Shah - The Islamic republic of Australia: Muslims down under, from halal to hijabs and everything in between

CONTENTS

Journalist and comedian Sami Shah is an ex-Muslim from Pakistan living in Australia. Since moving here in 2012, he has been profiled in the New York Times and on Australian Story, and is a regular guest and presenter on radio and TV, including ABC News Breakfast, The Project, RNs Sunday Extra and ABC Radio Melbourne. Previously he wrote and presented A Beginners Guide to Pakistan on BBC Radio 4, and he appeared on Stephen Frys QI. Samis autobiography, I, Migrant, was shortlisted in the 2015 NSW Premiers Literary Awards, WA Premiers Literary Award, and for the Russell Prize for Humour Writing. His first novel, Fire Boy, is available in Australia. In 2016 he wrote and presented a five-part documentary on Islam in Australia for ABC radio.

The ABC Wave device is a trademark of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and is used under licence by HarperCollinsPublishers Australia.

First published in Australia in 2017

by HarperCollinsPublishers Australia Pty Limited

ABN 36 009 913 517

harpercollins.com.au

Copyright Sami Shah 2017

The right of Sami Shah to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright Amendment (Moral Rights) Act 2000.

This work is copyright. Apart from any use as permitted under the Copyright Act 1968, no part may be reproduced, copied, scanned, stored in a retrieval system, recorded, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

HarperCollinsPublishers

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195 Broadway, New York, NY 10007, USA

ISBN 978 0 7333 3815 1 (paperback)

ISBN 978 1 4607 0807 1 (ebook)

National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication data:

Shah, Sami, author.

Title: The Islamic republic of Australia / Sami Shah.

Muslims Australia Attitudes.

Islam Australia Humor.

Australia Race relations.

Cover design by Lisa White, HarperCollins Design Studio

Cover images: A Turkish Man by Friedrich von Amerling, 1840;

all other images by shutterstock.com

For Mummy and Daddy

I m never writing another non-fiction book. Or, at least not one based around current events; youre always playing catch-up.

The Islamic Republic of Australia didnt even start as a book. As with much in my life, it began in the form of a stand-up comedy show. Being a professional comedian, the stage is where I process most of my psychosis. I get up in front of rooms full of strangers, hold a microphone, and let all my personal issues pour out. Its something Ive done for years and am only good at when I keep the distance between forebrain and microphone to a minimum. I did it in Pakistan (albeit carefully), and was thrilled to continue doing it when I moved to Australia. Australian audiences, I found, were just as accepting of me as Pakistani audiences had been which is to say, just enough for ticket sales to break even against venue costs.

After a couple years of performing in Australia, I noticed Id been studiously avoiding talking about Islam in my comedy. This was odd, given that I always use comedy to process whatever Im thinking about at the time. Somehow, though, my experiences with Islam were being censored to a degree. I made jokes about religion every comedian tends to find some comedy in the subject. But none of my jokes touched upon my personal experiences, nor even my personal opinions. Id talk about being an atheist, but somehow Id divorce that from the particular religion I abandoned to become an atheist. And, upon consideration, I didnt respect myself for this avoidance. It was born out of a need, I decided, to deny a part of my identity. Id spent so many years in Pakistan combating Islam in my head, that in Australia I wanted to pretend it just didnt exist. Except, it obviously still did. So I did the only thing Im capable of doing when confronted with an uncomfortable realisation about myself: I wrote a one-man show about it.

If this behaviour seems ridiculous, youre absolutely right. Its not how normal people react. But then, normal people dont aspire to make a living standing on stage talking about their genitalia. Not showing their genitalia many people throughout history have done that without any judgment at all but talking about it. Comedians are a strange bunch indeed.

The show was called Islamofarcist, a pun on Islamofascist, which, since Ive had to explain it every time Ive told someone about it, utterly failed as a title. I wrote the entire thing in Perth, two days before it debuted at the Perth Fringe Festival (thats actually an inaccurate way of describing the writing process. I wrote it in two days, because I thought of nothing but the show for six months prior. So by the time I put it down as a series of words, Id already drafted the entire structure weeks before). The show was, essentially, what this book is, but condensed into an hour with none of the journalistic flourishes like interviews and facts. It was about my journey from Muslim to non-Muslim, while trying to explain to Muslims that it was okay for people outside Islam to criticise the religion, and explain to people outside Islam that they can construct those criticisms without being horrifically racist or bigoted in their intent.

However, once the show had been performed to live audiences, I felt ... incomplete. I had avoided talking about Islam for so long that the brief attempt to do so left a need to expand more on the subject. I had thoughts, opinions, and analysis still to share. I also had so many questions unanswered, particularly about how Islam was practised and followed in Australia. So, with ABC Radio Nationals indulgence, I created a five-part documentary for their excellent Earshot series.

I spent several months travelling to Sydney, Perth and Melbourne to interview various Muslims and non-Muslims about Islam in Australia. And then, once theyd generously trusted me with their voices, I edited it all together with the original one-man show serving as the narrative structure to which everything else was pinned. And then, because I had all the interviews done and my thoughts were already sketched out fairly well, I expanded it further into this book. I think, now, Im done. I really should be.

The whole process from writing the one-man show on a plastic table and chair in the food court of Perths Dog Swamp Mall, to finishing the first draft of the book at home in Melbourne late one summer night took most of 2016. And when I was done with it, I thought I had quite comprehensively addressed all the issues around Islam and Islamophobia that contemporary global affairs could offer up. And then Donald Trump was elected.

In the time this book has travelled from first draft through to final publication, the 45th President of the United States of America has twice attempted to ban visitors from seven different Muslim countries, staying true to promises made throughout a campaign that relied heavily on the intent to do just that. The impact around the world cannot be understated. Donald Trumps victory has emboldened anti-Muslim rhetoric and violence. Assaults on Muslims in Western countries have increased drastically, and global affairs will no doubt be affected in unpleasant ways for a long time to come, its safe to say.