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the usual suspect said::

Taken from http://www.msnbc.com/

Malaysian Islamic body bans yoga for Muslims

Edict against practice reflects growing influence of conservative Islam

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia - Malaysia's top Islamic body, fresh from banning tomboys, issued an edict Saturday that prohibits Muslims from practicing yoga, saying that elements of Hinduism in the ancient Indian exercise could corrupt them.

The National Fatwa Council's chairman, Abdul Shukor Husin, said many Muslims fail to understand that yoga's ultimate aim is to be one with a god of a different religion — an explanation disputed by many practitioners who say yoga need not have a religious element.

"We are of the view that yoga, which originates from Hinduism, combines physical exercise, religious elements, chanting and worshipping for the purpose of achieving inner peace and ultimately to be one with god," Abdul Shukor said.

News of the yoga ban prompted activist Marina Mahathir to wonder what the council will ban next: "What next? Gyms? Most gyms have men and women together. Will that not be allowed any more?"

The edict reflects the growing influence of conservative Islam in Malaysia, a multiethnic country of 27 million people where the majority Muslim Malays lost seats in March elections and where minority ethnic Chinese and mostly Hindu ethnic Indians have been clamoring for more rights.

Recently, the council said girls who act like boys violate Islam's tenets. The government has also occasionally made similar conservative moves, banning the use of the word "Allah" by non-Muslims earlier this year, saying it would confuse Muslims.


woweee.
so muslims do their ashtanga and butches are not allowed in malaysia.
im appalled that in this time and day, educated people in fairly developed countries are expected to put up with their religious leaders' puerile complex.

unlike in singapore where they said the snake's very bright and scholarly head is often detached from the body, it seems that in our neighbouring lands, a seemingly socially progressive AND multiracial body is being led by a head still somewhere stuck in the kumpung era.

i care about this cos my future husband's from kl and who knows when a day will come when i will have to uproot and be on the other side of the causeway?

i certainly do not wish to, but hell, they say never say never.


now there is nothign wrong with faith, we all need a lil faith to get by.
but here it seems like religion is being misconstructed and intellectually abused.
in an extremist point of view, i see a club being run by buncha self-righteous bigots wielding control over a social construct that functions as opium for the masses.

a law banning yoga for fear of hindu religious influences just screams PROTECTIONIST!

why are you muslim clerics so afraid of your own people abandoning their islamic faith?
by assuming that when a muslim does his or her sun salutations he or she might be so drawn into the hindu theology of things that they will jump ship shows the arrogant perception of the religious leaders themselves.

it implies that some of Malaysia's religious leaders have theoretically dumbed down their muslim 'followers' to the true sense of the word.

simple minded cronies who cannot discern between holistic health and their own faith.
honestly, you believe that your followers are merely blind mice?
this brings me back to Marx's idea of religion as 'opium for the masses'.

in my opinion, i cant help for feel that this social construct called religion is for people who are ultimately afraid of being in limbo, of whats beyond their control, especially what's in store for us after death?

now i am all for doing whtaever one feel's like.
surely everyone is entitled to the notion of choice and free to practise whatever religion that they are spiritually inclined towards.
i say, do whatever that nourishes your soul and inspire you to be a better person.

im staunchly atheist but i have no qualms singing how great thou art at my cousin's church wedding (what a lovely song!) or holding joss sticks at the temple and sincerely seeking blessings for my loved ones.

i mean, i get my taste of the opium too. there are significant moments in my life when i find myself speaking to god, and god the spirital meaningfulness that doesnt take the form of a man, woman or animal.

in my bid to become the global citizen i aspire towards, i earnestly keep an open mind towards all forms of religious teachings that i encounter in my travels and heatily partake in their rituals. i see religions in the context of socio-cultural formations.

but to instill a list of superficial no-nos in the vein of religious protectionism?

its a reflection of a core, primal human stain that is present in all of us.
the need to glorify our own choices and advocate them as superior and worthy of followers.
care and share you say?
it is in our human nature to build a herd mentality around our personal choice as it affirms its validity.

perhaps a religion is not a religion without communal membership?
to fear the exodus of members and fretting over their personal abandonment of faith?
thats when your own divine faith is clouded by real human fears, and the unpolluted mind turns politcal.

and that in no sense entails moral cleansing or the divine act of enlightenment.
to turn political is but a trait of the human stain, bringing us down to the lelvel of mere mortals.

bloody bigoted hypocrites.








the usual suspect said::

gracie lou freebush
miss artful dodger
1986
st.nicks/cjc/nus theatre studies
//
Let each man exercise the art he knows.
Aristophanes

The drama is not dead but liveth
and contains the germs of better things.
-william archer

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is this the real life?
is this just fantasy?
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