"Mat Kilau" and Cultural Territory

Colonialism and imperialism operate on many different planes, and one of the most important planes that it operates on is in what I would call or conceptualize as cultural territory. There is an ongoing battle for cultural territory. And just as with geographic territory, you can gain or lose ground in that battle. While the Islamic movement has made significant strides in the Muslim world for the last fifty, sixty, seventy years or so, we have also lost considerable cultural and ideological territory. There are a lot of Muslims who have been completely subsumed by Western cultural norms, standards, and values.

And not just Muslims, of course, this has happened to people across the global South. But Muslims have the distinction of possessing a codified, unified, articulate, and intricate belief system that encompasses law, ethics, morality, discipline, public and private conduct and behavior, business, and much more, all of which heavily informs and regulates the individual cultures across the Muslim world. In other words, we have our own long standing and powerful civilization that is more than adequate to nourish and fortify us against the comparatively newer, less coherent, and lethally inconsistent beliefs, ideologies, values, and culture of the collective West. There is no reason nor excuse why Muslims should lose much less surrender one centimeter of cultural territory. Well, here in Malaysia, we have seen recently what can only be described as a triumphant reclaiming of cultural territory in the form of the newly released Malay film, Mat Kilaau.

This movie tells the story of anticolonialist Malay warrior Mat Kilaau been Imam Rasu or Mohammed bin Ibrahim in the late eighteen nineties, early nineteen hundreds, who fought essentially a guerilla war successfully against British colonialists. It would probably be fair to say that Mat Kila was the Malay Omar Makhtar, and this film, took over three years to make, has played for the last week in packed cinemas across Malaysia. It has swept the country in a resurgence of pride in their Malay Muslim identity, history, and culture, and it couldn't have come at a better, more crucial moment in time. As I've talked about on this channel many times, we are entering a new era in the global order, and the coercive power of the West, of Europe specifically, and The UK is diminishing. It is absolutely the right time for Muslims to reassert our civilizational identity and to take back every inch of cultural territory that we've lost.

Now this shouldn't be seen in any way or declared in any way to be hostile towards or aggressive towards non Muslims, but only against any effort to subvert, subdue, subordinate, undermine our culture, our identities, our beliefs, and our values. Look, the inescapable reality is this. Some groups will always rise above others. Some groups will always attain more power than others. We have all been living in a time when the collective West enjoys and asserts its dominance over the rest of the planet, but that time is ending.

So amongst the people of the global South, who do you think is most likely to rise in cultural, political, and economic dominance? There are only three relatively cohesive groups that are contenders for that position, the Hindus, the Catholics, and the Muslims. Now you might suggest the Chinese, but their demographic evaporation eliminates them from long term contention. Now the Hindus of India and the Catholics of Africa and Latin America have the population numbers, but they don't really have the civilizational architecture nor even the shared culture nor the inclusivity of the Muslims that would enable them to really operate as a truly global influence nor really does any group have the organizational history across borders that the Muslims have. It's simply inevitable that the Muslims will become the dominant group in the global South.

We may be entering into a multipolar world, but outside The United States Of America, there will be coalitions of Muslim states that collectively represent and constitute a global, cultural, and economic superpower. Now, of course, there will continue to be secular nation state based power players, but ideologically affiliated populations will eclipse these certainly in terms of cultural influence. The West has excelled in technological innovation, but they have failed as a civilization. And they have failed as a civilization because the West has failed to civilize itself even after some two hundred years since the enlightenment. The entire global South can testify to their savagery, hypocrisy, and tyranny.

While the Muslims can't claim that our tenure as an empire spanning more than a thousand years was immaculate, By comparison, our credentials against the West are pristine, and now we, the Muslims, have experienced colonization, subjugation. We've tasted foreign tyranny, and we know what it feels like to be reviled by those who have more power than we do. And these are lessons that we will never forget, and Allah forbid that we ever behave with the same cruelty, vindictiveness, and intolerance that we have ourselves suffered. Now to those Arab and Muslim rulers around the world and leaders, even in the private sector, who have been acquiescent and obsequious to the West and collaborated with the West, you're entering a time when our indictment against you will be suspended. Because, yes, many of us have blamed you for your collaboration with the West, But the argument can be made that you only acted that way out of necessity, but that necessity is ending.

You have the choice now. So the Muslims around the world are watching to see what you're going to do. Are you going to stand up for us, or are you going to continue to serve a dying master? So I recommend everyone, Muslim and non Muslim, Malay and non Malay, to try to see this film, Matt Killau. It has English subtitles.

It's absolutely the right film at the right time in the right place.