Goldmember- The Malaysian Insider
April 3, 2011 — The good doctor has done it again. In his new autobiography, according to The Malaysian Insider, Dr Mahathir Mohamad claims that Anwar Ibrahim arranged to have sex with four girls before he was sacked as deputy prime minister in 1998.
In addition, now there is a sex video which purports to show Anwar with a prostitute. The sexual appetites of the former finance minister seem to be of truly massive proportions.
Married, gay, bisexual, orgiastic — the man is alleged to be open to and a participant in every possible sexual orientation known to humans.
Of course, it may be a PR ploy by Dr M’s publishers to help sales of his new book. After all, political memoirs need controversy to help the public part with their hard-earned money. And what better than a mixture of politics and sleaze to titillate prospective readers?
But there is a more fundamental issue at stake here. The ruling establishment clearly believes that sexual misdemeanours have more traction with voters in ruining political reputations than almost any other kind, including corruption, nepotism, cronyism or plain incompetence.
As a society, behind our veneer of spiritualism and morality, Malaysia actually seems to regard sexual indiscretions as relatively light misconduct.
Even the authorities while raiding brothels and emerging with the mandatory China dolls or carrying out sporadic Valentine's Day khalwat raids, for the most part look half hearted, knowing that their actions are not backed by the public fully.
Otherwise there would be strident calls for heavier punishment or victimised wives picketing brothels, or demonstrations asking for stoning of adultery offenders.
There is a surfeit of openly available sexual services, at least in the Klang Valley. Offers of six-star full body massages by hot girls in the classifieds, dodgy karaoke parlours with mirrors on the ceiling and numerous GROs, gay bars or pick-up bars are all easily available.
Even when girls are openly prospecting for clients or being pimped in the Golden Triangle (aptly named) area, nobody seems to be batting an eyelid.
In fact our apparent conservatism seems to be restricted to disallowing open discussions on sexual topics. As long as the topic is not brought out for public consumption, in actual practice we have a much more liberal live and let live philosophy.
Galloping divorce rates are testimony to sexual peccadilloes being seen as an individual rather than social problem. The emerging discourse seems to be along the lines of "as long as no party is underage, and the sex is consensual, it really doesn’t need to be anybody else’s business."
Anwar’s ongoing Sodomy II trial far from establishing him as a filthy beast raises more eyebrows as to the sexually explicit content being splashed about in the media.
Do we really need to wake up in the morning to tales of rectal penetration and half a football team being found in the vicinity of somebody’s anus? Do we dare to tell our kids to read the papers to improve their grasp of the language anymore?
In fact at his ceramahs, Anwar himself is able to joke about the government’s obsession with his private parts to create empathy with his audience.
In this environment, the obsession with Anwar’s supposed sexual frolicking seems misguided. It seems to betray a certain fascination with the man which is not quite normal.
Good, bad or ugly, Dr M and Datuk T’s "expose" betrays an unhealthy fixation with the personality rather than the political acts of the man.
While homosexuality is still abhorrent to a large number of us, all round sexual indiscretions tend to caricaturise and trivialise the accusations.
If the intention was to ruin his political career, his ability to engineer the political tsunami of 2008 after 10 years of allegations of sexual misconduct should have given pause to the architects of this strategy.
Surely the man has made some political mistakes in his long career, some missteps that could be made political liabilities to him? At the moment, it just seems that the myth making is out of control, and it may do more damage to the instigators than to the defendant.
Will this ruin Anwar’s reputation beyond repair? Maybe, but it runs a serious risk of making him look like either like some kind of sexual superman, or the most maligned man in Malaysia.
Shagedelic, baby!
In addition, now there is a sex video which purports to show Anwar with a prostitute. The sexual appetites of the former finance minister seem to be of truly massive proportions.
Married, gay, bisexual, orgiastic — the man is alleged to be open to and a participant in every possible sexual orientation known to humans.
Of course, it may be a PR ploy by Dr M’s publishers to help sales of his new book. After all, political memoirs need controversy to help the public part with their hard-earned money. And what better than a mixture of politics and sleaze to titillate prospective readers?
But there is a more fundamental issue at stake here. The ruling establishment clearly believes that sexual misdemeanours have more traction with voters in ruining political reputations than almost any other kind, including corruption, nepotism, cronyism or plain incompetence.
As a society, behind our veneer of spiritualism and morality, Malaysia actually seems to regard sexual indiscretions as relatively light misconduct.
Even the authorities while raiding brothels and emerging with the mandatory China dolls or carrying out sporadic Valentine's Day khalwat raids, for the most part look half hearted, knowing that their actions are not backed by the public fully.
Otherwise there would be strident calls for heavier punishment or victimised wives picketing brothels, or demonstrations asking for stoning of adultery offenders.
There is a surfeit of openly available sexual services, at least in the Klang Valley. Offers of six-star full body massages by hot girls in the classifieds, dodgy karaoke parlours with mirrors on the ceiling and numerous GROs, gay bars or pick-up bars are all easily available.
Even when girls are openly prospecting for clients or being pimped in the Golden Triangle (aptly named) area, nobody seems to be batting an eyelid.
In fact our apparent conservatism seems to be restricted to disallowing open discussions on sexual topics. As long as the topic is not brought out for public consumption, in actual practice we have a much more liberal live and let live philosophy.
Galloping divorce rates are testimony to sexual peccadilloes being seen as an individual rather than social problem. The emerging discourse seems to be along the lines of "as long as no party is underage, and the sex is consensual, it really doesn’t need to be anybody else’s business."
Anwar’s ongoing Sodomy II trial far from establishing him as a filthy beast raises more eyebrows as to the sexually explicit content being splashed about in the media.
Do we really need to wake up in the morning to tales of rectal penetration and half a football team being found in the vicinity of somebody’s anus? Do we dare to tell our kids to read the papers to improve their grasp of the language anymore?
In fact at his ceramahs, Anwar himself is able to joke about the government’s obsession with his private parts to create empathy with his audience.
In this environment, the obsession with Anwar’s supposed sexual frolicking seems misguided. It seems to betray a certain fascination with the man which is not quite normal.
Good, bad or ugly, Dr M and Datuk T’s "expose" betrays an unhealthy fixation with the personality rather than the political acts of the man.
While homosexuality is still abhorrent to a large number of us, all round sexual indiscretions tend to caricaturise and trivialise the accusations.
If the intention was to ruin his political career, his ability to engineer the political tsunami of 2008 after 10 years of allegations of sexual misconduct should have given pause to the architects of this strategy.
Surely the man has made some political mistakes in his long career, some missteps that could be made political liabilities to him? At the moment, it just seems that the myth making is out of control, and it may do more damage to the instigators than to the defendant.
Will this ruin Anwar’s reputation beyond repair? Maybe, but it runs a serious risk of making him look like either like some kind of sexual superman, or the most maligned man in Malaysia.
Shagedelic, baby!
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