continued... (I seem to have exceeeded the character limit for a single post, and on my first day, that can't be good).

Instead youth are encouraged to engage in premarital sexual relations and 'experimentation' that end up leading to all sorts of messed up relationships and unwanted social problems like abortions, single motherhood, prostitution, drug abuse etc. as well as the inability of many in society to form lasting and secure relationships.

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A female can most definitely be a religious leader, and many noble women throughout our history have been religious leaders. I very much doubt you've read a single Islamic book in your life. Most of what you appear to have gleaned about Islam probably comes from trashy novels in Angus & Robertson with oppressed and downtrodden women peering out from behind obscuring veils on the front cover.

Women can indeed pray with men, but their lines must be behind men's lines. And this to you signifies inequality? I'm really curious as to what makes a woman so equal if she is in a row of men praying??? Your logic is skewed.

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You compare a 10 year old child's acquisition of a language with that of a man in his 50's?

His English is far better than most ex-pat Aussie's Arabic who live in Arabic countries. I've been to Arabic countries and met Aussies and other Westerners who've lived there for extended periods of time, and most can barely string a few words together. Sheikh Tajjudin can speak English, it's just that it's not really presentable on national TV that's all, it can be understood but he probably just feels it isn't eloquent enough to represent the Islamic community publically, so he has spokesmen.

Anyway he shouldn't have made the comments he made if he can't follow them up and explain what he really meant, which he insists is not what the media reported. Also did you know he married one of his daughters to an anglo-Aussie, isn't that integrationist enough for you? His grandchildren will therefore be half Australian, will you also tell them to hitch a plane ride out of here if they disagree with some aspect of the present Australian social situation?

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Start practising what you preach then, and extend those niceties to your fellow Australians who are Muslims.

The marriage was arranged at age 6. The consummation as you so delicately put it was at age 9 after her first menstruation. In Australia that is statutory rape, do you agree; or would you be happy with letting a 50 year old marry and have sex with your daughter at age 5 or 6 ( if that is the time of her menstruation)?  She was only 18 when he died at the age of 62.

If you disagree that it is statuatory rape or would be happy to sell your daughter off ( what other reason is their at such a young age) then you obviously have no place in a developed nation.

Why must people have sex to complete a marriage. This focus on it is entirely unhealthy. Marriage is a partnership of love, compassion, equality. I would suggest a female would not feel equal if she only got to spend 1 day in 4 with her husband because he is of having sex with the other wives.......

Again do you deny that Muhammad had sex with slaves? or that he made his son divorce his wife so Muhammad could marry her.... and she just so happened to be considered extremely attractive.......

As for your stance on the Muslim's being treated unfairly. Get real it was a series of brutal pack rapes. If you watched 'crime investigation Australia' tonight a group committed a pack rape and murdered the girl, their sentence Life with no chance of parole.

And the head of Muslim's in Australia said "white women were pieces of mean that deserve to be raped"....... and said he was misunderstood, that the translation was wrong.......... How does a translation get so wrong; why did he not immediately clarify what he said and most importantly after over 10 years of residing in Australia why can he not grasp even a basic level of oral English?

Logic - equality means equal; one can be replaced by the other as they are equal.

"their lines must be behind men's lines??????" Why, and how is this equal. This reeks of apartheid, a black section and a white section on the bus.

As to your comments on history; my point exactly. The Islamic faith needs updating for an evolved society where debate and science have provided the foundation of more informed decisions. I am not trying to provoke Muslims as it usually leads to death rather than dialogue... Theo Van Gough anyone?

I thought Islam didn't believe in Colonialism..... by 16 Muhammad had already 'conquered' numerous countries........ as I have said previously euphemisms. Perhaps at age 16 he was not developed enough to understand the consequences of his actions.

MW,

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This is an invitation to leave is it not? You're suggesting that any Australian who is not content with the situation here, should leave right? Or is it only Muslim Australians?

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Who is bitching and whinging? I've merely suggested some things in Australian society should change. Are you now suggesting anyone who has a suggestion about how Australian society should be directed in the future should also leave? Do you cling onto some blind patriotic notion that Australian society is 100% perfect, and anyone seeking to change it has no right? Or again, is it only Muslims?

Some doctors and other health professionals are seeking to change the drinking habits of Australians (one of the most sacred and central traditions of Aussie culture), which they identify as dangerous and socially/medically problematic, do you think they should book a plane ticket too? If you are indeed sincere about your claims, there won't be too many people left in Australia, were you to be actually able to enforce such an expulsion policy.

You must come to terms with the fact that Australia is a very diverse place, and there's a lot of people out there that don't share all the same views as you. And sometime in their lives, a lot of those people will engage in activities to further their ideas and beliefs about Australian society. This is just a fact of life, deal with it, or book a plane... actually, no I don't hold that kind of mentality. You're welcome to share your ideas and beliefs with me, and as long as they're half sensible and don't harm others, you might even find me agreeing with you about some of them. Now that is the Australian way.

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Islam encourages people to marry from outside their tribe/clan/nation. But it does not forbid marriage between cousins. As neither do about 25 of the states of the USA. The risk of genetic disease through the marriage of cousins is nowhere near as high as is commonly thought. Although in cases where it is persistently done generation after generation, the risks do keep increasing, and I've seen first hand examples of this.

Anyway Islam has no custom of marrying cousins, perhaps some Arabs or Indians have these customs, but it's nothing to do with Islam. So do some other non-Muslim cultures.

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In our very individualist society it is kind of hard to fathom, I agree, and I personally don't know if I could ever engage in said practise. But for those raised in different conditions, it's just normal. You need to step outside your own little comfort zone and accept that there's others out there, not 100% like you. Get over it and deal with it.

If other people have marriage arrangements like this, does it actually affect you in any way? Or are you just doing some of the 'bitching and whinging' you were talking about earlier?

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I wasn't attacking their manhood per se, just could not accept that a normal male, or even female would be unaware of this fact, which is understood by cultures and peoples all around the world, as the example I cited above demonstrates (The Seinfeld episode). It seems that D was perhaps being a little facetious and pretending that non-Muslim males are not like the rest of the males on the face of the earth. Quite a ridiculous facade indeed, and I merely exposed it, sorry if you got upset at my perceived attack on his/her manhood (or lack thereof).

QUOTE: Who is bitching and whinging? I've merely suggested some things in Australian society should change. Are you now suggesting anyone who has a suggestion about how Australian society should be directed in the future should also leave? Do you cling onto some blind patriotic notion that Australian society is 100% perfect, and anyone seeking to change it has no right? Or again, is it only Muslims?

Some doctors and other health professionals are seeking to change the drinking habits of Australians (one of the most sacred and central traditions of Aussie culture), which they identify as dangerous and socially/medically problematic, do you think they should book a plane ticket too? If you are indeed sincere about your claims, there won't be too many people left in Australia, were you to be actually able to enforce such an expulsion policy...' END QUOTE

Mate, I think you need to learn to contextualize.  You know nothing about me; needless to say, anyone can see that rant is your own perception.
Just as you assumed D was white/western. Your assumptions and personal attacks say more about your bias than anyone else's. I am conversing about institutional religion, you are just making personal attacks on both D and i. Have you run out of arguments?

Well this is going to be my last one for the night, so you'll have to wait for any points I don't follow up in this one.

D,

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In Australia, in the 21st. century that is statutory rape, yes. You must add that qualifier of time period, because at the time Muhammad (Pbuh) was being married, the age of consent in Australia most probably didn't exist, and in most other places in the world at his time, his marriage would've been perfectly normal. Anyway I've already commented on this, and I'm sure you can see now that this is not an avenue of debate worth pursuiing.

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I dunno, why don't you ask them? That's just the way, us humans developed. We feel that way.

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These are very noble words, I agree, but you must also concede that sex plays a large part in it, whether you find it appropriate or not, that's how humanity functions.

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Again, no I don't deny what you are saying, but again, I will ask you first to do a little research and apply a little historical context. Muhammad (Pbuh) permitted slavery to continue to exist, but he abolished almost every single means by which slaves could be obtained, whilst at the same time providing great incentives for people to free slaves. In fact a lot of the early Muslim community was built by freed slaves, freed by the earliest Muslim converts. He also forbade any mistreatment of a slave and placed conditions on the ownership of slaves that caused his enemies to accuse him of giving them too many rights that they'll rebel.

Also if you have a look at Islamic history, you'll find that not once, but twice, Islamic states spawned that were ruled by slaves! Actually ruled by slaves. The slaves were the ruling class, and the freemen were the underclasses. These "slave kingdoms" were known as Mamelukes, and appeared around a similar time in both Egypt and India. Also in the Ottoman Caliphate, a class of slaves known as Janissaries become one of the highest ruling classes in Ottoman society, and they pretty much ran the entire Caliphate for a number of centuries. So the concept o "slave" in Islam is very different to how it is perceived in the West. The West used slaves like animals to build their empires, the Muslims did not. They used us to build theirs.

But anyway, Islam discourages slavery and provides means to remove it from society, not to increase it. And my view is the Islamic view, slaves should be freed.

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Been reading one too many Voltare plays I think.

Please if you want to provide a critique of Islam, read Islam, don't read the garbage written by it's detractors. It only leaves you appearing very ill-equipped to effectively participate in the debate.

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Are we talking about the same case? I remember the victim being very present at the court case..

Anyway, what I also remember at the time was two 20 yo. Anglo-Aussies who broke into an 80 yo. lady's home, robbed her, raped her and murdered her, and they got about 8 or 9 years each. The Australian justice system is a joke, really. I am certainly not calling for leniency in anyone's sentence, I'm calling for stricter, yet more fair and balanced sentences, and so are a lot of other Aussies, so forget about framing this as a disaffected Muslim who's not happy with how Muslims are treated in the legal system.

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Did he? Can you paste his actual quote, not your 'colourful' (pun intended) paraphrase thanks.

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Islam believes in the segregation of the sexes on moral/modesty grounds. It's got nothing to do with apartheid or inequality. Both parties, males and females, are as equally distant from one another, none is being preferrred over the other, none is receiving any extra special benefit from their position during the prayer, so your point is just ridiculous. Do you believe segregated schools are a form of inequality? How about seperate male and female public toilets and change rooms? Please, bring forth something worth debating, stop wasting my time with this drivel.

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It doesn't, colonialism is not the only possible result from conquest.

MW,

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Muhammad (Pbuh) lived in a certain time period, and behaved in a certain manner that was befitting for that time period. He was just a normal human being, nothing divine about him. Perhaps your being unaware of this fact alone has led to the misconception?

Good night.

abu_rashid wrote on Jun 30^th, 2008 at 5:34am:


Do you and Malik know each other? Personally I think it's great that you guys come here to defend your religion.

Whoever it was that talked about the Nazis killing the Jews during WWII - It's like the Turks and Armenians. Just because the Turks were Muslim doesn't make it the movement of Islam committing genocide.

People are capable of great evil and great good. They don't need a religion to inspire them to do that. although religion can be used to justify just about anything.

Politics is the basis of the suicide bombers in Iran and Palestine. The problem is that people are being lured to do these things by the promise of a good afterlife. The suicide bombers themselves are religiously motivated, whereas the terrorist groups pulling the strings are motivated by greed and the desire to control others.

As decent human beings of any belief we should all distance ourselves from this kind of barbarity.

I can see both sides of this argument, and can see where both sides are deliberately being antagonistic. When you do that, it doesn't exactly do your cause much good. You either come out as a xenophobic redneck or a religious zealot. Think about what you write.

It's important to get to the difficult issues, but you can do that without  offending people.

We can't judge the standards of the past by the standards of today. Religions are not based on logic. They are based on Faith, and that faith can work in a very positive way, or in a very destructive way if you let them.

We are all homo sapiens, and I've seen a good cross section of the human race during my life. The things that make us tick are generally the same worldwide. We all fart, snore, procreate and wear socks.

MW wrote on Jun 30^th, 2008 at 12:31am:


Plenty of women choose to wear swimwear that cover everything, especially if they are older.

There are also plenty of Muslims who wear more conventional beach wear. I saw many of them on the Adriatic coast of Turkey, near Dikili, and I'd suggest that customs will change in Australia too. It wasn't so very long ago that all Australians used to cover up on the beach.

http://nla.gov.au/nla.pic-an13294757-v