Weekend Wrap for 11 August 2024

Australian analysts at the Online Hate Prevention Institute tracking offensive online comments since the current Israel-Gaza conflict have found anti-Semitic and Islamophobic posts have skyrocketed. They say the national eSafety Commissioner needs greater power to rein in online hate and there should be funding to train police to tackle it. Aside from the online behaviour monitored by the Institute, both Islamophobia Register Australia and the Executive Council of Australian Jewry have reported manyfold increases in incidents motivated by religious and cultural differences since the Hamas attacks on Israel on October 7 last year. (4 Aug 2024)
Read more at ABC News

New research reveals 1 in 250 Australians (87,000 people) have experienced child sexual abuse in religious organisations at the hands of leaders or adults. Although the prevalence of such abuse has declined, the research found boys experienced more sexual abuse than girls, almost 72 per cent of the abuse occurred in Catholic organisations and the majority of perpetrators were men. Professor Daryl Higgins, director of Australian Catholic University's Institute of Child Protection Studies is interviewed for this story. (5 Aug 2024)
Listen to this segment at ABC Radio National
And read the response to these findings from Australian Catholic Safeguarding Ltd here

ASIO director-general Mike Burgess says Australia's terror-level threat has been raised to "probable" due to a rising mix of ideologies where more people think "violence is permissible". Mr Burgess joined Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus in making the announcement, where he said eight incidents had been disrupted in the past four months. "Across the eight there's an equal mix of religiously motivated, nationalist and racist violent extremism." He said the agency observed that violence was becoming more permissible, with religiously motivated, nationalist or racist ideologies sometimes becoming mixed in ways that do not make sense. (5 Aug 2024)
Read more at ABC News

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese appears to have confirmed that his government has abandoned attempts to pass a religious discrimination bill during this term of parliament. The prime minister was asked for an update on the religious discrimination laws at a press conference in Western Australia on Friday afternoon, and said he was unwilling to proceed without bipartisan support—which he claimed had not been forthcoming. “One of the things I’ve spoken about is the need for greater social cohesion, and the last thing that Australia needs is any divisive debate relating to religion and people’s faith … I don’t intend to engage in a partisan debate when it comes to religious discrimination.” (9 Aug 2024)
Read more at Catholic Weekly

In an interview on Christian radio, prominent lobbyist Murray Norman has revealed that faith-based groups have been engaging with the government in an effort to “push back” against the Productivity Commission’s recommendations for the removal of special exemptions provided to Basic Religious Charities (BRCs). After praising the charities minister, Dr Andrew Leigh, for rejecting the Commission’s recommendations to remove Deductible Gift Recipient (DGR) status for school building funds – benefiting largely wealthy private faith schools – and religious activities in public schools, Mr Norman said there were “other things” faith groups were talking to the government about. “We want the faith charities to be recognised as special and given due respect within the whole myriad of different charities that we have within our community.” (9 Aug 2024)
Read more at the Rationalist Society of Australia