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Murdoch Twitter Message Claims Muslims Struggle to Integrate into "Societies"

Media mogul and occasional Twitter troll Rupert Murdoch sparked the ire of many after he sent a tweet claiming Muslims "find it hardest" to integrate into society.

By Arit John
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This article is from the archive of our partner .

Media mogul and occasional Twitter troll Rupert Murdoch sparked the ire of many after he sent a tweet claiming Muslims "find it hardest" to integrate into society.

Murdoch sent last night's tweet in praise of earlier comments in a Times of London interview with Lord Jonathan Sacks, the UK's outgoing chief rabbi. Sacks declared that Great Britain should put the idea of multiculturalism behind it, because it "has had its day and it’s time to move on." (He was referring specifically to British Muslims and their relationship to the rest of the country.) Mr. Murdoch, Chairman of News Corp and 21st Century Fox, tweeted this in response:

Spokespeople from the Islamic Council of Victoria and the Diversity Council of Australia in Murdoch's native country condemned the tweet, and accused Murdoch of inhibiting integration. "I find it even more ironic that Murdoch himself will be making such a claim when he is the one with his media empire that contributes to this issue ... creating fear and hysteria," Mohamad Tabbaa, a spokesman for the Islamic Council of Victoria, told The Guardian. "It's a bit rich for him to be bringing up the issue of integration when he is contributing to the problem."

On Twitter itself, at least one person noted that those with multicultural families maybe shouldn't call for an end to multiculturalism. "As father of two part-Chinese children, don't you think multuculturalism's [sic] been rather good for Australia?" tweeted Mark Colvin, an ABC radio presenter. Steve Dow with the Sydney Morning Journal added, "Let's surround ourselves in multiculturalism. That's what gives life its colour." Ed Husic of the Australian Labour party wrote that reading Murdoch's tweets is like "listening to the noisy, argumentative uncle at a family reunion."

This isn't the first offensive tweet Murdoch has sent out. Last year he called Scientology a "very weird cult" and had to issue an apology after tweeting “Why Is Jewish owned press so consistently anti-Israel in every crisis?” Murdoch also tweeted that London's multicultural 2012 Olympic open ceremony was "a little too politically correct."

This article is from the archive of our partner The Wire.