Forbidden Files #01 - To be swept away

As promised, I am coming up with an argument on a very politically fragile topic, one that has been close to my heart and dying to write about. What is it? Read on below. I hope that this will be a feature of interest to readers, so please do hint me comments on possible topics that might be of your interest in the tagboard.

For those who is reading this for the first time, please check out the previous entry for an introduction and heed the warning above the Harry Potter advertisement.

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Forbidden Files #01 - To be swept away
An exposé by Seraphim


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The Malays in Singapore make up the second largest proportion of people in the country. Despite once being Malay soil, Singapore has developed into a country dominated by the Chinese and surprisingly the foreigners, a group that makes up Singapore's minority group.

Over the years, the hold that the Malays have on the country as a whole has been slowly slipping away. It all began, of course, with the very founding of Singapore. The moment that the land was handed over from the Malays to the British was the moment that sparked off the Malays' downfall. Of couse, many sees this as a wise choice of the locals to let the higher power mould our beginnings, but what they fail to realise is why this was so.

The real reason the land was lost from the Malays was not because of wisdom, but because of greed. In secrecy, the government has managed to slip this piece of information into all youths without their notice. What I'm talking about here is the fact that lower secondary social studies never fail to emphasize how much MONEY the British paid the Malay Sultan in exchange for control over the land.

Thank God the government has enough mercy to spare the real reason why the Sultan needed the money, for the sake of the Malays. But since this is an exposé article, I'll defy the remaining efforts the Malays have put to save their faces and reveal it anyway. The Sultan needed the money for cock fighting, as in cockerel. Before the days of betting on horse racing, the early locals betted on fighting cockerels. Obviously the Sultan was a big fan of this.

I mean, hey, who in the world with the right mind would hand over an oversized island of a swamp to some guy in tights, weird sideburn and an exaggerated English accent when the land has strategic geographical advantages and an economic potential? If that guy wanted money, he could have just invested in the good old Singapore. Too bad he was desperately in debt.

And that concludes the embarrassing beginning, JUST the beginning.

More than a century has passed since then, yet nothing has been improving. The loss of the land to the British is now emphasized with the loss of control to the Chinese. The crime rate of Malays are way higher than the other races, and that goes for pregnancy, abortion, academics, and all the social problems there is.

To make it worse, the Malays are even associated to terrorism and for a reason that they themselves can’t deny. So far, all the terrorist-related prisoners are all Malays, most of which were in direct relation to J.I. and indirectly, the Al-Qaeda. Heck, Osama bin Laden’s a Muslim, and so are Malays. The relation is undeniable.

We can’t say that the Malays do not realize their mistakes. Some time back, the former prime minister of Malaysia himself made a public announcement about the failure of Malays. If that isn’t publicity of the Malays’ failure, then I don’t know what is. In that announcement, through tears he revealed to the Malaysian Malays their non-productivity despite the special rights that they have been endowed with since their birth and since the beginning of that nation. Even at the cost of the prime minister’s humility the situation is still the same.

Back in Singapore, efforts to publicize all the failures has become an ongoing effort. The latest edition to that effort is the weekly show titled ‘Hanyut’ on Monday nights on Suria. (for those who cared, I assisted in the production of the theme song, the singer is a stupid minah by the way). The name means to be swept away, the inspiration to this article and the focus of this exposé. Every week, the series tells the true life stories of some dysfunctional teenagers, with a different topic each show. The stories could be about anything negative, including gangsters, tattoos, extramarital pregnancies, abortion, smoking, drugs, you get the picture.

Now, to shed light on such negative matters to the community that spawned them could have several effects. The first is the classic ‘learn from your mistakes’. Probably when the producers thought of the show, this was what they had in mind. Though other consequences to producing the show were probably dismissed or probably not even thought of, typically Malay-like.

The second effect is to stereotype everyone’s impression of Malay teens. The irony is that the ‘everyone’ I refer to include Malay parents themselves. How many here can deny that Malay parents, after watching the show, will tell their children to not follow what was shown on TV without realizing that their children were the ones committing those offences themselves. As if failing is not enough, now the Malays just had to ensure that everyone thinks that they are failures.

The third effect is more psychological. Scientific research has proven that what one sees and believes in directly affect the type of person they become. Now let’s theorize what could happen to a Malay teenager who watches the show. I think you can see it already. Heck, just look down at the void deck to get a clearer picture. Now you can see what happened. When we thought the situation couldn’t get any worse, the Malays once again defied that by putting their youths’ future in a vice grip of past failures. They take the saying ‘history repeats itself’ to a whole new level.

What sparked my fury personally was the tone in which the show was delivered. It makes the viewers all seem naïve and innocent, as if the wrong-doers in the series are some bunch of losers from a faraway place. Well that could qualify since their colossal bosoms did originate from their thinking of walking to the bus stop is a marathon (notice that was a metaphor, not a simile).

If they wanted to make a show about how much the Malay community has failed, at least make it like a straight-to-the-head tight slap, like the article I’m writing now. They should produce a show exposing the sick problems that naïve and innocent looking Malays actually face instead of the naked-to-the-eye problems. Retelling the tale of past mistakes is becoming such a cliché. Surfacing newer problems would be such a touché.

Sometimes one would wonder how a disaster at this massive a scale could be kept blissful to the public eye. More importantly one would continue to wonder what could possibly the solution to all this. Day by day, the stakes are getting greater. As the public eye turns towards the direction of the Malays, will we see them scattering about like the filthy rats they are or rise from the ashes to be born anew. Only time can bring the ultimate exposé to that question.

And yes, I am a Malay.