Hi guys,
Long time lurker, first time poster. The perpetrator of this has been confirmed by Victoria Police & all media outlets to have NO links to Islam or terrorism & was acting on his own:
Victoria Police can confirm today's Melbourne CBD incident is not a terrorist incident. To clarify, the term CT stands for Counter Terrorism (from Vic Police twitter, the link won't post for some reason)
From the press conference: "There is an extensive family violence history involved. He has come to our attention on many occasions in the past. We have mental health and drug-related issues in the background of this particular person,"
"He has been coming to our attention more recently over recent days in relation to assaults, family violence-related assaults." (from
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-01-20/car-hits-several-pedestrians-in-melbournes-cbd/8197876 )
Mental illness issues such as paranoia & psychosis often involve conspiracy theories & delusional grandiosity. Taking single lines of his extensive rants & saying there are "Islamic links" is giving the illusion of smoke where there has been absolutely no fire. There's loads of islamophobia & fear of terrorism around, no need to use a tragedy like this to amp it up.
It would be more useful to connect his (or most violent offenders) actual history of family violence & mental illness to the systemic issues of ******ing these services. But talking about "monsters" as something that come from elsewhere is far easier than understanding how violence & horrifying acts like yesterday happen - both as a mix of personality, personal choices & the society we're all a part of.
Would put money on ice being involved in yesterday's incident considering how many hours he was driving around after stabbing his brother in Windsor & the mall incident... Hopefully the police will be able to speak to him soon & we can find out more.