Category: Social Commentary

Intolerant Malaysian Muslims


Stories like the below just confirms how intolerant Muslims in Malaysia are, and that’s why Malaysia would continue to face massive problems in turning the country around. No light at the end of this tunnel, from the look of things.

Here’s the story from Malaysiakini:

Malaysian Islamic Development Department director-general Wan Mohamad Sheikh Abdul Aziz sees no need for a guideline on azan to be issued to mosques and suraus across the nation.

“There is no need for azan guidelines, in view that Islam is the official religion of the country,” he told Malaysiakini in an emailed message.

He was responding to calls from several quarters for a guideline to be issued because of the confusion on its practice in Malaysia’s multi-religious landscape.

Proponents of an azan guideline contend that such a ruling would help avert problems in the future.

NONEThe azan issue became controversial after a local resident complained to the Prime Minister’s Office, alleging that the call to prayer at the Al Ikhlasiah Mosque near his house in Pantai Dalam Kuala Lumpur, was too loud and requested that the volume be reduced.

His complaint sparked a ruckus when several NGOs gathered at the mosque and burned an effigy representing the complainant, to express their displeasure at his request.

The complainant, lawyer Ng Kian Nam, who had since apologised over the matter, said that he was not able to differentiate between azan and morning sermons.

It was the volume of the morning sermons that he wanted reduced, not the azan, he claimed.

Come On Down Under


I wrote this email to some relatives more than 6 months ago, and thought I’d put it up here again…

Hi everyone
How are you guys doing? I know I have said this before but you should seriously consider, if at all possible, coming Down Under. Look at this:

1. Malaysia isn’t getting any better – the good old evils of corruption and discrimination are still so strong after so many years. Najib’s record and the Perkasa nonsense are clear examples. They are continuing trends which have been in place for many years.

2. Malaysian Minister (Idris Jala) himself said Malaysia is facing bankruptcy in 9 years. I know this is scare tactics to push through subsidy cutbacks but it is also true that Malaysia hasn’t developed any competitive advantages for many years now. Unless true meritocracy kicks in, the competitive advantage will always be second rate. Meritocracy will not happen – see the resistance to the NEM.

3. Education prospects in Malaysia are getting harder – more expensive without increase in quality. Graduates of Malaysian universities of today are no where near the qualities of before. Kids may score 10, 11 or 12 A’s but that doesn’t take them anywhere. Malaysian marks are increasingly meaningless because they are designed to make the government and Malay students look better than they really are.

4. Immigration will only get harder. Who is to say your kids will continue to have the same opportunities to migrate next time, if Malaysia continues to deteriorate and they want to leave? Windows are still open now but are narrowing.

5. Australia is in no way a great country. It has many problems, but (I believe) it is far better than Malaysia, especially for the kids’ education. Primary education in Malaysia is better than in Australia but after that Malaysia lags behind badly. Australia has it problems in schools and communities but no where the levels of these problems in Malaysia.

See story below – everyone depend on WiFi these days, and it is a technology invented/discovered in Australia. Life is different in so many ways but at least we give our kids a better fighting chance to develop well.

Australian CSIRO Story
Australia’s peak science body stands to reap more than $1 billion from its lucrative Wi-Fi patent after already netting about $250 million from the world’s biggest technology companies, an intellectual property lawyer says.
The CSIRO has spent years battling 14 technology giants including Dell, HP, Microsoft, Intel, Nintendo and Toshiba for royalties and made a major breakthrough in April last year when the companies opted to avoid a jury hearing and settle for an estimated $250 million.
Now, the organisation is bringing the fight to the top three US mobile carriers in a new suit targeting Verizon Wireless, AT&T and T-Mobile. It argues they have been selling devices that infringe its patents.
CSIRO, which is also now targeting Lenovo, Sony and Acer in new cases, says mathematical equations in its patents form the basis of Wi-Fi technology used in a whole slew of technology products including smartphones, laptops, routers and games consoles.
“CSIRO is poised to hit a home run … any company using Wi-Fi technology has no choice but to pay up,” said Trevor Choy, an intellectual property lawyer with Choy Lawyers.
“The widespread usage of the technology means that a few cents per customer / data volume usage could easily add up to a lazy billion or more.
“The fact that the court case is happening in the US is also good because US courts don’t shy away from awarding big damages figures.”
In a phone interview today, CSIRO’s commercial executive director, Nigel Poole, said the Wi-Fi patent was the CSIRO’s most lucrative yet but he would not comment on expected windfalls or on whether the next targets could be Apple, RIM and Nokia.
He pointed out that the existing cases could take a while to go through the courts unless the companies opted to settle.
“Every single company that sells products with Wi-Fi in them we would like to have a licence with … [but] there’s a practical limit to that – one of them is that there are very small or niche companies that are not going to sell very many units,” Poole said.
“There is another limit which is we only hold patents in 19 countries and so there are many countries where we don’t hold patents including Russia and China.
“After that it’s a practicality process of trying to license an entire industry.”
For as long as CSIRO has been fighting the tech giants, the targets of the suits have been battling to have the 1996 patent declared invalid, without much success.
Jim FitzSimons, an intellectual property lawyer and partner at Clayton Utz, said he did not know the specifics on CSIRO’s patent but in general the first court case that tested any patent was “extremely important”.
“The fact that they decided to settle … they could only have done it on the basis that they were going to lose,” he said, referring to the settlements with CSIRO in April last year.
Sydney CSIRO researcher John O’Sullivan, the man who came up with the theories behind the Wi-Fi patent, was awarded the $300,000 Prime Minister’s Prize for Science in October last year.
He and his team of inventors also won the CSIRO Chairman’s Medal last year and the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering (ATSE) Clunies Ross Award last month.
The patent, which is owned by CSIRO, had its genesis in a 1977 paper O’Sullivan wrote about how a set of mathematical equations could be used to sharpen images from optical telescopes. He developed it while searching for exploding black holes.
“By the late 1980s, we started looking at the growth of computer networking,” O’Sullivan told The Sun-Herald in December last year.
“It was several years before the worldwide web, there was just email and specialised computer services. But I started thinking that if you could just cut the wires and have portable computing, able to access networks at full data rates, there would be huge potential.”
The CSIRO first applied for its Australian Wi-Fi patent in 1992, which solved the problem of patchy wireless reception caused by waves bouncing off objects.
“We realised this was going to be big,” he said. “But I don’t think any of us realised how big.”
Source: smh.com.au

Najib Wants to Know the Real Truth? Us Too! About Altantuya Shaaribu!


The Malaysian PM, professed thus: “We also want to know the real truth”

He was on a campaign trail for a by-election and was anticipating the issue of the death of Teoh Beng Hock at the office of the Malaysian anti-corruption agency, MACC.

Actually, I think Malaysians agree that the PM should be concerned with wanting to know the real truth. He should enlighten Malaysians especially, on the circumstances surrounding the death of Altantuya Shaaribu. The aspersions cast on Najib Razak from the death of Altantuya Shaaribu suggests there are lingering doubts and he would always be seen as somehow involved, and one always wonders if he was in fact responsible.

Najib Razak, like you we also want to know the real truth. Not just about Teoh Beng Hock but also about Altantuya Shaaribu.

2 down …


AIA Group loses 2nd key executive in week | News | Business Spectator.

Another case of new chief wanting his new team?

Lead, Follow or Get Out Of The Way


Was it Clinton who repeated that very useful mantra?

I am just a tad fed up with some ex-church colleagues.  They throw general statements around, stomp out and then make pathetic attempts to light small fires  to get their way. What a load of rubbish. What a lack of personal character, let alone leadership qualities.

I was just saying to someone that quite frankly, we should stop wasting time with the likes of such people. They will attempt to vent whatever pathetic little voice they have left on whoever who would feel sorry or courteous to still listen to them. The smart ones would rightly think such views rubbish. We really should stop wasting time on these people.

By all means accept them with open and sincere loving arms when they decide to be smart about it and lose their little self’s that’s preventing them from becoming what they ought to be. Until then, we should all ignore them and move on.

A Fool of a Lawyer


That’s Alex Stewart from Brisbane. The 29-year-old must have thought it hilarious to video himself tearing up pages from both the Bible and the Quran and using it to wrap tobacco before proceeding to light up.

I know life’s often hard and one can always use a laugh and take oneself less seriously but life is also short enough to think about things more seriously and make it all count. This sort of just gives a free kick and show how foolish one can become if one holds on to atheism. Really if there’s no God, why take anything seriously?

Alas, God is. His word according to John, is Him. So it’s kind of really foolish to mock it the way this young lawyer did. It’s a bit like the Chaser mob maybe, where the mantra of life is – have a laugh. All else is secondary. One day, something will happen in their lives which will change this mantra forever. When that day comes, I hope people like Alex Stewart will have unburnt copies of the Bible around, to have a means of seeking what it all means.

The Swinging House


This Rob Oakeshott fellow has got to be one of those post modern guys who must appear, at all costs, to be one who has agonises over decisions he has to make. All we wanted – the nation wanted – was to know what the decision was. It is a given he has agonised over it, because fairly or otherwise, he was one of the three who has accidentally become the holder of the nation’s future in so far the government was concerned. He, Windsor and Katter did not deserve to hold that kind of power and it was bad enough we have had to wait and wonder if we were going to have a government or was it back to the polls.

To see him navel gazing and pontificating the way he did on Tuesday arvo was so very annoying. What’s worse, stuff he was advocating was just pure poppycock. How is the parliament to function – just gather around and talk even more endlessly than they have already been doing? Group hugs? I shudder at the potentially revolting inclusiveness of this variety.

That was Tuesday.

Yesterday, Tony Windsor had some issues with the mining tax. He wanted it included in the agenda of some tax summit with the Treasury but Swan had not plan to. So it was an issue and again magnifying glasses were raised to look for cracks in the “rainbow coalition” that is made up of 72 Labour, 1 Green, 1 Whistle Blowing anti-Iraq war Tassie in Andy Wilkie and 2 Independents which included the navel gazing tree hugger Oakeshott. What a bunch.

Today, it is the turn of the Greens to wake us up and remind us this rainbow is about to disappear soon. Bob Brown now is making noises about siding with the Coalition (not the rainbow variety) about matters such as parental leave scheme and healthcare. So potentially the 73 Coalition seats bolstered by the Westie Tony Crook may have Adam Brandt the Melbourne Greenman (it gets stranger by the day). That – at least for those issues Brown made noises on – brings it to a 75 votes each way tie.

Tomorrow’s Friday – thank God it’s Friday. Who knows – it may be a very short while before we go to the polls again. Phil Baresi my local candidate should not put his feet up too comfortably – the game may be back on again.

Dove? Love!


This Quran burning fiasco thought up by the Dove World Outreach Centre in Florida (it only happens in America?) is seriously misguided.

This phobia against all things Islamic has been played up by right wing America for so long now. I get endless streams of emails and youtube clips warning against the march of Islam. Often these emails are outright lies. Many recipients have foolishly forwarded these materials without making the simplest and quickest of checks. Kiddo once showed me the “Let-Me-Google-That-For-You” slap in the face type of site and senders of such emails should acquaint themselves with this facility.

We live in such angry and confusing times that clear thinking is more important than ever before.

I can’t understand how burning Quran can further the kingdom of God. Even if we are compelled to consider Muslims enemies, we have been asked – commanded – to love our enemies. The universal edict to love our enemies as ourselves requires an even higher standard of adherence when we are taught Jesus himself is love. Loving Muslims is not the same as believing or giving credibility to Islam or the Quran. In fact loving them is how we are to start sharing with them the gospel and the saving grace of God. If we are bloody minded in surging ahead with our chest thumping brand of Christianity and continue to initiate pogroms of sorts such as this. We are further than ever before, from reaching out Muslims with God’s love and be a bridge to share the saving grace of God with them. We have to start believing that when they see God’s love and saving grace, they will be lead by the Spirit to see the foolishness of man’s independent attempts to reach God, including via the Quran. Jesus asked us to be wise as serpents but harmless as doves. There can be no better context to apply this wise command from our Lord.

Gay Church in Malaysia? My Gay Thoughts Revisited


Gay Church? (Re-publishing in light of current interests in Malaysia…)

I have friends whom I think may be offended by what I’m about to write in this entry. It concerns homosexual practice. If you are one of these people, I hope you know by now that I believe God is real and He cares about us. He has great plans for us and I trust Him enough to know these plans are great ones. There is only one condition – that I must let Him be God and not try to play His role for Him. So, whatever my personal views may be about homosexual practice, they are secondary to what God has said in the Bible about the matter.

Personally, I don’t have any problems with homosexual practice. I am not one, have no such tendencies, and am prepared to accept that there are many with homosexual tendencies or preferences. To many, these tendencies and preferences are so strong they do not want to keep fighting them. They think perhaps life is to be lived, not fought against. They think a relationship is about commitment and sacrifice and building something together and there is nothing in a homosexual relationship which inherently precludes these virtues. I agree with these views. I would have subscribed wholly with them and would have supported same sex union as a logical consequence of these views. These however, are my personal views. As a Christian, I believe my personal views are not always the right ones. They can’t be. To insist that my personal views must prevail is to breach the condition set out above. His (perfect) plans wont work, and mine, which are no where near His (perfect ones) would kick in. My views really are a distant second to His, which is perfect.

I honestly do not know what to make of claims that homosexuality is a natural thing. It’s like someone who prefers one food to another, or has the natural tendency to use his left arm instead of his right. How can preference for one food over another or using one arm over another, be such a bad thing? Honestly, I don’t know. I dont know what harm there would be if say, half the world is gay. Maybe the world population would go down. The nucleus family would no longer be the norm. Is that a bad thing? I don’t know. If homosexuality becomes as common as a heterosexual union, it would be the first time since time immemorial, that the issue of parenthood becomes re-examined and the accepted convention of 2-sex parents is no longer. I don’t know what that does to the psyche of a child and how that affects his or her development and what sort of adult that child eventually becomes. It is such a vexed issue. It would certainly mean discarding what has worked for centuries, in favour of/exchange for acceptance of certain sexual preferences. Assuming the gays are right and it is perfectly “natural”. It is still only our way, not God’s. In fact, God wants us to subrogate our natural ways to His ways. The Bible speaks of dying to self in order to live. There are in any event, lots of things we naturally want to do but don’t, because they aren’t good for us. We wont go there for now however.

There is a Malaysian pastor who is now contemplating a gay church. This is just a bit whacky. Not that homosexual practice is whacky. It isn’t. It’s quite cool actually. It is however, against God’s ways. Jesus preached love and forgiveness and acceptance. That is true. He also however, preached obedience, repentance and judgment. These aren’t cool. They are however, core teachings of Jesus. To start a gay church would be like starting a church for any other perpetrators of any other practice which is against God’s ways.

We don’t for example, even think for a moment about say, a paedophile church. Before you scream murder, I’m not equating paedophilia with homosexuality. The obvious argument that one damages innocent young children while the other is between consenting adults is a familiar one with which I agree. However, again those are my views. They don’t matter. God’s views do. In fact they are the only ones that do. One doesn’t even have to proffer any arguments which a paedophile may put forward to justify the practice. You don’t need for example, to produce scientific evidence to show maybe some children aren’t damaged and may even acquire some life lessons. I know that is repulsive. I know society simply does not find paedophilia acceptable. My point is there will always be subjective views. Expert opinions change. Community rejection or acceptance of any matter is subjective. What is now unacceptable may be acceptable at different times, just as what was previously unacceptable may now be acceptable. The only objective standard is God’s. Okay, that is my belief. I know that to be true, because it is right there in the Bible (eg 1 Corinthians 6:9).

You know why the church today has credibility issues when they shout and thump their chests against homosexual practice? It is the issue of consistency. Homosexual practice is a sin, as is theft, lying, killing, jealousy, covetousness, and all the other practices listed in Exodus somewhere as well as in other parts of the Bible. In fact, remember Billy Graham’s 7 deadly sins? You hardly hear the church condemning these anymore. Why condemn homosexual practice but keep silent on theft for example? Why no word against murder? Why has the church not examined for example, the actions of people like George W and Robert M to see if they have perhaps committed murder? I know I know. George was defending his country, you may say. Really? From what? Terrorism? I thought that was in Egypt, Saudi Arabia and maybe Afghanistan? From oil drought? Ah…maybe he was then guilty of covetousness? Or did he not remember that and the other stuff in Exodus 20:15ff? If in lying and coveting Iraq’s oil he let his own view prevail over God’s that is as much a sin as homosexual practice is. Why didn’t the church condemn it but pretty much cover its head with ashes over homosexual practice?

So to the Malaysian pastors and churches crying out against that gay pastor, I say well done. However to sound a bit more credible, you should also take a stand against other practices which are against God’s ways. How many church goers in Malaysian churches today are guilty of sharp business practices (theft, lies, coveting)? How many have mistresses? How many overtly support regimes which condone murder (I have in mind the Malaysian police which the general public in Malaysia believes have committed murder in the summary execution of suspects in shootouts, pushing addicts off buildings, bashings in lock-ups and prisons leading to deaths)? Why does the church single out homosexual practice as a sin to condemn and leave the other iniquities alone?

So back to that gay church – no it wont work. I believe gay people in Malaysia aren’t Christians. If they turn up, it wont be because they are Christians – it would be because they are gay. It would be just another gay club. You cant for example preach on godliness because to be godly you need to well, subscribe to His ways. A homosexual practitioner has chosen to choose his own way over God’s. If however the intention of that church is to help practising gays get rid of that practice then that would be a great thing. That pastor could set an example and say homosexual practice is a sin in that it goes against God’s ways. It wont be a cool or popular thing to do, but godly.

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Self Must Die


One of my favourite television programs is the Band of Brothers. My favourite episode in that series concerns a Lieutenant Spiers. In that episode, Easy Company had emerged from a torrid time in a forest in Bastogne under freezing conditions. They were asked to take over the little town of Foy from the Germans. Easy Company was under the charge of an ineffectual commander and couldn’t break through the German defence until Spiers stepped up and took over. Spiers stepped up, took command and lead from the front. He blazed through and ran from one vantage point to another, methodically and courageously picking out snipers and artilleries. His brave feats lead Easy Company to complete victory and they overcame the enemy.

Later as the men took a well earned rest, someone asked Spiers how he did it. What was his reply? He said:

The only hope you have is to accept the fact that you’re already dead. The sooner you accept that, the sooner you’ll be able to function as a soldier is supposed to function: without mercy, without compassion, without remorse. All war depends upon it.

To function as a soldier, one has to accept that he is already dead. The sooner that acceptance occurs, the better the soldier will be able to function.

Dying to self is essential to effective function. He is no fool to give up what he cannot keep, to gain what he cannot lose. These were the words of Jim Elliot the missionary was killed in Ecuador.

The Bible has always taught giving up of self. The elevation of self is the greatest lie the devil perpetuated to continue to suppress man and deny him the fullness of life that self sacrifice was meant to bring. Leave the 99 sheep behind to seek that one lost sheep and forgetting the nine coins in order to find the one which is lost. Giving up what we have – which we can’t keep – to find the greater gift given by God – which we can’t lose. The devil seeks to stoke our egos, our self.

Genesis 3:4 has the serpent saying to Eve 4 “You will not surely die,” the serpent said to the woman. 5 “For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

Elevating man to the status of God seems on the surface, to be fulfilling man’s “purpose” but in fact is the death knell that sees man separated from God. To truly live, the self is to first die.

To move forward, one is asked to first lay down himself to the extent of death. Jesus has shown us what this means. In John 12:23

23Jesus replied, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. 24I tell you the truth, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds. 25The man who loves his life will lose it, while the man who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life.

So this morning as we remember His death for our sake let us seek to forget ourselves and focus on Him. More than 500 years ago, Nicolaus Copernicus discovered that the earth is not at the centre of the universe. Let us embrace the Copernican revolution and accept that we are not at the centre of the universe – God is. It is not about us. It is all about God and His plans. Let us see things from the perspective of God’s Kingdom and His purpose for His Kingdom. For only then can we be one as His family, as He commanded us to be.

Let us give thanks together

Heavenly Father, we thank you for your gift of redemption in and through Jesus, your only begotten Son. We thank you for His obedience. We ask that you will teach us to obey just as He obeyed. We ask that just as submitted to Your will we too will know how to look beyond ourselves and yield to Your will and Your purpose for Your church. In Jesus’ name we pray, Amen.

In Matthew 26, it says in verse 26:

While they were eating, Jesus took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to his disciples, saying, “Take and eat; this is my body.”

Let us eat the bread together to remember Jesus’ obedience on the cross.

Verse 27 – Then he took the cup, gave thanks and offered it to them, saying, “Drink from it, all of you. 28This is my blood of the[a] covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.

Let us now drink from the cup and accept the shedding of Jesus blood on the cross for our sin. May God bless us all.