Close one eye culture (Part 2)

In sociology, culture is defined as beliefs, practices, and propositions which amplify a particular way for life. Therefore, if one wants to do a culture analysis, one must go below the surface of the visible portion of the ice-berg.

It will then reveal the underlying beliefs, values, and assumptions which may tell an even greater story of the actors’ worldview assumptions.

Therefore, it was amusing for me to read about the 300 odd supporters or \”trouble makers\” who were somehow deemed by the Royal Malaysian Police to be peaceful protestors, and for a justified cause.

Why else did they not need a police permit to gather and make their rowdy protest? Why weren’t they deemed an illegal assembly?

It is now therefore a well known fact that any demonstration against the government, even to hand over a rose, is an illegal assembly which needs a police permit.

Whereas, a government encouraged (or sponsored) one, especially supported by Umno ministers, is ‘halal’ even for our one-eyed police, who claim to be neutral and double-eyed about everything.

This gathering of Umno trouble-makers with PAS and PKR leaders, claimed to seek to protect Islamic rights and privileges, but appeared to have been done in ‘very unIslamic ways’.

It is double speak to talk about ‘discourse and dialogue on the one hand and then to promote unruly behaviour on the other’.

Unholy alliance

I also pray and hope that non-Muslims writing about this subject may not also now be deemed as seditious or sensitive. In the bible it is recorded that the Jewish Pharisees and Sadducees once came together to question Jesus’ authority and demand that he show them miraculous signs to satisfy their curiosity.

Jesus was deeply grieved at this ‘affront’ and called them to come out of their spiritual blindness, instead of asking for yet more signs when many had been give to them, since the time of Abraham and Moses.

Such coming together of Pharisees and Sadducees was an ‘unholy alliance’ as these were sworn intellectual enemies from the liberal and conservative interpretations of the Jewish religion.

But, when faced with a common threat of a paradigm shift of logic which challenged their way of life, they were prepared to go to bed with strange bedfellows.

To me, it is the demonstration of a more fundamental identity crisis and fear of the future among the Malay Muslims in Malaysia. Change in Malaysia over the last 50 years has been fast and furious.

The average Malay in a more modern setting has lost the comforts of their harmonious community life in the village. In their current urban settings, as they need to choose the new values of life and living. And wrongly, they try very hard to be more Islamic than they are, or internal Malay culture will allow.

Identity crisis

They are therefore in a serious identity crisis and the net result is an emotional reaction and a resultant political culture of anger and hate. Is this not also the source of the hurts and anger of Hindraf, which is also dubbed a ‘force’?

Such force is not necessary in a civilised culture but there must be the right people in authority to listen to their issues, cares and concerns. There must be genuine listening to their fears and real concerns.

At the very first Article 11 Forum held jointly by the Bar Council a few years ago, amongst the most honest, sincere and articulate presentations made from the floor were from a few Muslim groups who felt disenfranchised about the practice of their particular faith, within the context of a mainstream Sunni-Wahabbi majority in Malaysia.

That particular event was a definite eye-opener for me, as I had thought, up till that point, that the Article 11 issues only concerned non-Muslim minorities. All groups argued that they did not have religious freedom in Malaysia.

Moreover, now, since the 2004 general elections, there has been a conscious and planned attempt by the federal government to \”standardise the administration of Islam at the state levels,\” which was a good initiative.

Some recalcitrant states have not yet signed into these federal-based interpretive edicts and their related nuances, but they are nevertheless part and parcel of the process.

Therefore, to me it is comical that these ‘actors of political Islam’ demonstrate their anger and create chaos amongst law-sensitive members or the Bar Council and their friends from civil society.

I say comical because I grew up in Kedah where you can meet some of the most beautiful, simple, and genteel Malays as you would ever meet anywhere in the world.

Religious freedom

Although I am sure there are many exceptions, in general, most Malays are traditionally a very gentle, humble and hospitable people. But, why this anger and even hatred, even to ask non-Muslims of Indian and Chinese descent to balik kampung ?

Therefore, my resultant confusion and question to my many Malay-Muslim friends: why do you allow a small and vociferous group of political-Islamic Malays to break the law and protest in the name of Malay unity while making Islam the focus and ridicule of a political agenda?

Are they really concerned with Malay unity or are they really more concerned with their political Islamic agenda and so-called unity?

Consequently also, my rhetorical question: \”is this cause of political Islam by a small group more ‘halal’ than that of a larger Hindu group who call themselves Hindraf or even the Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland? Does not the rose, smell the same if called by any other name?

Are not the Federal Constitution and the Rukunegara sufficient guides for nation formation or are we still experimenting after the last 50 years? Are not the Federal Constitution and all other guidelines like the Rukuneagara and Vision 2020 not sufficient for the due process of rule of law in Malaysia?

Do we really need such sensitive street protests or can we make whatever is the point about the actual problem cases discussed by the Bar Council Forum, which was made up of Malaysians from all walks of life?

Why should an artificial, strange unlikely political alliance of Umno-PAS-PKR members be allowed to disrupt the unity and consensus-seeking culture of discourse and dialogue?

These questions haunt me as I ponder on these events of the past weeks. May God give all leaders of all groups wisdom to handle all matters with care and concern and to learn first to listen before we take wrong action or make the wrong judgment.

Close one eye culture (Part 1)

To me, this sudden, politically encouraged, and privately provoked mob-like unholy alliance of unlikely bedfellows against the Bar Council dialogue, was very good quality wayang kulit . After all, the forum was only listening and discussing real-life problem cases.

It was also a well orchestrated sandiwara designed to communicate anger and create fear amongst the more rational and civil portions of society, who really believe in the rational way of dialogue and consensus-building which brought us our democratic culture to date.

More importantly, theirs was an explicitly political purpose and appears to have had very little spiritual content or meaning. Even the Almighty does not really need the help from such unruly mobs.