In the absence of halal food – prepared in accordance to Sharia dietary laws – the Islamic delegates were forced to eat “salad sandwiches and vegetarian pies”.
– – –
“Vegetarian is not halal. Vegetarian is vegetarian. Halal food is totally different, shouldn’t you guys (the caterers) have done your homework?”
The claims about what is “halal” or not are out and out lies. These bastards just lurv to have ignorant kafirs grovelling at their feet on any pretext. Especially when they can fool a PM into it as well. Bet they’re wetting their pants laughing.
I’ve organised many functions and events, massive, large, medium, small and mini, and so have had to ensure that the caterers provided kosher and “halal” meals on various occasions. Vegetarian is just fine. “Halal” refers to the method of killing beef, goats etc., not the method of general food preparation.
“The management of the catering company came to us and he was almost crying in front of us about how sorry he was,” Mr Rahman said. “He was apologising throughout the whole weekend.”
The more these people are appeased, the higher and wider the definition of “halal” grows. First, it expanded to claim that “haram” and “halal” food could not be touched by the same utensils, then couldn’t be stored in the same cupboards/fridges and then again, not even be in the same kitchen (that’s why all meals served at Port Hedland hospital are “halal”). Now they’re claiming the method any food preparation must be according to their latest, ever-elastic definition of “halal”.
And those fools in Canberra just keep falling for every new, outlandish claim.
Mr Rudd’s apology to Muslim delegates follows revelations by The Australian last month that the Federal Government was considering setting up a Muslim advisory body – which would include sporting figures and academics – to help dismantle the stereotypical and overly religious image of Islam in Australia.
Also of note is the absence of cries of outrage. Didn’t someone once have this idea…?
The Tizona Group 
April 29, 2008, 2:55 am at 2:55 am
Some would say the power of Islam!
April 29, 2008, 2:57 am at 2:57 am
And some would say “Bend over and lube up!” Deberigny.
I would rather say neither.
April 29, 2008, 3:48 am at 3:48 am
Vegetarian does generaly meet the requirements for halal. It just tends to taste like crap. Halal certification usualy included the surfaces and utensils used to prepare the food. In reality it either means 2 kitchens or halal only meats. Thats what happened at the immigration detention centre I worked at, no non-halal meats were used even though at times we had close to half the detainees non-muslim.
Prisons in britan and many in the US no longer use any pork products due to the hassle of the halal crap.
Creeping shariah in action.
April 29, 2008, 5:34 am at 5:34 am
One of these days they’ll declare coffee haram, and that’s when they’ll learn what jihad is really about.
April 29, 2008, 10:06 am at 10:06 am
#4 Dey fuck wit’ my mornin’ coffee, dey betta be prepared.
April 29, 2008, 10:09 am at 10:09 am
1st: What are Islamic delegates doing determining the future of Australia? With only a thousand places up for grabs (forget GetUP for now) there to represent 20 million Australian citizens, why is the term ‘Islamic delegates’ pluralised?
2nd: They wanted to come to Australia. I live in Korea. I had to make changes… many. I had to adapt. Why can’t they?
Rudd’s ‘popularist’ approach, both with this halal farce and the firm (ha!) action he is sure to take with the Chinese Embassy and their mobilised protesters, will be his downfall.
April 29, 2008, 10:16 am at 10:16 am
#6 You mean to tell me that you can’t throw a sickie so you can throw a prawn on the BBQ, have a cold one and watch the footy with mates? Or piss off down the beach ‘coz it’s too fukken ‘ot to do jack shit?!
April 29, 2008, 11:20 am at 11:20 am
#4; Swinish
I like that. We can establish a “Rubicon Roster”. “You touch this son, and harm will come”:)
April 29, 2008, 12:38 pm at 12:38 pm
#7 ( Can I call you Ash or do we have to continue doing this Tim Blair thang?) I have 10 ‘free’ sick days per year. In six months, I’ve taken eight of them. One time ’twas to go to the amusement park with my girl but we were both too hungover to dare enter the gates.
PS Vacation starts Friday at 2:30pm. Just one week this time. Could have had one week at the end of my contract, too. Could have had two weeks now. But I switched it. One week here. Those two weeks back in OZ.
BTW No Union over here, basically an AWA of sorts, and I’m doing fine. Means plenty of jobs. Which means plenty of opportunity. Don’t like the deal? Find a better job. Means the individual has to step up to the plate. Good. Does one have to hunt harder for the good jobs? Yes. Does it mean employers offering shit conditions find it hard to find a sucker to work for them? Yes. Is everyone tied in/down? No. Good.
Need I explain more? A free market.
I think the above mentioned philosophy is better. Still, ex (not the current) girl over here is a nurse. They have a union. Holidays? Zip.
Much as I despise Aussie trade unions, at least they’re effective, in that sense (holiday pay, sick pay for example). But being a capitalist, I know the onus should rest more on the individual than the collective. The collective smacks of socialism. That’s flawed. It’s been tried and has failed.
ESL teaching over here is a good market.
Many jobs, both here and back in OZ, don’t have that market. Maybe that’s why Howard lost. Maybe it’s the trade unions’ fault (hint hint) why those markets don’t exist in Oz in the first place. And maybe, Howard was on the right track (AWAs) but the trade unions are still too strong and most people don’t realise that trade unions help but a few and hinder a many, and hinder the most.
That ex thought like a loser. She belongs to a union and still accepts that she’ll never get a holiday, except for when she gets married (and after that most Korean women quit their jobs and become homemakers). As freaky as Spacecadette is, she’s a brain, and she’s strong, and she’s never had too much of a problem getting what she wants. Argument: the individual vs the collective.
Yet does the ‘individual’ argument smack of anarchy? Chaos? Cid said it’s a friggin’ zoo in here.
Whatever (love you, Cid). And back to the original argument…
Where do we draw the line? Halal for all? Just because it’s easier??
Why do they choose to live in Australia? WHY? Homeland violence? WHY? Australia rocks? Live here? Fine. We have a lot to learn from all of our immigrants, including the 1st settlers. And people settling in Oz have a lot to learn from the people already living here.
Hmmm.
Yet guys, I find myself in a conundrum… maybe, kind of, of sorts…: I am in Korea, teaching Koreans English, and as a consequence (and sometimes as a precursor), teaching them Western culture. Western culture which they have embraced.
And that’s where the cultural relativism stops… maybe
How can the West embrace such oppressive (Islamic) culture? The East at first resisted, then embraced and then championed, the West, but not Islam. The West at first oppressed the East yet now openly embraces it (big opening for debate there).
But not Islam.
Why? We, the West and the East, wanted to but Islam, so far, has wanted not.
Yet… Every Muslim I’ve met has been a wonderful person. Kind, normal and human.
It’s this terrorism that’s the bitch. And those few verses in the Koran.
Can we ever get along? The West and the East has compromised (hmmm). Well, maybe not compromised but learned to work together. ‘Bout time radical Islam does, too… with both the East and the West. Calm the fuck down. All facets of Islam should try more so, as the West and the East has already done more so. Selling oil at $120 per barrel isn’t a compromise. Wahhabism isn’t a compromise. The Saudi’s founding Islamic Study Centres at our universities isn’t a compromise. Not when we pay them millions for oil per day regardless. Not when there are no “Christian Study Centres/Churches/Democratic Study Centres etc.” in Saudi arabia.
Point: Given time, we will work things out with Islam, but it’s their turn to step up.
No more appeasement.
Hmmm, let’s get down to cultural relativism. The West is the best, without question. The car, the TV, the computer, the light bulb, the printing press, the Internet, democracy, DC, AC, that Scottish dude who came up with the idea of modern capitalism… the spinning jenny, the printing press (did I mention that? [the Chinese lost that along with the clock])… oil drilling techniques.
And most of that progress is thanks to Freedom, Liberty, Democracy, a Separation between Church and State, Capitalism, Universal suffrage, the Secret Ballot… entrepreneurial people.
Of course, ‘we’ adopt ideas from the the East… Rice, good food, chopsticks. Marco Polo and his pasta. Glasses. Adaptations on technology. New technology.
Before Islam, the Arabs gave the world the 0-9 system.
And then along came Mohammed… and what since?
Back to the Summit…
Why didn’t they just request halal beforehand instead of making a scene afterwards?
Why did they complain about the veggie sangas (sandwiches) when it didn’t contradict their ‘strict’ law, anyway?
Did Rudd not know? Really? How? Is he incompetent or insensitive? Or clever?
Did he say sorry, admit he fucked up etc. etc. or did he blame the caterers?
Did the buck stop with him or did he, as our Prime Minister, pass the buck?
Halal?
Glasses?China?Is Australia passing the buck on our way of life?
Ya food wasn’t halal. Fuck you. You had veggies. Get over it. Stop being pricks.
April 29, 2008, 3:26 pm at 3:26 pm
bb,
are you calling me freaky?
scaring the hell out of you?
don’t jump off my new “phat” apartment ;p.
April 29, 2008, 5:16 pm at 5:16 pm
#9 How many soju’s (?spelling) did it take to write that one, BB? Not saying it didn’t make sense – it did; just that in its trek, somewhat lengthened to cover all the necessary philosophical kernels raised by Sandi’s original post, one speculates that it was perhaps composed under a certain liberation of the synapses, which I, too, often find useful in bringing my more complex cerebral ruminations to full fruition.
And no, I’ve only had coffee.
April 29, 2008, 11:53 pm at 11:53 pm
D, yes, there was a liberation, such as you suggest, of the synapses going on.
I dunno. Something about the East/West thing. Both in a geographical and a political sense. Add to the that the whole Left vs Right argument. Then stir in Islam. To finish off, add the perspective of a Westerner living in the East, teaching them how to be Western. More Western, that is, as some of these countries have Westernised a great deal in the last half century or so.
It’s not as simple as just saying ‘assimilate’.
April 30, 2008, 12:00 am at 12:00 am
A footnote.
A Korean once asked me, “What is the West?”
To which I replied something along the lines of, “Imagine now you are in the East. If you head west, that will take you to the Middle East. Head even further west and you are in the West. Head further west again and you’re in the Wild Wild West.”
Her head went bingbing.