The Community Relations Commission has launched The Point Magazine, a community-based online publication that seeks to give a voice to young Australians from an ethnic background and engaged with global developments.
"Our readers are young, they are politically active and globally aware, they care about what's happening overseas, they have an opinion about it, and want to be able to put across their point of view," said its editor Nadia Jamal.
"The Point Magazine is trying to tap into these views, and to provide opportunities for those views to be explored," she added.
The magazine is published monthly by the Community Relations Commission as a nationally-funded initiative to counter violent extremism.
"It's hard not to be interested in news that come out of Syria, Egypt, Pakistan, Iraq, Kenya and many other countries when your parents, aunties, uncles and friends who are living there are breathing and experiencing conflict on their doorsteps.
Ms Jamal said The Point aims at exploring the local impact and significance of international events.
"How does a young person with young family react to the bloodshed in Syria? Do they get on a plane and become involved in the civil war? Or do they go looking for an Australian-based local charity, that is trying to help the tens of thousands of Syrian refugee who made it to refugee camps?," she said.
The first editions of the magazine looked at the security risk posed to Australia by Australians joining the fight in Syria, the impact of political turmoil in Egypt on young Egyptian Australians and asked “are the growing number of Australians tuning into global satellite media excluding themselves from the national conversation?”
Stepan Kerkyasharian, the Chair of the Community Relations Commission of NSW, says in a world more connected than ever, “young people do search for answers, as they are the ones who will inherit responsibility for the future".
“This magazine feeds into a world where horrendous events... [take place], leaving us with images of carnage that challenge us all. Young people have to question what is the point of all these criminal actions which are often committed by people who misuse religion for their own geo-political agendas," he said.
“We must support young people in their quest to stay within the mainstream of society. We must engage them at all levels and inspire them to take advantage of the opportunities that Australia offers," Mr Kerkyasharian added.
Only a few days before the bombing of a shopping mall in Kenya, The Point Magazine published an interview with a former Somali Prime Minister who called on Somali Australians to become 'viable' members of their local communities so that in the future they can help their former homeland rebuild its war-battered institutions, Mr Kerkyasharian said.
"In the light of the allegation that the some of the attackers in Kenya were terrorists from Somalia, this is the kind of ground-breaking journalism readers can expect in coming editions," he added.
"The real impact of such events on Australian communities cannot be underestimated".
The online magazine is funded by the federal government. The content is produced by the CRC’s Social Media Unit, which is based in Sydney.
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