Uthman Badar - Image, www.abc.net.au

Uthman Badar – Image, www.abc.net.au

The title of the talk was to be “Honour Killings are morally justified”. The name of the man who was to be delivering the session is Uthman Badar. The session was to be held at the Sydney Opera House. Everything appeared to be moving along swimmingly. Friends of mine from the Islamic community were incensed as to the title and content of the session. Social media run by a number of these friends of mine came out categorically stating that honour killings were NOT in accordance with Islamic teachings.

Soon thereafter the comments made by various critics were as follows:

“It is abhorrent for any person, regardless of faith or ethnicity, to argue in support of murder as a means of protecting the so-called honour of any other individual, family or community” Julie Bishop, Foreign Affairs Minister.

“To say Honour killings are morally justified is outrageous. I cannot say strongly enough, Australians denounce this barbaric practice. If Hizb ut-Tahir and the Islamic caliphate are trying to improve cultural understanding, I have a tip for them, promoting honour killings are not the way to do it.” Pru Goward, NSW Minister for Women.

“I don’t think Australia should have a title like that in the Opera House. This is not speaking his mind, this is speaking evil. NSW Police should stop this from happening for the sake of the safety of women in the community.” Dr Eman Sharobeem, Immigrant Women’s Health Service Manager.

“Wow. To say the least, this betrays a complete lack of wisdom on the part of a Festival desperate to provoke.” Irfan Yusuf, Author, PhD Student, Commentator on matters Islam.

After considerable furore about the session it was finally cancelled. The Daily Telegraph reported the cancellation of the session as follows:

“The speaker who was preparing to give a presentation about so-called “honour killings” claimed today that he was set up by the Opera House. Radical Islamic spokesman Uthman Badar has been stopped from delivering his speech at a cultural festival at The Sydney Opera House.

The event — part of the Festival of Dangerous Ideas — was slammed as a cheap stunt that could have put women’s lives at risk, and was cancelled last night.

Mr Badar took to Facebook to defend his speech, saying: “I should say something about the title of the presentation as well, given some have taken issue with it.

“It was not of my choosing, though I consented to it. The entire topic wasn’t.

“I, in fact, suggested a more direct topic about Islam and secular liberalism (something like “The West needs saving by Islam” – how’s that for dangerous?), but the organisers insisted on this topic, which I think is still a worthy topic of discussion,” he said.

He also said the “magnitude of the response” was beyond what he expected, and that the blowback showed “islamophobia” in Australia.

“What’s interesting is that I’m being attacked left, right and centre without having opened my mouth yet.”

“I guess that’s how Islamophobia works! I seem to have roused the ire of a nation without doing anything except accept an invite to speak. Quite an achievement, don’t you think?”

On Uthman Badar’s page he has said the following:

I must say it’s an honour to be on the other side of the fence to this lot…and dare I say they sound like a bunch of backward, angry, ‘extremists’. Maybe they should go back to where they came from if they don’t like it.

This is a statement that is inflammatory at best and puerile at worst and does nothing for the credibility of the speaker.

I have spent the last day or so following Mr Badar’s rants on his Facebook page. To say that he is positively rabid in his comments is probably understating his position.

There are a couple of interesting aspects of this matter that I found intriguing. Let’s leave aside the more substantive issue of whether the matter should have been or not allowed to proceed. The fact is that it has been cancelled and I applaud the decision of the Opera House to do so. There is no room for this type of session in our society.

What intrigued me most about this whole scenario was to examine the proposed amendments by Senator George Brandis, the Federal Attorney General, to the Racial Discrimination Act. The Current position of Section 18D is as follows:

Section 18D of the Racial Discrimination Act contains exemptions which protect freedom of speech. These ensure that artistic works, scientific debate and fair comment on matters of public interest are exempt from section 18C, providing they are said or done reasonably and in good faith

If you look at the comments of Mr Badar, clearly they are “matters of public interest” but they have not been “said or done reasonably and in good faith”. This would then mean that the exemptions of section 18D would not apply to his comments.

If we then examine the amendments that Brandis was proposing they read as follows:

  • “Whether an act is reasonably likely to have the effect specified in sub-section (1)(a) is to be determined by the standards of an ordinary reasonable member of the Australian community, not by the standards of any particular group within the Australian community.
  • This section does not apply to words, sounds, images or writing spoken, broadcast, published or otherwise communicated in the course of participating in the public discussion of any political, social, cultural, religious, artistic, academic or scientific matter.”

Clearly the speech would fall into the category of “participating in the public discussion of any political, social, cultural, religious, artistic, academic or scientific matter”. Under those circumstances it would fall for exemption and Mr Badar would have been at liberty to preach them without fear of prosecution for racial vilification. Clearly this is not an outcome that should be or is desirable.

This exemplifies the arguments that we have all proffered to the Attorney General not to make the amendments that he has proposed. It would appear that he is now reconsidering the whole issue. Hopefully this also means that he has abandoned the matter.