Moderate Indonesia allows alcohol sales and possession, but if the Islamic Defenders Front get their way, sharia would rule and all alcohol would be banned tonight. If I had to live in a Muslim country, I think I would have to drink, just to dull the throb of Islam, 5 times a day.
From Reuters January 12
From Reuters January 12
Indonesia Islamic group rallies to demand alcohol ban
(Reuters) - Hundreds of members of Indonesia's Islamic Defenders Front FPI.L rallied in the capital on Thursday to press the government to ban alcohol as part of its drive to turn the fourth largest country in the world into an Islamic state.
Indonesia is a secular state with the world's biggest population of Muslims, most of whom are moderate.
What is moderate? There is no distinct definition of a moderate, so why even bother to mention it? And if the people are (mostly) moderate, and the country claimed to be secular, when their constitution says Islam is the only accepted religion, and sharia the only law in the land?
The FPI protest group has in recent years raided bars, nightclubs and the office of Indonesia's Playboy magazine, though it has had limited success in achieving its central aims.
It is separate from a series of small, banned militant groups, some of which are affiliated with al Qaeda and have carried out bomb attacks. An attack on nightclubs in Bali in 2002 killed more than 200 people.
The FPI on Thursday protested against a plan by the interior ministry to revoke anti-alcohol bylaws in several areas of Indonesia on the grounds that the laws were in violation of Islamic sharia law.
Some of the protesters outside the interior ministry in the city's main square wore white robes with the word "mujahideen" emblazoned on their shirts.
But remember, this has nothing to do with Islam.
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