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Vivian Lee is going to prison for six months over a FB post featuring ‘bak kut teh’ with a halal sign during Ramadan. I do not know her personally. However, I am compelled to write something for her, not to seek excuses but to see how we as a society could show some compassion and forgiveness for her.

What she did in that FB post was inappropriate and wrong. Her ‘lifestyle’ before her bak kut teh antics probably did not meet the approval of many, too.

I am here not to comment on the jail sentence she received. I am here to say that sometimes playing pranks could change our whole life if we are not careful.

What happened to Vivian Lee is very unfortunate. I wish the society will look at her more gently. Did she have a history of inciting others, of deliberately causing racial tension, or of indulging in politicking using race and religion as template? I am afraid we might have judged her based on her ‘unconventional’ lifestyle.

I urge all of us to think a little of what we did when we were young. Did youthful exuberance spur us into doing many silly things? Did the free spirit and the inexperience in us lead us to experiment with life’s many colours and shades? Many of us must be thankful we did not get to face the consequences as Vivian is now facing.

At age 27 and now going to jail for six months, I think it is not just the physical trauma and punishment that she must go through.  She will face a lifelong stigma from which it will be so difficult to disassociate.

I believe we must all be responsible for our actions. However, sometimes we must temper punishment with compassion, more so for young offenders who have not shown consistent pattern of bad behaviour and have not committed physical violence. A compassionate society must be a society that believes in second chances.

I think Vivian Lee has suffered and probably have learnt enough from this episode of her life. I wish that a Muslim individual or an organisation could come up to say something magnanimous on her behalf. It will go a long way to help healing the wound, not just for her but also for Muslims hurt by her indiscretion and antics.

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