I hope Tony Abbott will forgive me if I’m a little sceptical of his “preachers of hate” red card system legislation he wants to push through the parliament.

Maybe it’s just me, but I’m a bit cautious when the first time he really seeks to go into the plan is on the Alan Jones programme. Jones we may remember is the man who has repeatedly faced court over claims he incited the Cronulla race riots with his own on air hate speech and who had the class to use Julia Gillard’s recently deceased father to launch a vicious attack on her.

I’m also sceptical when the government pushing this “preachers of hate” legislation is the same government that only recently backed down on its election promise on changing the Racial Discrimination Act to allow people to preach hate based on race.

Amongst those preachers of hate Abbott sought to give a green light to rather than a red card were Alan Jones and Andrew Bolt. How handy then to be discussing preachers of hate on the Alan Jones programme, after all I guess he’s an expert.

In Australia the last time I remember there being this much fuss over “preachers of hate” speaking in Australia was when Geert Wilders came to our country despite calls to have his visa application denied. Wilders has many charismatic followers, amongst them are Anders Behring Breivik who massacred 77 people in Norway in 2011, Andrew Bolt, and of course Cory Bernardi.

When this particular “preacher of hate” came to Australia it was Tony Abbott’s former Parliamentary Secretary Cory Bernardi that gave him not the red card, but the red carpet treatment, acting as his guide.



Geert Wilders – Europe’s pin-up boy for racial hatred

Still, “preachers of hate” of hate is a pretty loose term, ones view of it would depend on your views on preachers and on hate.

In the US there is Federal legislation to protect its citizens from hate crime. A hate crime is deemed a crime against someone who is based in the victims race, religion. ethnicity, nationality, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, or disability.

Tony Abbott seems to view hate a little differently, saying on radio;

“Under the law that we are bringing through the Parliament hopefully before the end of the year, it will be an offence to promote terrorism – not just to engage in terrorism – but to promote terrorism.”

Whilst I agree with this, I don’t think it goes anywhere close to far enough. In fact it would seem to the casual observer that Abbott believes  a “preacher of hate” is someone who promotes terrorism, not someone who is on a soapbox making speeches designed to promote hatred, discrimination, and ignorance.

I would suggest that this is a very narrow view indeed.

Preacher of hate Alan Jones used the Abbott interview to preach some hatred about an Islamic organisation in Australia he would like to see banned.


Preacher of hate... who me?

The group is called  Hizb ut-Tahrir and they are banned in some parts of the world. I don’t claim to know enough about this group to give my views on them being “preachers of hate” so I won’t, but banning them would seem futile to me.

Banning hasn’t exactly worked a treat for bikie gangs, why would this be any different? In fact it seems to only make them harder to monitor.

Banning an organisation won’t suddenly change its members beliefs, I’d argue that it may even antagonise the membership.

It is rather ironic that the same people who were arguing for greater freedom of speech when it came to changing the Racial Discrimination Act are the same people wanting less freedom of speech for those whose views they disagree with.

I am in 100% agreement however that freedom of speech should not be a get out of jail free card for those who incite violence, whether that be done directly or indirectly. However this needs to be a two-way street.



The handiwork of Alan Jones?


continue

John S wrote on Oct 13^th, 2014 at 7:36am:


Yes being blocked by an unrepresentative Senate.

John S wrote on Oct 13^th, 2014 at 7:36am:


Sounds like a commie politburo.

Swagman wrote on Oct 13^th, 2014 at 10:09am:


Unrepresentative? Our senate is a laughing stock because we've got imbeciles holding a seat with less than one percent of the vote!!! I guarantee you would be hard pressed to find anyone in the electorate if the idiot from the motoring party's electorate who voted for him if you spent a month there!

salad in wrote on Oct 13^th, 2014 at 1:57pm:



So you would be happy for Alan Jones to get on the air waves and preach all the hate in the world to thousands of his listeners but you don't want Hizb ut-Tahrir to preach hate to a few of his followers.

If it good enough to ban one from spreading hate it is good enough for all don't matter who you are.

John S wrote on Oct 13^th, 2014 at 7:34am:


changing the Racial Discrimination Act wont incite Australians the preaching hate based on race, racial attacks by individuals are a very rare, and with current laws, those who do, are punished.

There is no need to limit Freedom of Speech.

|dev|null wrote on Oct 13^th, 2014 at 3:12pm:


Its true, now what would happen if you yell "Fire! Fire!" in a crowded theatre? a fine, what happen if you racially attack someone? court with a large fine if not a prison sentence, currently laws work, yes a few people get away with in, even if you change the laws, people will still get away with it.

Being apart of a democracy comes with a lot of responsibility, one of these responsibility is to be grown up enough ignore or stand up against those who say something you fine hurtful/disrespectful, limiting Free speech in nations like NAZI germany and the USSR resulting the limited ability of the people to stand against the government for their own rights, once you start the ball rolling its hard to stop, why not ban people saying anything bad about unions? how about business? it will get out of hand.

Those who attack people racially are often named and shamed, friends and families around them are ashamed and individual is punished without the need to limited everyone else free speech.

Remember these offenders are are, out of a nation of 23 million people, they are but a handful of people, and it would be undemocratically if we limited everyones freedoms for s mall group of people.

Bam wrote on Oct 14^th, 2014 at 9:39am:


you know as well as I do that when voting by group, the first candidate gets say 3 quotas and they are pass to the other two.  In Muirs case he got .5% of the vote.  It was a travesty of the democratic system and look whi it elected?  A person so dumb that no body even bothers to interview him anymore. He doesn't make enough sense to warrant being talked to.

Pantheon wrote on Oct 13^th, 2014 at 3:26pm:


"Naming and shaming" has not put Jones, et al off the air, now has it?   Doesn't appear to be working too well IMO.   

In reality the measurement of success in the commercial media is how well you can sell advertising space/time.  The more controversy you can produce, the better listening/viewing figures and hence the more desire to advertise with that personality/program.   Until Jones and Co.'s advertisers feel the sting of public opinion over their comments OR Jones et al, are hit with legal sanctions on what they say, they won't disappear any time soon.