I Think I'll Take a Swim.

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/national/blokes-banned-from-dance-sister-dance-at-brunswick-town-hall/story-e6frf7l6-1226013934362

I read an article today about an all female dance party in Brunswick being awarded exemption from equal opportunity laws, which sparked fears of segregation in the community. There was also a recent, rejected bid by my local council for the funding of modesty curtains for female-only sessions at the Clayton swimming pool, which would additionally provide general privacy in the glass-walled community centre. Although both proposals would appeal to a wider range of women, the latter in particular was aimed at accommodating the Muslim community and was met with the attitude, "They've come to our country to reap its benefits, they should adapt to our ways." Does this mean renouncing their faith in order to take a swim?

Failing to accommodate religious requirements can only result in these women staying at home, which is the very segregation supposedly resented. Where special consideration is given to Muslims, people make the quick leap to a topsy turvy world in which, as predicted by Ratepayers Victoria president Jack Davis, “the next step [may] be buses only for various nationalities.” It seems there is little entertainment of the concept of shared power, but rather a misconception that by giving a minority a little power, we lose some of our own; that it will indeed lead to us becoming the minority and that ‘they’ will do unto ‘us’ as we have unto them.

In a country that boasts its multiculturalism, it is apparently the mostly white and/or Christian Australians who are promoting segregation, and not the newcomers. We should be encouraging those of other nationalities and religions to participate in our community, whilst allowing them the freedom to do so in adherence to their own beliefs. The fact they require our allowance at all is grossly indicative of where all the power currently lies.