Today, we have become too broken – not only by a series of bad leaders who have put themselves first and made corruption and racism a part of our culture but also by leaders who have politicised Islam.
And so today, religion, more than race, appears to have driven deep cracks and fissures across our once multicultural and multi-ethnic ‘Malaysian’ identity.
To heal, we urgently need to recognise that our greatest asset is our multi-ethnic diversity. Already we are being left behind by our neighbours.
So Malaysia needs to come out of its ‘multiple personality’ disorder quickly and decide whether it wants to be a Malay-led democracy or an Islamic dictatorship!
Our identity as a vibrantly harmonious people has been slowly eroded by leaders who have turned their backs on an older, more authentic and spiritual version of Islam (see Ed Husain on Islam, in his books The House of Islam: A Global History and The Islamist). This was the Islam of Nik Aziz Nik Mat and others like him, which many of us knew and grew up with in the 1960s.
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This version of Islam is kinder, humbler and gentler. This was the Islam that had always conditioned me to view my childhood Muslim friends as nothing less than my sisters of another religion.
The painfully fraught 2022 general election brought hope for change. In its aftermath, I hoped that the “unity government” would finally have a chance to repair and rebuild Malaysia.
Instead, the new administration has become a house of cards, at risk whenever anything is said or done.
Almost everything is perceived as an attack or an insult to either side of this wide Malay-Muslim/non-Muslim divide. A school revision camp, a ‘Jom Ziarah’ programme to learn from visits to various places of worship, a query about the civil service’s ethnic composition, a Women’s Day march, a K-pop concert, and a film about a ‘butterfly’ have been among the bushfires this government has had to endure.
To illustrate further, let’s recall a controversy we had in January of an infamous ‘march’ by a certain Pas MP through a mall in Seberang Perai – all in a huff over a Lunar New Year beer promotion at its ground floor concourse.
Regardless of how hot the debates were in the media, it was interesting to note the MP had forgotten that most international airports have open outlets that sell alcohol. In most foreign countries, liquor is also openly sold.
Such ‘frail’ sensitivities over the open display of alcohol would mean that Muslims in Malaysia would never be able to travel beyond our borders.
And so, was this storm in the teacup really about Islam? Or … was it really about this MP flexing his extremist muscles?
The same question would also apply to the string of incidents and complaints we have had recently over ‘appropriate’ dress codes at government premises, including police stations.
Are they really about Islamic sensitivities? Just as alcohol is sold openly overseas, women overseas dress pretty much as they please. Travel would be an impossibility if we are that sensitive.
Shouldn’t true morality be more about controlling oneself than about controlling others?
The response by the inspector general of police in not reconsidering the dress code at police stations was especially disturbing at several other levels.
Was the ruling also about using ‘the power’ of his ‘office’ to metaphorically ‘whip’ minorities into conforming to Islam-sensitive dress codes? As long as the public is dressed in accordance with the law, isn’t that enough?
I was also deeply disturbed that the ‘ruling’ implied that a quick response to a crime was less important than the dress code.
Although the police chief indicated certain ‘life-and-death’ exemptions, he failed to see that other matters like robberies and loss of property should also be seen as urgent matters! And so, isn’t he missing the forest for the trees?
Besides shrinking the democratic space for ethnic minorities, such an approach presents a warped view that, in Malaysia, some people are more deserving of government services based on their cultural identities and preference of attire.
We have a problem when we are no longer able to see how it feels when the shoe is on the other foot.
It is easy to cry foul when we call out China for allegedly mistreating the Uyghurs and disregarding their minority, religious, social and cultural rights. Or when the West and other nations ignore the rights and plight of the Palestinians.
History has shown us that when a race or a creed approaches the world thinking that their race or beliefs are superior to others, that’s when we see attempts to dehumanise and treat others with less respect and dignity.
And so, if non-Muslims are eventually viewed as less deserving of respect, I wonder what it will take for us to slowly stray in that general direction.
When we disregard the cultural rights, freedom and preferences of any ethnic minority or any group, just because they ‘offend’ our personal, political or religious sensitivities, then what are we really saying about ourselves?
When Islamic religious leaders issue a fatwa (a formal decree) to Muslims not to enter other houses of worship, are they unable to see that it may tear some families apart?
Have we become so narrow-minded that we presume that families in Malaysia come only in one colour?
And so, I ask, why can’t the Muslim aunt of my Hindu daughter be able to bless her (in any way that she wants, if she wants to) at her wedding in a Hindu temple? In what way will my sister-in-law’s faith be threatened when there is no intent on her part to convert, nor on ours to convert her?
Where is the compassion when we stop a bereaved Muslim daughter from paying her final respects to her deceased Christian father in a church?
Aren’t we all, after all, ‘related’ in so many ways, in addition to being ‘unrelated’ ‘brothers and sisters’ from different mothers and fathers?
So, why all these insecurities? Aren’t the 11 years of basic Islamic teaching in schools enough to reinforce one’s own faith to erase the fear of conversion to other religions?
Perhaps it is time to rethink how religious knowledge is taught in schools. Religious studies and teachers should provide more supportive guidance and opportunities for learning some basic informed fundamental beliefs and practices about other religions.
Questions about other religions should also be encouraged, with balanced and fair responses, without endangering the fundamentals of their own Islamic beliefs or insulting other faiths.
I told my ‘unrelated’ Muslim sister a few days ago that as a child, unlike her, I had absolutely no formal religious education. Yet, I have never ever felt compelled to convert whenever I walk into a Chinese or Buddhist temple or a synagogue or a mosque or a church or cathedral.
However, I have always covered my hair with veneration, lit incenses and candles with reverence and sat in silence with respect in each of the different houses of worship.
We desperately need a more tolerant and embracing approach to Islam if the people and the nation are to move forward. We do not have to have the same beliefs, but we need to be respectful, tolerant and accepting of our differences. We should be able to see that at some spiritual level, we are all alike.
And so, it was inspiring and exalting to finally hear our PM openly reject religious bigotry and declare that “Malaysia belongs to Malaysians” and not to any one group.
Now, all we can do is wait and hope.
Sukeshini Nair
Co-editor, Aliran newsletter
30 March 2023
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