CSL, more people will read and try to understand you if you could at least separate your post into a few paragraphs. no one is interested in a wall of words.
i'll try to stay on topic based on all the feedbacks here. imho, i would like to believe malaysians are always ready for discussions. however, there are a few issues that comes to mind.
1. what type of mentality do we approach the discussion? do we approach 'trying to tell our story' or approach to understand the other party?
about the 'Allah' issue, the judge has already made available the reasons in a 57 page written judgement why 'Allah' can be used. click http://www.themalaysianinsider.com/index.php/malaysia/49845-four-reasons-for-controversial-allah-ruling to read more. the license to publish is issued annually by the home ministry. last year, the home ministry disallowed the use of the word for whatever reasons. the Herald appealed and this was the judgement that was handed out.
as we are not discussing why the ministry decided to ban the word, let's discuss on the reactions of the parties involved. is it necessary to resort to violence by firebombing a place of worship over the use of a word? even if the word is wrongly used (which it is not as it is already proven), what gives a person or a group of people the right to be so violent? this group of people not only showed contempt to the court ruling, they also smeared the name of their own God by committing a sin (unless they are saying that it is alright to resort to violence).
did the group of people understand the christian's viewpoint? did the group of people realize that the word has already been used for many many years? did we, who are discussing this issue realize this was a fact? did you, as a reader/bystander view this thinking that those group of arsonists are religious extremists? did you, for a moment label their religion as an extreme religion?
in this country, where everything is 'boleh', these attacks may be isolated cases or maybe be planned beforehand. what those have done DOESN'T reflect on the majority. i have many friends who are muslims who also condemn violence. do you know how they felt when they see some people 'representing' them and do such crazy things?
so, once again, with what mentality do you approach a discussion?
2. how open are we to whatever the other party may say?
there's a saying that a cup that is full cannot be refilled as it will overflow. if we are not ready to listen to what others say, then we are just lying to ourselves when we say we are open for discussion.
we're all humans so we have our ego, pride, emotions, beliefs, biases, etc. however, we also have a brain that is capable of logical thinking. if we are not willing to use our logical thinking in this day and age, how different are we from savages?
3. freedom of speech and freedom after speech are 2 different things. we can speak up but like others have mentioned, do we still have our freedom AFTER we speak? until we have both, i guess we can only wait to go to the ballot box to decide things for ourselves.
---------- Post added at 01:55 PM ---------- 6 hour anti-bump limit - Previous post was at 01:34 PM ----------
The minister already mentioned, cannot use in Malaysia because there are still many people can get too sensitive in this issues.
this is the problem. many ministers say many things. however, none of them can provide any concrete evidence or facts to support what they say. people get too sensitive about it? do you see 60% of 22million people go burn churches?
this is like how we often laugh at the film censorship board over the 18SG, SX and U ratings. it doesn't mean that when they cut away those kissing scenes, malaysians won't kiss. having such a mentality will only make the general public doubt their credibility and professionalism.
as of now, the credibility of the ministers are low and possibly even zero. as a minister, if you don't even bother to show credibility by facts and keep using feelings or other means of measure, then they are not fit to be a minister.
What I understand was, the gov is worrying if this case made big, it will effect the economy. When effect the economy, it will got blamed. But, when it got blame or even voted down, also not as susah as those people who lost their job or come out school cannot find jobs due to the economy no good.
worrying that one word will affect an entire economy to the point of having a ministry and multiple NGOs act and react in such a way? isn't that like using a using a meat cleaver to cut vege?
there are many reasons why our economy is not in good shape. they should fix those first instead of worrying about one word will turn millions of malaysians into barbarians and start vandalizing buildings and hurting people.
It is not all about religion. You can choose to ignore this fact by throwing the responsibility to police or gov. But ask yourselves, how and what you gonna do if suka-suka got people report bomb, got people splash petrol, got people do something funny in random place with random ways? Who is the one who got hit in the 1st wave and who suffer in long term?
the govt is making the issue a religious issue even though it is not. you should tell this to the govt.
And, when you are believing this allah case is a religion or race related case, hope you also aware that it may be one of the thermometer poked by the gov, to evaluate the level and plan for the next move, either economy planning or election. But this is not that important. The most important thing is that, when reading these few pages in this thread, do we spotted our weakness? Do we learned?
why would the govt 'poke' a religious thermometer that has got nothing to do with the economy? if they wish to play the race card again for the next election, that is up to them. it is unfair for them to withdraw the license or ban a word just for political reasons. having said that, if what you say is true, then the public will see it that the ruling govt is willing to resort to such things just to stay in power while watching our economy slip further down.