Costello
Of course, the religious group that is spying on others looking to collect info for court cases is ... you guessed it. There is a major case going on in Australia right now in which two Christian preachers are being sued by a Muslim group for talking about Islam and violence. The trial, however, has somewhat backfired on the Muslims, who have been compelled on the witness stand to read from their own sacred books. But in any case, Costello is right: all this comes from bad laws that should be repealed. From The Australian, with thanks to Nicolei:
FEDERAL Treasurer Peter Costello today slammed Victoria's religious vilification laws, saying religious harmony would not be promoted by representatives of different religious groups spying on each other to collect evidence for court cases.In an address to the national day of thanksgiving commemoration in Melbourne, Mr Costello said differing views of religion should not be resolved through civil lawsuits.
He said religious leaders should be free to express their doctrines and their comparative views of other doctrines, although advocating violence or terrorism should be an offence.
Mr Costello conceded his thanksgiving day speech, presented at Melbourne's Scots Church, had already sparked some controversy.
Earlier this month The Age newspaper reported criticism from the Islamic Council of Victoria which suggested he could be giving legitimacy to those the Islamic Council was suing under Victoria's Racial and Religious Tolerance Act 2001.
That relates to a controversial case in which the council is suing two fundamentalist Christian ministers for allegedly accusing Muslims of being terrorists and rapists.
The council lodged the complaint on behalf of two Muslim men and a Muslim woman who were among 250 people who attended the fundamentalist Christian seminar.
Mr Costello said he had no intention of seeking to influence the court case.
"Since the issue has been raised, I will state my view," he said.
"I do not think that we should resolve differences about religious views in our community with lawsuits between differing religions.
"Nor do I think that the object of religious harmony will be promoted by organising witnesses to go along to the meetings of other religions to collect evidence for the purpose of later litigation."
Mr Costello said no-one liked vilification.
"But if rival camps start sending informants to rival meetings so they can take legal proceedings against each other in publicly funded tribunals we shall not enhance our openness or tolerance," he said.
"The proceedings that have been taken, the time, the cost, the extent of the proceedings, the remedies that are available all illustrate in my view that this is a bad law."
Mr Costello lamented that the legacy of the Judeo-Christian tradition seemed to be fraying, with evidence of moral decay all around.
the same is begining to happen here in the usa,
CAIR, center for islamic american relations, are already trying to silence the truth about islam,
michael j beebe
it is pretty scary when we can't talk about islam ,or we will be sued ,or called racist, granted ,christian leaders are not perfect ,as i live in phoenix where thomas O'brian was brought to court for the shuffling of priests who abused young boys ,and then this year he killed a person in a car accident ,and leaving the scene of the accident ,and now is on probation , but we talk about it ,,islam wants to stifle talk if you are not muslim ,,
'That relates to a controversial case in which the council is suing two fundamentalist Christian ministers for allegedly accusing Muslims of being terrorists and rapists.'
Does Australia have their own version of the ACLU (American Communists Lawyers Union)? If not- GOOD! Keep pounding these liars down, Down Under!
The "Hate-Crime Law" that keeps popping up could easily be interpreted to cover critical speech against a religion or culture. We need to keep our eye on this one. I am sure that CAIR is ready to influence someone in the government or in the courts to create an anti-Muslim criticism law.
Their kitman tactics (holy deception to further the aims of Islam) in order to turn criticism against the speaker: using the terms racism, hate speech, liars, we are the victims, are well-practiced tactics that they have refined over the last 1400 years.
Hmmm. Any possibility that Costello could be persuaded to put in some time as an adviser on multicultural legal affairs in the USA?
Michael, Mark, and EPG hit the nail on the head. "Hate Speech" legislation is nothing but an attempt to silence unpopular opinions. For Americans: State and National legislators sponsoring "hate speech" legislation ought to be impeached for egregious violation of the First Amendment.
By the way, I understand that one of the Christian ministers being sued is an immigrant from a Muslim country, and possibly an apostate from Islam.
Yes, Gary, unfortunately we have a down unda' version of the ACLU. Just as screwy as yours, always on the lookout for the rights of crims and scolding govt for things like raiding suspected Muslim terrorists' homes. You know, typical stuff.
In this villification case, Costello is federal govt - Liberal (in name only, they're our Conservative (Republican-type) party). So of course he believes in common-sense. The council that brought this idiotic case forward is the state govt's doing - and they're Labor (socialist wingnuts).
The case seems to have backfired on them (hooray!) since the Christian pastor said nothing bad. He just basically stated the truth, that some Muslims preach hatred and death to people of other faiths. When a parishioner asked what should they do? The pastor said Muslims need to be loved. Oooh, horrors, the Muslim spies at this service still felt villified and dragged the pastor to the courts. I don't know what's happened, the last I heard the judge needed some time to make a decision (he's sure taking a long time!). I would hope the judge isn't one of those loony-tunes Labor wingnut types although I think he really couldn't find anything terrible even if he tried really really hard.
As long as we get the Liberals back into federal govt later this year, we should be safe from this sort of stupidity infecting the whole country. It's a relief to have voices of reason like Costello's to temper the idiocy from Labor in the States.
Taranis: After the Democratic Party blamed Bush for 9/11 (Hello? Was he at the controls of the airplanes that were hijacked? Did anyone expect suicide hijacking at the time?) in the 9/11 hearings and had one of the most voiciferous maintainers of our older "firewall" between domestic criminal investigation and foreign intelligence (Jamie Gorelick) on the panel; I've decided they'll have to catch the republicans with their hands in the till and in flagrante with ten-year-olds before I'll ever vote Democratic again.
Mark
You say:,,islam wants to stifle talk if you are not muslim ,,, but I would like to say:",,islam wants to stifle talk if you are or are not muslim ,,. Islam is a cult and a combination of Nazism and Communism and doesn't believe in freedom of idea and expression.
B.A.- Iran