Friends Of STAR

I have been receiving a lot of emails about this article (of course, there are lots more emails about the RM15 million marriage). Just a reminder, you don't have to email me about your feeling - just post whatever you feel on the comment box and I promise you, with the moon as my witness, I will not censor anything.

First, who is Ariff Alfian Rosli? Many claimed he was from MCKK and some went as far as calling the school MC Gay Gay. Just to get it right, MCKK does not produce gays but they produce a number of great politicians and great businessmen. Of course, it is just incidental that one of the high profile sodomy cases happening right now involves a former MCKK old boy.

Ariff Alfian, I believe, is a former head prefect (or like they call them now "ketua umum") of Sekolah Menengah Seksyen 5, Wangsa Maju. He is also one of the brightest boys ever produced by the school. I was told, PETRONAS send only a few people, probably less than 10, to do medicine overseas. You need to score straight As in all subjects to win such scholarship so probably Ariff Alfian scored straight As in all subjects. In other words, unlike many of us he is not an ordinary guy, at least academically.

Gay is a word (a noun or an adjective) that refers to a homosexual person. The term was originally used to refer to feelings of being "carefree", "happy", or "bright and showy"; it had also come to acquire some connotations of "immorality" as early as 1637. The term's use as a reference to homosexuality may date as early as the late 19th century, but its use gradually increased in the 20th century. (The reference is from Wikipedia)

Being gay used to be looked down in almost every part of the world. In fact, almost all countries have laws that prohibit homosexual relationship until a few years ago. A few years ago some countries begun to dismantle homosexuality laws and some including some states in the US of A and most countries under EU legalized gay marriage. And probably Ireland is one of them.

If you look closely, most of the countries that legalize gay marriages are countries that strongly believe in individual rights over collective rights. If you read UK newspapers, you wonder whether criminals have better rights than victims. There are cases where victims who tried to protect their properties or their loved ones were instead punished. That is just a crude example of individual right.

Homosexuality is not only abhored by common people but universally by almost all religions. So the legalization of gay relationship goes against the principle of almost all religions in this world. If you are gay, we can safely conclude, you are not religious. But courts in America and Europe strongly lean towards individual rights over collective rights so you have gays pastors, gay preachers and so and so in such countries.

If there is anyone to blame for this fiasco, it is the religious bodies. Schools now have more religious lessons than 20 or 30 years ago. We are being bombarded with religion daily through radio, televison and billboards. But they are more interested in form and not substance. True, we have a number of "murtads" but most are those who converted to Islam through marriage and once the marriage crumbles, they apply to court to renounce Islam. It happens because we do not teach them the good things about Islam but we are more interested about numbers. We are interested about how many Christians convert to Islam and not how many many have now become good Muslims. We are more interested about how many get caned for drinking beer? We are more interested about how many foods contain DNA traces of pig? I remember clearly, the case of body-snatching at a local hospital not so long ago. It was a tug-of-war between a religious body and a Hindu family. At that time, I was a frequent visitor to the hospital since my wife had been warded for some health reasons. There were a lot of unclaimed bodies at KLH and most were Muslims. No religious body was interested to help them. And they died unknown except there were some humble Muslims at the hospital who went round collecting donations to ensure these Muslims were propely buried according to Muslim rites. Yes sir, no religious body was interested in these dead drug addicts or misers since their deaths would go unannounced in newspapers or TV. They were more interested in high-profile cases even if the guy's Islamic status was doubtful.

The question of why we still have cases like Ariff Alfian Rosli is best answered by the relevant religious bodies. To say that a highly bright guy such as Ariff fall down to temptations is totally unjustifiable. If a highly intelligent guy could succumb to temptations then God help most of us.

The case of Ariff Alfian Rosli is not an isolated case. Personally, I know two other cases of old boys (those from STAR and not MCKK) cohabiting with Mat Saleh in homosexual relationship. One in USA and another in Australia. So to call MCKK MC Gay Gay is not the right thing to do.

Since it is almost impossible for Malaysian authorities (including the religious minister who said he would investigate this matter) to interfere in this case, it is best we let the case rest. The best government could do is to get PETRONAS off his parents' back.

PHOTOS HERE