taken away by Senator Hanson, or any white Australian, at any time if he does not behave in a way that other white Australians expect him to behave. He felt that the tweet conveyed that non-white migrants to Australia will never be entirely welcome in Australia because Senator Hanson was telling Senator Faruqi and other non-white immigrants to Australia to go back to where they came from.
101 Senator Hanson's tweet reminded Mr Moolla of having been told words to the effect of "go back to where you came from" and other incidents of overt racism experienced by him on many occasions. The tweet brought up trauma and the feelings of fear, humiliation and anger that he associates with being the subject of racist abuse in Australia.
102 Mr Moolla said that he felt intimidated by Senator Hanson's tweet because it scares him that Senator Hanson, an Australian Senator with a significant public profile, would say those words publicly to another Australian, let alone another Senator. He believes that if someone like Senator Hanson can hold those views and engage in that kind of conduct, it amplifies and legitimises similar views held by other individuals living in Australia. That makes him scared for his own safety and also for the safety of other migrant people living in Australia. He also feels unable to fight back against that kind of conduct out of fear that the situation could escalate and that he would be at risk of being subjected to physical violence.
103 Mr Moolla gave evidence of racist experiences suffered by him. They included being told by a man on a bus "you are not Aussie", and being told "oh she's like you, just go marry her" in relation to a woman who appeared to be of Middle Eastern descent who boarded the bus. Such incidents have caused him to feel angry and fearful, that he was doing something wrong, and that his identity as an Australian, and his right to exist in Australia as a human being, had been taken from him.
Sana Ashraf
104 Sana Ashraf was born in Pakistan in 1990. She migrated to Australia in 2015 to do a PhD at the Australian National University (ANU) which she completed in 2019. She married an Australian man and became an Australian citizen in June 2023. She works as a public servant.
105 Ms Ashraf believes that she saw Senator Hanson's tweet on social media in the week following the Queen's death. She understood the tweet to be telling Senator Faruqi to go back to Pakistan, or to go back to where she comes from. She understood the strength of the language in "piss off
