Howard, Carr fuel racism
The combined efforts of John Howard, Bob Carr and the media to create a xenophobic atmosphere surrounding Muslims and all things Islamic has begun to bear its bitter and poisonous fruit.
On August 22, a pregnant woman was physically assaulted and had her scarf pulled off by another woman in a Lakemba car park. There is no sense of shame or self-control being exercised by narrow-minded, ignorant bigots anymore. Where is the media? But when a SBS news crew were assaulted in Lakemba it was front page news.
The removal of the scarf is often seen by many people as liberating Muslim women from what they perceive to be a symbol of oppression. Speaking as a Muslim woman, this neither liberates nor assists us. In fact, the wearing of the scarf by Muslim women in Australia is a symbol of their faith and their liberation from a system that judges women firstly on their physical appearance.
In an earlier incident an elderly couple who were holidaying with their daughter, in-laws and grandchildren on the central coast were severely physically assaulted by an Australian man. Despite several witnesses coming forward, the culprit is still yet to be charged by police.
These incidents highlight a growing trend in Australia to openly attack Muslims. This is a direct consequence of the vindictive racist policies of the Howard government, in relation to refugees, and the war of terrorism they are waging against the Third World and Islam in general as the lapdogs of America.
These attitudes have been further reinforced by Bob Carr in his handling of the gang rape issue. As if Lebanese men are the only rapists in Sydney. Rape is a horrific crime that is related to power and control, and the humiliation of the victim. It is not a crime that is related to ethnicity or religion. In fact, Islam along with Christianity and other religions repudiates rape as a foul crime that should be punished.
There is a growing resistance movement to the attacks upon the Muslim community. However, it is small urgent action is required.
Name withheld at request
Lakemba NSW
[Abridged.]
Unions and sexual harassment
I'd like to think AMWU national secretary Doug Cameron has the best interests of an alleged victim of sexual harassment at heart in his vendetta against Craig Johnston. His previous lack of attention to such issues leaves me with many doubts.
I worked closely with Max Adlam, a South Australian AMWU official for many years. Her battle within the AMWU to have action taken against a fellow AMWU official over sexual harassment was long, difficult and personally frustrating.
This harassment went back to 1995. Adlam attempted to obtain support from the national bodies of the AMWU to no avail. In April 1998, the Supreme Court convicted the official of sexual assault. He continued in his official union position.
He was again charged by the courts with "gross misbehaviour" in September 1999. It wasn't until October 1999 that the AMWU national council had any discussion and that finally led to the official resigning not sacked from his position of South Australian secretary.
In May 1994, two women workers from a Perth building site won a settlement through the Equal Opportunity Commission after a three-year battle over sexual harassment, including the display of sexually explicit images in the union site office. Both the employer and the union were found culpable. The women were members of the then Metal and Engineering Union. The union not only failed to uphold their right to a safe working environment and educate other union members around sexual harassment and EO legislation, the shop stewards threatened the women for upsetting the worksite.
Women have fought hard for the right to a workplace free of discrimination and sexual harassment, so it is essential that unions defend those rights. It is enormously offensive if this is cynically manipulated for factional ends.
Melanie Sjoberg
Kensington NSW
War crimes
Foreign Minister Alexander Downer has been quoted as saying he believes the United States legal system would vigorously prosecute any Americans suspected of war crimes.
Is he trying to say that he is too young to remember the slap on the wrist given to Lt. William Calley for his crime of slaughtering villagers in Vietnam?
If he is, perhaps he is still young enough to volunteer to fight in the war in which he appears so keen to embroil us.
Ron Gray
Australian Peace Committee
Adelaide
Criminal sentences
People applauding the 55-year Sydney rape case sentence have claimed that criminal sentences ought to reflect "people's wishes". Would they still hold this view if society generally supported very light sentences for objectively major offences, or very heavy sentences for objectively minor offences? Is it right that the same offence would incur a dramatically different penalty in two separate communities with dramatically different values?
If people's wishes are considered irrespective of their moral legitimacy, this implies that if people want a racist society we should create such a society.
Some people have even come out in defence of pure retribution. But how can the world be a better place, all things considered, when someone's well-being is reduced with no gain for anybody else?
We should chiefly establish criminal sentences based on deterrence research with, when punishment appears to act as a deterrent, a balance being struck between (undesirable) harm done to offenders and a (desirable) reduction in expected crime. And the key goal is to address social causes of crime certainly not to punish people because some people like to see others punished.
Brent Howard
Rydalmere NSW
Telstra
What oracle has decreed that the rest of Telstra must be sold into private ownership, and that country services are key to this? What say have we, the populace, had about this?
And haven't we always had the advantage of the long distances of country telecommunications being subsidised from the public purse, so why not continue this?
Didn't our founding fathers and mothers establish the core public institutions of schools, hospitals, roads, railways, airports and communications, because each of us couldn't possibly provide them individually or by small groups alone?
But the oracles now claim that "private ownership is always more efficient than public", but look at One.Tel, HIH or NRMA Insurance, or at American Enron and WorldCom.
And look at what the privately owned banks have done to country people. How many know, for example, that the original people-owned Commonwealth Bank loaned for government development purposes, such as the transcontinental railway, at interest rates of 1%, and how much do privately owned banks charge now?
So it seems that we'd be wise to be on guard against being conned by the silvertails and silver-talkers on this Telstra issue, for, as every farmer and small business person knows, when the farm or the business is lost, that's it!
Ken O'Hara
Gerringong NSW
From Green Left Weekly, September 11, 2002.
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