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Do Islamic values equal Australian values?

Bill Muehlenberg

Oct 26 2011

8 mins


The great thing about a democracy is that various groups can make their competing truth claims in public, and no one need lose their head in the process.

Differing worldviews, religions and ideologies can slog it out in the public square, and people are free to decide which voices they will listen to.
 
Indeed, groups can even take out advertising in various forms to make their case. Thus the free market and democracy combine to allow genuine freedom of expression. However, there is such a thing as truth in advertising, or the lack thereof. If an ad is found to be blatantly false or misleading, it can be pulled from airing.
 
A good case can be made that the newest round of pro-Islam ads – now to be screened on television – fall into this category. The ads seek to show that Islam is a religion of love, peace and compassion, just like Christianity. Here is how one news story covers this development:
 
“The Muslim organisation behind the provocative ‘Jesus is a Prophet of Islam’…
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