When Malaysian lock-up detainee abuse scandal first came to surface, especially when a video of it was made public, I noticed a number of people tried to associate the scandal with discrimination and, ultimately, racism. Moreover, some tried to manipulate some sort of chauvinistic communal nationalism. I wholly disagree with the association; correlation does not imply causation is an apt phrase.
To me, this issue concerns neither ethnicity nor nationality. It’s simply about persons being abused. No more than that. Nevertheless, the apparent fact at that time didn’t help my case since, previously, all the abused detainees seemed disporportionately Chinese Malaysian and Chinese from People’s Republic of China. Hence, I must say, I’m relieved with the revelation that the abused detainee in the video that was forced to strip and squat by a Malaysian police officer was not a Chinese from PRC but in fact, is a Malay Malaysian.
That disclosure vindicates my stance that there was no racism involved. This piece of information should render those that expounded that the scandal was tainted with discrimination and racism to sit in a corner and sulk. It proves that they’re wrong. More importantly, it cleanly undoes those racist opportunists’ crude works that tried to fire up communal feeling.
Of course, because my take is that ethnicity doesn’t matter, the fact that the victim’s a Malay shouldn’t make the issue any less angering as it should be. But it does and it does because of the existence of those that always try to transpose every issue as communal issues. These people cry of discrimination while they, deep within themselves are racists. Without them, the fact that the victim’s a Malay wouldn’t comfort me by one bit.
Malaysian society is young when compared to many others. While we grow up, we need to realize that not everything is about discrimination and racism. At the same time, racists don’t work in the open. They’re among us, trying to cry “Discrimination!” or any other word in similar context even when it’s not. Whenever we overhear somebody cries that, we must to ask ourselves, is it really about discrimination or racism or is someone trying to manipulate Malaysian complicated racial politics?
The ability to discern the two possibilities is paramount if we as Malaysians hope not to see the current Australian race riot to replicate itself in Malaysia as our second May 13 Incident.
5 replies on “[684] Of I’m glad she’s a Malay”
Cyrix, yes. interesting implication. nearing suspicious in fact. almost conspiracy-like, just like what desparil said. The court should release the name and the picture of the victim. To clear the air around this further.
Regardless, i don’t think this has anything to do with a no confidence vote for any other party. This is even more given that MCA claims to have received the vid first, a few months earlier.
how can we be sure she’s really the victim in the video clip? the way the whole thing’s been handled reeks of conspiracy. i mean, if she’s malay, why send somebody to china to appologise?
anyway, the issue of race shouldn’t matter. if it’s wrong, then it’s wrong no matter if the vic was malay, chinese, indian or lain-lain.
I personally know a few guys who were shouting racisim, discrimination, etc. etc. shut their mouth instantly.
The racists in Malaysian politics are mostly found in the BN. When will the public realize this?
Agreed. I am actually very happy that the woman in question was finally confirmed to be a Malay. This should really make Noh Omar eat his allegations of a ‘hidden agenda’ (read: race-motivated) involving DAP and China-Chinese foreign workers. His cliche attempt to paint DAP as a ‘Sino-centric’ party has also completely backfired in his face. Lol!:P
Sigh…. BN and the race card = Always guarenteed. It says alot about them, doesn’t it?
In fact, actually, this is a terrific opportunity for DAP to reach out to the Malay community, and re-stress it’s ‘Malaysian Malaysia’ stance, you know. DAP should take this issue and politicise it for maximum effect. I think they deserve at least this small bit of glory, after years of being unfairly demonised.
It also helps that the police who got the video (presumably a Malay) decided to hand in the video to DAP, instead of BN. This certainly shows that DAP’s commitment to expose abuses of power is at least trusted by all Malaysians regardless of race. But is this also a vote of no-confidence for both PAS and PKR, since it wasn’t handed into them instead?
Hmmnn… all in all, very interesting implications, don’t you agree? :P