Dawud, who claims to possess intellectual capacity, wrote a letter to malaysiakini , which was published. Unfortunately, Dawud wishes to impose the reasoning churned out by his or her capacity on others; thereby denying others the possibility of going through the intellectual process for themselves.

From this line forward, any reference to Dawud would be in the form of the male pronoun, because Dawud is an Arabic as well as Hebrew name for a male. If Dawud is a female writer taking a male name, this error of gender cannot be mine.

He proposed that the Malaysian government do something to shut down malaysiakini because he deemed malaysiakini an irresponsible news-site spreading lies and distortion. If that is indeed the case, where are the criminal charges, where are the civil defamation suits which would surely be piling up?

He claims to have been a permanent resident in Malaysia for more than three years. As a Malaysian, I'm deeply saddened that someone is attracted to live permanently in Malaysia due to his perception that the Malaysian government can and should do what he suggests in his letter.

Amongst the more worrying lines that he has penned:

"You (i.e. malaysiakini ) stand for something which is an impossibility in the face of practical reality - racial and religious harmony and the success of all Malaysians within the national framework cannot be continuously enhanced or achieved unless the clear distinction of race and religion are acknowledged."

Surely the last phrase flies in the face of the government's own policy of creating a Malaysian nation (Bangsa Malaysia) by 2020. Whether one believes it's achievable by that date is a different issue, but believing in perpetuating clear distinction in race as the way forward, like Dawud does, is an entirely different cattle of fish.

I think putting religion in his argument is an irresponsible move, one which clearly lacks background knowledge. Malaysians, generally, do not concern themselves with seeing their different religious adherence as a problem in their daily life.

No non-Muslim in Malaysia will ridicule a Muslim's avoidance of pork. Similarly, no Muslims are going to force-feed beef to a Hindus. Equally, no non-Buddhists will object to big Wesak Day processions. Therefore, I think Dawud's putting of race and religion in the same breath has somewhat missed the point.

Yes, Malaysians debate about racial issues, Malaysians feel strongly about it; a significant number of Malaysians feel that certain government policies are not quite right, rather strong-armed; an equally significant number of Malaysian think that the Malaysian opposition is out of their senses.

Yes, Malaysians have differing views, but for a permanent resident, a non-citizen to suggest to the government that it should stifle these debates and arguments is going overboard. Perhaps he should consider relocating to Cuba. Much as I could say about its superior health provision (third best in the world), I think Dawud would find the political environment there appropriate for him.

Nobody can criticise, rightly or wrongly, the Cuban president, under threat of jail. No political parties are allowed. No alternative views other than those authorised by the state are allowed. That sounds pretty much like Dawud's ideals when he criticised malaysiakini as a 'poison' to Malaysia.

He also wrote such:

"As Malaysia's own human rights are gradually being brought into sync with Islam, you will soon be at a stage to either accept the fortunate circumstances Malaysia finds itself in or renounce your citizenship and settle in Siberia to practise your theoretical ideas and systems."

I don't think the Malaysian human rights situation would be downgraded if brought more into sync with Islam. I must stress on the equal and just Islamic principles. (I'm not saying that there are unequal and unjust Islamic principles that we should avoid, more in the next paragraph).

Tariq Ramadhan, a European Muslim philosopher has recently called for a moratorium on hudud penalties in all Muslim countries, because the way they are carried out do not mete justice, which is a feature of Islam. He said the conditions for hudud are not met in any Muslim country today with Malaysia being mentioned too.

The mufti of Egypt had asked for time to consider Ramadhan's views. Therefore, this is not a man whom detractors might want to conveniently term as a loose cannon in order to discredit him, rather than go through the potentially lengthy inconvenience of discussing or debating with him.

In fact, if Malaysia's human rights records were indeed to be brought more into sync with Islam, Dawud might find it more difficult to have totalitarian actions like shutting people up simply because he doesn't agree with them.