In 2001 the state Labor government in Victoria passed the Racial and Religious Tolerance Act, which made it an offence to offend, insult or humiliate anyone on racial or religious grounds. This was yet another triumph in the art of carrying out persecution while claiming the moral high ground. On 9 March 2002 three converts to Islam arrived at a Catch the Fire seminar in Melbourne in the hope of being offended by the Christian message. They were duly distressed, and so the Islamic Council of Victoria (ICV) took the complaint to the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal (VCAT), a refuge for lawyers who want to change the world but cannot get elected to parliament. For two years the case dragged on, at a cost which is likely to exceed two million dollars. Finally, on 17 December 2004 justice was supposedly done, and Judge Michael Higgins found Danny Nalliah and Daniel Scot to be dangerous criminals. The congregation at the Catch the Fire seminar was also found to have laughed, and the barrister for the ICV, Debbie Mortimer, objected to any readings from the Koran on the grounds that it vilified Muslims.
Truth was no defence in this case. What matters is that people’s feelings were hurt. If the same kind of law is applied to the nation’s political life, our politicians will be struck dumb at the next election. Mr Yasser Soliman, the president of the ICV, applauded Judge Higgins’ decision, and said that it was ‘a win for religious debate’. Perhaps VCAT might send a copy of this enlightened law to Saudi Arabia or Iran. In the midst of this farce, the Roman Catholic and the Uniting Churches supported the ICV, and condemned what they considered extreme right-wing Christians, by which one assumes they mean anybody who actually believes the Bible.
The whole anti-discrimination approach to law has been a godsend to the grievance industry and lawyers suffering from Utopian hallucinations, but it is contrary to decency, truth, the promotion of healthy human relations, and justice.
Peter Barnes