We recently had a case here in Australia where a US anti-abortion campaigner, Troy Newman, had his visa cancelled by the Australian government while he was en route to Australia, arrested when he arrived, and then sent back to the US. The reason this occurred was because a Member of Parliament, Teri Butler, wrote a letter to the Minister of Immigration and outlined some misinformation about who he was and what she feared he would do here, that resulted in the government acting quickly to prevent him from being here so that women would be saved from having to hear his anti-abortion opinion.
However, while this man was banned from entering Australia because of his opinions against abortion, an extremist Muslim group was allowed entry to Australia despite the fact that they openly called for the death penalty for homosexuals, actively promote terrorism, and preach violence against women. If you’re a Muslim preaching terrorism, executions and other violence, you can enter the country. If you’re a Christian who is against abortions – we don’t want your kind here!
I’ve looked into this issue with Troy Newman and his anti-abortion stance, and where many are claiming that he would incite violence, there’s no evidence that he would. The accusations against him are based entirely on a single quote from a book he co-authored in 2000 that states:
“In addition to our personal guilt in abortion, the United States government has abrogated its responsibility to properly deal with the blood-guilty. This responsibility rightly involves executing convicted murderers, including abortionists, for their crimes in order to expunge bloodguilt from the land and people. Instead, the act of abortion has been elevated to a ‘God-given right’ and the abortionists canonized as saints.”
If you look at that quote with a clear head, you can see he’s not calling for the execution of abortion doctors, but for convicted murderers, which in this case would include abortion doctors. In the US, many states already execute convicted murderers, so it looks quite clear that the claims against him are taken out of context in order to push a political agenda.
This quote is the only evidence being used against him in Australia. He’s not been involved in any crimes, nor has he actually incited any crimes, anywhere. He’s even known for being against violence. It seems to me that this is definitely a political act, especially when the person who instigated this action was Terri Butler MP, an active pro-abortion supporter.
“There is a real risk that Mr Newman’s conduct may cause discord within the community and disrupt the ability of women to access lawful reproductive medicine.” – Teri Butler MP
Her claims that his mere presence in Australia would be enough for people to engage in violence is ridiculous. Well, unless ‘disrupt the ability of women to access lawful reproductive medicine’ actually means ‘we’re afraid that his planned seminars will get women to change their mind about abortion, and we don’t want women’s choices influenced in any way…’.
I find it quite disturbing that Australia is becoming a country of people willing to support a government who will revoke visas and kick people out simply because of an opinion. This article shares some insights about this that I agree with.
Why are we so afraid of an anti-abortion activist?
SO AUSTRALIA has become one of those countries that ban people whose views are not acceptable to the feminist establishment, and then locks them up… Newman has no criminal record, is not a threat to national security or to good public order…He just has an opinion the “#ShoutYourAbortion” crowd don’t like. He believes abortion is murder.
Whatever your view, banning uncomfortable opinions puts us on a dangerous path
My issue with this is the dangerous path Australia is moving towards where people are banned for an opinion rather than for a crime, while those who actively support crimes (eg. Muslim extremists) are allowed entry. This is because pro-abortion supporters and feminists seem to care more about women being able to have abortions than they do about stopping terrorism. If that statement is untrue, why then aren’t they also calling for the removal of the Muslim extremists that advocate violence and terrorism?
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