Salam Merdeka, Malaysians. Here’s to our forefathers and the freedom fighters. We might be independent, but we are yet to be free.
We can’t even get our information freely—it doesn’t matter that information by itself wants to be free. The government wants to put a firewall and filter our internet out so that we can only read what they want us to.
The newspapers are blatantly controlled by the ruling parties: their news is our news. Whenever we try to speak our mind, when we try to dig for the truth, we will get silenced. Enter the sedition act.
I dread the days where they get their ways, and bloggers would have to be registered and profiled, just like sexual offenders.
We are not free to watch films we want, much less make the films we want. Films arrived on our shores badly-mangled with various cuts, despite the fact that we paid to watch over-18 films.
We can’t make films about mat rempits, about cross-dressers, about transsexuals. We can’t even make films about supernatural any more, lest we want to get admitted to a counselling seminar.
Last Friday before Merdeka, sermons were given so Muslims will strive to be free from the enemies of Islam. Ask me, and I will tell you that “Islam” and “free” had no business being in the same sentence, at least not in Malaysia.
Everyone with the slightest authority in Islam will try to dictate on what you should or should not do.
They will tell us that just because some of us are women, our opinions do not matter. Just because our principles are different from theirs, we’re deemed heretic who should attend rehabs.
It’s haram to do yoga, it’s haram for women to “look like men”, it’s haram to swear. For reasons so vague and ridiculous.
Don’t like something? Just complain to the National Fatwa Council. They have been so kind to grant fatwas forbidding the smallest of stuff just because “the public demands it” or “the public is confused”.
The simplest form of joy, music is restricted to us. Numerous artistes surely had refused offers to perform in our country in frustration over the silly decency rule. Muslims are banned from attending certain concerts just because the sponsors happened to be in the alcohol industry.
A little mention of concert sends them into a berserk, no matter that the band is harmless Michael Learns to Rock.
Muslims can’t contend in pageants. Muslims can’t do this. Muslims can’t do that.
It’s discrimination, that’s what it is. Only it’s worst since the prohibition comes from the same group getting the bans.
Why are you so bothered with what every soul will or will not do? If you’re saying that Islam is the religion of the free and willing, you’re not convincing me. Not when you’re prodding and crushing people into submission.
God forbid that you’re an infidel, then! You can never get a house of worship in peace. They will try to impose their morals on you whether you like it or not.
All these are just a small slice of the liberty we’re denied of. We are not even free from the shackles of racial-centric attitudes. Every race is paranoid of each other.
I am grateful for the efforts of our forefathers and every freedom fighters who had shed their blood, sweat and tears since time immemorial to make our country sovereign, but it’s time we move on from that. Individual rights and civil liberties should be our next target.
Am I proud though? Of being Malaysian? Not really, no. Not this year.
I won’t pretend to be merry for this year’s Merdeka. There’s nothing to be happy or proud about.
We love you so much, Malaysia. Why won’t you love us back?
Are enjoying this year’s Merdeka? Do you think that we’re doing okay and I’m just a depressing bugger? Leave your comments.
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i completely agree with you Zack. All this while the situation in Malaysia enraged me but the hint of sadness in your note got to me as well. The current state of affairs is heartbreaking but reality bites I guess =(
P.S: I’ve told the several people who wished me “Happy Merdeka” that there is nothing to be happy about..
the world really leaves us with no option but to be bitter, doesn’t it?
I’m studying abroad for the first time and the person I spend the most time with is a classmate who is of a different race from me. It gives me a sense of pride and amusement when the locals here cannot comprehend how we are of different races, religions, mother tongues, dress codes, dietary requirements etc, all at the same time and still be from the same country. So often taxi drivers ask us what country are we from; not from what race of people we are.
My point is this: it is only in Malaysia that we are not defined by our country but segregated by our ethnic race, when in the face of the world, we are seen by others and ourselves in the light of our nationality.
It is only in Malaysia that they feel there is a need for patriotism to be “inculcated” within us, not experienced and nurtured through our common love for the same homeland.
It is only in Malaysia that being Malaysian is politicized, not by the man on the street with his Iban wife and Chindian buddy, but by the very same authorities that flagrantly flaunt our diversity for tourism and corporate image.
This Merdeka, I am 6646 miles from home and for the first time in my life, it means something to me: the meaning of a home connected by one love in family and friends.
But of course, it is hard to have this love and pride for a home that we have no say in and that is so systematically divided that we can hardly call it one, let alone call it our own.
I don’t know about you but I find it hard to share the significance of our forefathers’ triumph in independence dictated to us from textbooks, which I cannot relate to when I am categorically imprisoned within the confines of racial politics, the accompanying religious beliefs and power relations in ruling classes.
Why would “Malaysia” love you back when you don’t do what they say?
But I take heart that bloggers, such as yourself, independent filmmakers and organizations are questioning these very notions; cogs in the wheels of raising awareness and aspirations for the future.
Phew! =P
Thank you and very well said, DoodleMistress. I know exactly how you feel, being abroad myself quite a few times.
Najib Razak put the situation miserably in his speech yesterday when he said that we must “repair the bridges and tear down the divisive walls” between the races. (http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2009/8/31/nation/4621969&sec=nation)
He’s wrong. Citizens like you have proven that away from the country, away from the walls raised by the divisive politicians, we are aware of our role as Malaysians very well. That there has never been a wall in the first place.
i agree with you statements! there is not much freedom in malaysia actually..
but oh well.. know there is nothing much we can do..
I’ll have my hopes up and will be patiently waiting for change to come possibly in the next 10 – 15 years. Until then, we have to do what we can to shorten that time period for change. I’m hoping that we don’t have to wait for one or two generations to come before the current state of affairs takes any turn for the better.