Rudyard Kipling"
“When you're left wounded on Afganistan's plains and
the women come out to cut up what remains, Just roll to your rifle
and blow out your brains,
And go to your God like a soldier”
General Douglas MacArthur"
“We are not retreating. We are advancing in another direction.”
“It is fatal to enter any war without the will to win it.” “Old soldiers never die; they just fade away.
“The soldier, above all other people, prays for peace, for he must suffer and be the deepest wounds and scars of war.”
“May God have mercy upon my enemies, because I won't .” “The object of war is not to die for your country but to make the other bastard die for his.
“Nobody ever defended, there is only attack and attack and attack some more.
“It is foolish and wrong to mourn the men who died. Rather we should thank God that such men lived.
The Soldier stood and faced God
Which must always come to pass
He hoped his shoes were shining
Just as bright as his brass
"Step forward you Soldier,
How shall I deal with you?
Have you always turned the other cheek?
To My Church have you been true?"
"No, Lord, I guess I ain't
Because those of us who carry guns
Can't always be a saint."
I've had to work on Sundays
And at times my talk was tough,
And sometimes I've been violent,
Because the world is awfully rough.
But, I never took a penny
That wasn't mine to keep.
Though I worked a lot of overtime
When the bills got just too steep,
The Soldier squared his shoulders and said
And I never passed a cry for help
Though at times I shook with fear,
And sometimes, God forgive me,
I've wept unmanly tears.
I know I don't deserve a place
Among the people here.
They never wanted me around
Except to calm their fears.
If you've a place for me here,
Lord, It needn't be so grand,
I never expected or had too much,
But if you don't, I'll understand."
There was silence all around the throne
Where the saints had often trod
As the Soldier waited quietly,
For the judgment of his God.
"Step forward now, you Soldier,
You've borne your burden well.
Walk peacefully on Heaven's streets,
You've done your time in Hell."
Don’t mock Hadi, take him very seriously By Commander S THAYAPARAN (Retired) Royal Malaysian Navy
Thursday, May 11, 2023
Malaysiakini : See, that’s the problem right there. When people show you who they
are you should believe them. Hadi is the personification of the kind of
Islamic governance the people who vote for PAS want.
This is not
about Hadi but rather how a certain growing section of the Malay/Muslim
polity believes in religious governance to the exclusion of anything
else.
This is about PAS and tangentially whoever works with PAS. I
sometimes make the mistake of saying religious extremist coalition but
the reality is that the first principle of this coalition is set down by
PAS.
In other words, it really does not matter if it is Bersatu or Dr Mahathir Mohamad, or Gerakan, it is all PAS, all the time.
I wonder if people who so easily mock Hadi actually take the time and
read what he says as opposed to the soundbites that appear in the
English language media. I always read what Hadi writes. I go straight to
the source.
Do you know how I wrote that Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim should make this about class instead of race and religion? Well, Hadi does something really interesting.
Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim
In
his writings, he manages to conflate race and class, and what English
language audiences only get is the “race” bit. Indeed Hadi’s rhetoric is
drenched in the kind of class rhetoric that would make a committed
socialist quiver.
He cherry-picks elements of religious dogma to
highlight the inequalities of democratic systems when it comes to class
issues but ghettoises those ideas in religious supremacy and the power
of clerics.
True voice of opposition
So if
you are a disenfranchised Muslim (regardless of race) in capitalistic
Western-influenced Malaysia, you would take away two points from Hadi.
The first is, by virtue of your class, you are being shafted by the system even though your religion dictates otherwise.
And
the second point, in an Islamic state, the keepers of the faith will
protect you from the inequalities of the system because Islam as a
system of governance supposedly treats everyone equally.
People who vote for PAS truly believe what that Indian import Zakir
Naik says about being better to be led by corrupt Muslim leaders rather
than honest non-Muslim leaders.
Hadi, the true voice of the
opposition, has said more or less the same thing. But wait, you say? Who
could believe such bigoted nonsense?
This is about something
more. Look how Pakatan Harapan supporters have sublimated their
principles for the greater good when it comes to working with the
“corrupt” Umno because the greater evil is PAS/PN coming into power.
Well,
PAS supporters see the greater goal of an Islamic state as more
important than the imperfections of their leaders. Do you get it now?
Hadi
understands his audience. He understands how young people have been
indoctrinated by the vast religious bureaucracy. But most importantly,
he has people who understand how to use social media.
What we are
dealing with here is the long game. The fruits of the labour of the vast
religious bureaucracy and how it has shaped a generation of young
people that race and religion are the sole determinants for political
power.
While the urban polity has been in its echo chambers, the
religious industrial complex has defined “Malay” culture and
preoccupations from entertainment to commerce and has normalised,
especially among the young people, ideas that are anathema to secular
democratic norms.
Defend Islam
Keep
in mind, that doctrinally, Islam is meant to be defended. When some
Muslims say the faith needs to be defended, what they actually mean is
the faith needs to be superior. This is the last word of God after all.
Now
for modern progressive Muslims, this means very little. Like most
progressive believers, they believe the relationship between the supreme
being and themselves is a personal one.
This does not hold true
for the people who vote for PAS and indeed for any mainstream political
party. This is why Harapan Muslim leaders are always obsessed about
being seen to “defend” Islam.
Hadi and his political operatives
have defied Malay rulers. What this demonstrates to people who believe
in PAS and their struggle is that the leaders of this struggle are
willing to slay sacred cows in the service of saving their religion.
Not
only are they defending Islam against autocratic rulers but they are
normalising religious obligation over supposedly sacred conventions that
have sustained this country for decades.
Hadi is not alone. He is
not some crazed voice in the Malaysian political landscape. Think about
it. I mean really think about it.
Everything which relates to
Islam in this country is in some way defined by Hadi and PAS. Of course,
the Islamic bureaucracy in certain states has to blunt their religious
aspirations but ideologically they are in sync with Hadi.
Hadi
uses his religion which is the religion of the state, so anyone
attempting to charge him is in reality opening up the mainstream
interpretation of Islam for investigation. And this is the key.
People
make the mistake of thinking that Hadi is just pulling this nonsense
out of his posterior. He is not. Hadi, like most theocrats in waiting,
understands they need to reshape the political landscape so it will be
malleable to their religious indoctrination.
This is why I keep
harping on the fact that there must be a counter-narrative to the kind
of Islam PAS propagates. But there isn’t. Every Islamic institution in
this country serves Hadi’s vision of Islam.
Indeed, why do you
think PAS and Hadi have never really brawled with local state Islamic
authorities in any meaningful way? The answer is simple. Those local
religious authorities share the same ideological DNA as PAS.
Hadi
is the most astute religious operative in this country because he
understands - and this is the important bit - that the religious state
project of this country is not an individual endeavour.
