Queer Bedfellows
Babette Francis
I am absolutely mystified by the hypocrisy of our Left-wing parties, the ALP and Greens, the Democratic Party in the USA, and Pierre Trudeau's Liberal Party in Canada, in their attitude and policies towards Islam. Every ideal the Left proclaims such as women's and homosexual rights is denied by Islam. Homosexual practices are punishable by death, imprisonment and/or whipping - as in our neighbouring country, Indonesia's province of Aceh. As for women's rights, Islam is deeply misogynistic. In fundamentalist countries like Saudi Arabia and Iran, women have to wear very restrictive clothing, and are required to be subservient to their male "guardians" - father, husband, brother or even adult son. In Saudi Arabia women are not allowed to drive; in Iran they cannot cycle in public. Driving and cycling are alleged to affect women's virginity.... but even if this queer idea was scientifically valid - which it isn't - why aren't women who are not virgins but are respectably married allowed to drive and cycle?
While the so-called "progressive Left", including "our" ABC, misses no opportunity to denigrate conservative Christians, they never criticise the ideology of Islam. Indeed the Left is hostile to Muslim reformers. An example is their attitude to Maajid Nawaz, a moderate Muslim in the UK who opposes Islamic extremism and is co-founder of the London-based Quilliam Foundation which supports interfaith tolerance. The Southern Poverty Law Centre in the US has added Nawaz to a list of 15 "anti-Muslim extremists". Nawaz is suing the SPLC for defaming him and the Quilliam Foundation. Nawaz has named western apologists for Islam the "regressive Left" - pseudo-liberals who are so blinded by identity politics that they take the side of backward theocrats rather than the victims of Islam - women, apostates, intellectuals, cartoonists, novelists, homosexuals, infidels, atheists and anyone who dares to criticise Islam. Late-night comics on TV have no hesitation in making fun of Donald Trump, supposedly the most powerful person on earth, but they dare not not mock Islam or its prophet. Queer.
