Christianity bad, Islam bonza

coopers halal certFairfax columnist Andrew P. Street might or might not be a homosexual, but let us hope he is. As Gore Vidal is reputed to have said of cocaine-snorting, boy-bothering political fixer and disbarred Mob lawyer Roy Cohn, being gay was “the nicest thing about him.” Inversion, in Street’s case, would certainly merit greater acclaim than his disdain for consistency when addressing the topic of religion.

To save readers the distress of visiting the Age‘s now ultragirlythemed site and boosting its web traffic, which only encourages the further debasement of a once-sane and decent news organisation, here is what Street has to say about the Coopers beer company. By way of background, know the Adelaide-based  brewer was associated with a video-clipped and widely propagated debate about gay marriage between two Liberal MPs, Tim Wilson and Andrew Hastie, the former for and latter ag’in. Here is what Street has to say about Coopers, Christianity and the righteousness of hip dudes in spurning the company’s suds:

There was a massive social media backlash about Coopers’ involvement in sponsoring a religious organisation to make an explicitly political point, including slews of one star reviews on Coopers’ Facebook page amid promises from lifelong Coopers drinkers that this was the final time they’d let a Pale Ale pass their lips. The Old Bar in Melbourne announced they’d stop stocking the beer. And Coopers realised very quickly that they’d made a terrible mistake.

Now remember that this was a debate, not some ranting, one-sided sermon about the scourge of sodomy or the shame of four (ed: or more) hairy legs (ed: and hairless ones, too) entwined on the same mattress. Had that been the case, Coopers would have richly warranted condemnation and boycott. Telling people who they may and may not rub up against is never within any brewer’s purview, despite their products encouraging much of that activity over past centuries and longer. Abetting the civil exchange of differing views on a matter of public interest is, however, very much a public service. What Cooper’s has done differs not at all in spirit from the good works of, say, the Lowy Institute, underwritten by the Westfield fortune, which does exactly the same thing on other topics. Likewise the Myer Foundation.

But let us not focus on Street’s refusal or inability to present both sides of the story. After all, he does work for Fairfax where, as even the ABC’s Media Watch has been obliged to note, over-promoted boy editors believe it their duty NOT to report Islam-related stories that go against the progressive meme. Far more interesting, although distressingly characteristic of Fairfax CEO Greg Hywood’s unsupervised sandboxes, is Street’s telling inconsistency. A Christian organisation’s fair and evenly weighted debate is beyond the pale. But concerns about Islam’s hip-and-shoulder jostling into the mainstream of Australian life and supermarket shelves are entirely groundless. Indeed, they are held only by “hysterical and ignorant people”, according to Street.

Government backbencher Cory Bernardi’s been going through the submissions to his very, very necessary inquiry into food labelling, which is definitely a matter of grave urgency and certainly not just a chance for him and the government to further besmirch Muslims by implying that Halal labelling look (sic) is concealing something sinister, that’s for darn sure!

Why, it’s about ALL food labelling – Kosher, organic, everything! Although yes, admittedly almost all of the submissions have been about Halal food, largely written by people who don’t know what they’re talking about. But this is an important opportunity to give hysterical and ignorant people a voice!

Islam good. Christianity bad. Got it?

Meanwhile members of the Cooper family donate to a Christian group, while the company — hang on, why didn’t Street mention this? — supports Islamic proselytising by forking out for its halal certificate, as per the certificate reproduced atop this post.

Street’s column can be read at the link below. Coopers products are available at all half-decent bottleshops. Readers unhappy with the gay left’s determination to silence all opinions but its own might wish to consider picking up a slab or two.

— roger franklin

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