The ironies of Malaysian liberals

Reading recent rants coming out from liberals like Wan Saiful, Shafiqah Othman, Farouk Peru and the likes, it’s not difficult for me to say that most liberals from Malaysia are delusional.

They live on the idea that everything “Islamic” is out there to get them. They live by the thought that the guy with a thobe on is bringing “arabisasi” to Malaysia, that ustaz giving Friday sermons about deviant teachings is politicizing religion, or maybe that mufti giving a fatwa is being an “islamofascist”.

I can’t imagine how negative they must feel every time they get out of bed in the morning; waking up to an Islamic country like Malaysia.

I could imagine them having a panic attack strolling down Putrajaya; with all the administrative buildings having mosque-like domes and Islamic (Arabic?) architecture everywhere.

And the fact that they rant out very often to express their hate towards people who disagree with them, shows that their world pretty much revolves around hatred.

Liberals like to contradict themselves. They advocate freedom of speech and they want people to have them speak on stage, but they wish to keep anybody who disagrees with their liberal point of view, to be censored or taken action by the government; even when everybody’s playing by the rules.

They say they are the “voice of the silent majority”, but when people decide against their beliefs, they express discontent and accuse the majority being deluded by politicians (refer to syed saddiq’s twitter poll on hudud).

Liberals say that they are against this “binary thinking”, the idea that there is an absolute truth; the 0s and the 1s. It’s not hard to understand that they stand by the idea that truth is relative; that for one person, one thing might be true, and for another, a different truth.

Here’s an advice for liberals: your perception of truth should not be based on what other people think. If you are a Muslim, then you should believe that the Quran is your guide, and that every instruction is an instruction that you obey; that’s what makes you a Muslim.

And if other people don’t believe in that truth, that doesn’t change anything. It’s called living with true principles regardless of what people say – something that liberals don’t have.

Speaking of principles, liberals are ironically very binary-minded. If a country implements islam and is not secular, they think of it as a theocracy.

If something is based on Quran and Sunnah but is not “western”, then its conservative and backwards. If an NGO advocates for Malay unity, they are racists.

If muftis give fatwas that do not align with the western concept of liberty, then they are islamofascists! Oh dear, please take a chill pill.

Liberals hate labels (well I guess nobody likes being labeled). But ironically while they hate being labelled deviant, they like calling people radicals or fascist.

I don’t even need to elaborate much on this point as it is pretty straight forward. It’s simple, if you are not interpreting islam according to Quran or Sunnah, then your teachings deserve no better label then being deviant!

Liberals like this idea of dialogue and engagement. They think it’s an excellent tool for creating harmony, and promoting coexistence.

It’s true, getting to know what other people think it’s an excellent way to have empathy and to know their perspective.

But ironically (again), liberal only like to engage in dialogues people who have similar wavelengths. When it comes to muftis or JAKIM, they prefer to not have these people on stage with them to discuss issues that arise.

For liberals, it’s enough to write lengthy articles on Malay Mail to condemn religious institutions, then to actually discuss with them on their ideas.

Take Shafiqah Othman’s attack on JAKIM advocating that people who go against the government are damned by God. Have she ever had the effort to ask JAKIM on which quranic verse or hadith that they are referring to in order to come out with that statement? Or if there are exceptions to the rule?

I don’t agree with JAKIM, therefore it must be unislamic, says the liberal.

Have you ever heard them have an ustaz from JAKIM as a guest on their “dialogue” events? I don’t think so.

One thing that I find similar across all liberals is that when they run out of ideas, they’ll take out the “money” card.

Yes, we’ve all seen that card before, sometimes way too often! It’s very rare that an Islamic NGO replies to their rants on Malay Mail.

NGOs like ISMA is one of the few that are actively rebutting their ideas, though there are many that are advocating for the same cause.

These liberals get a little surprised to see these “conservatives” having such good English, and they sometimes wonder what drives these smart, educated writers to rebut their arguments time and time again.

Since liberals are mostly paid writers working for news tabloids, or working for NGOs that receive funding from local and foreign government (people should really look into this foreign funding thing), they wonder how in the world does this group of illiberal writers keep on advocating against liberal ideas if they are not funded by the so called, “islamofascist” ruling party?

It is then that you wonder, “Have they been living under a rock?”

Mohammad Yusri Jamaluddin
Isma Activist

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