Spacehamster’s Blog

I have to confess, the outright xenophobia directed against Muslims - both by my own family and the rest of Australia is getting worrying. I have to admit, I don’t recall even the Anti-Asian hatred fermented by Pauline Hanson being quite this bad. This latest kerfuffle over the latest (quiet-possibly uninformed) criticism against Muslims does raise one very serious problem - the complete and total lack of Muslim voices in the Mainstream media. It seems that every “ethnic” community has one - Asians, Greeks, Italians, our indigeneous Aboriginal brethren. But apart from sporadic contributions by Keysar Trad the Muslim cognoscente seems to be remarkably barren.

One Muslim commentator I can recommend is Irfam Yusuf, who also goes by Madhab Al-Irfy. He’s a Liberal Party supporter as well as being a devout Muslim, so hopefully this should mollify any suspicions from the rabid right. He’s also remarkably and refreshingly honest about the issues facing our fellow Australian Muslims in today’s modern world. And he presents a far better and insightful analysis about the issues then you’ll find in any mainstream paper (eg. Andrew Bolt, Paul Sheehan).

So why doesn’t a fellow like Irfan get more radio time or press? I have no idea. I suppose you’d have to ask him that question. I’ll only say that as long as the mainstream community doesn’t pay any attention to Irfan’s observations, the more fraught with peril our relationship with our fellow Muslim Australians will become. Irfan Yusuf’s writings represent a refreshing change from the one-sided criticism we often get. Hopefully he will continue, as Australia needs more people like him to contribute to the ongoing and increasingly paranoid debate.