HOW TO BE A SUCCESSFUL ENTERTAINER? MAKE FUN OF UMNO
By Hang Kasturi, New Malaysia Herald
One of the aims or goals of most entertainers (Malaysians) is to be accepted by all, or at least the majority. For most, it’s giving the grassroot Malays what they want – dramas about Datos and Tan Sris skirt-chasing every minute of the day, Tan Sris talking about billion-dollar projects in small boardrooms to other pathetic-looking executives and oh well, you know what I mean.
However, there’s a bunch of entertainers who seem to prefer to ply their trade and be more relevant and acceptable to the ‘IN’ crowd – the urban hipster cool crowd, sometimes also referred to as the Bangsar Bubble or the KL crowd. The members of this crowd include bananas, coconuts, oreos and every other person who prefers speaking in either English or Mandarin in their daily lives.
These are the type who go to see English plays (because it is deemed cool to go and support local English theatre); they are those who also catch the beautiful sounds of the Malaysian Philharmonic Orchestra (because it makes them look learned); and for the less arty-farty, the ones who party at Changkat Bukit Bintang talking about the joy of having RM500.00 wagyu steaks.
Intellects Of Society
The members of this elite crowd are also supposed to be the most economically stable and the most loaded – they are the ones who drive imported cars, wear branded products, drink expensive wine and along the way, somehow, proclaim themselves as the intellects of society.
They also consider themselves more Malaysian than others (barring the part where they hardly speak in the national language at all), marketing themselves as heroes of a just multi-racial Malaysian society. They claim to be freedom fighters for they fight against inequality and injustice. By the way, they also think that they are ALWAYS in the right.
Furthermore, if there are any opinions from the ‘Malay’ quarters, especially from rural society and leaders, and especially those who are the products of the national educational system – these opinions are worthless or flawed at best. Why listen to these ruffians, they ask. They are the creme de la creme and graduates of great Australian universities. So they know what they are talking about (just like that fellow who claims to be a financial whiz because he is an accounting graduate from Australia).
So, these are the people some entertainers would bend backwards for. If they can win over this crowd, they have got it made. And how do they do it? They pander to the oft and easy way of making fun of UMNO and the ruling government (as long as they are not DAP or PKR). They also earn extra points if they make fun of Najib and Rosmah. They believe this crowd loves to hear them whack UMNO and their ilk.
This is strange because for a very long while, these stand up comics never stop making fun of Mahathir Mohamad, the then incumbent Prime Minister of Malaysia. It was the rage back then if you can make jokes about Mahathir and his UMNO cronies.
Today it is different. They don’t make fun of the old man anymore. His sins are now considered ‘passe’ or irrelevant. All is forgiven. It is Najib, Rosmah and IMDB who are the current flavours of the month. Nothing else and no one else matters.
So who are these comedians? I won’t mention their names but I let you figure out who they are by only using their initials, or maybe scrutinising the collage below for a bit.
