As a dedicated agnostic, or in other words a doubter as to whether an all-powerful, all-knowing ‘almighty’ might or might not exist, I’m aware that my very existence is anathema to those billions of ‘believers’ who claim to deplore blasphemy, or what my Webster’s dictionary defines as ‘the act of insulting or showing contempt or lack of reverence for God’.

I console myself, however, with the thought that if such a supreme divinity did exist, he/she/it would likely not even deign to notice, let alone give a damn about, my or any other mere human being’s might/might-not opinion on this or any other question.

In fact, in the unlikely event that the almighty/almight-not-be did notice me despite my utter insignificance in the great scheme of things, he/she/it might, rather than blaming me for my doubts, perceive them as a blessing for the reason that, in taking the trouble to wonder which if any of the countless competing combinations of gods and religions is the genuine article, at least I’m using my allegedly God-given mind.

In other words, I believe there is a strong and even ‘religious’ case for considering those of us who sincerely contemplate, question, doubt and even reject allegedly ‘accepted’ so-called ‘beliefs’, ‘faiths’ and ‘truths’ or ‘wisdoms’ as not the ‘blasphemers’ we’re cracked-up to be, but what could justly be called blessphemers.

Whereas the real blasphemers are those who proclaim their unquestioning belief in some God, yet think nothing of ‘insulting or showing contempt or lack of reverence for’ their God whenever it suits what they perceive to be their economic, political or other secular self-interests.

As, by way of most recent example, Islamic extremists in Indonesia have recently done in support of political opportunists hell-bent on denying the governor of Jakarta, Basuki Tjahaja Purnama, commonly known as Ahok, another term in office, and into the bargain having him flung into jail.

Faced with the prospect of the popular Ahok’s winning a second term despite his being both Christian and Chinese, two minorities long embattled and at times even savagely persecuted in Indonesia, some ‘pious’ Muslim political competitor accused him of insulting the Quran.

Never mind that this was a lie of Islam-disgracing proportions, in light of the fact that what Ahok had done was to complain in a speech that a line from the Quran was already being (mis)used by his opponents to unfairly deter Muslims from voting for him, the Islamic mob staged months of mass-demonstrations to force the courts to convict him of blasphemy.

And now these same sanctimonious scum, unsatisfied with his conviction and condemnation to two years in jail are still hysterically urging his sentence to be made more severe.

Of course this instance of blasphemy, or in other words ‘insulting or showing contempt or lack of reverence for’ their own God and what even the most willfully ignorant of them well know to be His moral stipulations seems trivial in comparison with the murderously un-Islamic activities of the such mega-blasphemers as the Taliban, Islamic State, Boko Haram and so on.

But its relative mildness by no means excuses this or the similarly blatant blasphemies routinely engaged in by the rulers and supporters of every other Islamic ruling regime I can think of, including the one I know the best and thus loathe the most, Malaysia’s Umno/BN...