So it turns out the “sword” confiscated during the September 18 terror raids in Sydney's north-west — you know Australia's largest terror raids ever — was actually plastic.
That would be the “sword” the cops had placed in a plastic bag that the media made such a big deal out of to terrify us all with the “threat” of a “random beheading”. Plastic. It was a fucking plastic sword.
But still, OK, let's not be too hasty. That does not automatically mean there is no threat! Before we leap to conclusions and start accusing the media and security agencies and the government of being lying, scaremongering pricks, let us consider that given that plastic is not actually biodegradible, it could still be considered an act of terror against the planet. Maybe ASIO are just closet greenies?
In which case the threat could well be far more widespread than at first feared, because the October 7 Sydney Morning Herald reported that a “plastic decoration” is “common in almost every Shiite Muslim household”. There must be thousands of them!
It might sound a ridiculous reason for terror raids with 800 heavily armed cops, but it makes no less sense than the claimed reason when you consider that the person actually detained during the raid produced by the plastic sword was actually a Shiite Muslim.
Shiite Muslims are, of course, the very people the Islamic State extreme Sunni fundamentalists are killing right now in Iraq, among many other groups. A Shiite Muslim carrying out a terrorist attack, like say a “random beheading”, because Islamic State called for it is about as likely as an African American burning a cross because they were told to by the KKK.
Then again, maybe we can't really be sure it was plastic. I mean sure, it was reported in outlets such as the Sydney Morning Herald and ABC News, but it is probably best to wait for the final word from the most reliable and least sensationalist voices in the Australian media landscape — News Corp.
And so far, as far as I can tell, the Murdoch media has said absolutely nothing on the news that the sword they splashed on front covers, according to one source, “wouldn't be able to cut a cucumber”.
Of course, this shit has real consequences. The SMH, with no apparent concern or even recognition that it may have played a role in whipping up this type of hatred, reported on October 10: “There have been at least 30 attacks on Muslims — mainly against women wearing the hijab — in the three weeks since the police anti-terror raids ...”
The article went on to say that Muslim community leaders “claim 'mistrust' with police had led to the real rate of anti-Islamic episodes going unreported”.
Well, gee, I wonder why that might be? Why might the Muslim community be wary of approaching the police?
Do you think, SMH, that the reason they don't want to approach the police is because maybe they don't want to appear on the front page of the fucking Sydney Morning Herald when the goddamn cops arrest them in a staged “mega-raid” with hundreds of heavily armed officers because they are carrying a plastic fork in a take away container that also includes a potentially dangerous biological agent, also known as a large beef vindaloo with rice?
It can seem the country has gone mad, but there is a cold hard logic to it all. For one thing, security agencies have just received $600 million in extra funding and new anti-terror laws drastically increase their powers — not just against “terrorists” (real or imagined) but journalists and whistleblowers too.
And, for Abbott, a bit of war and racism makes a nice distraction. After all, it is not anyone wearing a hijab and or brandishing a plastic sword that is destroying universal health care, kicking pensioners and the disabled or pensioners, or placing university education out of the reach of the poor.
And doing it all in the name of a supposed budget emergency so fake all it took was the sniff of a new Middle Eastern war for billions of dollars to magically appear.
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