Time for a Merdeka truce

Togetherness: In this month of Merdeka, we should also pledge that our flag be honoured by more compassion and generosity. — Bernama

MY, there are a lot of thin-skinned people in our beloved nation, aren’t there!

These people, almost overwhelmingly with the XY chromosome and somewhat prone to be thick around the middle, seem to be triggered by just about anything and everything.

As a child, my father used to tell the story of a man who kept pointing at buildings, mountains, trees and everything he saw claiming that each reminded him of love. When asked how these seemingly innocuous things could remind him of love, he replied, “Everything reminds me of love!” “Love” may have been a euphemism for something else but I suspect my father sanitised this story a little to suit my little girl ears.

Some people in our country are a bit like that man, seeing reminders of what they dislike everywhere. But instead of finding joy in them, they are finding offense. Everything from socks to flags to women’s dress is a source of insult to them. Even if the “offense” was unintentionally done by a perfect stranger, somehow, they manage to make it seem almost personal, that they have been hurt right into the deepest reaches of their being where, apparently, a heart does not exist.

It makes me wonder how the easily offended go about their lives. If you’re perpetually looking for the slightest insult every single minute of the day, you must surely be constantly frowning and a terrible grump to be with. Their friends must all have their brows furrowed as well because what human with the slightest amount of joy and levity would want to be around these types of people? They derive happiness, it seems, from ensuring that they spoil other people’s days.

But there you are, these insult hunters, these offense opportunists, who must surely wake up every morning thinking “Whose life can I make miserable today?”. Or rather, more specifically, who from the community that generally minds their own business but can sometimes be a bit culturally obtuse, can they harass today? And since it’s been a while since they had any mention in the papers, whose attention can they attract today? Notoriety must be addictive since some people seem to perpetually crave it.

So much time is spent on these ways to get enraged that there must be no time left to do anything productive like, say, earn an honest living. Imagine setting up your own stall to sell pisang goreng where you’ll be able to hang as many flags as possible all over it? There you can be perfectly certain that each is hung patriotically correctly. Surely that would eventually earn you enough to buy your wife a real LV bag because undoubtedly everyone will want to buy from a correctly-beflagged warong. That seems like a better use of time than protesting one store and its befuddled owner and shutting down a whole row of businesses.

I am so glad however that there are some sensible people in this country. On Aug 19, in the case of Heidy Quah Gaik Li vs the Government of Malaysia, the Court of Appeal delivered a landmark ruling. The Court’s presiding panel unanimously ruled that the prohibition against content that is “offensive ...with the intent to annoy” under Section 233 (1)(a) of the Communications and Multimedia Act 1998, is unconstitutional.

In its wisdom, the Court said that criminalising the words “offensive” and “annoy” would infringe on our constitutional right to freedom of speech as well as the right to equality under Articles 8 and 10 in the Federal Constitution. As a result, they expunged the two words from Section 233(1)(a).

This was quite incredible. It returned the right to say what you feel about a government policy to the people. After all, not all government policies or even laws are necessarily correct, justified or fair. If they affect people negatively, then surely there’s something wrong with these laws and they need to be revised. The only way for our lawmakers to know if their bills are not up to the mark is by listening to those most affected by them. Some people may get frustrated by this process and express this in ways that may not make our government comfortable. But they have a right to do that. If the government or whoever gets annoyed or offended, it is not the complaining person’s fault. After all what annoys or offends one person may not be received the same way by another.

But, as is the Malaysian way, our government is appealing the decision of the Court. I guess it wants to be perpetually annoyed and offended. Which makes me think that we should have the right to also take the government to task when they annoy and offend us. Given that this happens almost daily, it would keep us, lawyers and the courts even more busy than they are already. Another waste of time that we can’t afford.

Perhaps we should call a truce. We should agree on all sides to stop being offended by anything other than truly major issues such as schoolchildren being bullied, women being abused and murdered, people being unable to afford necessities, the quality of our children’s education, man-made causes of floods and landslides and everything else that really affect our lives. In this month of Merdeka, we should free ourselves from pettiness and unkindness and pledge that our flag be honoured by more compassion and generosity.

Selamat Hari Kebangsaan, folks!

Marina Mahathir wishes that the thin-skinned would all take a breath before they feel hurt on behalf of other people. The views expressed here are solely the writer’s own.