Tag: secularism

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Society

[2659] Valentine’s secularization

As far as I understand it from my experience living in the United States during my undergraduate years, the Christian right, which is a loose socially conservative religious group, believes that there is a social war going on. It is a war on Christmas.

The war is really about the secularization of Christmas. It is a symbol of a wider conflict between the social conservatives and the liberals.

Putting that aside, an example of the secularization involves greetings associated with Christmas. In place of the phrase ”Merry Christmas”, many liberals are resorting to wishing ”Happy Holidays” instead.

The very phrase ”Happy Holidays” is partly an effort to be inclusive by those who embrace liberal, cosmopolitan values that are inclusive. That is so because Christmas is not only a celebration that takes place in December. There is the Jewish celebration of Hanukkah. There is Thanksgiving at the end of November. Soon after Dec 25, there is the New Year’s Eve. And given the nature of the Muslim calendar, it is very possible that Ramadan can fall around the same time as Christmas.

The point is that non-Christian holidays do and can happen around the same time as Christmas. So, the greeting ”Happy Holidays” sounds inclusive, especially when one wants to be polite but does not know the other person well. This is particularly a relevant point to mass communication when tailored messages can be a little hard to deliver with precision.

The more important point is that the end-of-the-year holidays — at the risk of committing tautology — are the end-of-the-year holidays. Schools end, professionals take their leave and families or friends go to somewhere together if they do not spend it at home. Even non-believers do this.

So, the time that is traditionally celebrated as Christmas holidays becomes the common great holidays for all. For many Christians in America, Christmas is about Christianity. For many non-Christians, Christmas is a secular holiday devoid of any religious connotation. So secular that if the political left had their way, they would have labeled Christmas as a capitalist holiday for all of the shopping sprees that happen all around the world.

Apparently, the secularization of Christmas does not only happen in America. Some years ago, several of my French friends wished ”Merry Christmas” to me. I told one of the friends that I am not a Christian. She replied, ”Neither am I. I am an atheist.”

”Oh. Then Merry Christmas to you too,” I said while smiling at her.

There we were, two non-Christians wishing each other ”Merry Christmas”.

We were just being nice to each other and we had no Christian image of Nativity in our heads.

This is only a data point but it is a proof of secularization of Christmas nevertheless.

Some secularization also happens in Malaysia.

There are nominal Muslims who celebrate the end of Ramadan not because they consider it as a particularly religious day. In fact, a lot of them do not observe strict fasting during the month of Ramadan. Still they celebrate Hari Raya because it is a tradition to do so and because everybody is in their gayest of all moods, dressed in their best bright-colored baju Melayu and baju kurung. It is effectively a nationwide party. It is hard not to get afflicted by the ambience comes to being only in the month of Syawal. Never mind that there are also non-Muslims who celebrate Hari Raya by visiting friends in the days after Syawal 1.

That is the seed of secularisation that to some extent divorces the holiday from its religious significance.

The full separation between those holidays and its religious significance however is unlikely to happen anytime soon as long as religion continues to play an important role in any society.

In Malaysia, religion will continue to be relevant for a long time.

While that is so, there are celebrations that have been fully divorced from their original religious connotation.  One of such celebrations is just around the corner and it is St Valentine’s Day. Despite the name, Valentine’s in its popular conception in Malaysia and in many other places has nothing to do with religion.

The simplest way to ascertain that is to run a survey. Ask any couple out on Valentine’s and see if they have religion in mind. More likely than not. They are likely to have each other in their mind instead. The truth is that Valentine’s of modern times is a very secular romantic celebration of each other.

And secularization has allowed the idea of Valentine’s to come closest it has ever been to becoming universal.

Yet, many conservative Muslims in Malaysia in one way or another believe that Valentine’s is about Christianity. Like the Christian right which suffers from make-believe assault and siege mentality, the Malaysian Muslim conservatives suffer from the same delusion. In their mind, this is yet another conspiracy against them.

But it is not.

It is an evolution within society. Society takes what it thinks good from within it. Through secularization, society makes whatever that was confined within a restrictive four-wall more universal so that all can benefit from it.

So, to take Valentine’s as celebrated today within a religious context and then to oppose it is truly to miss the point of it all.

Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved
First published in the Selangor Times on February 8 2013.

Categories
Liberty Society

[2401] No to the Ministry of Non-Muslim Affairs, again

I am a secularist. I strongly believe in the separation of the state and religion. At the very least, the state should not interfere in personal belief within libertarian constraint and religion should not influence the state to the extent that it transgresses individual liberty.

Although there are other concerns I have written throughout this blog of mine, my primary concern here contextualized within the latest development on the issue revolves around negative individual liberty.

Religion and other personal beliefs are private matters. As long as these beliefs do not contradict individual liberty, the state should get out of the bedroom so-to-speak. Recall the base function of the liberal state: the protection of individual negative liberty.

The separation between the state and religion prevents religion from hijacking the state, and the state from controlling any religion. At one fell swoop, the separation goes a long way in guaranteeing freedom of religion and other individual rights that might come into conflict with religious beliefs.

This is not just some academic concern. It is a real worry in Malaysia. Existing institutions apply highly corrosive effects on individual rights granted through individual liberty. There are religious police in Malaysia.

Within Malaysian context, the roles of Islam in the state are repulsive. Before I am being misconstrued, I am referring to the relevant religious institutions in Malaysia, not the religion itself.

There is a need to reduce the prominence of these Islamic institutions that exert unduly coercive influence on liberty. The state controls Islam and the Islam as in the form sanctioned by the state and through apparatus of the state exerts suffocating stranglehold on individuals who refuse to bow.

The latest news has it that Roman Catholic Church in Malaysia will lobby for the formation of a non-Muslim affairs ministry, again.[1] I wrote again because it has been raised since as early as 2007. This should be seen in parallel to the state of Islam in Malaysia.

Will non-Muslims be forced to fit the mould of certain religion they identify themselves with? Will the government try to interfere in how non-Muslims practice their religion?

Even if the answers are no, it will give the state a piece of the pie. The Church and its merry men, which themselves have not-so-impeccable reputation as far as individual liberty are concerned, will have to share that pie of tyranny.

For an illiberal government eager of telling individual what to believe in, perhaps the formation of that ministry is consistent.

Yet, an illiberal government is not the ideal government for me.

I oppose the formation of the ministry. The formation will give greater legitimacy to moral policing within Islam. It gives legitimacy to the division and compartmentalization of society to coerce free persons. We already have two laws in this land, one for one group and another one for another. One is free, and the other is not as far as libertarians are concerned. The establishment of non-Muslim affairs ministry will strengthen that illiberal dichotomy.

Religion should play less significant roles in the state. That ministry will only enhance the roles of religion, and at the same time, the scope of the state. There should be less government, not more. There is already a lot of room for tyranny in the state. Why should more space be made for tyranny?

A certain somebody a long time ago said the era of government knows best is over. Now is yet another chance to prove whether that statement was made in good faith or not. Prove it by not dictating private individual beliefs. Prove it by rejecting the religious lobbyists out right.

Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved

[1] — KUALA LUMPUR, July 26 — The Roman Catholic Church here will lobby for a non-Islamic affairs ministry now that Malaysia has formalised ties with the Vatican, says Archbishop of Kuala Lumpur Tan Sri Murphy Pakiam. [Debra Chong. Catholic Church plugs for non-Muslim affairs ministry. The Malaysian Insider. July 26 2011]

Categories
Education Society

[2318] Increasing the appeal of national schools by reducing the role of religion

Prejudice against any group depends on generalization for it to take root successfully in one’s mind.

Although I have to admit that sometimes there are voices in my head whispering ethnic prejudice and stereotype, I typically find it hard to harbor such sentiment for long. I have friends of ethnicities different from mine. If I succumbed to such prejudice, I must necessarily think badly of them. I appreciate my friends and thinking badly of them disturbs me.

I take comfort that I know many of them do not fit into prejudicial descriptions that exist out there. I know my friends violate such prejudicial generalization, hence falsifying it. This forms my first barrier against such prejudice.

I am only one person, whose preference and experience are not necessarily shared by others. Yet, I do think the idea that a person’s familiarity with individuals of different ethnicity acting as a contradictory force to prejudicial generalization can be extrapolated to others’ thinking. The idea encourages one to evaluate a person based on his or her action or words instead on others’ who share the person’s ethnicity.

This is why I support any platform encouraging interaction between individuals of different ethnic backgrounds. This is why I support the national school system and frown upon any system contributing to ethnic segregation, despite the shortcomings of the national schools, and despite my appreciation for choices within the Malaysian education system.

While tuning in my blue iPod to the BBC in London recently, I caught David Cameron announcing that multiculturalism has failed. He lamented the policy of passive tolerance that has caused individuals to segregate themselves according to their ethnic background. From far, British society is multicultural but a closer look may justify Cameron’s concern.

Although the situation in Britain is different from that in Malaysia, there are communities in Malaysia that segregate willingly.

The education system in general does not help in breaking this trend. The Malays mostly go to national schools, which are Malay or Muslim-dominated. The trend repeats itself in the vernacular streams.

There are exceptions. Some national schools are diverse, especially those that are well-endowed and located in urban areas. Some vernacular schools are diverse as well. It is worth stressing again that these are exceptions, however. There are simply not enough children from different ethnicities learning in the same classroom when one assesses a majority of these schools individually. This limits the opportunity for interaction.

There are many reasons why that trend prevails in the national schools. I will not go into all of them. I intend to highlight only one of them in hope of bringing focus. Others can highlight other factors if they wish to do so.

Religion, specifically Islam, plays too much of a role in the national schools. That erodes the idea that the national schools are national, hence inclusive. When one religion appears to dominate, the idea of inclusivity bows down to exclusivity. The dominance may cause parents with other religious beliefs — as well as those without belief — distrust in the national schools being able to provide their children with the necessary education without instilling Islamic belief.

Worse, the heavy presence of Islam in the system creates the perception that non-Muslims are second-class citizens. This is best demonstrated when Islamic prayers are said during school assemblies. While students of other beliefs are encouraged to pray in their own way when the Islamic prayers are said, the practice does say a lot about which religion takes the foremost position.

Another example is the segregation that happens during Islamic lessons. Non-Muslims typically are asked to shift to a different class where they are expected to go for moral studies while Muslim students stay in the same class. That happened during my time as a student in a national school.

While the practice more than anything else is a matter of convenience — most students are Muslims — it does create the perception that, again, Islam is the religion of the national school and other religions do not deserve attention. Still, the ultimate reason they were segregated is that one group is labeled by the state as Muslim and the other as, well, others.

The perception is dangerous because children learn something about inequality. The greater danger is that these students may accept the lesson as simply the way things are in Malaysia, when such inequality should be fought instead of condoned.

There are other more sinister examples. One includes an incident several months back when a student was caned because he brought pork for lunch to school. Islam prohibits Muslims from consuming pork and that wrongly guided the action of the responsible school official to cane the non-Muslim student. The wider implication is that the example suggests that non-Muslim students should follow Islamic teachings. This links back to the issue of trust mentioned earlier.

The perception that non-Muslims are second-class citizens is not something non-Muslim parents would want or should let their children accept. Malaysia belongs to all Malaysians. Religion should not matter.

If attendance at the national schools encourages acceptance of inequality by these young students, then non-Muslim parents who believe in equality have a reason — likely another reason out of many — not to enroll their children in the national schools. This ultimately hurts the national schools’ function as an unofficial social integrator within Malaysian society.

One solution is to separate religion from schools. The national schools should be made blind to religion in a way that religion stays only within the necessary lesson. Religion should not be included during school functions and not in science classes, but only in religious classes.

The separation can remove the apprehension non-Muslim parents have about the national schools with respect to religious belief, hence making the system more appealing to non-Muslim parents. Muslim parents meanwhile can continue to be assured that their children will learn about Islam during Islamic lessons, if they wish their children to learn it.

Perhaps as part of larger liberal values, all students should be allowed to choose what they wish to learn, regardless of their religious beliefs in the spirit of free inquiry. This also includes the arts and the sciences. No longer will students be segregated during lessons based on religious beliefs but they will be separated based on their interests and curiosity.

Hopefully, after making national schools neutral of religion, we will be a step closer to becoming an inclusive national system to encourage interaction, where individuals of one ethnicity befriend those of another to acquire the idea that his or her friend contradicts many of the prejudicial generalizations that exist out there.

Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved

First published in The Malaysian Insider on February 16 2011.

Categories
Liberty Politics & government Society

[2276] Of it requires an answer

At a recent public lecture in Sydney, Australia, Anwar Ibrahim said he avoids answering which he aspires to: a secular state or an Islamic state. He reasoned that the issue is contentious and unproductive to engage in. He believes what exists instead is a quasi-secular state, and a hypocritical one at that. He went on to state that the problem revolves around hypocrisy. I left the lecture dissatisfied with the message. Immediately after he ended his speech, I began to wonder about the kind of consistency he was looking for.

He argued that part of the reason why the issue is contentious is that both mean different things to different person. For instance, there are opponents of secularism who believe that secularism is anti-religion. That illiberal brand of secularism stifles religions in the public sphere, like what happened in Turkey before. And then there are proponents of secularism who assert that secularism is neutral of religion. Backed by liberal principles, a liberal secular state will treat all religions equally as long as those religions do not infringe on individual liberties. I myself subscribe to this idea.

Being the glue that holds Pakatan Rakyat together, it is completely understandable why he avoids the question. If anybody needs a reminder, DAP and the Islamist PAS are both the main component parties of Pakatan Rakyat. Both have rattled sabers over the matter within the Malaysian context. In Sydney, he stressed the need to build consensus. Fair enough.

The avoidance, however, is problematic when he is critical of the double standards in the implementation of Islamic law in Malaysia, where the rich and influential get away with what Islam frowns at while others get punished. That criticism relies on the idea of equality before the law. Such equality itself is a sound concept. Yet, not all equality ranks equally in terms of preference.

While the application of unequal weight of the law is distasteful, I shudder to think of a situation of equal implementation of Islamic law, especially in its current form in Malaysia. This is because it violates individual liberties — especially for those whom the state considers as Muslims — such as freedom of conscience. That translates into law that states whom a person can marry, what he or she can eat or drink, what a person can believe in, etc. It excessively dictates one’s personal life. An Islamic state that runs on Islamic law necessarily does that.

Religion has always been a personal, private matter for liberals. When religion is a private matter then the state has no say, freedom has more opportunities to flourish. This is why liberals prefer a secular state with respect to any religious state, while holding all other concerns constant. The opportunity for liberty to flourish doubles when there are guarantees for individual liberties within a liberal democratic framework, which addresses the problem of tyranny of the majority.

Criticism of hypocrisy and the existence of preferences in different kinds of equality essentially introduce back the question of secularism and Islamic state. The question does not need to be framed in such a stark contrast. Forget the labels. Ask instead, will religion, specifically Islam, be used to dictate a person’s lifestyle? More specifically, will it be used to dictate a Malay’s lifestyle?

Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved

First published in The Malaysian Insider on November 18 2010.

Categories
Politics & government Society

[2216] Of solution to Methodist Church’s fear of politicization

The Methodist Church in Malaysia is apparently under heavy criticism after it accepted money from the BN federal government during the recent Sibu parliamentary by-election. Quite clearly, the context in which the money was given strongly suggests that the money transfer was political of nature. The transfer could have been done outside of election time but I am confident that without the election in Sibu, the money would not have found its way to the Church’s hand.

Bishop Hwa Yung of the Church’s Council of Presidents in defending the Church, among others, states that it is the responsibility of the government to give grants to religious bodies.[1]

The Bishop insists that the Church cannot takes sides in politics. Yet, the Church suffers from politicization and it was presented with difficult fork: accept the money and be dammned as pro-government; reject the money and be deemed as pro-opposition.

A pragmatist would look at the options, understand the inevitability of politicization under the scenario and settle for the least hurtful outcome. Between suffer politicization, or suffer politicization and be several millions richer, the optimal solution is non-brainer. The Church is a pragmatist. It took a pragmatist action. It took the money. It is as simple as that. Save the moral argument.

The fear of politicization issue would have been comprehensible if it is not how the Bishop defended the action of the Church. The Bishop writes “the problem in our country is that most of the money for religious bodies is usually given to one particular religious community, with relatively much smaller proportions given to other communities“.

It is hard for me to sympathize with the Church when it uses that reasoning as its shield. First of all, the Church should realize that this is an arbitrary gift from the government. The grant in no way solves the problem of unfairness that the Bishop raises. Besides, no wrongdoing should be used to correct a wrong. The act of justifying the arbitrariness is thus problematic, making the Church’s fear sounds hollow.

As a secularist, his statement that it is the responsibility of the government to give grants to religious institutions makes it impossible for me to sympathize with the Church.

Perhaps such dilemma would not have existed if the state was secular. By secular, it is the idea that it is not the responsibility of the state to provide religious bodies with money.

If the Church does not want to find itself in such dilemma ever again, it should support such secularism. Under such secularism, the Church will never have to face the oh-so-painful problem of accepting or rejecting money from the government.

Secularism solves the dilemma cleanly. Why not try it?

But really, is it a dilemma to start with? Who are we kidding? A lot of us can do with a little bit of money. That includes religious institutions as well.

Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved

[1] — Many of our church members are aware of the reports in the media that the government made grants to four Methodist churches in Sibu, on the eve of the recent parliamentary by-election. The Council of Presidents discussed this matter at its May 25 meeting.

Pending fuller deliberations on the matter by the General Conference Executive Council at its upcoming meeting, we wish to issue a pastoral letter stating the following:

1. First, the giving of grants to religious bodies for the advancement of religion, as well as to other bodies like schools, etc, is a government responsibility. To receive such is a citizen’s right. After all, the money given is actually taxpayers’ money. [Church is non-partisan, grants put us in dilemma. Hwa Yung. Malaysiakini. May 28 2010]