In UK doctors are regulated by BDMA. It's argued that doctors are not allowed to resign from it just to escape discipline. Now suppose that people assumed you are a doctor just cos your parents are one and also the BDMA was an evil organization that jails people who try to leave it. (Seems to me you can say as soon as you they pronounce that sentence, they have admitted you are not a doctor and therefore they have no authority over you and cannot jail you.)

Now what about if your dad is a doctor, you don't wear a tie, you try to leave the BDMA ? They might turn around and say he's not really proclaiming himself a non doctor he's just trying to escape punishment for not wearing a tie. The problem is in the automatic assumption that you are a doctor. It seems right and proper to apply BDMA rules to people who have declared themselves doctors. I shouldn't incurr any time or money proving I'm a doctor. It's up to them to prove I'm a doctor. Like it's upto a court to prove people guilty, not for them to prove themselves innocent .....

The BBC report about lina joy is not particularly not radical

What's your religion ? If it's upto the upto civil court to decide your religion.'

joke: I met 3 guys in the Café yesterday I asked them what relgion they were The Tibetan said "I'm a Buddhist", The Ethiopian "I worship the Rain God. The 3rd said : "I'm a Malaysian I don't know what religion I am ... the court didn't tell me yet ?"

If it's upto the upto the courts to decide your religion then it's a case of the government telling people what to think.

Why bother having elections, we could just get the court to tell us how the people should vote.

I thought there was supposed to be no compulsion in Islam ?

I think that what most Malays feel in this country is that Islam is their culture and the foundation of their being, even though they may not practice it so hard, and so a Malay actually wanting to leave Islam is really shocking. It's partly racial but they feel that all Malays have this obligation to defend their culture and religion, and that once a person can easily just say goodbye to this culture without any difficulty, then the culture would be severely weakened and eroded. I can sympathise with them having lived through the sixties and seventies in UK. The same sort of social decay looks like it is happening here in the same sort of way mainly as a result of capitalism US style, rampant materialism and the decline of values which really ought to be universal - not sectarian. I believe in a Universal religion which embodies these core values, whether it is Buddhist, Christian or Islamic.

4 million died in Congo 1998-2004 = 2000/day

I'll just comment briefly cos
1. Foreigners know nothing about Malaysia and are not allowed to express opinions
2. Each persons religion is their own when it doesn't effect other people
3. Perspective in the scale of things it not such a big deal it's not life or death we are talking about something that only effects the lives of say 1000 people a year. Decisions which lead to the deaths of 50+ people a year are surely more important. The point of principle is that irrational laws should not be able to stand.

The current situation is :
1. bad for people Like Lina Joy.
2. Bad for Malaysia cos to the rest of the world Malaysia looks like a banana republic where people are oppressed and jailed for thought crime. And a place with a twisted sense of morality.
3. Bad for Malaysia cos it encourages a culture of self censorship and lying which makes for poor decision making
4. Bad for Islam - it makes it look like a weak pathetic religion who members don't stay in cos it's good, but cos they are terrorised into staying.

I feel that if religion is something you can adopt one day and then discard the next then it wouldn't be religion. - That argument is a "straw man" no-one is talking about dropping a religion in a day, but the right wing politicians want this to be the argument as it's easy to attack. If someone goes through a 6 year court case then it’s not a one day decision is it ? (also she converted 17 years ago) BTW contrast this with the 30s it takes a man to get a divorce. The same politicians support making a life changing decision in a flippant way on that occasion. Also contrast this with the 60 years it took a court to decide one guy wasn't a Muslim.

Some people don't see the point of religion and think it is part of the problem rather than part of the solution.
Yep ... Good people make good actions irrespective of their religion. Wheras bad people often hide behind their religion, to justify bad actions

But I consider myself as "religious" (even though I'm not always virtuous) and true religion is I fell what is lacking in the world today.
No I disagree religious people don't have a monopoly on morality. Morality based on logic is surely better than morality based on dogma. An often quoted case is that American towns with high church attendances, have higher crime. Indeed surely countries with few religious believers like Scandinavia or Holland have better standards. Contrast this with so called religious countries where prostitution, incest and other forms of exploitation are rife. Logic gives you the idea of putting yourself in the other persons position before taking action. Wheras to me it seems many religious people continually twist morality to benefit themselves.

Maybe this a case in point instead of imagining what it is like to be in the situation of this poor woman ie. not believe, then fall in love with someone yet be prevented from following the natural pattern of her life : not free to be with person she loves, have his children or choose her own job, when we know there is no direct impact on our lives even if she did marry him then their argument is purely theoretical "well if 1000s of people copied her then society 'could' fall apart." What's so good about non change anyway ? If change wasn't permitted then Malays couldn't have changed to Islam in the first place. Surely we should all be compelled to go to the mosque, all compelled to vote for the government, because by doing otherwise weakens society.

That's why the world and human society is in such a mess.
Again I disagree "We have never had it so good", In the bad old days husband beat their wives, people turned a blind eye to child molestation and millions died in intertribal wars, also slavery and discrimination were acceptable. Religions have bad history of covering up child abuse cos they don't want to see the religion harmed. Today the world is altogether more grown up.

Religion means a great deal to me.
Being good means a lot to me.

I think that what most Malays feel in this country is that Islam is their culture and the foundation of their being, even though they may not practice it so hard, and so a Malay actually wanting to leave Islam is really shocking.
Again sounds like a politician speaking. A British National Front politician might say "racial intolerance is British, it's the very essence of Britishness. If we all start being racially tolerant then we'll stop being British !

It's partly racial but they feel that all Malays have this obligation to defend their culture and religion, and that once a person can easily just say goodbye to this culture without any difficulty, then the culture would be severely weakened and eroded. I can sympathise with them having lived through the sixties and seventies in UK. I can sympathises with also and it's important to put yourself in their position. But it doesn't mean one has to accept their position as right. It seems to me that one of the problems is they themselves don't put themselves in Lina Joys position.

If you like Elvis, but most others say it's terrible and if people listen to Elvis then the whole fabric of society will fall down , is it right for them to stop you listening to Elvis ?

The same sort of social decay looks like it is happening here in the same sort of way mainly as a result of capitalism US style, rampant materialism and the decline of values which really ought to be universal - not sectarian. This seems to another politicians argument trying to establish a FALSE cause and effect ie. Saying less religion=social decay. Easy to say impossible to prove. You can attribute false cause and effect to anything e.g. before people didn't wear red hats, red hats are a change, red hats cause social decay, red hats are evil, we need to ban red hats.

One could argue the contrary if people chose their religion freely then their morals would come from the heart instead of fear of being caught. If the Imam breaks the law speeds or rapes would it be acceptable to say "we should hush this up cos it might harm confidence in the establishment" ? You seem to be harping back to some golden era which I am not sure ever existed Again now you able to report your neighbour who beats his wife and police take rape claims more seriously.

I don't think there is a big big problem in either Malaysia or the UK. I am rarely a direct victim, but for me Europe is in general more moral. It seems to me most people in Europe rarely break laws, but here in Malaysia the average Muslim breaks the law a dozen times a month from buying pirate DVDs, speeding, jumping red lights, dropping litter being in a place where alcohol is served, not being dressed modestly, bribing a policeman, avoiding taxes and other corruption. Seems they have got into the habit of breaking laws and twisting justifications to suit themselves. Yet would get to heaven and say "well I broke some laws, but I didn't eat pork".
Wheras in England most people are moral, but unfortunately there is a small but noticeable percentage of yobs which means it best to avoid being in a public place on Friday or Saturday nights. Again neither country has much suffering caused, by crime or immorality.

In Malaysia I know crime would be cut if you doubled Indonesians salaries. and police salaries for that matter. I believe in a Universal religion which embodies these core values, whether it is Buddhist, Christian or Islamic. I judge people by their actions, not their religion.

BTW I agree with the last courts decision. but Action should be taken against the Sharia court cos it's incompetent in the way it doesn't reach it's judgements correctly or quickly. The process should be something like. Monday appear before a notary and witnesses. Next Monday same thing. "You seem to be of sane mind", " decision made", Once you have the decision then one would no longer be a Muslim and so can't be prosecuted for it. Apostasy is accepted as a crime (wrongly in my opinion), but it can't be punished as once one has left the faith one is no longer a muslim so not subject to the sharia court. BUT here also the court here seems to think it has the right to sentence people for retraining if they think about leaving the faith, I think that's a law they have made up.

A previous court should have said it's the Sharia court's decision, but since they are incompetent and one can't wait months or years to be fixed, then it's unfair to expect anyone to wait for their ruling, so if you say you're a Christian now then that's enough. End of rant.