Insulting the insulter: Where does it all end?
The Chinese community must practice what it preaches if it wants to end racism.
Scott Ng, Free Malaysia Today
If you’re a follower of TV serials, you know the feeling of watching from a bird’s eye view as people in the show come into conflict over what is obviously a misunderstanding. It’s frustrating, and you wish you could reach out to the characters on the screen to shake them and tell them that what’s happening is wrong, that their allies are not their enemies and they should change the way they are behaving.
I feel like that sometimes as I watch the conflict between the Malays and the Chinese escalate to histrionic and ridiculous levels. It seems like a series of misunderstandings have built up into tiny cuts, and we just keep picking on each other’s scabrous wounds as if we’re addicted to pain and frustration. It becomes even worse when we try to one-up each other, as if this is some sort of game or contest.
As a member of the Malaysian Chinese community, I feel like we need to be honest with ourselves. Sure, much of the rhetoric coming from some Malays has been blatantly anti-Chinese, but we too have been guilty of arrogant racism.
Let’s take Zahid Hamidi’s recent trip to Indonesia. Yes, there are legitimate concerns on the use of public resources, since the DPM’s son just happened to have his wedding in Jakarta during his visit – a visit, mind you, to study the haze situation, and we’ve been studying that for a long time.
However, it is not acceptable for Namewee to tell Zahid to “balik Indonesia” and then curse him with one of the vilest insults a Malaysian can level at another. Did he have a point? Perhaps he did, given the “balik China” insult that’s been repeated many times for years, but Namewee must realise that the Chinese community does not gain anything when a member of our community makes a statement as inflammatory and, I dare say, as racist as the one he aimed at Zahid.
And Namewee is not alone. Some days, I dread wading into the comments sections of news sites because I know in my heart that the first blatantly racist comment will likely come from a Chinese commenter in response to either a cybertrooper or a moderate Malay who sees the Opposition as not quite worthy of trust.
What we don’t realise is that we too are creating tiny cuts in the Malay psyche, and the insults build up as scar tissue that cannot be ignored. Often enough, it is insinuated that the Malay commenter does not know what he is talking about because he comes from a kampung. It’s the same kind of racism directed at the Indian community when the first question you ask an Indian man is, “You drunk, is it?” and the same kind that a black man in America suffers when he is searched for drugs or guns.
