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This is a real story. In the event that you choose to use it or parts of it, I would appreciate it if you do not use my real name.
A few years ago while I was working and living in a Muslim country abroad, I had the misfortune of being invited by the then Malaysian High Commissioner to that country to a special dinner he was hosting for the visiting Foreign Minister at that time, Syed Albar. I cared little for Syed Albar (and I care even less today) and really did not want to go but out of respect for the High Commissioner - a nice, humble man who asked for my support - I went.
Unfortunately for me, of the 30 or so guests who were invited, I was asked to sit at the same dinner table as Syed Albar, together with the High Commissioner and 8 others. In the course of our pathetic, shallow small talk over dinner, inevitably someone started criticizing the locals. This was and still is a favourite pastime of foreigners in that country. What do you know? Syed Albar cheerfully and enthusiastically chimed in, although he knew about the locals as much as he knew about quantum physics. I sat there listening uncomfortably, as I had developed some close friendships with the locals over my years there though I'm not a Muslim. How cowardly and hypocritical of this Foreign Minister, I thought, rubbishing the people of this host nation he was visiting, behind their backs of course. And he was a fellow Muslim, of all the nerve! One specific criticism he leveled against the locals was how they badly they behaved while on the haj. Apparently he had heard complaints against the locals regarding this. Some others around the table joined in, with anecdote after anecdote. Having had enough of this shameless bashing of the locals, I jumped to their defence, saying my locals friends had, on the contrary, told me about their unpleasant haj experiences in the hands of some of the Arabs who had treated them with disdain at hotels, airports, and so forth, assuming they were uneducated and stupid, simply because they came from a very poor Third World nation. A few around the table started nodding their heads, perhaps in agreement or perhaps to acknowledge that they understood what I was saying.
At this point - and this is the main point of my account - the allegedly learned minister stopped me from continuing, with this classic mother of all arguments. These were his actual words, "We should not criticize the Arabs. After all, the Prophet Muhammad himself was an Arab."
Naturally, every around the table nodded their heads vigorously and muttered some form of agreement with him, except me, of course. I sat there stunned and speechless, hardly believing the words that I had just heard. To Syed Albar, what he had uttered was absolutely logical and reasonable. To me, it was twisted, naive at its best. My contention was not against the Prophet or Arabs. It was the minister's 'logic' or 'rationale' that shocked me.
I fought the urge to pursue the conversation further with a rude and sarcastic question like, "YB, would you criticize a group of Arabs who had raped your mother, wife, and daughters while you watched?"
Of course, I didn't, partly out of respect for the High Commissioner and partly out of fear of reprisal from this powerful UMNO warlord.
I left the dinner early, with a bad taste in my mouth (although the food was fabulous). But more significantly, I left with a very troubled heart. This was one of the highest ranking ministers in our country, one with the potential of becoming the PM or deputy PM, and I had just been exposed to his frightening psyche.
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