When is Malcolm Turnbull going to censure immigration minister Peter Dutton for singling out a group of Australians for race-based condemnation?
You might recall that Peter Dutton, Minister for Immigration and Border Control, enjoyed a little tete-a-tete with Andrew Bolt on Sky News on Thursday night, during which he opined that many foreign fighters travelling to the Middle East were the first or second generation offspring of migrants who settled in Australia under the humanitarian programs of the Liberal government of Malcolm Fraser.
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Peter Dutton names Lebanese Muslims
The Immigration Minister reveals he was referring to Lebanese Muslims when he said last week that Malcolm Fraser had made immigration mistakes.
"The reality is Malcolm Fraser did make mistakes in bringing some people in the 1970s and we're seeing that today," he incorrectly declared. "We need to be honest in having that discussion. There was a mistake made."
People saying stupidly inflammatory things on Sky News isn't a surprise: it's what the station was designed for. It's Australia's low-rent attempt to ape America's Fox News, only with less market reach than a suburban pizza shop flyer.
But Dutton's statement on Monday wasn't made on Andrew Bolt's webcam. It was made in the Parliament of Australia.
Instead of walking back his comments when questioned about them by opposition leader Bill Shorten, Dutton doubled down.
"Out of the last 33 people who have been charged with terrorism offences, 22 of these people have been from second or third generation Lebanese Muslim background," he baldly stated. "Where I see extremism I will call it out."
And so will we, Pete: singling out an entire section of the Australian community because of allegations made against a handful of people is racism, plain and simple.
Now, Turnbull has betrayed plenty of his previously-expressed principles – marriage equality, renewable energy, climate change mitigation – since getting into power, but most people have understood that these were policy matters which he was forced to retain in order to remain in the job – even as he sold out the wellbeing of Australian LGBTIQ kids by gutting anti-bullying programs because the more reactionary elements of his backbench felt the Safe Schools programme wasn't sufficiently homophobic.
And to be fair to the PM, there are good reasons that he should be timid about standing up to explicit racism right at the moment, since elements of his government seem to be awfully enthusiastic about wooing it for political advantage.
After all, his own Attorney-General freely discussed how One Nation are looking set to make a splash in the Queensland election in his Dutton-like "how could I have possibly imagined I might be recorded by this microphone at this media event?" faux pas on Monday, while describing members of his party as "mediocre".
The loss of the safe seat of Orange in the recent by-election clearly scared the hell out of the NSW Nationals, who dumped their leader and deputy before the final tally was even confirmed, and last night federal Nationals senators crossed the floor to show support for the importation of banned firearms, despite it being obviously (and correctly) doomed to fail.
If the Nationals are focussed on appealing to One Nation voters while the Liberals are openly wondering how they can unravel the Coalition agreement, doing something prime ministerial like – for example – defending a group of Australians being unfairly maligned by a frontbencher in a position of responsibility would be terribly, terribly scary.
But this is the point where we have to ask the PM to finally stand up for something. And yes, it seems utterly insane to have to say, yet again, that racism is a bad thing that leads to dangerous, violent, entirely avoidable consequences for everyone, but here we are.
Plenty of Australians have lamented the US election result and openly asked how they can stop the coming hate storm. And the answer is that you can battle the brushfires right here and right now in our own backyard, before they get completely out of control.
For a start: you could sign this petition demanding that Turnbull censure Dutton: it's a symbolic thing, sure, but symbols are useful.
Better yet, you could send a message directly to the PM, maybe linking this 2007 piece from the Parliamentary Library articulating the sorts of racial abuse and open discrimination experienced by Australian Muslims, including those specifically from Lebanon.
And you can keep demanding that the Prime Minister stand up for Australians – all Australians – because we should be clear about this: Turnbull has an important choice to make right now.
Either he makes clear that ethnic profiling to condemn entire groups of citizens has no place in Australian discourse, or he confirms – by his silence or otherwise – that Dutton makes a good point and scapegoating ethnic groups is a perfectly reasonable thing for an Australian government to do.
And yes, it's uncomfortable to stand up to explicit racism.
Especially for cowards.
Andrew P Street's new book The Curious Story of Malcolm Turnbull: the Incredible Shrinking Man in the Top Hat is out now through Allen & Unwin, and book now for The Double Disillusionists live at Giant Dwarf talking Has Trump Doomed Australia with Fairfax Media's Jacqueline Maley and BuzzFeed's Mark di Stefano on Thursday, November 24.
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