Moving Backwards

While catching up with my backdated Newsweek magazines that I subscribe to, I came across this article by Christopher Hitchens on theocracy and why it won't work to govern a country. I think it did a great job in explaining the effects of theocracy in the Middle East. Here are excerpts of the article that I particularly resonated to:

[...] The immediate result of theocratic policy when measured by the standard of repression is pretty clear and getting ever clearer: any government that imagines it has a divine warrant will perforce deal with its critics as if they were profane and thus illegitimate by definition. [...] and watch what happens to a state or society that forbids itself the secular catharsis of self-criticism.

A country that attempts to govern itself from a holy book will immediately find itself in decline: the talents of its females repressed and squandered, its children stultified by rote learning in madrassas, and its qualified and educated people in exile or in prison. There are no exceptions to this rule... [...]

But when the crops fail and the cities rot and the children's teeth decay and nothing works except the ever-enthusiastic and illiterate young lads of the morality police, who will the clerics blame? They are not allowed to blame themselves, except for being insufficiently zealous. Obviously it must be because the Jews, the Crusaders, the Freemasons have been at their customary insidious work.

A failed state that cannot allow any grown-up internal debate, or any appeal against the divine edict, will swiftly become an even more failed state and then a rogue one because its limitless paranoia and self-pity must be projected outward.

Though the article is talking about the importance and direct interest to prevent Iranian regime from threatening the global security with nuclear weapons, I can't help but see the tremendous resemblance in the spiralling events in Malaysian politics in the past couple of years. For one, the detention of certain news reporters or bloggers by ISA in attempt to prevent them from criticizing the government is a sign that the country is embarking upon the path of an autocratic nation. The many privileges for the "bumiputeras" notwithstanding, there has been an increasing lack of tolerance for other religions' freedom of speech, or just non-Muslims in general voicing their dissent in certain governmental policies. All these has put Malaysia under the international spotlight, creating a negative image of Malaysia as a hypocritical nation -- one that prides itself to be a cultural melting pot of multiple religions and uses the slogan "Malaysia, Truly Asia" yet rules the nation by what seemed to resemble much of theocracy. One can't help but wonder, rather than wooing the global community and investors alike with its well-established "achievement" of intercultural harmony, is Malaysia regressing and following the footsteps of the radical Middle Eastern extremists instead? Anyone who is paying attention to the current events in Malaysia might sense that there is an imminent danger looming about the grim political climate, and if the government doesn't put a halt to the political movement carried out by certain parties, it is only a matter of time when things can't be suppressed anymore and will eventually blow up.

Regardless of whether this is governing through a holy book, any state that tries to - and I quote Hitchens on this - "forbid itself the secular catharsis of self-criticism" and "repress its people" will find itself in decline. And sadly, that seems to be where Malaysia is heading. Yet despite my seemingly pessimistic prediction, I still believe there is a chance the country won't go down that path. It really depends on the people, and of course the politicians. Especially the politicians. Is 1Malaysia just going to be a mirage? At this point it's hard to tell. But I do hope things will change for the better.