Animal Farm: Malaysian Edition
Welcome to a land where pigs, chickens and cows are the true messengers of the human word
Jasmine Wong, Free Malaysia Today
George Orwell wrote the satirical, dystopian Animal Farm in 1945. Through the use of allegory, Orwell tells the tale of an oppressed and suffering society (made up of animals in a farm), who after toppling their cruel government (made up of humans), elected new leaders among themselves, only to find these new leaders inflicting the same forms of oppression on them.
Suffice to say that such a profound representation of political tyranny and the dangerous promptings of the ego is lost on most Malaysians, who have instead preferred to assume a more literal interpretation of Orwell’s classic.
“The distinguishing mark of man is the hand, the instrument with which he does all his mischief,” so wrote Orwell and he couldn’t have been more right.
Animal Farm: Malaysian Edition involves humans of the most questionable intellect who think cow heads, pig heads and bloodied, dead chickens send a far clearer message than calm and fair discourse. Also, the more sacrilegious the better.
Cows are revered by Hindus, pigs are “haram” to Muslims and chickens… well chickens are simply cheaper and easier to slaughter and fling whole at the Chinese.
Falling short on the gift of rational speech, “concerned” citizens who have felt their very existence threatened by Rayer’s “celaka Umno” remark and Teresa Kok’s comedy sketch have reasoned that the head of a dead animal or two sums up their outrage better than words can. Much like the numerous pig heads thrown in front of mosques at the height of the Allah issue in 2010.
One does wonder how our multi-racial, multi-religious and for the most part peaceful society degenerated so fast into a carcass-wielding band of hooligans every time somebody took issue with what they saw or heard.
Having our own Home Minister punctuate these unruly acts with his “big mouth” remark clearly explains why we as a society are spiralling out of all control. When the top brass can do it, surely we can too.
And speaking of top brass, where’s our Prime Minister? His complete and utter silence has got many wondering if the cat has got his tongue.
