Accept it - Australia is secular, liberal, democratic

The Australian newspaper reported (21/11/05) that Liberal backbencher Alby Schultz wanted to make it harder for people from countries with “a history of anti-Christian behaviour” to migrate to Australia. Why?

He said, “We cannot afford under the present uncertainty we have in the world, we can't afford to take any chances.”

What is less clear is exactly what Mr Schultz meant by “anti-Christian behaviour”. Was he referring to countries which persecute Christians on the basis of religion? Or did he mean countries which have a non-Christian religion as their state religion?

How is anti-Christian behaviour to be defined? Would Palestinian Christian immigrants from Israel or the Occupied Territories be included? What about Muslim asylum seekers from Communist China?

Mr Schultz’s comments were made in the context of an attack on Morris Iemma for providing a letter of support for a migration application made by an associate of French terror suspect Willie Brigitte.

Yet Brigitte’s associate has not been charged with any offences, while Brigitte himself is still in French custody. Are we to deduce that France is an “anti-Christian country”?

Then again, in light of France’s decision to ban the wearing of all religious symbols in state schools (including presumably crucifixes and the headdress worn by the Mother of Christ), perhaps the anti-Christian label is not so inappropriate.

And how does Mr Schultz propose such a policy be implemented in practice? Which migration categories would be covered? Would new religious criteria apply to refugee and humanitarian categories?

Mr Schultz is not the first conservative politician or commentator to call for the reinstatement of an immigration policy which discriminates on the basis of race or religion. Former National Party Senator John Stone called for the formation of a Queen Isabella Society, presumably it seems to forcibly remove Muslims such as myself from Western countries in the same manner as the Spanish Queen who started the Spanish Inquisition.

One wonders whether, once the Muslims have been dealt with, Mr Stone will follow Queen Isabella’s lead and call for a further inquisition of our Jewish community. These recent comments follow Mr Stone’s claims in On Line Opinion (18/8/05) of Australia’s “rapidly growing Muslim problem”.

And Mr Stone’s solution to this problem? Stone suggested, “We must fundamentally rethink our immigration policies and our official policies of multiculturalism (that is, non-assimilation). Our future immigration policy should focus on whether those concerned are capable of assimilating into an Australian culture shaped by, and part of, a Judeo-Christian Western civilisation.”

Easier said than done. For a start, there is little evidence to suggest that non-Christians integrate any less successfully into mainstream Australian life. Australia’s largest non-Christian faith community follows the teachings of Buddha, not Muhammad.

Further, the most recent study of Australia’s Muslim community conducted in 2004 by Professor Abdullah Saeed, of Melbourne University, shows that over half of Australian Muslims were born in Australia.

Much is made of the size and composition of congregations attending the lectures of radical clerics in Sydney and Melbourne. Yet the 1,000 or so that attend the lessons of these sheiks fade into insignificance compared to the 25,000 or so Muslim Australians that attended the Multicultural Eid Festival at Sydney’s Fairfield Showground on Sunday, November 20.

It seems in recent times some conservative leaders have found a niche in Muslim-bashing. What this small fringe of conservatives needs to accept is that Australia is no longer a Christian nation. Australia is a secular liberal democratic nation.

Further, despising followers of non-Christian faiths, especially other semitic faiths, is hardly a conservative agenda. Judaism and Islam are more similar to each other than to Christianity. Even the most cursory study of Jewish and Muslim scriptures will show that observant Jews and Muslims essentially share the same values as conservatives of Christian faiths or indeed no faith in particular.

Muslim voters are just as concerned about ensuring governments act to protect families, to ensure the rule of law and to allow business to operate in a free market economy. Readers who don’t believe me can ask prominent Australian businessmen John Ilhan and Ahmed Fahour.

The current anti-Muslim trend has worried Jewish leaders who rightly fear that their community will be next targeted. The Executive Council of Australian Jewry was one of the first non-Muslim groups to condemn Liberal backbencher-for-life Bronwyn Bishop’s call to ban the wearing of headscarves in state schools. The ECAJ statement expressed concern that this would be the first step toward the banning of other religious symbols, including the Jewish yarmulke.

Finally, a word of warning to anti-Muslim and allegedly conservative MPs seeking to discriminate against Muslims in migration policy. One of Australia’s most senior DIMIA bureaucrats is none other than Mr Abul Rizvi, the son of an Indian Muslim history professor who taught at ANU. The department’s own website states that Mr Rizvi is responsible for policy development and implementation in the areas of migration and temporary entry, refugees, settlement, citizenship and multicultural affairs.

But in case anyone doubted Mr Rizvi’s professionalism and impartiality, the website also states: “Mr Rizvi has had a long standing involvement in Australia’s immigration programs, both permanent migration and temporary entry. His leadership in reshaping the size and composition of Australia’s migration and temporary entry programs has positioned us to respond directly to Australia’s economic development, social and population needs.”

So we can thank Mr Rizvi for implementing a raft of policies deemed by some to be anti-Muslim and seen as popular to Muslim-bashers.

Mr Stone may be calling for the formation of the Queen Isabella Society. But for Jewish and Muslim Australians familiar with Spanish history, immigration policies inspired by the inquisition should be left in the history books where they belong.