In recent weeks, she often spoke to her family about there being little time left for her to do much of anything, including celebrating the coming Hari Raya Puasa.
That’s when I realised how important gender recognition and acceptance was for her, and how without it, life was not worth living.
I had this strange fear that she was going to take her own life. Of course, the hospital and doctors now tell us she died of a heart problem and low blood pressure. It would not be proper for me to think otherwise.
We as a nation must not let her death go to waste, for we can learn something from this tragic loss of life. If we do nothing, then more lives will be wasted, and more families will be heartbroken or will suffer in silence.
Questions about sexuality, gender, belief, faith and personal freedom are important matters to the individuals concerned.
To many of us, they constitute the core of our existence. That’s why the government (and that includes the ministers, the National Registration Department, religious authorities and judges) should handle these issues with care and gentle consideration.
I know it’s difficult for this government to be gentle and respectful of minorities, or anyone different.
They have begun to believe their own spin: that they are the great protectors of the religion, race and general wellbeing of the Malays.
They have taken it upon themselves to decide for the Malays (who are by law Muslims) everything under the sun, big and small. For example, if the Malays want to sell a piece of property, chances are the Menteri Besar and his exco have to approve the transaction.
I tried to sell a small shoplot after owning the property for four years, but my application was rejected.
Maybe one day during a recession when prices have gone south, I will finally get the approval to sell from these great protectors of my race.
It seems that as a Malay, I am not considered fit enough to decide when I can sell my own property.
I am not fit to take advantage of the market situation. I must be really incapable and weak, like a walking handicap. My rights as a property owner are restricted, but the government will say it’s for my own good.
Not sexual perverts
I apologise for the digression, but this same lack of recognition of our right to choose is reflected in Aleesha’s case.
In future, if a Malay says she is a woman, whether by birth or by biological transformation in adult life (and scientifically or by hormonal testing one can easily establish that assertion to be largely correct), then I hope the National Registration Department will just accept that fact.
Why is the department so interested in denying her proper identity?
I know some will say that we must not give legal recognition to those tampering with God’s design, but this was not what Aleesha was asking for.
She was asking for official recognition of her true self, one that only she and God truly knew. Some scholars reprimanded me for not taking their viewpoints seriously.
Well all I can say is Aleesha’s viewpoint is the only one that is relevant. Its her body and her life.
Others can talk and talk because talk is cheap. Even if we were to go so far as to say that her decision to go for a sex-change operation amounted to tampering with God’s design, what should we then make of visits to the dentist to straighten crooked teeth, or using Botox to make the nose more attractive? Is that not also tampering?
Aleesha was not alone. There are thousands like her who continue to be ostracised, ridiculed and humiliated because of their sexuality.
They may not fit our image of the male or female stereotype, but they are not out to cause mischief.
They are not sexual perverts, nor do they suffer from the curse of God. Their identities are rooted in biology – they are who they are because of their genes and their hormones.
It would not cause anyone any harm if they were to be left alone and accorded the respect and rights that all human beings are entitled to.
Berita Harian yesterday called on us not to ridicule Aleesha. Well it’s too late now – she is gone.
If those in power had been more caring and had not overplayed their role as the great protectors, she may still be alive today.
[Written by Zaid Ibrahim, President of KITA]
“Jews have always been a problem. They have to be confined to ghettos and periodically massacred.”
Those are the exact words of the notoriously sly former prime minister, Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad which were quoted and carried by news media when he launched the maiden assembly of the General Conference for the Support of Al-Quds (GCSQ) in the capital on Jan 20.
Coming from a supposedly great leader and a champion of the Third World, every single ounce of the speech is irresponsible, inciting and racist, to say the least.
It also goes to reflect the nature of Mahathir’s thinking and his deep-rooted hatred of anything Jewish.
However, it has never deterred him or his administration back then to use Jewish elements as long as it benefits him politically and economically.
Allegedly, the Malaysian government employed the services of disgraced US lobbyist Jack Abramoff to secure an audience with the then US President George W Bush.
He blamed the 1997-1998 Asian Financial Crisis squarely on currency speculators led by one George Soros, a Jew (which he then retracted after a meeting with Soros years later). Mahathir’s administration employed financial giants Salomon Smith Barney and Citigroup, also with clear Jewish links, to assist the country in climbing out of the crisis.
The superficial antagonism of Mahathir towards Jews is a clear paradox to his irrefutable association with them.
In fact, back in the 80’s his rumoured involvement in the Freemason movement put him on the backfoot, to the extent that he had to deny it in his speech during an Umno general assembly in that period.
Mahathir can wear the facade of an anti-Semitic while behaving in the exact manner at almost the same time.
His Jew-bashing speech at the GCSQ event did not end there and Mahathir also spewed venom on the Western imperialists, taking aim at the United States.
The absurdity of his speech reached nonsensical heights when he drummed up a conspiracy theory ala Michael Moore that the Sept 11 attack on World Trade Centre in New York was staged by the US in order to attack Iraq and Afghanistan, i.e. the Muslim world.
Only Mahathir is capable of throwing everything including the kitchen sink towards his victim while nonchalantly absolving himself of all blame.
After being awed by Hollywood’s technological prowess visualised by the brilliantly executed James Cameron sci-fi movie “Avatar”, Mahathir came to an almost seemingly outrageous conclusion that the “self-inflicted” Sept 11 attacks on the World Trade Centre in New York was staged by the US themselves.
While some fringe wannabe commentators (myself included) are unable to fathom the logic and reasoning of Mahathir’s rants, many of his die-hard fans will believe every shred of nonsense that comes out of his mouth.
It goes to show a basic fundamental problem with Malaysians (especially hardcore Umno-ites and Malay nationalists) that this veteran leader is the only hero that they can look up to.
Much revered for his material and economic contributions to the country, these same people seem to easily forgive and forget that Mahathir himself has allowed billions of ringgit (RM100 billion according to Barry Wain’s recent book) to be leaked from the nation’s coffers to satisfy his enormous megalomaniac appetite.
Billions were squandered and lost due to comatose projects like Perwaja and the LRT system, which bear Mahathir’s insignia.
Nepotism, cronyism and abuse of power have been the order of the day.
Mahathir feeds on the dogmatic and Malay-nationalist patriotic junkies with his often racist statements on Malay rights and supremacy of the Malay race.
He started out as an Ultra-Malay, according to the first prime minister Tunku Abdul Rahman Putra Al-Haj. Mahathir then ruled the country for 20-odd years, displaying his liberal side but never lost any of his anti-imperialist and anti-Semitic rhetoric.
By wearing the “Keffiyah” symbolising his solidarity with the Palestinians’ struggle, Mahathir has shown his ultimate chameleon side.
For an over-hyped statesman and one that has his own World Peace Conference, implicating leaders from the West with crimes against humanity, ideas of persecuting any race or community is definitely not just and peaceful.
While he criticises and insinuates against everyone that crosses his path, Mahathir comes across as someone who is out of time and definitely out of tune much like how Lee Kuan Yew is for Singapore.
His economic policies have shown failure and the spill over effects are felt up until today, with the country now lagging to even compete with minnows back in the 1970’s like Indonesia, Thailand and even Vietnam.
He built a coterie of cronies that sucked the wealth and resources of the country to the point that it was unbearable for the economy.
His leadership was an absolute nightmare, none more so than the devilish treatment of his once anointed successor, Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim, who was stripped, beaten and jailed in 1998.
He has created a political monster in Umno that gobbles up everything in its path and rules the country according to their whims and fancies.
While the tallest and biggest super-structures were built, education, healthcare and welfare of the commoners deteriorated.
This dinosaur of a leader does not deserve the accolades that Malaysians shower him with.
As he is being shunned by the rest of the world except for Venezuela, Zimbabwe as well as Iran, and is being left behind by globalisation and rapid technological advances, Malaysians especially Umno-ites and Malay nationalists need to free themselves from the man called Mahathir, to move on into the real world.
Mahathir, the Jews are not the problem, you are!
[Source : The Malaysian Insider]
"Even after their massacre by the Nazis of Germany, they survived to continue to be a source of greater problems of the world. The holocaust failed as a final solution," he said. OMG, what is this man saying? Is he regretting that Hitler failed in his evil pursuit to finish off the entire Jewish people? So, if the final solution by Hitler did not work, is Mahathir planning to launch his own "Ultimate Solution" on the Jews then? Now comes the biggie. If they can make Avatar, then they can make "9/11" to create the impression that Muslim terrorists carried out the acts and he went on to cast aspersions on the Americans that they are nothing but a bunch of cold blooded murderers. Like he said, "Killing innocent people to provide an excuse for war is not new to the US." I believe that the Americans have a chat with this fellow before he starts to create "WWIII". By all account, the genocide of 6m Jews must be a myth created by the Americans.
