Overcriticism Anyone ?

 I really CAN NOT STAND some of the folks here. They keep comparing Malaysia to western countries and Singapore and makign them sound like a utopia without any problems. These people are VERY ill informed about things overseas and besides, these countries being high and mighty (in Singapore’s case, just plain kiasu) do not really make it a habbit of announcing their problems for the world to see and the local papers would not report it since most of them bear no relevance to our country.

Take Singapore for instance, granted they have alot of things that leave us looking primitive but they do have their fair share of problems. They have a political system that would almost make a them a dictatorship, albeit a benign one. Unlike here they do not have a very open political system whereby any criticism will be handled very harshly which is apparent in their parliment with their apparent lack of proper opposition as well as the inability of the newpapers to say anything bad about the government. We on the other hand have a more open press whereby writers are allowed to write critical stuff about the government within boundries of the law and we have what resembles as quite a substantial presense by opposition parties who do speak their mind, at times too far but hey, thats the price of freedom.

Another example would be America which our less than informed friends love to compare to. America is a great nation and was one of the first successful democracies and boasts one of the most open societies in the world. Now don’t you morons think having such a open democracy and society here can actually be counter productive? Do we want our youth shooting people in our education institutes? Do we want morons running around preaching hate in the name of free speach? Do we want their kind of public health system where most people without medical insurance do not get the care they need since most of their hospitals are privatized? Our society is not stable enough for such openess since people in our country is nowhere close to their level of development and per capita income. We can not risk having extremists openly preaching hate in our country since the majority of our people are easily incited to do crazy things thanks to the relegious fervour of the race that holds the position of majority here. 

Those are a few examples of the problems faced by those countries you people so love to compare to and make thdem seem so perfect. I can list a whole lot mroe problems faced by these nations and my point is there is no such thing as a perfect country and while it is nice to follow the good points of the aforementioned counties always bear in mind are we capable of doing what they do and are we ready for such things. 

p.s – I know this is not on par with my usual posts but I am really tied down with my college work :s

Not Always Boleh

As we reach our 50th birthday and cries of “Malaysia Boleh” ring out, we should really reflect on this a bit. I am one of those who always find the constant shouts of “Malaysia Boleh” a bit tiresome. Not to be a spoilsport or anything, it’s just that sometimes our focus on what we boleh (can) seems very shallow.

I cannot express how much I admire Malaysians who can sail solo around the world, climb Everest, explore Antartica and brave the English Channel. These truly great feats and the glory achieved by many of them reflects on us, and motivates others to try and do similar things. I do however, have a problem with are the types of Malaysia Boleh feats that have to do with creating the longest popiah, the most number of teh tarik pulls, the most number of satay eaten, etc. No doubt everyone wants their 15 minutes of fame, but after that, what ? Will the person who ate the most number of durians ever be featured in Hari Ini Dalam Sejarah ?

As we scramble to get into some book of recordsfor things we boleh do, I wonder if we ever reflect on the things we tak boleh (cannot) do ? Here is a partial list, in no particular order :

• We tak boleh talk about so many things because they are deemed too sensitive for some unknown people’s ears. Thus there are so many things swept under the carpet now that we can hardly walk without tripping.We tak boleh complain about the govrnment on many issues.
• The women tak boleh feel safe in public because if something happens to them, it’s always their fault.
• We tak boleh be trusted to decide for ourselves whether a movie is good or bad.
• Young people tak boleh be given information about the many bad things that could happen to themeven though this could safe their lives.
• Universities tak boleh be left with more women students.
• We tak boleh ask why the government have some ruling or other.
• We tak boleh, tak boleh, tak boleh talk about religion even though sometimes the implementation of religious rulings can make our lives miserable.
• We tak boleh coplain when cars are triple parked and blocking traffic on Fridays because, hey, what is a human law when it is broken to commune with God ?
• We tak boleh be sure if anything we do will be judged on its own merits; we must get some dato’ or VIP to help us.
• We tak boleh point out contradictions in our society.
• We tak boleh act as if we know how to think and give our opinions.
• We tak boleh trust our young people even though one day, whether we like it or not, they will take over the country.
• We tak boleh deny the fact that Siti Nurhaliza is a lot more influentioal than most politicians. But then Siti tak boleh make us feel miserable.

Every day it seems we are encouraged to do things to prove we are the best, biggest, brightest. But rarely are we ever encouraged to be thinking and compassionate Human beings with opinions of our own, especially if those opinions are different from the norm.
Are we to show Malaysia Boleh only in harmless non-threatening ways even though these often have no long term benefit ? Or should we really be challenging ourselves in our minds and hearts, so that we can make a better Malaysia ?

**Adapted and modified from an article published in The Star (2003) **