In the past, we all enjoyed our fair bit of rivalry in any situation what so ever. Its healthy and it makes you work harder to outdo the other person. However today, such rivalry among our own people have made us hate each other for whatever reason there may be.
I had this chat while driving with the girls the other day, it gave me an opportunity to view it from the point of my own perspective and those raised in a different culture than mine, for example the girls. In the end, I realized that perhaps it is our own grooming at home since we were small that made us hate each other like how we are today.
I come from a Malay upbringing and throughout my time, I spend most of my tertiary studying years among non-Malays and it astounds me the amount of perception and believe one person is told in order to hate your fellow man in this country. The Malays are brought up to hate the non-Malays every time there is a situation that might disrupt the order of the race in the country. The Chinese are brought up to hate the Malays because they are unfair to their race and to hate the Indians because they cannot be trusted. Vice versa for the Indian. What I question is very simple:
Is this hate necessary?
To many, they feel that this is the only way for them to go in order for them to retain their rights in the country. If one does not have such hatred, you will lose out in this community. As I mentioned this to the girls, the more we start to hate each other, the more we start to be the very reason of our community's downfall. Instead of us focusing on the important things to progress, we choose to use the racial card to hate each other instead.
whether it works, at least someone is doing something about it...
Today, we have seen people actually protecting the right of us to hate each other, as unbelievable as it may sound. The concept of "1Malaysia" is an attempt to bridge that hatred among all of us and in the end, so many choose to condemn it, quoting that its a "stupid man's ideology to buy the hearts of the public". I for one would call shame to those people as any attempt to actually fix this situation should be welcomed, instead of fighting for reasons for us to continue hating one another. It hurts the nation to see people not even giving the idea a chance and already calling for the campaign to stop before it can even produce any results.
The one thing I would never understand, why should we continue to hate? If our forefathers have stayed in this country for so long together, why we the present and future generation choose to ignite the hatred among each other. Perhaps this would be something I can find out from your opinion on this matter.
On a personal note, something is changing to this site... Watch this space! :D
Nang if you like this post! Thanks!
(: totally agree with your post
ReplyDeletei believe that most of us are living properly, but it's the political parties that is making a mess of this racial issue.. =/
ReplyDeleteWe are bought up whatever we were told of. Obviously, racism is not human nature, it is learned - from our parents, from our communities, etc. We were told to hate this race, and then being told to like this race, and blah, blah, blah. That is how parents blindly teach their kids.
ReplyDeleteAnd sadly, many of these parents don't know what this world is actually like. To me, the reason behind this racism is because of the "Divide and Conquer" rule during the colonization era, where the Chinese are businessmen, the Malays are villagers, and the Indians are working in the estates. When they campur together, of course there will be many conflicts. Today, everything is under a melting pot. That makes a sick society. Even in jobs, if the manager is a Chinese, they even blacklist out the Malays' resumes without looking at their qualifications. (one of my friends from my hometown told me).
Even 1Malaysia cannot be an effective medium. Politicians quarrel among each other for the elections, while at the same time you'd been hearing some hate speeches going around. Tell you larr, they are not sociologists, and they are not trained to solve problems. Instead, they just claim this and accuse that. Even if you wanna vote, you also dunno who you will cast you vote to. Who is more sincere, Najib or Anwar? You can't tell, right?
When times get tough, even if races are having a melting pot between each other, within their own race, people are not united. Among the Chinese (my community), I only hear people talking about money, and nothing else. What is a society when people don't care about each other? It's very shallow, you see. Try walking out alone in a crowded area. You're like a ghost walking over them.
By the way, view this site. http://www.thezeitgeistmovement.com. It's about social change for resource-based living. Indeed, we really have to change socially. In this world, (to relate to my previous paragraph), there are already many people being left out in that situation. People are dying every single day due to hunger, poverty and preventable diseases.
P.S - If you visit the site, do view it with an open mind. Watch the lectures there as well, though it's like 2 hours long, it's eye-opening.
about time someone wrote about this!! glad you did!! :D
ReplyDeleteare you revamping your site?
To undo this "hate" we have for each other, we have the change the very core of society itself. Doing away with the Chinese, Indian and Agama schools for example. Not to mention changing the mindsets of the majority of the citizens. It's a really big change that cannot happen overnight.
ReplyDeleteBut change do and can happen, starting with ourselves. Speaking from a Chinese perspective, are we prepared to view Indians or Malays as someone who can work hard, smart and intelligent? Or when a robbery happens, are we prepared to NOT utter statements such as "Aiyah confirm the Indians do one la"?
To quote Mahatma Gandhi, "We must be the change we want to see".
HATE is not my game..
ReplyDeleteI get really agitated when people stereotype someone based on their Races.
Shouldn't someone be Judge based on their personal characteristic?
what's the need to be racist?
No wonder Malaysia is still a 3rd world country.
Just dropping my two cents. ^^
I LOVE MALAYSIANS
*Specially the one with brain & good sense of judgement* Ciao!
In reply to Lukey, do you think we should go even further and maybe open up MCKK etc. to non-Malays?
ReplyDeleteas it is, im an east malaysian bumi, non-malay. it was really tough at first as i was d only non malay of my batch under the mara scholar. yes, it is though being in the peninsular with strong racism problems. and it really bothers me that these 3 races are dissing each other face to face. i may not be a person of these 3 races but my family, uncles aunties n cousins ect. are of it. through time, i bulit good relationships with my fellow west malaysians, currently dating a malay. who says racial intergration is not possible. its the way you take things in hand and treat others the way you want to be treated. =)
ReplyDeletemalaysia wont grow unless its people change their mindsets.
im glad u wrote this post.
thanks so much for your insight on this. Its really great to see that there are still people like you around who truly believe that there is a way around this hatred. I honestly agree with you, that racial integration is possible and it is only up to our own mindset to make this happen.
ReplyDeleteAnother one of the thought provoking, mind engaging topic here,
ReplyDeleteI was brought up in an rubber estate where my best friends were a Malay and an Indian. As a child, we are blind to the subtle differences of colour, culture, political point of view, or the different name we call God. All I knew was my best friend's name was Haslan and Maniam, not Malay or Indian. We knew each other since we were small kids. I can't remember at any point in life where I learned my bahasa Malaysia. It felt like it was my second nature. That goes to show how indifferent I was to different races or religion back then.
I hope I don't offend anyone by saying that I think UMNO leaders today forgot the fact that the Alliance in the form of Barisan Nasional in the past won the heart and mind of the rakyat by practicing considerations on racial and religion stability and unity. In a stark contrast in politics today, UMNO has skidded away from the path of mainstream Malaysia, and is using racial sentiment to garner their own selfish political support.
The political party today is a total deviation from what the late Tunku Abdul Rahman has selflessly fought for.
It feels really sad to see our rakyat is represented by idiots who plays the racial cards to get support, and they have the audacity to call themselves as part of an Alliance. What crap!