There is an incomplete argument that Islam is always only a culture and way of life. Islam is also a belief system, much like every other belief system, through which the beholders must have personal faith, and then extrapolate their belief system and its implications into the public spaces of life. That then becomes their theory for and of life.
But in Malaysia law such public spaces belong to all Malaysians; and are everyone’s arena for contention, discourse, and agreement. That is the nature of our current democratic polity.
Islam does not even make ‘objective claims’, unlike the Christian faith; which makes an explicit claim about the objective reality of Jesus Christ’s birth, death, and resurrection in the history of space and time of mankind. So most of their adherents must come to terms with this reality and accept the full implications about their personal faith in the personhood of Jesus Christ. If they cannot, they have to reject all of it as fiction, or unreal.
But those same believing Christians also make the claim that this same person of Jesus will come again to judge mankind. Again, they are either lying or telling their absolute truth.
Therefore and consequently, any attempts by pseudo scholars to make any argument about a Malaysian athlete and at the SEA Games, especially about her dressing and not athletic performance plus winning of gold medals, is simply out of place; and they really need a dressing down.
Ministering through sports
The statement by the sports minister of the federal government and his ‘dressing down’ of the so-called Islamic experts is good, right, and within the proper context. He is right to kick them out of his public policy space. They should only exist in the personal faith space; which is always and only a private matter.
Religious doctrine may not be responsible in nurturing this young girl for the last so many years to win her gold medals. It was her skills, determination and discipline of her parent’s faith and belief that helped her obtain the gold. Congratulations to her and all her coaches who also endured much to achieve this victory.
This young lady has demonstrated true grit, strength of conviction, and focus to have delivered the gold medal for the nation-state. We are truly proud of her success. You would only understand if you are also a sportsperson. It is no less a service than our soldiers who fight for the sovereignty of this nation.
But, when we allow ‘idiocrats’ to abuse our youngsters publicly with their skewed views; we run the risk of withdrawing from all sporting events in the world.
I am therefore glad and proud that my good friend and senior at the Royal Military College (RMC), has also spoken up on this issue. Munir Majid ( photo ), writing in The Star of Saturday, June 20, 2015 wrote a column titled ‘Malaysia: Losing glitter by 2017\’. His argument is that Malaysia should not host the 2017 SEA Games if we are going to embarrass ourselves with our new dressing codes.
Tabling of the hudud amendment proposal
I have noticed that ever since the newly-elected PAS leadership made themselves irrelevant to non-Muslim Malaysians through their clean-out of the ‘moderate Muslims in their party’, their spokespersons have become more arrogant and with emotional animosity. All moderate Malaysians will have no choice but to now reject PAS candidates unconditionally, if this is the party’s public policy posture and prose.
For one, their proposal is being labelled as unconstitutional by some well-known Muslim lawyers, and I am sure more and more moderate Muslims will also speak up about ‘this attempt to introduce back-door Islamisation’. PAS’ new leadership, one without the highly respected ones and trusted individuals like Tok Guru Nik Aziz Nik Mat ( photo ), and their clean-out of the so-called progressives or ‘Erdogans’, we are going to see PAS become reduced to a non-national player.
But with such irrelevance, much like with Perkasa and Isma, they have to also learn to speak harder and louder, simply to be heard. The real question therefore for all moderate Malaysians is whether it is not time for all of us, who are the Middle Majority, to also learn to speak up and out as Old Putra Munir has already done?
Mohd Munir Majid was the first Securities Commission chairperson and laid the foundations for that institution’s success to date. He is probably also closely tied to Umno. But how can we simply stand by and watch idly as these ‘religious idiocrats’ redefine public spaces and increase their jurisdiction of operations into public spaces illegitimately? Let me quote Munir:
“What is different from the days of Tun Razak and Tun Dr Ismail is that the honour and justice that characterised the Malay leadership of this country has been lost. I cannot look into the eyes of a prospective investor at a road show and say: You can be assured of Malaysia’s political stability. Not long ago, that was our country’s strongest point above everything else.”
Green colour mist or green coloured glasses?
Therefore also, I have argued in this column many times before: the air we breathe is colourless and we cannot allow these ‘idiocrats’ to spray them with green colour mist, or only see these spaces through their green coloured glasses. They are and should remain colourless as God ordained them.
While the federal constitution has been declared many times over as a secular constitution; it only meant that the drafters were fully cognisant that within the multi-ethnic nature of our nation-state, it has to be a universally agreed set of values and not any particular or specific values that are used to define public spaces. Therefore, no coloured set of glasses are needed, or allowed.
Therefore too, when even a Muslim gymnast participates in public spaces, like the SEA Games, based on their privately held values, but under conditions and rules set by the universal games standards, they do whatever is needed to get the gold medal. That is just the nature of life. We do not all live under a ‘tempurung’.
Non-participants, or spectators, cannot dictate the dress code or seek to dress them up, or even down. In some instances, like the case with athletes from Saudi Arabia at the Olympics, a religious personal statement was made by an athlete and it was duly respected by all viewers, me included. May God bless Malaysia to continue as a multi-ethnic country with multiple sets of beliefs and values; all of which help define our national culture and courtesies.
