NOW WE HAVE ANOTHER NAIL

June 2008

We have believed for some time that Muslims in Australia were living in ‘religious’ polygamy, marrying more than one wife according to Sharia (Islamic law), but not declaring them to Australian authorities. An Imam (the current Mufti) was featured on ABC Compass a few years ago stating that they were marrying more than one wife in the Mosque but only registering one with the authorities.

To claim that polygamy protects women is the most male chauvinistic comment I have heard in a long time!

The question now is – will prudence or principle direct the way this debate goes in Australia.

Principle states that Australian Marriage Law will only recognise one wife at a time. That is best for women and children. That is the ‘western' model based on Biblical principle.

Prudence – money – would suggest it would be beneficial to the government to allow more wives to be legally recognised. How many? Does it matter? If Muslims want four is it not discriminatory to say they cannot do so in the twentieth Century?

At present, in reality, a man can have as many unregistered ‘wives’ as he likes. If his unregistered wives have children they can legally register as single mothers and get government benefits - as long as a man does not live in the same house as the woman for more than three nights a week.

If these ‘wives’ were registered then they could not claim single mother status and the ‘husbands’ income would be assessed for any child benefits.

This would immediately raise many problems as to how this was done if he had 4 wives, but it always gets very complicated when you move away from God’s design but that has not stopped us moving away before.

Another danger arising from this Muslims suggestion is that, as stated in our Journal article, “the only reason given by the Federal Labor government for their endorsement of heterosexual marriage is “tradition”. That is very dangerous indeed because ‘traditions’ can change all too easily these days, especially when you are looking to save government money!

Please write letters to state and local newspapers on this issue as soon as possible.

Tell them that if Muslims come to Australia they should abide by our laws – one man, one wife.

Tell them that this is best for women and children.

Tell them we should not be changing our culture for 1.7% of the community – especially when we know that what we have is the best and fairest system there is.

Call on the feminists to show they really care for ‘women’ by rejecting this suggestion.

Call on the government to rout out those who are abusing women and even young girls by forced and/or multiple ‘religious’ marriages. They should comply with our law or be deported. 

All major newspaper emails for letters to the editor are listed on our web site at: http://www.saltshakers.org.au/html/P/16/B/114/

Also write to the Prime Minister and tell him you expect him to uphold the Christian principle of one man, one woman marriag
e.
Go to http://www.pm.gov.au/contact/index.cfm and leave a message on his web site.


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SALT SHAKERS 

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