Malaysiakini : Who let PAS decide what constitutes Islam in this country? Oh, wait.Having
watched the whole video, I can understand how emotionally triggering
this may be for the religious minister, especially when the child
claimed that not only was her father disinterested in giving her a
religious education but also presented himself as an example of
religiosity by dress and demeanour to the outside world.
The
description of the father as a video game player, porn watcher, public
masturbator but most importantly, a molesting cretin, is compounded by
the fact that his circle of friends consisted of womanising layabouts
who had no issue relating their exploits to a child.
Of course,
all this sounds lurid but this is the age we live in, where a young
child actor felt the only way she could expunge the pains she suffered
from her memory was in the confessional confines of a talk show.
Does
this say something about the culture we live in, maybe? The issue here
is not the manner in which she disclosed it but how the religious state
chose to deal with it.
As I said, this goes far beyond victim
shaming but rather a groupthink which is far more dangerous than what
idiots think that “woke” groupthink is going to destroy civilisation.
How
I despise Western culture wars, but I digress. This is really about
how, PAS, through its various agents, proxies and compromised political
and greedy political operatives, wants to control the majority in this
country - and when that happens, the minorities can only be pak turut.
Even when PAS was in the then Pakatan Rakyat, I was sceptical of their motives.
Not in the sense that they were not upfront about their radicalism,
but rather, they managed to play a religious shell game with their
non-Muslim colleagues who did the work of advancing Islamism under the
guise of Bangsa Malaysia.
PAS is winning
What
folk do not seem to understand is that you can mock PAS all you want on
social media, but the reality is that PAS is winning and tragically
enabled by compliant non-Muslim political operatives.
The ideas of
this religious party have seeped into every facet of Malaysian life.
The mainstream political establishment is held hostage by this belief
system.
Ideas of majoritarian rule and how demographics enable such are themes in an ongoing fascist takeover of this country.
When
PAS talks of Western ideologies and their effects on mainstream Malay
culture and polity, these are ideas that have been used to justify the
Islamisation of this country.
For instance, in March 2017, during a
debate regarding the Syariah Courts (Criminal Jurisdiction) Act 1965
(Act 355) proposed amendments, lawyer Aidil Khalid argued: “In turn, some (of these laws) are based on the principles of morality from Christian principles.
"Muslims in this country have been subjected to the civil laws, we do not complain."
Pay
attention to this part of the reportage - However, Aidil argued that
interpretations of Islam and the Quran should be left to scholars who
have spent entire lives dedicated to understanding the religion.
"It is extreme arrogance from us to say anybody can decide on this," he said.
In other words, morality in the kind of Islam that PAS proposes is defined, not by adherents but rather by religious scholars.
This is why religious extremists in this country, or anywhere in the world, want to destroy secular or civil systems.
This
is why it is imperative that Harapan offers an alternative Islamic
narrative that is in direct stark contrast to the one promulgated by the
Malay uber alles state.
It is pointless for political operatives
to harp about corruption when we have someone like Zakir Naik telling
all and sundry that corruption will be sanctioned by God and that
Muslims have to vote for Muslim political operatives, even though they
are corrupt.
What is needed is a clear-eyed pragmatic contrast to the corrupt religiosity on display.
If
this issue is ignored or we pretend it does not matter, we will always
live in the shadow of a state which would not hesitate to use Islam as a
weapon against any of its views as compromising its hold over the
country - or if Harapan ever comes into power, they will be subservient
to extremist groups who will realise that their lack of resolve
translates into weakness.
This remains the state of play.
