Malaysian religious indoctrination breeds racists

TMI - National schools ‘breeding racists, extremists’ (extracts):

HUMAN rights lawyer and activist Siti Kasim has branded Malaysia’s national school system as “indoctrinating factories for Malay children” and blamed the system for creating a society that was increasingly polarised.

“In Malaysia, we have institutionalised racism and Islamo-fascism from primary schools right up to university. This is why we have the problems that we have today,” said Siti.

Sweetie has been spot on. But as we have recently witnessed the capitulation of Mahathir to the organised PAS-UMNO rage against Malaysia's ratification of ICERD, most, if not many, Malay males are dead set against non-racism, human rights, equality, but instead very pro racist and racial supremacy.

I've also just read another article in Malaysiakini by one of my fave columnists, equally sweetie FA Abdul.

The article is titled Forcing birds of a feather to flock together where Sweetie informs us that religious teachers have been telling Malay students they are different from nons and should stay clear of those generally 'unclean' infidels, with one ustaz even saying it's haram for Muslim students to be close to people who are not Muslims. He said those non-Muslims could influence Muslims to do wrong things that could eventually make Allah swt angry.

Wow and holy wow, and as Sweetie concluded:

How do we move forward as a nation when religion is continuously used to indoctrinate our children?

Keep religion out

Our children should grow up as one community, appreciating one another as equal members of that community, without being reminded of how they differ from one another.

In order to do just that, all religious elements should be taken out of our schools – and this includes Maszlee’s own proposal to use Islamic teachings to educate students about moral virtues.

After all, anyone would be able to tell you that in order to bring people of different backgrounds together, one should focus on their similarities and not on their differences. [...]

Here’s the thing - we can change the colour of our school shoes, change policies and guidelines or build bigger schools, nicer toilets or even share swimming pools with five-star hotels, but as long as religion creeps into our education system, our schools can never be a place for racial integration.

The school is the first place our children learn to integrate before they learn to function as a unit in a multiracial community. As such, the school is the perfect place for us to nurture young minds to love their friends and neighbours, whatever their race or religion is.

But how do we create bonds among our students when schoolteachers and school systems themselves spawn fear and discrimination?

Perhaps, Maszlee can enlighten us on that.

Mahathir Chosen Pribumi (a racist party)