This was the headline of an article in TheStar not too long ago, regarding the case on Lina Joy’s appeal to change her religion from Islam to Christian in her identity card. Read that article here.
It is sad that Lina was not able to get the ok sign by the court to change her religion status. But possibly there are more underlying things at hand instead of just that situation? Not looking at this in terms of a Muslim converting to Christianity, but more so on where is the tolerance, understanding and freedom, that a person is meant to have.
Having denied her appeal for a change, of course people are going to question why the court decided as such? They have already accepted that she has converted to a different religion and they have also permitted her to change her name in her IC. So why not allow her religion status to be changed as well on paper?
There are a few ways this could be interpreted. One that all the talk of being understanding and tolerant to one another could be just a farce. Two because of the topic ‘religion’ and especially between Islam and Christianity, were there any suspicious agendas on the list? There are claims that there are none… Three, does the government just want to prove a point that their authority is sovereign? Or that there can’t be any argument made on this matter, because the topic is taboo. Just because there are Inter-religion talks doesn’t necessarily mean that everyone is being open and tolerant. Half the time in MYO anyway, it is all talk.
It’s said to be a political decision, and like I stated before, what political decision? For a democracy, shouldn’t the citizens of the country have a right to their free will, their beliefs and rights? I may have possibly gotten the facts wrong on the case, but I didn’t follow it as closely.. so forgive me on that.
***Disclaimer**
It’s a draft, and I’m putting it up anyway cause its my thought, and had to release some tension on how
I’m once again annoyed by something.. So if you made it to the disclaimer…thanks a lot for reading ^_^
