Wednesday, February 15, 2006

beyond the vale

This morning Alan Jones announced his support for Danna Vale’s extremist views. If it weren’t for the fact that Jones is generally conceived of as an important conservative opinion-maker to the masses, I would leave my response to epithets hurled at the television set, and move on. But it is disturbing that Jones is intent on validating and legitimising Vale’s statements. He seems to want to paint her as the second coming of Pauline Hanson, someone brave enough to "voice the very question that millions of Australians continue to ask" (ie, ‘will we all end up Muslim?’). Jones first explains that the Danish cartoon controversy proves that Islam is bad, dangerous and spreading, then goes on:

"Well, fast forward to Australia in the last 24 hours and the Federal Liberal MP, Danna Vale, is now under siege by the politically correct brigade because she dared to say that an annual abortion rate of 100,000 could result in Australia becoming a Muslim State in 50 years time. And that's all she did say. If the publishing of the cartoons is defended on the basis of free speech, where do Danna Vale's utterances fit in?"

Well, Alan, since you ask, I think they would best fit into a nice shady spot where the sun doesn’t shine. Certainly in the extremist margins, on the lunatic fringe. And honestly, aren’t we all sick of seeing that ‘politically correct brigade’ tag hauled out every time someone disagrees with a conservative? Are Vale’s colleagues Amanda Vanstone or Jackie Kelly also being ‘politically correct’ when they distance themselves from her views? Or does the nifty little label apply exclusively to the Left?
"The reality is, whether we like it or not, Islam is the fastest growing religion in the world…Danna Vale was questioning what kind of nation we would be in 50 years time. But here we go again. Danna Vale is now paraded as the problem."

Jones, we get your drift. Islam heaps bad. Abortion heaps bad. Both killing off White Australia.
So, where does he want to go from here?