KL Club Crackdown

Kuala Lumpur is a bizarre mix of mall culture, women in headscarves, fabulous nightlife, and Sharia law. But a recent crackdown on "indecency" in nightclubs is stirring debate over whether a secular constitution can endure alongside an "Islamic Department" that keeps watch over the sexual mores of Muslims. Asia Times reports on a widely publicized raid at one of Southeast Asia's most famous nightspots:

The music suddenly stopped, the lights came on and dozens of uniformed and plainclothes Islamic police were crowding the dance floor, shouting, gesticulating and ordering…Police from the Federal Territory's Islamic Department separated Muslims from non-Muslims. While non-Muslims were told to party on, Muslims were herded into trucks and taken to the department's head office.

Whole thing here.

Comments

[Rhywun]

whether a secular constitution can endure alongside an "Islamic Department" that keeps watch over the sexual mores of Muslims

Next month I'm spending two weeks in KL with my (non-Muslim) boyfriend, who is from there. The more I learn about Malaysia, the less I want to visit... Anyone been there?

[Pedro]

I'm wondering whether a secular constitution can endure alongside a "War On Drugs" that results in posts like the last one (5:43).

[isildur]

If it were me, and I were a Muslim there, and mostly what my religion meant was 'get rounded up in trucks when I'm having fun'...

I'd get baptized.

But hey, far be it from me to stop backwards kooky religions from alienating their followers. I'm holding out hope that Christian Rock will do the same thing here in the US.

[Larry]

Well put, isildur.

P.S. does anyone actually put their real email address in the email dialog?

[Douglas Fletcher]

I'd get baptized.

"The faithful" muslims would still consider you an apostate or whatever it is they call someone who rejects Islam. Supposedly they hate them more than they do infidel unbelievers.

[SM]

I've been there on bizniz. Couldn't read much into the country since corporate offices, KFC, Hilton Trantor all tend to homogeneity, eryplace in the Galaxy, & thank God for that. But it definitely was not Saudi Arabia. Seemed very western liberal actually.

IMHO, this seems more like a class conflict than a religious one though there's obviously religion in there too. Government employees/policemen all through Asia tend to be proles, especially in the lower echelons. Nightclub revelers are typically wealthy, &/or employed in the global private sector. This is especially true of the women. I would guess from how the cops "jeered" at the cosmopolitan woman that this was payback time for the village idiots in the gendarmerie. When do we start bombing ?

[Shem]

Douglas-
You could always lie 😉

[Ruthless]

Pondering where Dubya would come down here.
Would he have viewed this differently back when he was still on the sauce?

[Brian]

This is second-hand (from a sister that spent 3 weeks in KL last year), but my understanding is that if you are ethnically Malay and living there, you are considered Muslim by definition in the constitution. So getting baptized might not do the trick.

If you are Chinese, Indian, or Western, you're pretty much in the clear. For now.

[kwais]

I don't know if this is relevant, but I should mention that women in moslem countries seem to be easier than ones in non moslem countries.

Of course this is anectdotal evidence of only 3 encounters of mine. One with a Sunni moslem, one with a Shia moslem, and one with a Christian Arab.

So to answer Rhywun's question, I can't tell you how fun it would be for you, but it might be fun for your boyfriend, even if y'all break up. Or maybe especially if y'all break up.

[Rhywun]

I can't tell you how fun it would be for you, but it might be fun for your boyfriend

I doubt it, since he likes guys... for which they can toss you into jail. Maybe that too only applies to Muslims?? (He is Chinese). Malaysia is definitely a strange country...

[kwais]

Oh, my bad, I take it you are a guy too then. I am an idiot, this has probably come up in another thread.

I have never been to Malaysia. I have met some Malaysians before, and they seemed to be the coolest people.

I think that the Sharia (islamic law) punishment for homosexuality is death by stoning. I'll check on that.

However the strick application of religion makes homosexuality more prolific rather than lest prolific in my humble opinion. There is rampant sexuality in Saudi Arabia, that the authorities have to know about, and they do nothing. You can prevent men and women from hanging out with eachother unless they are married, but you can't prevent men from hanging out with eachother.

And to catch a sexual act in progress is not easy even in a dictatorship.

In Iraq and in Sauid Arabia men walk around holding hands and they kiss eachother when they are happy, even military men in uniform.

So not knowing Malaysia, I would think that you would be cool, based on what I have seen in other moslem countries. I think you would be more accepted in the moslem countries I have been to than where I am from in the US.

I don't really know. I have just typed a long post and I have never been to Malaysia.

[Rhywun]

I take it you are a guy too then. I am an idiot, this has probably come up in another thread.

No problem... I didn't mention it because it wasn't relevant to the original post... I know the ex-Prime Minister used "sodomy" as an excuse to toss his opponent in jail. Gotta love "democracy" in action...