MORAL DECAY AMONG MUSLIM TEENAGERS IN MALAYSIA
by Asmida binti Abdul Majid [View Writer's Profile]

Abstract
This article discussed about the moral decline among Muslim teenagers. I would like to highlight Muslim teenagers because they are foundation for our nation and Muslim reflected Islam as a formal religion for Malaysia. We as a leading religion not only in this country but also in this universe should practice good moral and values in our life because we are the Khairu Ummah (the best Ummah) in this universe.

"You are the best of the nations raised up for (the benefit of) men;..."
- Qur'an 3:110

Therefore, strong Islamic moral values should be cultivated in the soul of our teenagers. This is a best approach for us to lead them in achieve our mission Excellence, Glory and Distinction.

Moral Decay Among Muslim Teenagers in Malaysia

Nowadays, we can see Muslim teenagers around us, not only dressed in improper attire but they also behave in rude ways. They seem to forget their culture and religion. For them, freedom and happiness must be their first aims. Their tradition culture and religion should be left behind because they only restrain them from achieving total freedom in their life.

For example, in Edisi Siasat 2006 program dated on 30th April 2006, they shot a videoclip in one of nightclub in Kuala Lumpur area¹. From that scene it showed female and male teenagers dancing in wild manners without notice that there was a camera capturing their bad and wicked behaviors. With sexy luxury casual dressed the female teenagers without any shame danced in the group of man as they are high-class entertainer for male teenagers there. According to Edisi Siasat’s host they just took ecstasy and felt energetic and excited. They were able to dance the whole night without break. Some of them are studying in higher institutions and come from elite families.

Therefore, nowadays we witness moral decay not only happening to low class people without high education. But it is also happening to elite, high class and professional group to achieve particular aims and satisfactions. And we can say that most of these problems occured to Muslim teenagers. When these social problems have spread among our teenagers, all of us started to show fingers to parents. But in this situation we should not blame each other. Instead, we need to find out the solution to reduce or to stop these problems. As great scholars stated “Every illness have its remedy”.

When we ask this “Millenium teenagers” regarding these issues they will say “ooo….. Government must put Closed-circuit Television (CCTV) at all areas in town and the authority should increase their efforts to solve this criminal issues…” But if we think deeply, how much CCTV could help the authorities to solve this problem? Should government spend the expenditure to make sure that all areas in town in the whole Malaysia has CCTV? This suggestion is unreasonable. Should we put all these burden to the authorities and government? What is our role to protect ourselves in this moral problem? That’s are the thinking of our “millennium teenagers”. This assumption is one of the factors for moral decay among them.

According to Russell Kirk in Wikipedia website, moral decay can be defined as the loss of an aim or object in life such as life values or moral values. From this definition we can simplified that moral decay is a decline of moral values² . According to Al-Ghazali this moral decay happens when there is an inverse relationship between prosperity and moral decline. Its occurrence influenced by hedonistic worldview and lifestyle³ . From that statement we can say that moral decay or moral incline happens when wealth, physical and emotional satisfaction and pleasures become as the fundamental goals in our lives.

In my opinion, the main cause of this problem is devoid of Islamic values. This is because Islam is the way of Muslim life. Islam is a complete religion where it gives us guideline through Qur’an and Sunnah which cover all aspects in human life. It is including the way we behave in our daily life. As Prophet Muhammad S.A.W. said,

'This Deen or way of life is easy'; 'Make it easy, don't make it difficult; 'Let people rejoice in being Muslims and not run away from it'.