Grateful or Betrayed?-The Malay Mail Online
JAN 23, 2014 — There is a certain kind of person in Malaysia whose sole purpose in life seems to be to get deeply insulted almost daily, foam at the mouth at the ungratefulness of the insulter and then threaten deadly reprisals.
Insulted by the kangkung eating effigy in Penang? Threaten a repeat of the May 13 incident, never mind that by saying that it changes the traditional version of events of that fateful day. Insulted by people of a different faith using your words in their prayers? Just threaten arrest or seize whatever is at hand. Insulted at losing the popular vote in the last GE? Just ask these ungrateful pendatang to go back where they came from.
What is really insulting to this person is not the incidents in themselves, but a growing pattern of behaviour that challenges the traditional feudal mindset. In any monarchy, a certain amount of bowing and scraping is inevitable. Ditto for a political system built primarily on patronage. Add to that Asian values and a strong religious orientation, and being grateful becomes the centre of one’s universe. Grateful for an education, grateful for a livelihood, and grateful for a place in society and indeed in heaven.
Of course in terms of power and pelf, this system benefits only a small elite at the expense of all those who have to be grateful for everything, and relies on the unquestioning obedience to this belief in gratefulness among everybody in society. Till a decade ago, Malaysia could remain largely just that kind of society.
Insulated from opposing ideas by a rote based education system with a carefully crafted syllabus and a controlled, compliant media, opposition was hard to come by. Also, access to wealth and concomitant exposure to international trends was largely restricted to patronage based elites; whose self-interest ensured the system was never under threat.
The Internet, alternative media and Air Asia changed all that. The democratisation of ideas and the emerging power of the individual decoupled from familial, religious and social ties made for a heady clamour of dissenting voices that is all around us today. Much as the government may want to take credit for this newfound freedom, it was not given, but taken with grasping hands by a people able to use this newfound access to information to make sense of the country they live in.
The first casualty of this process was a sense of gratefulness. Confronted by the reality of widespread injustice that was always hidden, whether in the award of contracts, or ICs or needs-based programmes, gratefulness was replaced by a sense of betrayal for those able to connect the dots.
Far from acknowledging this change, this is what the FT minister Ku Nan had to say on the kangkung issue. “What Najib meant was that even the price of kangkung could go up and down but these silly people are not adopting Asian values. Instead, they follow the Western values by mocking Najib and making fun of his statement. Those who continued to harp on the kangkung issue would be answerable for their actions on Judgment day.”
Western culture has no values while Asian culture is grateful is what the minister is implying. But the perception of his party and the ruling coalition among people with access to impartial information is at complete variance with any notion of being grateful.
When the image of the benevolent ruling party handing out largesse is replaced by that of a grasping, corrupt regime with its head in the clouds, comparisons to the famously insensitive “if the peasants have no bread, let them eat cake” are bound to happen.
However much the ruling elites try to affect a return to the feudal system of unquestioning obedience through appeals to Asian values, respect for rulers, race and religion, the one counterpoint to all their assertions is the fundamental human desire for justice and fair play.
The truth is that the desire for justice is at the heart of this change from gratefulness to betrayal. If even as the evidence mounts of continuing unfairness across the system, the powers that be do not address it but carry on in the belief that they know best, then the writing is on the wall come the next election.
Simply put, the base of sycophants in a feudal system can only influence the masses if they have enough largesse to dish out. Given the parlous state of the nation’s finances, buying affection is no longer an option. Therefore the voices of those insulted daily by issues of race, religion etc. are likely to be drowned out by the voices of those insulted by the rise in cost of living, corruption, waste and official patronage.
And these voices can engineer, real, overwhelming change.
Insulted by the kangkung eating effigy in Penang? Threaten a repeat of the May 13 incident, never mind that by saying that it changes the traditional version of events of that fateful day. Insulted by people of a different faith using your words in their prayers? Just threaten arrest or seize whatever is at hand. Insulted at losing the popular vote in the last GE? Just ask these ungrateful pendatang to go back where they came from.
What is really insulting to this person is not the incidents in themselves, but a growing pattern of behaviour that challenges the traditional feudal mindset. In any monarchy, a certain amount of bowing and scraping is inevitable. Ditto for a political system built primarily on patronage. Add to that Asian values and a strong religious orientation, and being grateful becomes the centre of one’s universe. Grateful for an education, grateful for a livelihood, and grateful for a place in society and indeed in heaven.
Of course in terms of power and pelf, this system benefits only a small elite at the expense of all those who have to be grateful for everything, and relies on the unquestioning obedience to this belief in gratefulness among everybody in society. Till a decade ago, Malaysia could remain largely just that kind of society.
Insulated from opposing ideas by a rote based education system with a carefully crafted syllabus and a controlled, compliant media, opposition was hard to come by. Also, access to wealth and concomitant exposure to international trends was largely restricted to patronage based elites; whose self-interest ensured the system was never under threat.
The Internet, alternative media and Air Asia changed all that. The democratisation of ideas and the emerging power of the individual decoupled from familial, religious and social ties made for a heady clamour of dissenting voices that is all around us today. Much as the government may want to take credit for this newfound freedom, it was not given, but taken with grasping hands by a people able to use this newfound access to information to make sense of the country they live in.
The first casualty of this process was a sense of gratefulness. Confronted by the reality of widespread injustice that was always hidden, whether in the award of contracts, or ICs or needs-based programmes, gratefulness was replaced by a sense of betrayal for those able to connect the dots.
Far from acknowledging this change, this is what the FT minister Ku Nan had to say on the kangkung issue. “What Najib meant was that even the price of kangkung could go up and down but these silly people are not adopting Asian values. Instead, they follow the Western values by mocking Najib and making fun of his statement. Those who continued to harp on the kangkung issue would be answerable for their actions on Judgment day.”
Western culture has no values while Asian culture is grateful is what the minister is implying. But the perception of his party and the ruling coalition among people with access to impartial information is at complete variance with any notion of being grateful.
When the image of the benevolent ruling party handing out largesse is replaced by that of a grasping, corrupt regime with its head in the clouds, comparisons to the famously insensitive “if the peasants have no bread, let them eat cake” are bound to happen.
However much the ruling elites try to affect a return to the feudal system of unquestioning obedience through appeals to Asian values, respect for rulers, race and religion, the one counterpoint to all their assertions is the fundamental human desire for justice and fair play.
The truth is that the desire for justice is at the heart of this change from gratefulness to betrayal. If even as the evidence mounts of continuing unfairness across the system, the powers that be do not address it but carry on in the belief that they know best, then the writing is on the wall come the next election.
Simply put, the base of sycophants in a feudal system can only influence the masses if they have enough largesse to dish out. Given the parlous state of the nation’s finances, buying affection is no longer an option. Therefore the voices of those insulted daily by issues of race, religion etc. are likely to be drowned out by the voices of those insulted by the rise in cost of living, corruption, waste and official patronage.
And these voices can engineer, real, overwhelming change.
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