which caught my eye this week.

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Paul Grahams words on finding your purpose and doing what you love (via Brain Pickings).

What you should not do, I think, is worry about the opinion of anyone beyond your friends. You shouldn’t worry about prestige. Prestige is the opinion of the rest of the world.

Prestige is like a powerful magnet that warps even your beliefs about what you enjoy. It causes you to work not on what you like, but what you’d like to like.

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Terrorism and other religions...

[box] Contrary to what is alleged by bigots like Bill Maher, Muslims are not more violent than people of other religions. Murder rates in most of the Muslim world are very low compared to the United States.[/box]

An amazing piece on moderation versus extremism.

[box] The Quran and the Hadith very clearly and explicitly warn against extremism in matters of religion...In the Quran God says, ‘Do not commit excess in your religion.’ According to a report in the Sahih Ibn Majah, the Prophet Muhammad is said to have remarked ‘O People! Save yourselves from excess in religion, because earlier communities were destroyed […] due to excess in religion’[/box]

It is this that I wish people remembered.

This a beautiful piece written by artist James Rhodes...

[box]The government is cutting music programmes in schools and slashing Arts grants as gleefully as a morbidly American kid in Baskin Robbins. So if only to stick it to the man, isn't it worth fighting back in some small way? So write your damn book. Learn a Chopin prelude, get all Jackson Pollock with the kids, spend a few hours writing a Haiku. Do it because it counts even without the fanfare, the money, the fame and Heat photo-shoots that all our children now think they're now entitled to because Harry Styles has done it.[/box]

Very cool Facebook page, Room for Debate - it is the exact kind of space I would like to encourage and grow...They are currently talking about whether the Hijab is worth fighting for?

[box] ...aside from the racial overtones when mostly white Western women are trying to “save” mostly non-white non-Western women, Femen activists have insulted the group they claim to care about. A campaign against the hijab is an attack on Islam instead of on patriarchy itself, effectively marginalizing all those women who choose to seek their rights in an Islamic context.[/box]

An MUST read by Mohamed Ghilan on "The Irony of Muslim Terrorism". I've just discovered his blog and I am sold.

[box] The matter is not about Islam. A closer investigation of Islam through proper methods of study and proper contextualisation will reveal that it is impossible for anyone to conclude any room for justifying, let alone do it in the name of Islam, the indiscriminate killing of innocent people on the streets. What we are dealing with are the repercussions of political decisions and historical forces that gave rise to insane acts by misguided Muslims who think they are serving Islam and Muslims.[/box]

A really well presented piece by Stella Young on the Politics of Exclusion, something I know about perhaps from one angle but not from this particular angle - that of disability and the invisibility it renders...

I posted this during the week but it is worth a conversation - diversity in motorsport.  Will Buxton writes an awesome piece on this...

I have to include this amazing spoken word video. It's rather viral at the moment (includes swear words). Seriously though, watch it. A letter to JK Rowling from Cho Chang.

Here are some equally interesting critiques, all which bring up interesting points (this is just one example) and it is good to see the poet has engaged with them via her tumblr.  I think pieces like this are extremely important and a healthy part of the public sphere of debate.  Clearly, there are many critiques, but what this has achieved is highlighted a problematic discourse and created a catalyst - a conversation through which we as a society can dismantle and tackle the issue.  How can issues ever be resolved if they are not talked about? 

For a bit of fun, check out these awesome LEGO CREATIONS!

Enjoy your Sunday!

Crazy Rig Conversations: Part 3

So, life on the rigs never stops with the amusement! This series, 'Crazy Rig Conversations', chronicles a few of the G to PG rated things that get said on a rig in an everyday context that make me internally chuckle in disbelief and misguided mirth. Enjoy...

NB: Generally, each person is referred to as ‘old mate’, or OM for short.  ’Old Mate’ is Australian for ‘that random dude’, or someone whose name you have forgotten.

***

OM: Oh it's good you're back on shift. The other guy was too hard to understand, I could never get what he was sayin' over the radio.

Me: Oh, was he talking too fast? Sometimes he talks too fast...

OM: Oh nah, he just talks too Asian. It's like COPYYY, and he's like *puts on an unidentifiable ethnic accent* "wha?! wha?!*

***

During a long winded, mostly joking argument with a roughneck about women are in general, he comes back with this:

OM1: Listen Yassmin, men were created first. Women? They were an afterthought, and only made for company.

In hindsight, I should have said something like "Oh yea? We were just version 2.0, the latest edition...but at the time I was too busy scoffing.

***

I asked someone how they got to their position, as I usually do. Had they been on the rigs for long, etc.

OM2: Oh yeah, I've been around for a while. But you know, I just kinda slept my way to the top. Even from school, that's how I got my grades you know, and I mean I was Captain of the Rugby team and ripped and all that, so it was no wonder with all those young teachers and that... yeah.  Just kept doing it, and it worked for me ya know?

Well, that was one bit of career advice I was not going to take...

***

OM3 is the Aussiest bloke around.  He starts off this conversation very clearly telling me about how he doesn't really subscribe to any type of religion.  I braced myself, and got my comedy-wit boots on!

OM3: So, like, do you hang around only African people living in, like, your own world that has nothing to do with the rest of society?

Me: No, well that's not how I see it, and most of my friends are from everywhere because I went to a Christian [ecumenical] high school...

OM3: Oh okay, so you don't get together and do like, bomb throwing practice or anything?

Me: Oh... nah not really...

OM3 starts laughing.

Me: ...but of course, if that was something you were interested in.. ;) [I start laughing, he sort of stops.]

[and now I am worried I have jokingly written this on the internet, I am so going to be tracked by some sort of law enforcement]

At the end of the conversation, which was surprisingly quite detailed and extensive about what we Muslims do, where I pray and what I eat etc, OM3 starts to leave.  He stands at the door and turns around, cheekily.

OM3: Now I'm gonna tell all my mates I spent time hanging round a Mozzie! Doing crazy practice throws!

***

If you haven't seen it yet, check out my interview on the ABC with The World - it was quite exciting and an honour to be on the show!

***

Links, Links, Links!! 28th April 2013

Hi everyone! How are we this fine Sunday?

I've had an interesting week, not least as I was interviewed by the ABC (live! zomgsh) on my piece in the Griffith Review.  Check out the video HERE!

How many times do we have to say this?  The use of the word "illegal" is ignorant and mischievous!

[box] While the Coalition may have hoped to score political points with the reappearance of its "illegal boats" billboard this week, it has shone a spotlight on its feeble grasp of international law. Opposition Leader Tony Abbott is wrong to say that the Refugee Convention says asylum seekers are "illegal". [/box]

On the topic of the Boston Marathon Bombings: why is it considered terrorism and Aurora and Sandy Hook not?

Wise words on Bahrain from an unlikely source: Joe Saward, the F1 journalist...

[box] Some would argue that it is necessary to remove all religion from the political process and that until Bahrainis stop thinking about being Shias or Sunnis there cannot be a truly democratic country. If you go back in history you see many nations going through similar religious troubles, notably in Europe in the 16th and 17th Centuries when Catholics and Protestants murdered one another in large numbers. We do not live in a perfect world, but sport is one of the few ways in which nations can unite, transcending internal divisions and thinking as a group. Thus looking at a much bigger picture one has to say that the Grand Prix is a good idea for Bahrain. No doubt some will disagree…[/box]

Finding a way of being a girl that doesn't hurt... again going to a question of where the feminist movement is?

Again on the issue of feminism...Five Myths about Feminism.  How do you feel about the label?

A massive discussion about social media's do's and don'ts. Really interesting - how do you use social media, as an individual and as a company?

Seth Godin asks the question: What is your critical mass?

[box] If your idea isn't spreading, one reason might be that it's for too many people. Or it might be because the cohort that appreciates it isn't tightly connected. When you focus on a smaller, more connected group, it's far easier to make an impact.[/box]

This is old news but I think I forgot to link it in my hubris - the first female, Muslim MP in Australia!

I am a sucker for beautiful photography (who isn't), and beautiful photography of beautiful machines? How could I resist...

Oh and don't forget to check out my posts this week; one on Global Migration and Identity and the other on Stirling Moss's comment's on women in F1. If you want to keep in touch more regularly, you can always check out my Facebook page!

Links, Links, Links! 21st April 2013

 

How are we all this morning? How has the week been? I've been super busy with a crazy week at work (I've a new trainee), getting excited about being published and wrote one of my most-read articles on an encounter at the airport.  Enough about what I did though...here is what I came across on the net!

I love this piece by the Informed Comment: Top Ten Reasons why Terrorism is Forbidden in Islamic Law...

From the simple dollar: 5 pieces of advice that changed my life.

Young people need to be more involved in all levels of decision making in society; even though public and corporate decisions usually affect us we are rarely party to the decision making process.  That should change, and one way is by getting young people on Boards.

I completely relate to this writer - the love of technology mixed with nostalgia for print (I was an insane bookworm growing up and still feel guilty that I own a Kindle...I feel like I am betraying print) and it's interesting to read this piece from a lady who says her life is better without Facebook. I don't know if I could leave Facebook (isn't that a sad state of affairs!) - working out in the sticks doesn't help I guess...

Feel like you have media overload? A piece from Wired on balancing your media diet...

Why aren't there more women in technology? Forbes thinks it's a numbers and expectations game...

On one hand, the Boston bombing reaction reporting seemed relatively free of bias...but that was definitely not the case. 

Regardless of your views of justification and intent: whatever rage you're feeling toward the perpetrator of this Boston attack, that's the rage in sustained form that people across the world feel toward the US for killing innocent people in their countries. Whatever sadness you feel for yesterday's victims, the same level of sadness is warranted for the innocent people whose lives are ended by American bombs. However profound a loss you recognize the parents and family members of these victims to have suffered, that's the same loss experienced by victims of US violence. It's natural that it won't be felt as intensely when the victims are far away and mostly invisible, but applying these reactions to those acts of US aggression would go a long way toward better understanding what they are and the outcomes they generate.

A post (a rant, really) from an irate Sudanese blogger who is frustrated at the fact that in Sudan, skin colour is still an indication of status...

I don't agree with everything the United Nations does, but I do believe there is a place for it.  Why we get value for money at the United Nations.

I love examples of Muslim women challenging the expectations, and this Bosnian Mayor is a inspirational case!

The difference in treatment and expectations of male and female CEOs - Queen Bees getting the flak.

The age old question about "peak oil..."

Enjoy the rest of your Sunday (and the Formula 1 and MotoGP!)

PLEASE EXPLAIN: Why my clothing choice matters to you?

A small incident occurred in my life a couple of weeks ago that I had trouble processing.

On my way to a flight, travelling through airport security, the lady standing at the metal detector stopped to ask me  about my head covering.

"What do you mean it's because of your religion?" I was asked.

"...uh, it's what I wear for a hijab.  I am a covered Muslim woman and I have to wear this because it's compatible with my field engineering job..." I was a little confused and at this point frustrated; they were holding up the entire line and the questioning was causing an unnecessary scene.

"Yeah look it really isn't religious enough.  Aren't you guys supposed to wear the..." She trailed off, looking at me.

"You mean the full veil/hijab?"

"Yes, that.  You have to wear that for it to be religious.  Guys who wear turbans can't come in with a baseball hat covering their hair and say that is religious, because it is a baseball cap, not a turban.  Look do you have a veil with you to prove that this is religious?"

I looked at the lady, incredulous. Was she serious?

"No, I don't carry an extra scarf with me in my hand luggage".  The lady didn't seem to pick up on my dry tone.

"Oh okay. Well in the future, carry with you a scarf so you can show the security"..

"Wait, wait a minute." By this point I had all my luggage and was ready to leave, but I just had to clarify. "So you're telling me that I can't wear what I am wearing because it isn't religious enough for you and I need to bring a 'proper scarf' with me to prove to you that I am Muslim?"

"Yes. Do you understand me and where I am coming from?"

"...no, not really. But I'm going to go catch my plane, I'll just go with it. Thank you for your advice..."

***

Women's bodies, in particular Muslim women's bodies, seem to be a battlefield for all sort of political debates and concerns, exemplified by the never ending French battle with the burqa/niqab/hijab.  This particular incident and raised questions on two levels: one a personal level, and one around the question of Muslim women, their clothing and bodies in general.

***

Firstly, it must be clear that I am not assigning blame to the security lady per se, as such an incident is likely due to a combination of ignorance, poor training and miscommunication.   If a Muslim individual had made the same comment - 'this isn't religious enough' - I would have taken umbrage for a completely different reason.  In this case however, it is more an unfortunate reflection of the understanding of Muslims and their traditions in Australia society.  

There are two sides to this coin.  On one hand, there is an onus on the Muslim community to go out and educate the wider community on traditions, so as we are not taking on a 'victim mentality', as we did so often after September 11.

On the other hand, it is also important that members of our security forces, particularly those in sensitive areas such as the airports, be properly educated and trained.  It is quite likely (though I am making the assumption) that the training consisted of explaining "what a Muslim woman looks like" and subsequently only showing the traditional/stereotypical image of a Muslim woman in the classic hijab.

Unfortunately (ahem, surprised?), not all Muslim women look the same and dress the same, and as the community matures in Australia, looks will diversify further.  Stereotypes should not be the way we expect our community to look.  

Perhaps recommendations can and should be made to the security department in order to improve their training.  If their existing programs are already quite extensive, perhaps it was an isolated case...? The tendency is to give people the benefit of the doubt (although in this case, that may be counter intuitive).

***

On a personal note, it was uncomfortable being told by a complete stranger that I wasn't dressed 'religious enough'.  I don't take offense to much at all, but I personally felt affronted by someone judging whether or not I was practicing my religion appropriately or 'enough', particularly by, essentially, a random individual...

Religion is a purely personal thing, and so is clothing choice.  In a nation which prides itself on all sorts of freedoms, the fact that individuals are made to feel uncomfortable due to either choice may require us to have a look at ourselves, and if our societal norms and expectations are eroding those freedoms.

***

The second point this incident raised is related to the debate about Muslim women and Muslim bodies more generally.  The existence of organisations such as FEMEN and the responses from the Muslim women around the world exemplify the battlefield that is the 'Muslim Woman'.  I might leave this point for another day actually, there is a lot to it...

***

Links, Links, Links! 6th April 2013

  Hello all! How are we this week? I’ve been flat chat at work doing the oil and gas thing, while also working on getting a few things moving on the Youth Without Borders side and writing a whole bunch of different articles… anyhow, enough about me! Let us look at interesting things on the net recently…

Daily Dishonest posters…I had to chuckle.

But that's the thing about racism: it goes way beyond bad intentions. The most insidious racism is just so ingrained it's involuntary.

Waleed Aly’s brilliant piece on ‘The Curse of Australia’s Silent Pervasive Racism’.

This one is pretty cool: Miracles of Engineering in Peru: Drinking Water Out of a Billboard!

“Each generator captures the air humidity and from there it goes to a reverse osmosis system. Each tank stores about 5.28 gallons of water. These 5 generators purify the vital liquid and its total is gathered in one tank,” said one of UTEC’s engineers involved in the project.  The billboard has already produced about 2,496.42 gallons of drinking water in a 3 month period, an amount that equals the water consumption of hundreds of families per month.”

An interesting piece by the Australian Government’s ‘Resilient Communities’ initiative on ‘advice to young Muslim Australians’.  I don’t enjoy motherhood advisory statements, but this was rather good.

And, don’t wait for someone to come and take you by the hand. Don’t wait for the leaders and Imams. They have their hands full. You must initiate the process.

You must lead the way.

There is a perception among many of us that it is fine to be an Indian Muslim, Pakistani Muslim, Algerian Muslim, and Palestinian Muslim. And so on. But, for some reason, there is a false perception that it is not fine to be an Australian Muslim. The ‘Australian’ part is seen by some as ‘kufr’ (unbelief). Don’t be fooled by this simplistic and false understanding.

Don’t be afraid to say you are a Muslim and an Australian. Don’t be afraid to say that you are an Australian Muslim.

An interesting and informative perspective: How to move beyond youth tokenism into real engagement.

A good round up on what is happening in North Korea and why the general analysis is maybe looking at the wrong audience.

My piece for Future Challenges on women in the workforce, and why there is more to it than just numbers.

Why volunteering in orphanages sometimes does more harm than good. This is part of the ‘well intentioned but misguided’ mindset my father and I share about a lot of aid work…

Again on the ‘well intentioned but misguided’ note, a piece on WhyDev that really resonated (and challenged me in equal parts) on Why making the world better does not make necessarily make YOU better’.

It sounds harsh, but it has to be said. It’s important to understand that doing good things does not make you good. It is important to understand that good people can and frequently do do bad things. Not all good doers (confession: I positively loathe the term “do gooder”) are nice. You need to enter the aid world understanding that you will have to work and deal and maybe even share quarters with some truly nasty individuals. You need to understand that you, too, may do things that are not nice, things that you’re not particularly proud of. And you need to understand that this is nothing at all about your competence as a humanitarian. Being deeply committed to reducing the amount of injustice in the world, and expending great amounts of energy and personal resource towards that end in no way precludes you from treating your staff unjustly. It’s the opposite of “but he/she/they mean(s) well…” argument, all too frequently used to justify everything from poor individual performance to ridiculously reasoned startup NGOs.

On a totally different note, looking for some crazy cool (modest) fashion inspiration? Oh, check this out. I couldn’t get past the first jacket…

Thank you, Mr Sartorialist.

Death, Spirituality and Why I Believe.

Spirituality and death are not light topics often spoken of, particularly in Australia.  Deeper questions on life, death, spirituality and meaning are often left untouched outside the circles of philosophy, religion and very close family and friends. Yet they lurk in the shadowy recesses of our minds, buried beneath the busy-ness and the whirlwind of daily life, emerging only when prompted and typically buried soon after.

Death seems to be the one thing that is a certainty, yet it manages to shock us. It is as if we know that it will eventually happen, but don’t believe it when it does, as it forces us to confront our own mortality, our own frailty.

It is fact.  You are going to die. A moving piece written on the NYT puts it well.

we don’t have a choice. You are older at this moment than you’ve ever been before, and it’s the youngest you’re ever going to get. The mortality rate is holding at a scandalous 100 percent. Pretending death can be indefinitely evaded with hot yoga or a gluten-free diet or antioxidants or just by refusing to look is craven denial.

Yet, that is what society does.  We deny it to ourselves.  We imagine that somehow, we will not fall prey to this fatal condition called life.  And yet, we do.  Inevitably.

And inevitably, we become simply another organism that has lived on this earth, and life moves on.  No matter what role we played on this earth – king, pauper, mother, villain – the planet keeps spinning, and eventually, save for a few, even the memory is forgotten.

***

Paraphrasing from R.Roberts, Islam (for me) is the wonderful belief that this life is not our whole story.

The fundamental belief in Islam, and indeed in many other religions, is that this life is merely a stage in the lives of our soul – that the time on this earth will be judged after we pass on, as we continue into the next life.

This is why death is something we are not taught to fear, but to prepare for.  That doesn’t always make it easier to deal with, but somehow easier accept, and it provides answers to questions no one living can definitely respond to.

I’ve grown into my religion and spirituality as I have aged.  It is a process, just like any thing else, and with this growth has come the realisation that belief in the afterlife changes the perspective and the attitude taken to life as a whole.

For example, people often ask about the difficulty in forgoing things in this world – alcohol, pork and promiscuity are the ones I get asked about the most – and find it difficult to comprehend why anyone would voluntarily put themselves through extra difficulty.  Once you understand that these actions are providing “brownie points” for a level of the game you haven’t reached yet, it begins to make some more sense.

If I have a medical problem, I’ll go to the experts – the doctors.  If I have a question on life, spirituality and what’s next, I live by what the experts in that industry say – the industry of spirituality if you will, is religion.

I don’t always understand the answers I am given, but I have faith. After all, we follow doctor’s orders don’t we?

***

Here are a two beautiful links that prompted me to write this piece.

Regrets of the dying.

You are going to die.

Brisbane Times: How Racist Are We?

I wrote this piece for the Brisbane Times... check the full article (and comments!!) out here. ***

In 2005, when news of the Cronulla riots spread, my family was inundated by calls from friends and family overseas asking if we were okay.

"We're fine!" we would say. "Queensland's different".

That's how I'd always seen it. Growing up in Brisbane in the 90s and 00s, I remember associating racially motivated violence with Sydney and Melbourne.

Although there were incidents in Queensland, it was never as common or visible. Even after 9/11, although our mosque was burnt down and there were incidents of racism, the community didn't experience the widespread and intense incidents of racial hatred as exhibited at the Cronulla riots or more recently, the attacks against Indian international students.

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So why is Queensland different? Do the numbers support my anecdotal evidence? Are we more cohesive, or is it a case of luck and "it just hasn't happened yet"?

According to census data, New South Wales and Victoria have an over-representation of LOTE (Language Other Than English Spoken at Home) population, with Sydney and Melbourne's LOTE population at 37.8% and 33.7%, compared to Brisbane's 17.9% (ABS, 2011).

It is quite clear then, that the ethnic population density in Queensland is significantly less than those in the southern states, perhaps a reason for less racial violence.

Furthermore, the southern capital cities have more densely populated areas with particular groups of migrants that have been settled for longer, whereas Brisbane and Queensland's migrant populations are younger and less dense.  In 1996, Queensland had 29.7 % fewer LOTE speakers compared to NSW (ABS, 1996).

On the other hand, the Scanlon Foundation's "Mapping Social Cohesion" (2012) report states that Queenslanders are particularly likely to hold negative views on cultural diversity.

Numbers may not always tell the whole story.  As a lifetime Brisbanite, I don't think we have a widespread issue with racial violence as we are a little different to our southern neighbours.

Firstly, the settlement of racially diverse populations hasn't been in the dense concentrations of lengthy settlement as seen down south.  This has allowed ethnically diverse populations to better embed themselves into the fabric of the mainstream community.

With that familiarity comes understanding and the reduction of the likelihood of racial violence.

Secondly, as a society, we are now much more aware the needs of migrants and LOTE populations having learned from Sydney and Melbourne. As populations now settle in Queensland, the many support mechanisms available from government and organisations help alleviate many of the issues based around settlement that may provoke violence.

When my family moved to Australia almost 20 years ago, the level of support was essentially non-existent.  Now, there are extensive networks to help, and the positive impact this has cannot be understated.

However, it cannot be denied that there are negative - dare I say racist - views around the state. We've been lucky so far. I feel safe, accepted and don't find my race a major inhibitor in my ability to participate.

We shouldn't be complacent however, and as we become more racially diverse we must work together to ensure that our community isn't marred by the manifestation of negative views and the racially motivated violence that can truly damage the fabric of our society.

Read more here!

***

Thanks to the Brisbane Times for giving me the opportunity to contribute...

So what are your thoughts? I only had 500 words, there is plenty more to the discussion!

Hypocrisy of the Hierarchy: "Islam" vs "Islamists"

Below is an excerpt from the blog of an activist currently in Sudan in reference to the NCP, the nation’s ruling party. He raises a poignant point; highlighting the Sudanese government's use of religion to justify their actions while simultaneously flying in the face of everything the religion stands for.

Far from a moral and legal compass, Shari’a has been nothing but a political tool used by the NCP to consolidate their hold on power. While some naively believed the rhetoric and rallied around ‘the Islamic State’, the majority has known that the regime’s founding ideology has long been perverted by power and greed. In the past, the NCP made an effort, however minimal, to cover up their religious merchandizing, if only as a courtesy. However, when CS gas is fired into a house of worship on specific orders, it seems evident that we are no longer dealing with a regime that can be bothered with even insincere courtesies.

This has been a cause of personal frustration for some time now.

Another example can be found in Timbuktu (yeh, it’s a place), Mali, where a group called the "Ansar Dine", control part of the country and destroy the nation's heritage and history in the name of "Sharia Law".

This band of terrorists has recently turned their guns and fanaticism against the historical shrines that had made the city of Timbuktu a beacon of learning through so many centuries. They have used pick-axes, shovels, hammers and guns to destroy earthen tombs and shrines of local saints in the desert city of Timbuktu, claiming that they are doing so to defend the purity of their faith against idol worship. They are behind the destruction of at least eight Timbuktu mausoleums and several tombs, centuries-old shrines in what is known as the ‘City of 333 Saints’.

***

My frustration is twofold.

Firstly, even though the actions are not aligned with Islamic values and principles, these groups will often claim their actions are in the name of the religion and then rub salt into the wound by denouncing anything or anyone they believe isn’t following Islam.

Secondly, by using Islam as a political tool, these groups taint the name of the religion itself.

Take the example of the the Muslim Brotherhood, or Al-Akhwan al-Muslimeen, the current Egyptian President’s party.  The organisation started as a religious social organisation, with stated aims to preach Islam.  With power usually comes political agendas however, and the Brotherhood is now one of the largest political movements in the Arab world.  The organisation (the political wing) operates under the banner of Islam, however throughout its history, its actions haven’t always been aligned with Islamic values.

Yet, because the Brotherhood as an organisation has an Islamic mandate, Muslim members and calls itself the “Muslim” Brotherhood, it’s actions are seen as representative of 'what is right under Islam'.

This is unfortunate as there is a difference between Islam and self proclaimed ‘Islamists’, or those who use religion as a mean to a political end.  This is not to say that all political Islamists are bad as such, things are much more nuanced than that. There is simply a difference between Islam and Islamists, and this should be recognised.

It is not the religion that should be judged by the people but the people whom should be judged by the religion.  After all, we are only human, and humans are fallible.  Such is the nature of our humanity.

***

This isn’t Islam’s problem alone, it has happened with Christians, Jews and numerous other religious groups.  Religion is an extremely effective and persuasive political tool, and unfortunately is often used to justify evil and undeniable atrocities.

However, when you look at it…

“Do you love your Creator? Then love your fellow beings first.” – The Prophet Mohammed (SAW) [Muslims]

“Love thy neighbor as thyself” – Jesus, quoting the Torah (New Testament) [Christians and Jews]

“Hatred does not cease by hatred, but only by love; this is the eternal rule.” – Buddha [Buddhists]

It would seems to me that mercy and love are what all religions preach and what we should focus on, regardless of denomination.

***

In all of this, it should be noted that Muslims have been not given a mandate on how to rule a nation.

There are detailed descriptions for many things in Islam, down to the very details of how to wash before you pray, but there is no description for the best “model of government”.

Yes, there is the concept of ‘Sharia’, however Sharia is not a book of law as Western civilisation would have it, rather it is the ‘path’ or the Islamic ‘way of life’ (read further here).

What there isn’t is a ruling on whether Muslims should be right wing, left wing, realist, socialist, communist (though that wouldn’t really work anyway), democratic, authoritarian, dictatorial…

Politics is one of the areas that Islam hasn’t mandated.  What does that tell you?

***

So, what are your thoughts? For me personally, I think religion and politics are different realms and should be kept separate. That is how I will keep it at any rate.

The Weekly Grapevine: First Week of October 2012

 

Can you believe it is October? I spent the week learning about killing wells and trying to get decent phone reception… but enough about me, this is what I found on the net!

How politicians get away with dodging the question: The Pivot:  "Politicians," he says, "are exploiting our cognitive limitation without punishment."

This ought to go down well with my fellow uni students: why lectures are ineffective. 

 Top myths about the Iranian Nuclear Program

It is alleged that Iran has threatened to annihilate Israel. It has done no such thing. Iran has a ‘no first strike’ policy, repeatedly enunciated by Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. Iran’s president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has expressed the hope that the ‘Zionist regime over Jerusalem” would ‘vanish from the page of time.’ But he didn’t threaten to roll tanks or missiles against Israel, and compared his hopes for the collapse of Zionism to the collapse of Communism in Russia. Iran has not launched a conventional war of aggression against another state in all of modern history. Israel aggressively invaded Egypt in 1956 and 1967 and Lebanon in 1982 and 2006. The list of aggressive wars fought by the US, including the 2003 invasion and occupation of Iraq, is too long to detail. So why is Iran being configured as the aggressor?

I know we have heard so much about the video and the backlash, but here is an interesting take by an American Muslim on the analysis…

…that’s not to say the film is an “excuse.” The film rather is a “last straw.” The attack on the embassy in Cairo following the one in Libya was not an attack on America but an attack on American intervention of Egyptian affairs. This is why it is so crucial for Egypt to establish its own democracy without Western influence. It restores a fundamental inseparable right of a people to determine their own government, and the morality of this principle on which America was founded means less war and less hostility. And it means more opportunity for us to focus on our own defense and build it in the event of an attack against a single nation (rather than five total wastes of military occupation).

They don’t hate our freedom; they hate that we think it’s ours.

10 favourite TED talks by a fellow blogger; these are great!

An interesting article: The Trouble with South Africa that highlights the issue of representation in the media of figures and groups not as “human beings with stories”, but more a collective that thinks and acts as a single monolithic non-relatable entity.

I’ve been puzzled and not a little disturbed by the lack of empathy on South African social media with the horrific events at Marikana, where 34 protesting miners were killed by police on August 16th. …

So what’s going on? Partly, it’s to do with people’s tendency to believe and react to images over text….

But it also has to do with the way most media have covered and continue to cover the strike. This was pointed out by academic Julie Reid, also in the Daily Maverick. Her piece also argues that the day-to-day event-based coverage has also helped obscure a very worrying much larger trend of police violence against citizens. Beyond a lack of investigation and intelligent mining of the data, I have not come across any article that has attempted to get into the lives of the miners, show them to us as individuals, and help us genuinely understand their daily struggles. Much (if not everything) of what has been written lately glosses over miners’ past, dreams, desires, frustrations, etc. Short: their lives. The failure to give attention to those details made it impossible to imagine what it would mean to live a miner’s life, which has allowed the debate to be sucked into a very ordinary South African debate — a spiral of numbers, acronyms, figures, maps and politicking that works as a cover to say: we haven’t got a clue.

This is sad: An interesting recent piece of research on farmer suicide.

The study revealed numerous male suicide clusters of high risk from across Australia, but generally not (state/federal) capital city regions. Only the capitals of Adelaide and Darwin were found to have male clusters, although these are the fifth and eighth largest of Australia’s eight capital cities, respectively. The Adelaide cluster has also been found to have a higher incidence of mental and behavioural disorders. Suicide rates tended to be highest in areas that were both of lower socioeconomic status and with a higher concentration of Indigenous inhabitants. Only one female cluster was identified and over 40% of statistical local areas (SLAs) had no female suicides at all during the study period.

“Win an Adventure to Africa”  -- Sounds exciting, but a it does frustrate me sometimes that going to Africa is seen as one single destination: Africa is a continent made up of over 50 wildly diverse countries…

This does sound amazing though: UNREASONABLE AT SEA

Aussie Racing Legend, Jack Brabham and a chat with SPEED

The Muslim Dilemma?

The West and the rest of the world will not know peace until critical thinkers in the Arab and Muslim worlds start speaking out and getting an audience from the global media. There is no alternative to native dissent to the suffocating culture of the sacred. Muslims are as intellectually capable as anyone else in the world, but their minds are almost hopelessly shackled by taboos, big and small, social and political. Instead of producing a culture of critical thinkers, Muslim societies are teeming with thin-skinned moralists.

Meanwhile, Muslim-majority nations, those whose flags display stars, crescents, and swords, can’t compete with a nation like South Korea in contributing to global scientific research, or invent anything to save their lives.

Muslims are struck in an impossible bind: They are totally dependent on the West for all the good things in life but are fanatically attached to religion as a marker of their separate identity. By being unable to be fully Western, they have forced themselves into an orthodox corner. Fanaticism is the result.

Westerners and Western-educated folk who apologize for Muslims by invoking the depredations of the West are not helping make things better. Muslims don’t need to indulge in a victim mentality; they need to develop their societies, build stronger economies, cultivate the arts and and encourage innovation and critical thinking in all fields. Neither self-pity nor piety will get them there.

A tune to finish off your reading: Skyfall from Adele, for the new James Bond film…

So Why?

A comment after I had written this piece did raise a point that I had forgotten to address, and a question that many non-Muslims are probably wondering: Why is there such a response in the first place?

For many living in authoritarian countries, the publication of a piece such as “The Innocence of Muslims” is seen more as a reflection of what the entire government and community believes in that country rather than the words, actions and beliefs of a single individual. Furthermore, it is easier for extreme and radical leaders to twist the actions of an individual and say that it represents “The West”, and usually that also means “America”.

For example, Sheik Hassan Nasrallah (the leader of Hezb Allah) publically stated:

“The ones who should be held accountable and boycotted are those who support and protect the producers, namely the U.S. administration,” Source

Whatever you think of the man and his policies, this is a clear illustration of the leadership using the actions of an individual as representative of the “enemy”.  This is how you will get people like Haji Samar Gul:

…an 80-year-old protester at the Kabul demonstration who said: "We shouted death to America, death to supporters of America, death to slaves of America."

If you’re source of guidance comes from your local leader and he says to you “check out this insulting video, it was made in America, this is what they think of us and how they treat our religion”…well, you can imagine you’d be feeling pretty put out and pretty keen to start shouting.

It still doesn’t excuse violence though, especially not in Australia. This is just symptomatic of a whole other kettle of fish to do with extremism, the leadership within the communities internationally, and the education levels of those on the street. A little more thought required on this issue…

(Thanks for bringing up this point Emile!)