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A niqab wearer, KKK hood wearer, and motorbike helmet wearer enter a Parliament House...

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Metaphor

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From SMH

A trio of men have attempted to enter Parliament with one wearing a Ku Klux Klan mask, and the others wearing a niqab and a motorcycle helmet as part of a protest against the burqa.
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Sergio Redegalli, Nick Folkes and Victor Waterson call their protest movement "Faceless" and oppose the burqa being worn in public spaces. They also expressed strong views against what they said was the "political ideology" of Islam which they said was "contrary" to Australian beliefs.

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The protesters were stopped between Old Parliament House and the Parliament House forecourt and told by police that the men wearing the Ku Klux Klan hat and motorcycle helmet would be forced to remove their facial coverings but the person in the niqab would be allowed to keep theirs on.

"One of the requirements of coming into Parliament House is that the motorcycle helmet is going to have to come off, your headdress is going to have to come off and your burqa ... your identity will be checked," the security guard told the protesters.

Mr Redegalli removed his Ku Klux Klan mask to reveal a niqab underneath. He said "so I guess this is the time to say that I'm now allowed into Parliament House am I?" "No," responded the security guard.

"Bit of a loophole, eh?" Mr Redegalli questioned.

The group were screened as part of the regular entry procedures and all three emerged with their facial coverings removed.

"Because we're males so there's a bit of sexism there. It seems you're allowed to wear a full face covering into Parliament if you're a Muslim woman but no other group is allowed to have that same privilege," Mr Redegalli said.

"That's a lot better than we thought, so that's a fantastic thing," he said.

The group said they opposed the decision earlier this month to overrule a ban on the burqa being worn in the public galleries over the Parliamentary Chambers.

Speaker Bronwyn Bishop and President Stephen Parry had been asked by Liberal Senator Cory Bernardi to consider banning the religious headwear being worn in Parliament.

On Monday, Senator Bernardi said the group's stunt highlighted "just how ridiculous it is to allow anyone wearing an identity concealing garment into Parliament House".

"The rules should apply equally to all Australians and all visitors to Parliament house irrespective of gender or ideology," Senator Bernardi told Fairfax Media.

Senator Bernardi has been a long time supporter of Mr Redegalli's attempts to protest against the burqa being allowed in Western countries.

In 2011, the South Australian Liberal backed Mr Redegalli's six-foot high 'Say Not the Burqa' mural, which he painted in Sydney's Newtown.

"I happen to agree with Mr Redegalli that the burqa has no place in Australia. I consider it a security risk and a symbol of repression and Islamic fundamentalism. Many Muslims (and opinion polls suggest a vast majority of other Australians) agree with me," he wrote in 2011.

Nationals MP George Christensen has also publicly backed a ban on the burqa in Paliament, and tweeted in response to Monday's stunt: "Where is the left-wing outrage at these three guys being told to remove their facial coverings at Parliament House?"
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If you're going to require people to not conceal their identity in Parliament, then you ought to require that of everybody.
 
Absolutely. It is nice to see this sort of protest happeneing. I have long said that wherever a muslim woman can wear a veil, I should be allowed to wear a ski mask. There should be no special allowance for her, that isn't available to everybody, nor should there be laws specifically banning her veil and not other forms of covering your face. And the only reasons you should be able to ban head coverings should be on legitimate safety and security grounds.
 
Ya, I really dislike the idea of special religious exemptions for things. If a muslim can wear a mask during identity checks, I should be able to wear a mask during identity checks. If a Sikh can bring a knife to school, I should be able to bring a knife to school.
 
Tom Sawyer said:
snip.. If a Sikh can bring a knife to school, I should be able to bring a knife to school.
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I think in some schools in USA it was bargained down to six inches plastic knife?

BTW do the liberals fighting for the right of Sikhs to wear kripans actually know why the practice originated? It was so that Sikhs would always be ready to chop off any Muslim head whenever Muslims tried to persecute them. The direct physical answer to Jihad.

It has always amused me to think about how liberals would resolve the corundrum.
 
Tom Sawyer said:
Ya, I really dislike the idea of special religious exemptions for things. If a muslim can wear a mask during identity checks, I should be able to wear a mask during identity checks. If a Sikh can bring a knife to school, I should be able to bring a knife to school.
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In countries like Qatar, Sharjah, Abu Dhabi and Dubai, women who wear a veil have to take it off for ID purposes. However there are special screens for this where a female immigration officer will check them.
 
whichphilosophy said:
Tom Sawyer said:
Ya, I really dislike the idea of special religious exemptions for things. If a muslim can wear a mask during identity checks, I should be able to wear a mask during identity checks. If a Sikh can bring a knife to school, I should be able to bring a knife to school.
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In countries like Qatar, Sharjah, Abu Dhabi and Dubai, women who wear a veil have to take it off for ID purposes. However there are special screens for this where a female immigration officer will check them.
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A reasonable compromise as far as I'm concerned.
 
Not reasonable if the taxpayer pays extra for it. If they are charged a fee for the service, then I would be more ok with it.
 
whichphilosophy said:
Jolly_Penguin said:
Not reasonable if the taxpayer pays extra for it. If they are charged a fee for the service, then I would be more ok with it.
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Why not? Given the veil itself is not in the Quran, religion cannot be used to avoid the fee.
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That's exactly the point. There's no good reason for anyone but the person themselves to pay for the additional services. This isn't some kind of disability where the person requires additional services as a result of an impairment, it's additional services requested due to a personal preference. If they are willing to cover the costs to have people cater to their preferences then they should be free to do so, but nobody else should be paying a a dime for it.
 
Tom Sawyer said:
whichphilosophy said:
Why not? Given the veil itself is not in the Quran, religion cannot be used to avoid the fee.
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That's exactly the point. There's no good reason for anyone but the person themselves to pay for the additional services. This isn't some kind of disability where the person requires additional services as a result of an impairment, it's additional services requested due to a personal preference. If they are willing to cover the costs to have people cater to their preferences then they should be free to do so, but nobody else should be paying a a dime for it.
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Of course I don't really care what people wear but if there is a cost implied as you mentioned, that should be paid for by that person. Scroll down on the link and there is a short write up of facilities for veiled ladies. Since it is a Muslim country but where very few wear a veil, only very few use it.

http://www.abudhabiairport.ae/english/airport-information/airport-security/security-checks.aspx
 
Of course people should not get religious exemptions from security procedures; However, this protest is not really about religious exemptions - it is about whipping up baseless anger at exemptions that do not exist in reality.

This 'protest' is in fact propaganda of the worst kind - just like the 'War on Christmas' bullshit we see every year, where people angrily denounce the (totally fictional) people who are banning them from saying 'Merry Christmas'.

These 'protesters' are opposing a privilege that does not exist, for the purpose of enraging those who are thereby fooled into believing that the privilege must be real.

I can find not one recorded instance of a person being permitted to enter the Australian Federal Parliament building with their face concealed. Not one Muslim woman has ever exercised this non-existent 'right'.

When people start protesting against things that are not happening at all - Burka-wearers in Parliament; bans on saying 'Happy Christmas'; Jews torching the Reichstag; etc., it is time to be afraid.
 
I agree with bilby. We should all be afraid of the Muslims and stop them from joining up with the Jews and stealing our freedom.
 
bilby said:
Of course people should not get religious exemptions from security procedures; However, this protest is not really about religious exemptions - it is about whipping up baseless anger at exemptions that do not exist in reality.
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Huh? Of course the exemptions exist.

The protesters were stopped between Old Parliament House and the Parliament House forecourt and told by police that the men wearing the Ku Klux Klan hat and motorcycle helmet would be forced to remove their facial coverings but the person in the niqab would be allowed to keep theirs on.
Click to expand...

Only when it became clear that it was a protest (and the person under the niqab was a man), then the niqab-wearer was told to remove the covering.

Many banks and petrol stations still have discriminatory requirements -- you cannot wear a helmet while pumping gas but you are allowed to wear a niqab or burka.

Now either it's important to see someone's face, or it isn't, so either both helmets and niqabs (and anything else that covers the face) must come off or none of them do.
 
Metaphor said:
Huh? Of course the exemptions exist.

The protesters were stopped between Old Parliament House and the Parliament House forecourt and told by police that the men wearing the Ku Klux Klan hat and motorcycle helmet would be forced to remove their facial coverings but the person in the niqab would be allowed to keep theirs on.
Click to expand...

Only when it became clear that it was a protest (and the person under the niqab was a man), then the niqab-wearer was told to remove the covering.

Many banks and petrol stations still have discriminatory requirements -- you cannot wear a helmet while pumping gas but you are allowed to wear a niqab or burka.

Now either it's important to see someone's face, or it isn't, so either both helmets and niqabs (and anything else that covers the face) must come off or none of them do.
Click to expand...

I can find not one recorded instance of a person being permitted to enter the Australian Federal Parliament building with their face concealed. Not one Muslim woman has ever exercised this non-existent 'right'.

The problem of wider discrimination against motorcycle helmet wearers at petrol stations is real, but of dramatically lesser importance in ensuring public safety than defusing the current hysteria being whipped up against Muslims.

I despise Islam; but I despise fascism even more. Singling out a particular religion as somehow 'un-Australian' is, frankly, about as un-Australian as it gets. Particularly when the excuse for this bigotry is a phantom; Nobody is trying to get into Parliament House wearing a burqa, except the morons who are trying to demonstrate that this is a thing. It's not a thing. It is pure fascist propaganda, and needs to be exposed as such.
 
bilby said:
Metaphor said:
Huh? Of course the exemptions exist.



Only when it became clear that it was a protest (and the person under the niqab was a man), then the niqab-wearer was told to remove the covering.

Many banks and petrol stations still have discriminatory requirements -- you cannot wear a helmet while pumping gas but you are allowed to wear a niqab or burka.

Now either it's important to see someone's face, or it isn't, so either both helmets and niqabs (and anything else that covers the face) must come off or none of them do.
Click to expand...

I can find not one recorded instance of a person being permitted to enter the Australian Federal Parliament building with their face concealed. Not one Muslim woman has ever exercised this non-existent 'right'.

The problem of wider discrimination against motorcycle helmet wearers at petrol stations is real, but of dramatically lesser importance in ensuring public safety than defusing the current hysteria being whipped up against Muslims.

I despise Islam; but I despise fascism even more. Singling out a particular religion as somehow 'un-Australian' is, frankly, about as un-Australian as it gets. Particularly when the excuse for this bigotry is a phantom; Nobody is trying to get into Parliament House wearing a burqa, except the morons who are trying to demonstrate that this is a thing. It's not a thing. It is pure fascist propaganda, and needs to be exposed as such.
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The point is not about how many people are 'trying', but that the rules are fair. I've never seen a woman in a burka in Australia, so it doesn't surprise me that I haven't seen one try to enter Parliament, either. I've seen some women in niqabs though, and I would hope that whenever someone has a rule, and there is a good reason for that rule, religious exceptions are not made.
 
It upsets me when people get special rules because they harbour particular delusions or come from a particular culture. If she can wear a niqab and he can carry a kirpan into the court room, I should be allowed to do the same. It is blatantly unjust to require otherwise. The only special rights should be things like handicap parking, things that have an actual rational basis.

I support this sort of protest, and to try to stop such a thing because it "criticizes muslims" doesn't wash. If these people were not demanding special rights, we wouldn't have the need for the protest.
 
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