An Open Letter To Most of my Countrymen with Half a Brain

Dear sir's and Madams,

Recently the whole issue on the word "Allah" has been thrust into the limelight of our local media, where a raid by the Selangor Religious Department (JAIS) illegally apprehended members of the Bible society of Malaysia, on the reason of them distributing bibles that still referred to God as "Allah". Now there are stories of a protest that is going to be conducted whilst Christians are having their Sunday Mass by a group of Muslims. Since when did we revert to the days of Ignorance a.k.a Jahilliyah, why are we so worried that the usage of a word such as Allah will corrode the faith of the Muslims. Why is it that we are repeating the mistakes of the Catholics in the 15th Century that is the religious Inquisition, too root out "threats" to the faith.

Why do we always force others to accept our dominance, for is not the most dominant one the God of our faith. Does not God, Allah, Yahweh or whatever you choose to call the supreme being, say that we must respect one another, and not fight amongst each other. My friends what is needed is more critical thought over our own actions, we should not condemn those who we feel are wrong just because they are of a different belief than us, instead we should engage each other in dialogue and we will see that there is no difference between us. Alas, i know the people who really need to be enlightened by these words i have written will not be enlightened as they are too busy fanning the flames of hate and ignorance, but for those who do, please take a moment to ponder as to the beauty of all religions and how all religions are in fact one regardless of the semantics and distinctions that are made by those who claim to know better, for did not the supreme being give us all minds to think with.

Shalom Aleichem, Asalamualaikum, and Peace be Upon you all.

Ashli

Prices?

Recently there has been a widespread feeling of dissatisfaction among the people of my country, due to the rise in costs of living. So much so that it led to the recently concluded "TURUN" rally which supposedly was to urge the government to lower living costs. My problem in the whole scheme of things is that 1) I agree the government should do something to  keep the economy afloat and the price increase is justifiable to a certain extent. However at the same time this brings me to problem number 2) The government should also start cutting the salaries of the members of parliament, and other higher ranking officials who are earning salaries higher than 15K a month as well as stop this need for government aid to the people because this is what is draining our economy in the first place.

In addition to this issue, I personally believe that members of the opposition should not even participate in events such as "TURUN" because they too are partly the reason why the country is going arse over tit. They earn just as much as the Government officials do, but yet because it is a "Government" decision to increase prices they feel that they can latch on to the feeling of dissatisfaction for their own gains. At the end of this diatribe i feel that there is a need for everyone to have some minor knowledge about economics because then and only then can they rationally decide whether or not the price hikes are justified instead of just jumping on the band wagon because prices have risen.

Think For Yourselves For Once People,
Ciao,
Ash "The Dashing" Li