Islamisation will tear Malaysia apart, says Marina Mahathir

Low Han Shaun Low Han Shaun Updated 6 years ago · Published on 18 Jan 2018 7:10AM · 14 Comments

Marina Mahathir, daughter of Pakatan Harapan chairman Dr Mahathir Mohamad, says Islamisation has led to divisiveness in and inevitable violence Malaysian society. – The Malaysian Insight pic by Seth Akmal, January 18, 2018.

MALAYSIA is on a slippery slope if the nation carries on with its Islamisation agenda, which will not only divide society, but also promote violence, said Marina Mahathir.

Citing a recent example of a man slapping a Muslim woman for not wearing a headscarf in public, the socio-political activist said Islamisation is not going to be positive or healthy for the nation.

“What could possibly have given the man the idea that he is entitled to harangue and slap a Muslim woman for not wearing a tudung as happened recently in Penang,” she said at a book launch at the Kuala Lumpur and Selangor Chinese Assembly Hall last night.

The footage of a man slapping a woman for allegedly not wearing a headscarf some two weeks ago went viral on social media.

The man had singled out one of the women seated at a bus stop believed to be in Penang and questioned her about her religion and the way she was dressed.

He then slapped the woman in the face.

Touching on the book she launched last night, Illusions of Democracy, Marina said the publication provided “empirical back-up” to her stand on the Islamisation of Malaysia because “it is another form of colonisation, a concept that has never been known to being non-violent”.

Illusions of Democracy contains a series of essays on democracy in Malaysia. – The Malaysian Insight pic by Seth Akmal, January 18, 2018.

“Whether it is the growing numbers of modest fashion of family cosmetics to the denunciation of any friendly overture to people of other faiths, to the demonisation of anyone that does not fit into one’s official interpretation of Islam, all of these have proven not only to be divisive in our society but has led to inevitable violence,” she said.

She also commented on a statement by “a former educator” who said minorities should not be given scholarships, and also questioned “a political party leader” for suggesting a Muslim-only cabinet.

At the Rise of the ummah convention recently, Raof Husin, a former education officer said Putrajaya was constitutionally bound to limit study aids to Bumiputeras.

PAS president Abdul Hadi Awang said last year only Muslims will occupy decision-making roles in the Islamist party’s cabinet.

“If you didn’t know better, wouldn’t you think that Isis (Islamic State) had said these things?

“And yet in our enthusiasm to fight terrorism in this country, some people become confused,” Marina said.

While it is said that Malaysians are moderate people who want peace and freedom of religion, sometimes the “toxic tones of the most violent Islamic groups in the world” are also practised, she said.

“On the one hand, some groups are labelled liberal and pluralist, yet at the same time, they are mentioned in the same breath as Isis despite the fact that liberal and pluralist are not words that would describe that particular group.

“Instead, some of the more official pronouncements that we hear or read about are more reminiscence of Isis than any liberal could ever be.

“There are people who want doctors to cut off people’s hands for stealing for instance… some people think that women who speak their minds and protest their own discrimination in the name of religion are unsuited to call themselves Muslims.

“There are those who call for the prosecution of academics who warn against the increasing radicalisation of our institutions.

“Are we merely confused or just hypocrites?”

Sophie Lemiere, a Harvard University academic, is the editor of Illusions of Democracy with essays on democracy in Malaysia. – The Malaysian Insight pic by Seth Akmal, January 18, 2018.

She said although it is easy to spot the black mark in an “undemocractic” state where “lies are touted as truth”, she is still positive that Malaysians will persevere.

“I have seen ordinary Malaysians resisting falling for the provocations, how they have refused to react in the way they are expected to.

“Malaysians have refused to believe that the burning of churches or the throwing of pig heads were the acts of real people like them rather than hired goons.

“They have taken insults, contained their anger and prayed instead. Malaysians have reached out across faith and race to help one another in times of trouble.”

She added that although the authorities are finding ways to differentiate and separate society, Malaysians still have hope and are capable of respecting one another.

“This is a country where those in power change the name of hot dogs while ordinary people got together to learn how to love canines.

“We are carrying on as normal even though the authorities are finding ever more things to differentiate us and keep us apart.”

But Marina remains optimistic that despite all these setbacks, Malaysians are humane and capable of respecting one another, and who can respond in love.

The daughter of Pakatan Harapan chairman Dr Mahathir Mohamad, Marina was speaking at the launch of Illusions of Democracy, a compilation of articles by Sophie Lemiere, an academic from the Weatherhead Centre at Harvard University, with contributors speaking about democracy in Malaysia.

Lemiere, who moderated the forum, said more research needs to be done about democracy in Malaysia.

Also present were Lawrence Ross, a researcher at Malaysia’s Academy of Malay Studies, and civil society group Empower’s executive director, Angela M. Kuga Thas, both contributors to the book. – January 18, 2018.

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Comments

  • I agree BUT THIS commentary does not help. The man who slaps the woman, IS A CRY OF HELP. He is pathetically dysfunctional. He cannot find enough meaning, enough personal sustenance in his life, he has to feel entitled to hold power over others, which he finds when he find solace and refuge in his religion and the s state-sponsored religious authorities does not say he does not have, because the state sponsored religious authories feel THEY are entitled to.

    What Malay and all Muslims who have to face the modern brutally capitalistic and technological world in front of their face is the answer WHY Islamisation does these things and many in fact, want an Islamisation that does not do these things AND fufill the promises it says it can.

    Posted 6 years ago by Bigjoe Lam · Reply

  • Islam has always been a religion of violence. That's the base. period.

    Posted 6 years ago by White Rose · Reply

    • @White Rose: UNPERIOD. All of the attacks that made headlines are false, precarranged and are inside jobs Go and watch youtube, key-in EX-MARINE EXPOSES TRUTH ABOUT ISIS

      Posted 6 years ago by Luigi Giancarlo · Reply

    • ...and all of these are being blamed on Islam. Let me remind you that there are good & bad in every demigraphy. 2 main things that tarnishes Islam: 1) muslims who do not carry themselves as they shoukd,i.e...bad people,and 2) non-muslims who even before they attempt to read and understabd Islam, are just nothing more but hell-bent in condemning Islam. You xould use some resourcing for truth and critical thinking rather than simply accepting and holding on to crappy news.Watch the youtube site i just gave you. There are many more but one is enough.

      Posted 6 years ago by Luigi Giancarlo · Reply

    • ...and all of these are being blamed on Islam. Let me remind you that there are good & bad in every demigraphy. 2 main things that tarnishes Islam: 1) muslims who do not carry themselves as they shoukd,i.e...bad people,and 2) non-muslims who even before they attempt to read and understabd Islam, are just nothing more but hell-bent in condemning Islam. You xould use some resourcing for truth and critical thinking rather than simply accepting and holding on to crappy news.Watch the youtube site i just gave you. There are many more but one is enough.

      Posted 6 years ago by Luigi Giancarlo · Reply

  • All this mess, no thanks, in no small part, to daddy's 22 years of authoritarian rule. So much so that many Muslims here now feel empowered to be judge, jury, and executioner.

    Posted 6 years ago by Xuz ZG · Reply

    • Fair enough, daddy Mahathir has a hand in this but if BN wants to cont this policy, isn't it sheer hypocrisy to cont this policy? Major been telling people that Dr. M is responsible for the mess we are in, then why doesn't he do or undo the wrong as the case maybe, to show the rakyat he is an agent of change?

      Posted 6 years ago by Brandy henderson · Reply

  • This is the result of indoctrinating the mischievous idea of KETUANAN by the Biro Tata Negara (BTN). If BTN is not shut down, things will only get worse and worse. The root of racism must be taken out, like removing gangrenous flesh, in order to heal the wound. Even if a bit of the gangrene is left behind, it starts to grow all over again. Will Dr. M, who initiated the BTN, shut it down if he is in power again after GE14? You can't have
    unity with BTN. The other racists and bigots are influenced and emboldened by the work of the BTN. How many of them have actually gone through the BTN indoctrination courses?




    Posted 6 years ago by Ravinder Singh · Reply

  • Soo much confusion in Islam.

    Islam promotes violence?? Please differentiate between Islam (actual teachings of the Prophet) and so called 'muslims'. The prophet never did what you mentioned above ("proofs" that Islam is indeen violent).

    Violence happens because in certain "islamic" countries because they did not follow the true teachings of Islam. If they did, muslims and fellow non-muslims will live happily together, as proven during the life and time of the Prophet in Madinah where, muslims, christians, and even jews are living together peacefully.

    An random act by random muslim and you quote them as representing Islam?? If a christian wears a cross and massacared childrens in schools, then according to your logic, Christianity promotes violence, right? You see the flaw there?

    Please quote me a teaching of Islam, from the Quran, or the Sahih hadith that Islam promotes violence? No cherry picking please.

    Posted 6 years ago by Zai Zai · Reply

  • There will never be meaningful change here when every religious decree is sacrosanct, deemed inerrant beyond question. These archaic anachronistic laws that limit mankind must be revisited,debated to fit the times. Perhaps during those times civilization was still in its primitive savage state unlike the modern times. Women these days can take punitive legal action against acts of barbarism. All this mindless hijacking of individual rights will cause irrepairable damage if left to these 'tunnel visioned' religionist. I see a failed state in the making, when mankind is fashioned into dull AI robots denied exercising their thinking faculties.,..there is a sense of artificiality, a copycat sickness in human intelligence..no beauty in replicating stale secondhand information..only extinction!

    Posted 6 years ago by Arun Paul · Reply

  • Malaysia is not getting more islamised - lets not even talk about acting and behaving as if god can see what you are doing although you can't see god, the number of malaysians who pray 5 times a day, inclined to charity, practise things like fasting to control their senses is not increasing. You cannot say that malaysia is getting more islamised when the the number of people that adhere to the chief tenets of islam is not increasing.

    What I think Marina Mahathir means is that Malaysia is getting more muslimised or arabised. Muslimisation or arabisation is a particular manifestation of a group mentality , and group mentality in turn is a state where where individuals identify themselves to a group or a mob in a fanatical manner. They are fanatical in the sense that they become extremely exclusive, whereby they will do things to deliberately separate themselves from those they deem others and they will also become extremely defensive, in the sense that in their relationship with those they deem to be others, they will blindly take the side of their own regardless of what they individually believe is right or wrong.

    Muslimisation or arabisation is a unique manifestation the group mentality in the sense that group is formed by parameters set by the arabs or or some vague notion of an international muslim community, but it is not unique in the sense that muslimisation or arabisation is not the only manifestation of group mentality out there. Embracing group mentality has become a trend for the present time. Brexit, Donald Trump's America First, BJP's Hindutva are all other examples of the popularity of group mentality worldover.

    Group mentality could be dangerous as Marina says because different groups are antagonistic and aggressive against each other, in a country like Malaysia where different segment of the population identify with different groups, the antagonism and aggressiveness if left unchecked, will have a disintegrating effect on the country.


    I think the conflating the term islam, muslims and arabs causes confusion. Although these three terms are closely related to each other, i don't think they are interchangeable. Talking about one while meaning another. only causes new problems without solving old ones.


    Posted 6 years ago by Nehru Sathiamoorthy · Reply

  • No religions teach their followers to be either extremist nor violence. Every religions teach us to united and respect each others. It is basically some followers who take things at theor own hand and blame it on religion.

    Posted 6 years ago by Abdul Rahman Abdul Razak · Reply

  • Based on the behaviour of so called Malay Muslim Supremacist, one can only conclude Islam is a RACIST and misogynist religion which evolved over a period of war and violence. This explains why polygamy and child marriage, lying and even killing of kafirs in the name of dakwah is considered not illegitimate by such muslims.

    Posted 5 years ago by Roger 5201 · Reply

  • Folks, a case for Siti. It is January 1, 2119. On your news feed you catch a glimpse of an item that says 100th Anniversary of Islamic Malaysia (Im paraphrasing here). You vaguely remember a Malay woman who warned the Malaysian people of the impending theological cloak surreptitiously enveloping the nation, but you keep confusing her name with a singer in her era. You fire up the video. You see a blond woman, sprightly but vulnerable and heartbreakingly so. Siti is lashed for blasphemy and her lawyer is jailed for defending her right to free speech. Her legal eagle is deemed blasphemous for representing her seemingly inert but powerful position on reason. He said there are three forces jostling for pole. Fundamentalism, Reason and Anarchy. He said Fundamentalism and Anarchy are a process, rather a condition, and that the former has the upper hand because the latter, a spiritual cousin, stands by it. Reason, he proposed, is a condition that stands alone on a different plane. She is sprightly, vulnerable and heartbreakingly so. He said his client, Siti, stands on that plane.

    Posted 5 years ago by Tommy Peters · Reply