I have always tried to stay away from any form of religious discussion, either in private conversations, or in my published writings.

The reason is obvious. Whatever I write or say about any religion, it is going to make somebody boiling mad. It would seem that, more so than the contentious issue of race, religion is one of those questions too close to the hearts of all Malaysians for any public discourse to be possible.

That this is so in Malaysia may be an indication that our experiment in democracy has been deeply flawed.

Democracy is not merely going through the motion of voting once every five years. It is a form of political organisation that is steeped in world history - if one is allowed to talk about any kind of world history.

Ideally, democracy is a way of life, and one of the values it encompasses is that, conflicts within the political community should find articulation and resolution through dialogues and compromise, and not through the use of force and bloodshed. The federal parliament and the various state legislative assemblies are supposed to be the highest political forum for this purpose.

The idea of freedom of speech is precisely to ensure unencumbered expression of public opinions by the citizens at large so that meaningful exchange of views can lead to some general consensus. The assumption is that if we cannot resolve our gravest political problems through peaceful debates, then we are left with no other recourse except through the violent use of force.

Guided democracy

Unfortunately, there is one apparent problem with the idea of free speech. The old tired argument goes that if you give a child the freedom to play with fire, it will eventually burn down the whole house.

People who compare the citizens of a country to mere children never think of themselves as children of course. In their own mind, they are the rational reasonable patriarchal adults who must guide, discipline and control the rest of the nation. And yes, of course, they know better.

Such advocates of guided democracy will point to the May 13 incident in our nation's history, as a perfect example of political freedom gone awry in our young immature democracy. If we open up public discussions in these "sensitive" matters such as race and religion, the spectre of bloodshed will return to haunt us. So they say.

They will further argue that our Malaysians are not ready yet for the responsibility of political liberties. Look at the African continent, they say, and see how some people can never be civilised enough to handle freedom or self-rule. (More than a few Chinamen have told me proudly that the Chinese people will always need dictators like Chairman Mao.)

The more learned among these well-meaning conservatives will even quote J S Mill, the great Guru of liberalism in 19th Century England.

Mill was a great advocate for the freedom of speech as a pre-requisite for the democratic way of life. Even so, in his classic works On Liberty (published 1859), he wrote:

"It is perhaps hardly necessary to say that this doctrine (if political liberty) is only meant to apply only to human beings in the maturity of their faculties. We are not speaking of children, or of young persons below the age which the law may fix as that of manhood or womanhood. Those who are still in a state to require being taken care of by others must be protected against their own actions as well as against external injury. For the same reason, we may leave out of considerations those backward states of society in which the race itself may be considered as in its non-age."

Obviously, even a great European thinker like J S Mill was not free from the prejudice of his own age. According to him, there were "backward states of societies in which the race itself may be considered as in its none-age". The implication is clear: there are races of people so primitive that they have to be cared for like immature children.

Coloured people

Mill was probably thinking of all the coloured people of the world whom the Europeans had colonised. Despite his liberalism, he was probably conditioned by the Euro-centric way of thinking about the world.

A century and a half later, here in the former British colony of Malaysia, we have "coloured people" themselves, thinking that other fellow "coloured people" are also in their "non-age", such that they must be denied the liberties rightfully belonging only to civilised citizens.

That is how the BN came into being after the May 13 incident. The idea was to rope in the opposition parties, so that discussions about "sensitive" subjects could be bought from the volatile cauldron of public opinions to the BN negotiating table behind closed door.

In the language of those in power, the government had to "reduce politicking, in order to concentrate on development."

Thenceforth, the people at large - the "race of non-age" - were forbidden to discuss these sensitive issues in public by all sorts of harsh laws. The Seditious Act even applies to members of parliament, and the Malaysian parliament ceased to be the highest political forum in the land.

Did it work? Many would insist that silencing public discussions on "sensitive" issues had worked to produce the kind of stability and growth that we had witnessed over the last three decades or so. In fact, this will further justify the continued use of all the harsh laws in Malaysia, forever if necessary.

Frankly, I am uncomfortable with the whole argument.

I grant you that, given the heightened racial sentiments of the 1969 elections, and the inflammable aftermaths of the May 13 riots, some sort of drastic actions was necessary. However, to argue that those drastic measures in social coercion and suspension of the most fundamental rights of the people should be institutionalised forever, is quite another different story.

For one thing, we have only one single cause-and-effect analysis on why May 13 occurred. It was the government version as contained in a white paper. Did it really happen that way, and for that reason? We have no other recourse to the truth. It is one of those sensitive matters that will forever be locked up in the national memory of our people.

Secondly, the suggestion that Malaysians will never be mature enough to discuss sensitive issues like race and religion, peacefully and intelligently, is a horrible idea. It demeans and dehumanises the entire citizenry.

I know for a fact that the prejudice still remains among many urban Malaysians that many indigenous communities in Malaysia are considered to be in such "backward states of society in which the race itself may be considered as in its non-age."

Other factors at work

Nevertheless, all the indigenous communities that I know of have the most democratic way of life in matters affecting their own welfare, especially with the operation of their traditional customary laws called adat.

In the case of the Ibans in Sarawak, much of that democratic way of life has been destroyed by the intervention of government administration, such as to replace elected longhouse chiefs and village committees with politically appointed ones.

Heavy-handed coercion and political repression alone cannot be credited for ensuring stability and prosperity. Many other factors are at work also. For one thing, by and large, Malaysians of all races are decent law-abiding and hospitable people. If only you dare to step outside your own racial or religious enclaves, you will be surprised at how wrong your prejudices are about the moral character of other people.

In contrast, politicians are the ones who would tend to turn every national dispute into a war between different races and different faiths.

They may or may not believe in their racial or religious dogmas. It does not matter any way, because all that matter to them is power, that eternal seducer of the human spirit. Having gained and held on to power for a long time, they now want to shut out everyone else on the issues of race and religion, so that their version will be the sole legitimate biblical account of these important issues that define the identity of 23 million citizens.

How you view this subject of freedom of speech depends on what you want out of a democracy.

If development, stability and personal gain are all you want, and security is your most treasured value, than of course you would prefer for dust to be swept under the carpet forever.

But as Rousseau remarked in the Social Contract, the greatest security is to be found in the prison. Today, what we get is what we vote for, a political climate that is akin to a moral, spiritual and intellectual prison.

I have studied too much Plato and Aristotle for my own good. I agree with them that the purpose of politics is to make citizens good. Their concept of the Good is not always the utilitarian or the pragmatic good, but that of a vision of human beings capable of moral and spiritual achievement.

For that purpose, you need the presence of the logos, the Greek concept that is similar to the Chinese idea of the Tao.

For the self-proclaimed patriarchs, even they have to face the prospect of their children being grown-ups like them one day. Is it not the duty of a kindly and loving father to prepare their children for the turbulent life of the adult world? Or will they never be allowed to grow up, like Peter Pan, living in a fantasy?

The public sphere will have to be opened up, sooner rather than later. I do not dwell on the sterile question on whether our prime minister will do it or not. At least, I should do it first.

That is why I should try to discuss religious issues.