Retailers Call for Ban on Hijabs, Hoodies!!

URLhttp://au.news.yahoo.com/a/-/australian-news/5263595/retailers-ban-hijabs-hoodies/ (Accessed on 15 January 2009)

Retailers call for ban on hijabs, hoodies
ABC - January 15, 2009, 3:48 pm
The Retailers Association has called for hijabs, hoodies and helmets to be banned from shops and banks. The Queensland-based organisation says it represents smaller, independent retailers in Australia.

Association executive director Scott Driscoll says the items could be used as a disguise by criminals. Mr Driscoll says the issue is about security, not religion… ??!!

"We're certainly getting reports from overseas (??!!), that these pieces of clothing are actually being utilised by people that are not of the Muslim faith and certainly have ulterior motives," he said.

"That's bringing us to a point now of realising we need to be moving into the current times and addressing these things right across the board…??!! (Racists or Discriminations??).

"It is not intended whatsoever to show disrespect to the Muslim community - indeed it's the opposite”, Mr Driscoll added ….??! "We want to protect the reputation of all good people in the community - we've got the support and the backing of some senior Muslim leaders (??!! WHO??!!) from across the country."

The debate was triggered by on-air comments from a commercial radio presenter in Brisbane. The Australian Retailers Association says the comments are xenophobic and immature.

Richard Evans from the Australian Retailers Association says people should be allowed to wear their cultural dress in shops and Mr Driscoll should apologise. "I'm calling on anyone who thinks this is a respectable debate to rethink their position," he said.

"And for those that are making comments that we should be banning these cultural and custom outfits, they should be apologising to not only those people that wear them but all of Australians."

Comments:

Oh… Oh… Racists and religious discrimination groups are already knocking on the doors of ‘civilized’ Australia… BUT from what I studied at university, the concept of ‘civilized’ nation that embraced the concept of ‘civil society’ does NOT discriminate people based on race and/or religion.

These are maybe from small group of secular (Jewish based) that are upset on the fact that Muslim are banning their Jewish and US products, so this ‘action’ may be a retaliation to Muslim.