Road to hell
It may well be that Nurul has quoted from the Quran, but that freedom had long been removed, especially and particularly in Malaysia, yes, our dear sweet Malaysia – please read on to understand what I mean.
KTemoc Konsiders
Recently, there was much ado about a letter to Malaysiakini by Steven Oh, where our world famous (but domestically infamous) Police wanted from the online news portal, details about that letter and its writer … or else.
Malaysiakini held on courageously to its policy of confidentiality on the identity of letter writers, which lamentably for our policed state … with that ‘or else’ Damocles’ Sword hanging over MKINI’s head … would have resulted in the seizure of its computer equipment, because our men in blue just love forensic IT and would go to any lengths to dabble in that discipline (the forensic science, not ‘police discipline’, wakakaka).
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| Sword hanging over Damocles’ head |
Fortunately, Steve Oh agreed to MKINI releasing his details.
The whole brouhaha was of course related to Nurul Izzah’s statement about ‘freedom of religion, even for Malays’ (or ‘no compulsion in religion’) utterance.
I believe she has since regretted making that impetuous statement (‘impetuous’ for a Malaysian Muslim, especially one from Pakatan), which in mitigation, was uttered in the adrenalin-flowing exuberance during a campaign forum.
We know that subsequently, a no-doubt panicking regretful Nurul attempted to neutralize her politico-social-religiously near-fatal faux pas by blaming it on Utusan, and even making a police report on it – wakakaka, now where did I hear this before, though I must say she has far greater credibility than Utusan.
Anyway, Siti Kasim, a member of the Bar Council human rights committee and Orang Asli rights advocate, the very person who asked Nurul that fatal question, had expressed her disappointment with Nurul for backing away from her statement, that of freedom of religion, even for Malays’ (or ‘no compulsion in religion’), and opined the young politician had wanted to ‘impress’ her audience.
Siti Kasim had been right in saying that statement effectively translated – in the past tense of course as Nurul has since denied such a meaning – into Malay-Muslims having the right to leave the religion, or that dreaded word in Islam, commit apostasy.
Siti Kasim, having experienced the tap-dancing antics of Mr Manmanlai, lamented that Nurul has failed to stand firm on her remark.
But as I stated in an earlier post in mitigation of Nurul’s hypersonic back-pedalling:
… maybe Nurul indeed wanted to impress her audience but alamak, Siti, cut her some slack lah as Nurul is still young and really, a babe in the political woods. Besides, to a Muslim, apostasy is an extremely serious issue, in which the punishment could well be death, though of course the authorities in Malaysia won’t go to that extent.
Okay, that brings us back to Steve Oh’s letter to MKINI titled Nurul’s watershed idea for the nation where he referred to Nurul’s “original” (wakakaka) statement with unrestrained glee, going on to was eloquence over Nurul’s courage and brilliant perception, etc etc ad nauseum.
Alamak, this man didn’t care that there was NOT even one teeny weeny itsy bitsy swallow for a summer make, wakakaka.
All this means that Steve Oh’s extravagant effusive ebullient praises for Nurul was a bit premature, because as we know, Nurul has backed away from that pro-apostasy statement pronto, and given Malaysia’s draconian boleh-ness, we most certainly don’t blame her.
But Nurul’s statement provided a wonderful springboard (titik tolak) for Steve-Oh’s agenda-driven train, so how to stop it ler, wakakaka.
Thus, as if that religious freedom thingy was not bad enough, he used Nurul’s faux pas to commandeer a larger landscape than mere ‘freedom of religion’. Whether his points reflect his own sentiments or that of non-Malays are irrelevant because in his discourse he has screwed up Nurul’s positionkau kau, and only succeeded in lending fuel to those out to get the poor girl.
Each time I read arguments by people like Steve Oh or some Church leaders or non-Muslims coming out to defend Nurul, I cringed even before she did, because I believe without any doubt that their secular or Western-Christian based arguments would rile many Muslims. No matter how brilliant and sincere their unwitting (perhaps even deliberate and opportunistic) arguments might be, they won’t move nor convince most Muslims.
Read more at: http://ktemoc.blogspot.com/2012/11/road-to-hell.html
