The Daily Telegraph's Disgraceful Front Page Headline

In April 2005, I had something published in a Sydney newspaper about a Sydney sheik who said women who dressed a certain way are eligible to be raped.

I promised myself I would never write anything related to “Muslimy” issues again. The last thing I wanted was to be known as the media’s “village Muslim”. Heck, there are so many other things to write about.

Then the London bombing came along. People claiming to represent me and 300,000 other people who, amongst other things, happen to have Islam as their religion were saying all sorts of crazy things.

Australians were naturally scared, especially with those responsible for the bombing thought to be kids born and bred in the UK. With the exception of leaders in Victoria and ACT, those claiming to represent Muslims were not saying or doing much to alleviate people’s fears. Their inaction forced my hand and my pen.

With John Howard and Peter Costello harping on about Muslim extremists more than Muslims “harp on” (to use Mr Howard’s phrase) about jihad, I now find myself in the same situation.

But this time, my concern isn’t so much about the words of greying politicians in dark suits. I’m angry about a headline.

A young Australian girl of Turkish background falls in love with a young guy and has been in a relationship with him for 4 years. Her terminally-ill mother disapproves of the relationship, and the young girl succumbs to a psychiatric condition which leads her to make a number of calls to Carlingford Court. The calls were in fact bomb threats.

The girl pleads guilty and her solicitor calls evidence from a psychiatrist. I am not sure if Dr Russell White was the girl’s treating psychiatrist, but I’m not sure if it really matters. He is qualified to give his report, and his evidence is accepted by the magistrate and not opposed by the prosecutor.

According to Dr White, this girl’s psychiatric condition has two causes. First, there is her mother’s terminal illness. Second, there is the parental pressure relating to the relationship.

Yet for reasons unknown, this psychiatric condition is reported on the front page of this newspaper with the headline as “Muslim Legal Excuse”. The article suggests that submissions made by her solicitor were incredulous. Hardly one sentence from solicitor Jonathan Anton’s submissions have been quoted with a view to showing that the act of making bomb-threats and the subsequent allegedly poor excuses were allegedly “Muslim” behaviour.

The newspaper has defamed the girl. It has also defamed her boyfriend, her parents, her psychiatrist and her lawyer.

Further, the newspaper has engaged in breaches of the Trade Practices Act 1974. It has engaged in misleading and deceptive conduct in trade and commerce by falsely attributing certain criminal conduct to Muslim culture.

It is one thing to speak of a clash of cultures. It is another to describe criminal conduct and its explanation as a “Muslim legal excuse”.

The headline represents an insult to all persons who happen to be of Muslim background.

Perhaps my colleague, Mr Anton, might consider advising the young lady to pursue action against the newspaper.

The editor and sub-editor of the paper have behaved irresponsibly in relation to both the headline and the editing of the story. If the girl happened to be Jewish, I doubt they would place as a headline “Jewish Legal Excuse”.

I believe that, should the paper be found to have defamed the girl, damages would be quite substantial. She is already suffering stress as a result of the circumstances outlined in her psychiatrist’s report. Now to have her name and reputation tarnished purely because of her family’s religious background will be a cause of even greater stress.

The Daily Telegraph, its editors and its publishers should be held accountable for their gross misconduct and complete lack of professionalism. It saddens me to say this given that the newspaper has allowed a small number of nominally Muslim voices (including my own) to be printed on its pages. But in the current environment, with Australian Muslims feeling the heat from all sides, the media must learn to behave responsibly.

And if they will not learn voluntarily, they may have to learn through the prospect of court action.

© Irfan Yusuf 2006