Those five words were at the centre of a multi-million dollar campaign in 2002. 

At the campaign’s launch, then-Prime Minister John Howard said: ‘‘I don’t want Australians to become frightened, I don’t want Australians to stop living their ordinary lives. If that happens then the terrorists win.’’

The phrase went on to be repeated on television, in print and on fridge magnets.

Not only was the phrase subject of satire, it was subject to criticism.

The campaign called on your friendly neighbourhood detective to report any ‘‘suspicious behaviour’’ to a hotline.

However, it failed to suggest what form this suspicious behaviour might take.

In her role as acting Opposition Leader at the campaign launch, Jenny Macklin said the ads contained no ‘‘practical information’’.

‘‘There’s also nothing useful in the advertising giving people a lead as to what they should be looking out for,’’ she said.

Some critics suggested that the campaign was deliberately vague, and resulted only in passersby giving each other extended side glances.

Did the campaign result in the foiling of any terrorist acts? If so, the public were not told. 

What the campaign did achieve was a heightened sense of fear.

Indeed, a more suitable catchcry would have been ‘‘panic, but don’t show it’’.

Those in Australia’s society who strayed anywhere near the propagandised image of a terrorist were sidestepped in public and stopped at airport security gates.

It was a post-9/11 world and all Muslims were threats.

It would have been so alienating and frustrating to be an Australian Muslim at that time, and it must still be so.

Recent events would suggest the fear machine is about to crank back into top gear.

Australia’s national-security level has been shifted to high, we’re deploying elite special forces military personnel to the United Arab Emirates and on Thursday, the Australian Federal Police carried out anti-terrorist raids in Sydney and Brisbane – the largest in our country’s history.

Ever-headline-making Senator Jacqui Lambi has also waged a war against sharia law, which, if you missed it, included comments such as ‘‘Anyone who supports sharia law in Australia should not have the right to vote, should not be given government handouts and should probably pack up their bags and get out of here’’.

Not surprisingly, her comments drew ire from the Islamic community – as they should.

 Along with a lot of other Australians, Senator Lambie needs to stop believing everything A Current Affair tells her about Muslims - there are varying levels of extremism to every religion and belief system.

All of these events go a long way to further marginalising and demonising everyday Australians who just happen to be of the Muslim faith.

It further perpetuates a fear of the mindless, evil terrorism that can be fought only with bullets and bombs.

There has always been a faceless enemy–the Germans, the Japanese, Communists, and Islamic terrorists.

However, Australia is much more multicultural than in times of the World Wars, so it is important to ensure that our anti-terror campaigns do not malign those in our community who happen to share the same religion as those we perceive as the enemy.

There are a lot of victims in war, and they are not always the ones on the battlefield.