He’s not a public intellectual. He’s a guy who fakes an indian accent on television and hosts a bingo show. Oh and he advertises curry paste too.

Wikipedia lists him as a Comedian by the way.

Let’s see. Tanveer has a double degree in Arts/Medicine, is a psychiatric registrar at one of our top research/teaching hospitals, a journalist, a prominent public intellectual, a fomer director of the AMA, a current board member of the Advertising Standards Board. And now he is running for public office.

No great achievement? What a bitter and ignorant comment. Steve, Tanveer is among the most respectable and accomplished Muhammadans alive today. And rather than cheering him, you try to put him down. No wonder you people are in such a pickle.

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Denial is not just a river in Egypt.

After this time, all the top scholars and scientists in the “Islamic world” were either Persian Shia – mainly Ismaili and Twelver – Sufi, Xian, Jewish, Turkish or Mongol. Even Ibn Khaldun acknowledged the minimal scholarly achievements of Sunni Arabs.

Sadly, after the 15th century there were no more of these great scholars, when even the previously pro-knowledge Mongols succumbed to Sunni distrust of Science.

These are most certainly NOT the sort of values we want Australian children to be indoctrinated with!

For example note the number of very successful Aussie Muslims who attended Xian private schools, such as Waleed Ali and his Skippy Xian (now converted) wife.

Muslim youths are angry, frustrated and extremist because they have been mis-educated and de-educated by the British schooling. Muslim children are confused because they are being educated in a wrong place at a wrong time in state schools with non-Muslim monolingual teachers. They face lots of problems of growing up in two distinctive cultural traditions and value systems, which may come into conflict over issues such as the role of women in the society, and adherence to religious and cultural traditions. The conflicting demands made by home and schools on behaviour, loyalties and obligations can be a source of psychological conflict and tension in Muslim youngsters. There are also the issues of racial prejudice and discrimination to deal with, in education and employment. They have been victim of racism and bullying in all walks of life. According to DCSF, 56% of Pakistanis and 54% of Bangladeshi children has been victims of bullies. The first wave of Muslim migrants were happy to send their children to state schools, thinking their children would get a much better education. Than little by little, the overt and covert discrimination in the system turned them off. There are fifteen areas where Muslim parents find themselves offended by state schools.

The right to education in one’s own comfort zone is a fundamental and inalienable human right that should be available to all people irrespective of their ethnicity or religious background. Schools do not belong to state, they belong to parents. It is the parents’ choice to have faith schools for their children. Bilingual Muslim children need state funded Muslim schools with bilingual Muslim teachers as role models during their developmental periods. There is no place for a non-Muslim teacher or a child in a Muslim school. There are hundreds of state schools where Muslim children are in majority. In my opinion, all such schools may be designated as Muslim community schools. An ICM Poll of British Muslims showed that nearly half wanted their children to attend Muslim schools. There are only 143 Muslim schools. A state funded Muslim school in Birmingham has 220 pupils and more than 1000 applicants chasing just 60.

Majority of anti-Muslim stories are not about terrorism but about Muslim
culture–the hijab, Muslim schools, family life and religiosity. Muslims in the west ought to be recognised as a western community, not as an alien culture.
Iftikhar Ahmad
www.londonschoolofislamics.org.uk

That demand for good quality Muslim schools among Muslim parents certainly exceeds supply is something I have encountered in the research I have done.

As a parent myself, reasons I like my daughter’s Muslim school (she is in kindergarten) include: she is surrounded by people who think being Muslim is a good and normal thing; I don’t have to battle to explain Muslim religious requirements i.e. no pork in the food, why Mummy wears a headscarf, why we don’t gorge on chocolate in April etc.; her comprehensive curriculum includes time for Arabic and learning Qur’an and basic Islamic beliefs.

BUT, if we were in doubt about the standard curriculum of subjects offered (the three Rs etc.) at that particular school, we would take her out and put her in another school even if that was a non-Muslim school.

My personal experience (both as a parent of a child who attends a Muslim school, and as friends of teachers at Muslim schools) is that by and large Muslim schools are very interested in promoting engagement with the wider society. Years ago King Khalid (now AIA) set up a program with Wesley and a Jewish school – whose name escapes me – where children would develop pen-pal friendships and meet up at the end of the year. Yesterday my daughter came home having learned Maori songs. I think it is rubbish to suggest religious schools are inherently isolationist.

Hmm, and what about religionist or theist thought?