The Malaysian Insider :: Opinion

Posted: 26 Jul 2011 04:25 PM PDT

JULY 27 — I'd like to write about civility in this nation of ours, and I'd like to talk to the 60 per cent of the population that prides itself on being Malays and Muslims. The rest of you can read this, but honestly, I'm focussing on the Malays for this one.

I'd like to start off with one question: Where the hell were your brains and your religious beliefs during Bersih 2.0 and the Malaysia–Chelsea football friendly?

I would think your parents educated you better in Malay and Islamic culture, but apparently not. But I don't blame your parents. They were probably so busy working to put food on the table that they didn't have time to focus on these aspects.

We are a race that constantly supports mob rule. Just look at any Umno or PAS meeting and that becomes pretty obvious pretty fast. If you saw our home minister raising a keris in the streets, would you actually clap and praise him on, screaming Allah is Great, or would you call the nearest hospital or police station for help?

Quite a valid point, yes?

As such, mob rule was what happened during the Malaysia-Chelsea match. When a player, who is Jewish and captain of the Israeli World Cup team, got the ball, the crowd started booing him. Again, mob rule took over, and they were much happier when he failed to score.

Honestly, I hope Fifa punishes us because of the action of these stupid, testosterone-driven footie fools. Not because they booed him, but because there wasn't a single person, not even the announcer, who bothered to tell them all to shut up.

My critique over this action is simple. What if our national team was sent to a place like Norway where so many people died in what was at first regarded as a terrorist attack because someone thought a Muslim did it?

Would we want the same treatment we gave the Chelsea player?

I'll bring up another case, and this one happened during the Bersih rally that I was a part of as well. Yes, the fat guy in the pink shirt was everywhere from Dataran Merdeka right through to Stadium Merdeka, but not KLCC.

After the first tear gas session on the way to Dataran Merdeka, some of the rally goers decided to gather and try again in front of Central Market, where they were once again tear-gassed.

It was here that I got a phone call from a colleague while protesters were running off left, right and centre. It was also then that I heard someone calling the FRU team "Yahudi" (Jew). Now the police were brutal that day. They were mean, and somewhat stupid to do what they did at Tung Shin Hospital, but I doubt any of the officers attended a Bar or Bat Mitzvah. And they're policemen, not financiers. I even doubt if his name was Goldman or Goldstein or even Spielberg for that matter.

So why the Yahudi comment?

If you look at the Muslim religion and culture, guests are of the utmost importance. Guests are to be cared for regardless of whether you like them or not. In fact, you can hate a person's guts and still have to invite him in and offer him at least a glass of plain water. You take care of your guest first before you even bother about prayers.

So where was this civility that was supposed to be ingrained in every single Muslim?

Did PAS send a memo out saying everything was fair game, even forgetting that the police were brethren of the same religion?

I think this is something that politicians and religious leaders have failed to teach. You don't get to boo a Jew off a football field just because you support Palestine. You don't get to call a cop or a politician a Jew just because you're mad at them. You don't get to call someone a "bapok" or a "pondan" just because he doesn't behave like you.

All these actions reflect badly on ourselves; our beliefs, our national culture and our own intelligence. It shows that we Malays have let a bunch of idiotic, emotional, testosterone-driven guys out there represent us.

I hope that an imam somewhere will mention this in a khutbah. Islam pleads for moderation and civility. As such, there is a need for more tolerance, acceptance and for God's sake, perhaps some brains!

Or as some would say, "Jangan buat malu kaum kerabat, boleh tak?"

* The views expressed here are the personal opinion of the columnist.

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The Christian who never was

Posted: 26 Jul 2011 04:19 PM PDT

JULY 27 — I am a little tired of people making religion the scapegoat for the suffering of the world. Take the New York Times and its over-eagerness to speculate that the Oslo extremist responsible for the death of 76 people was Muslim. Now, headlines trumpet the fact Anders Behring Breivik calls himself a Christian.

Even without religion, mankind will still find reasons to hate. Skin colour, nationality and anything that marks one person as different from another have become cause for persecution and discrimination.

That does not stop people like Richard Dawkins publishing diatribes against faith such as The God Delusion. Most agnostics and atheists I know believe that religion is a cause of suffering at worst, and a mental weakness at best.

The irony is that technically Breivik is not a Christian if you refer to his 1,500-page manifesto.

"If you have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ and God then you are a religious Christian. Myself and many more like me do not necessarily have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ and God. We do, however, believe in Christianity as a cultural, social, identity and moral platform. This makes us Christian," he wrote.

The whole basis of Christianity as well as what pushed Martin Luther's call for Reformation in the first place is having that connection with God. Luther believed that man did not need the Church to play intercessor or intermediary. That a man's relationship with God is formed from a personal, individual acceptance of God's love.

Breivik rejected that notion of a personal relationship, which makes me wonder why he still called himself a Christian. Like the detractors of religion, he considered Christianity no more than a wrapper, a cloak to wear as it suits him.

I am no apologist for the religion. More like, I am appalled at the ignorance of other people's and even, for that matter, a person's own faith. So many people I meet claim to be willing to die for their religion and yet display poor knowledge of either theology or the very tenets of their faith.

Breivik is a troubled man, full of hate and fear. Prejudiced and entrenched in his own warped beliefs to the point he ignored such things as compassion and mercy. The latter is something common to both the religious and non-religious.

Gandhi once professed to a Christian that while he liked their Jesus, he did not much like Christians who, he said, were much unlike their Christ.

As Terry Pratchett wrote in his novel Small Gods, you do not die for God. You live for him; all the days of your life. You serve, you give, you work. It is a tragedy that Breivik ignored the commandments that decreed that he was not to kill as well as to love his neighbour.

Beware then, those who wear the cloaks of faith but have minds of stone and hearts of ice. God is who we pray to but only we can save ourselves from the evils of our own hearts.

* The views expressed here are the personal opinion of the columnist.

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Rabu, 27 Julai 2011

The Malaysian Insider :: Opinion

The Malaysian Insider :: Opinion

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