Thumbs Down for Institute For Islamic Understanding (IKIM) and Syariah Judiciary Department Of Malaysia

It is heartening and consoling to really have the opportunity to read the enlightening and passionate article on behalf of all malaysians written by Farish A. Noor.

Farish has indicated explictly his anger and disappointment over the proposal by the so called muslim elite and intellectual that " Non-Muslim found commiting khalwat (close proximity) with Muslim will also be held liable and under threat of punishment"

It seems that these so called hard religious leaders and intellectual have been exploited by the UMNO-led ruling BN government to mislead and brainwash the illiterate and extremist of the Muslim community for their narrow and shortsighted political ends at the expense of the national security and harmony.And it also clearly shows how desperate UMNO is that it has to resort to these third-class dirty tricks of playing the Islamic trump card in detrimental to the unity and peace of Malaysia. We have seen scenerios in other parts of the world that even in a totally Islamic state, muslims are killing among themselves because of differences in ideologies and teachings; but we in Malaysia are very lucky that even though we are made up of different races having different cultures, beliefs and religions, we cherish the peace and harmony since independence except for the sad May 13 tragedy, in which the sad experience does not aggrevated but serves as a good lession for our younger generations to be appreciative of what we have achieved so far in terms of mutual respects and tolerance.

Islamic teachings should be viewed as a moderate religious teachings, the same holds true for buddhism, hinduism etc and no single religion can have a upper hand or dominance over others or compell others to conform to its ideology, otherwise the order of the rules of the game would be destroyed and the innocents be victimised."Islam Hadari" should be portrayed as a moderate and progressive ideology which has its relevancy in contemporary world in regards to peace and love for the mankind regardless of their racial and religious backgrounds and should not be capitalised by politicians for their devil ends.