ONE question to those calling for blasphemy laws to be used against the woman at the centre of a controversial stand-up comedy skit: Should online trolls be investigated if they “insult” other faiths too?
That is what vocal women’s rights group Sisters In Islam (SIS) wants to know as the firestorm over Siti Nuramira Abdullah’s performance at the now-shuttered Crackhouse Comedy Club last week burns on.
SIS executive director Rozana Isa noted that veteran singer-actress Fauziah Ahmad Daud a.k.a. Ogy is being trolled online for calling those who mock religion “uncreative”.
Rozana told FocusM that netizens are “disrobing” the headscarf-clad Fauziah by posting old pictures of her from when she was not wearing the tudung, essentially questioning her faith and insinuating that “she wasn’t always an angel”.
“Should those people who disrobed her and put up those photos as a way to shut Ogy up be investigated under Section 298A of the Penal Code as well?” Rozana asked. “If not, why? What makes them think it is okay to ‘disrobe’ Ogy on social media like that over what she said?”
Siti Nuramira is currently the talk of the town following her controversial performance at a comedy club last month where she discarded her headscarf and baju kurung in a skit that was seen as distasteful and offensive to some.
On Wednesday (July 13), Siti claimed trial to a charge of causing disharmony among Muslims as a result of her performance at the Crackhouse Comedy Club in Kuala Lumpur on June 4.
Framed under Section 298A of the Penal Code for religious insults, the charge provides for a two- to five-year-jail sentence for those found guilty. She is expected to make her RM20,000 bail today, news reports say.
Like other comedians, Fauziah chipped in on the matter, making heads turn by saying she would have “skinned them alive” if “these comedians were my children”, and telling comedians to emulate comedy legend Charles Chaplin by never being biadab (rude).
Think before you act
Clarifying that she was not advocating for the use of blasphemy laws, Rozana said she simply wanted people to put on their thinking caps before making such a call themselves.
In fact, she said Section 298A of the Penal Code needs to be repealed in its totality, along with other blasphemy-like laws and similar provisions in shariah law as well.
“We need better laws related to hate speech that follows the Rabat Plan of Action,” she said, referring to a United Nations (UN) document that prohibits the advocacy of national, racial or religious hatred that leads to incitement to discrimination, hostility or violence.
But Rozana said it did not come as a shock to her that Siti Nuramira’s “stunt” got the reactions and responses that it did, saying this was the sad reality of life in Malaysia.
“The reactions came about because of the reality of our social and political context now where any contrarian actions and remarks that relate to Islam will usually be seen from the lens of being threatening, subverting or insulting the religion.”
If Malaysians want world-class comedy acts, then “we have got to be a better society” and “raise our own personal standards in treating other people”, regardless of religion, race, gender and other differences.
“Siti’s act is certainly not the first act that people generally disliked or disagreed with, and it certainly won’t be the last,” Rozana pointed out.
Rozana also slammed the netizens’ sexist responses and policing of what women wear by training her guns at Fauziah’s online trolls in particular.
“Before the 2000s, the majority of women were wearing clothes of their eras. Their clothing and fashion sense weren’t an insult to any religion, weren’t meant to insult any religion and should not be regarded as an insult to religion now,” she observed.
“Fashion and cultures evolve over time and that’s a reality. These clothes and fashion were worn by our grandmothers, mothers, aunts, sisters, wives and daughters. What they wore then didn’t make them less of a person than who they are now, and it certainly didn’t make Ogy a lesser person then,” she added. – July 18, 2022
Photo credit: Rotikaya
