Rudyard Kipling"
āWhen you're left wounded on Afganistan's plains and
the women come out to cut up what remains, Just roll to your rifle
and blow out your brains,
And go to your God like a soldierā
General Douglas MacArthur"
āWe are not retreating. We are advancing in another direction.ā
āIt is fatal to enter any war without the will to win it.ā āOld soldiers never die; they just fade away.
āThe soldier, above all other people, prays for peace, for he must suffer and be the deepest wounds and scars of war.ā
āMay God have mercy upon my enemies, because I won't .ā āThe object of war is not to die for your country but to make the other bastard die for his.
āNobody ever defended, there is only attack and attack and attack some more.
āIt is foolish and wrong to mourn the men who died. Rather we should thank God that such men lived.
The Soldier stood and faced God
Which must always come to pass
He hoped his shoes were shining
Just as bright as his brass
"Step forward you Soldier,
How shall I deal with you?
Have you always turned the other cheek?
To My Church have you been true?"
"No, Lord, I guess I ain't
Because those of us who carry guns
Can't always be a saint."
I've had to work on Sundays
And at times my talk was tough,
And sometimes I've been violent,
Because the world is awfully rough.
But, I never took a penny
That wasn't mine to keep.
Though I worked a lot of overtime
When the bills got just too steep,
The Soldier squared his shoulders and said
And I never passed a cry for help
Though at times I shook with fear,
And sometimes, God forgive me,
I've wept unmanly tears.
I know I don't deserve a place
Among the people here.
They never wanted me around
Except to calm their fears.
If you've a place for me here,
Lord, It needn't be so grand,
I never expected or had too much,
But if you don't, I'll understand."
There was silence all around the throne
Where the saints had often trod
As the Soldier waited quietly,
For the judgment of his God.
"Step forward now, you Soldier,
You've borne your burden well.
Walk peacefully on Heaven's streets,
You've done your time in Hell."
Malaysiakini : Actor Zul Ariffin who is under some sort of investigation
for posting that clip that started this mess said something that gets
to the heart of the issue. He said: āI apologise to everyone who was
affected by the upload of that video.ā
Two points need to be made.
First, nobody has the right to ban or censor something which āaffectsā
them. If you read or watch something that affects you, you are a
complete moron if you want to ban or censor that which affects you.
The
second point (and this relates to Malaysia specifically), the state
does not care if non-Malays/Muslims are affected by words, actions or
images from the dominant polity. Even more so when it comes to political
and religious operatives from the Malay community.
Two years ago, a PAS political operative made statements that the bible was distorted and refused to apologise but was willing to have a dialogue.
There
is no possible way to have a good-faith religious dialogue in this
country because non-Muslims will always be at a disadvantage as they
cannot make factual arguments about how Islam is practised.
The reality does not fit with the fair rhetoric that its adherents claim is what the religion is based on.
This is the unfairness when it comes to fighting with one hand tied behind your back.
This
handicap when it comes to defending secular positions and the reality
that if you do this, you would not only have to contend with mainstream
Malay/Muslim retaliation but also partisans who have no interest in
rocking the boat.
On the face of it, we as citizens of this
country are dealing with state censorship and moral policing but as
ethnic communities, what we are dealing with is unequal applications of
laws and norms that regulate political and social interactions.
Freedom
Film Network director Anna Har in discussing how censorship should only
be there to protect minors - anyone who reads my columns understands
that I have very little sympathy for āthink of the childrenā type
reactions ā said something interesting about censorship classifications.
She
said: ā(It) must take into account that there are different types of
Malaysians and it's important to respect and protect everyone's needs
and interests and not just the dominant or loudest, and (the) best way
to do it is by classification.ā
Actor Zul Ariffin
Censorship and sedition laws
Here is the problem. The state does not recognise the reality that there are different types of Malaysians.
In
fact, what the state actively advocates is a monolithic majority and
minorities who are here only because of the benefice of the majority
community.
We are dealing with a political and religious
bureaucracy that seeks to define the racial, sexual and religious
identities of the majority of Malaysians and attempts to impose that
definition on minority communities.
Every book, film, and
photograph that attempts to subvert this idea has been met with some
form of censorship or outright banning.
The state especially when
it comes to the majority polity actively curtail any attempts in the
words of George Bernard Shaw āā¦ challenging current conceptions and
executed by supplanting existing institutionsā.
This is the
problem here in Malaysia. If people start talking about curtailing
censorship by the state, what they run into are political and religious
operatives, claiming that people are trying to āprovokeā the majority.
Elements within the majority who attempt to curtail the excesses of the state are met with similar or even worse sanctions.
Have
you noticed that whenever political and religious operatives say they
have received numerous complaints on certain issues, they never give
examples as to what constitutes censure-worthy speech? It is always in
the abstract.
There is censorship and then to keep people afraid,
there are sedition laws which are part of the censorship apparatus in
this country.
Keep in mind the numerous artists, activists and
ordinary rakyat who have been charged with sedition while the political
and religious elites have the freedom to define narratives in this
country.
These laws are enacted to muzzle the public but, more
importantly, are vital tools in the āfear boxā to remind the public that
whatever they say or do against the state is always under scrutiny.
You
can never tell what you say or do is seditious or illegal because these
laws are there for the convenience of the ruling elite, rather than any
kind of traditional normative values or reasoning of a functional
democracy.
The main reason why there has never been and will never
be an authentic Bangsa Malaysia is that the censorship by the state has
made it impossible to even discuss what it means to be Malaysian beyond
political bromides and propaganda.
When the state controls how people talk to each other, they define the people.
