From Malaysiakini, 13 Jan 2009
I was absolutely flabbergasted when I read this report in Malaysiakini a few minutes ago. This can't be happening, I thought. It's certainly one of the most absurd - nay, insane - things I've come across thus far outside of Nigeria, Somalia, and Saudi Arabia.Don't these blithering idiots realize: CORPORAL PUNISHMENT IS A MILLION TIMES MORE "SINFUL" THAN DRINKING BEER?
Can't stand the taste of beer myself but I have lots of friends of all colors and creeds who drink - and not one of them is remotely a "bad" person just because they enjoy a couple of beers.
What's going on here is the ugly face of a dying patriarchy, trying to scare people into obedience to benighted, irrelevant, meaningless and barbaric laws invented by the falsely pious for the sole purpose of controlling others.The question that springs to mind is this: if we're going to practise "tough love" in the interest of running "a tight ship" - then why not cane those found guilty of wilfully destroying the environment for private profit? Or those who have been caught demanding kickbacks and bribes? These are far more serious crimes, with long-term negative consequences that affect the entire nation.
Beer-swigging Muslims are in the same category as pot-smoking teenagers. They number in the hundreds of thousands, if not millions. There aren't enough canes to go around if we're going to start caning every "offender." The National Fatwa Council could advise all Muslims who prefer to imbibe Al-Kohol rather than Al-Koran to keep a cane handy with which to flagellate themselves when they go home. Nevertheless, I think the hangover from overindulgence suffices as punishment.
Every Muslim on this planet has a sacred duty to speak out and defend the honor and integrity of his or her faith from being so hideously besmirched by fundamentalist bigots and time-warped fanatics such as those who advocate corporal punishment for activities some people deem pleasurable and which don't actually cause any harm to anybody (except to their own health if done in excess). The worst disease plaguing humanity has always been the deformed consciousness of rabid control freaks who hide behind the façade of "morality" in their obscene lust for power over others.
I'd rather be in the company of a boisterous platoon of beer-drinkers than spend even one minute with any human whose worldview resembles that of a Spanish Inquisitor.May God in her wisdom terminate once and for all the bloodlines of these hypocritical killjoys - unless their children end up marrying Germans.
So be it!
I know it's another nine months to Oktoberfest but after reading that ludicrous news report I just have to soothe my nerves with some gratuitous images of buxom beer-swilling Bavarian beauties. Prost!
[First posted 14 January 2009]
