what you see is not what you get

"Is Malaysia a racist country?"

That was the question that was asked to start off the discussion amongst my friends at one of the gathering we had. I must fairly admit that I was taken aback by the question and it took me a while to recover my senses before I could muster enough 'strength' to answer it.

Several aspects of the question struck me as peculiar: Was he expecting a clear-cut 'yes' or 'no' answer from the rest of us? Why does he have to highlight that particular characteristic - if it is at all a valid one that is - of the country? How could he have simply make the connection between those two things - Malaysia and racism - and conveniently phrased it in a direct question like that?

My immediate response to his question was "What do you mean by the word racist?"

Silence. Dumbfounded looks from all of them.

I asked it again, "How do you mean Malaysia is - if at all - racist? Do you have a list of criterias in mind about what makes a country racist and you find that Malaysia fulfilled all of these criterias? Or do you simply make the conclusion that just because Malaysian comprises of many different races, therefore its people automatically are called racist?"

Once again, my questions are met with complete silence. They seemed to be at loss to describe what they personally understood by the term 'racist'.

And that is the problem.

You put forward a question asking whether such things have such characteristics and yet you have no clear idea of exactly what those characteristics are.

It is like driving blindly at night without your headlights on; you have no clear view of where the road will lead and you won't even know whether you have reached your destination because you don't even know what and where it is supposed to be.

Personally, I felt that the question was asked because I sounds provocative and a little cliche' to most people. Many people think it is easy to start the ball rolling on such questions, but that depends on the quality of the discussion you intend to have.

It is the kind of question which have the potential of generating a lot of interesting discussions and bringing forth a multiplicity of views but if not approached properly or phrased in the right manner, it would not bring you any closer to the answer - if there is one that is.

It is the kind of question which could be both discussed in the Parliament, at international academic conferences, written in detail in thesis papers or at the mamak stall in the corner.

Everyone can contribute their views and opinions to it. But the quality of the discussion they get out of it may differ greatly.

In the case of the discussion I had amongst my friends, I believe they were a little misguided because they insist of obtaining a 'yes' or 'no' response. The crux of the matter is that such questions often does not have such categorically neat answers.

To insist on answers of such nature is akin to trying to plug a square peg into a hole; you can invest a huge amount of effort trying to answer it but you are actually getting nowhere near the answer.

I truly despise people who have a tendency to frame everything into black or white without even considering the possibility the grey area in between those two extremes.

They ruthlessly reduce the complex interdependency and the delicate interplay between the different elements of an issue into simple, neat 'rightist' or 'leftist' groups. For them, if something is not in A, then it must be in B, assuming that A and B are the only groups available.

I realized that to a certain degree, all issues require that kind of reductionist treament but to frivolously apply it to the extent that you lose your sensitivity to the minute and fine details is slowly leading you into an intellectual dead end.

In this case, my friends have applied such treatment to the issue of race in Malaysia. It is like trying to limit a person's whole vocabulary in his daily communications into just several words.

And to do so does nothing but to bring in more confusions, introduce weak presumptions and create divisions where there are initially none into the matter.

Done enough times over and this will eventually be considered as the only way to view the matter. Worse, some people might even make the damning leap of faith to assume that that is the true nature of the matter.

And when you have people who conveniently compartmentalize their views into clear cut categories without even stopping to think of the other possibilities, streotypes, prejudices and generalizations begin to flourish.

Opposing views are scorned upon and restricted. The diversity of opinions are frowned on and suppressed. The intellectual landscape eventually becomes sterile.

I think in Malaysia, we are sometimes inadvertertly and unwillingly lead into this kind of thinking. Every social, political and economic issues affecting the general public are cast in such a way that the distinctions between the victims and the culprits are overly highlighted to the point that it is second nature for us to swiftly point the finger of blame to someone, without even looking at the big picture or critically examining the matter.

The routine are always the same each time: an issue crops up, the media will highlight it, government officials will give their 'formal' response, someone will become the sacrificial lamb (often not the ones who deserved it) and after a few weeks, the issue will die down.

The whole thing plays out like it was scripted to the very last letter. And we simply allow ourselves to be washed away by the excitement of the moment and did not reflect or look deeper into the matter.

We do not take heed the calls for or allow room for intelligent discourses on the issue which might have offered us with a more lasting solution rather than a knee-jerk response Malaysians are so famous for.

In short, we allow ourselves to be taken for the ride.

Similarly, in the case of my discussions with my friends, most of them thought it was an exciting and exhilirating topic to talk about. And did they talk like their lives depended on it, fiercely defending their own views and trying to force them into each other's throats. But at the end of it, nothing truly profound and memorable comes out of it.

They made the mistake of finding and coming up with the answer that wasn't there to begin with. They made the mistake of trying to simplify the racial issues which have been plauging Malaysia for so long into a simple clear-cut black-or-white issue.

They fail to comprehend the complexity of the subject and by doing so, they have neglected a large section of the argument which eventually leads them astray.

I often think that people who have a tendency to make such simple categorization did so because their minds cannot comprehend the fine details or aspects of the issue. The subtleties of the argument and the little nuances in the words used are lost in them.

I must admit that it is frustrating speaking to people like that. You cannot seemed to get them to understand that there is more to the matter than just black-or-white; they do not appreciate the intricacies of the matter or the problem at hand, the different sensitivities which needs to be taken care of and simply bulldoze their ideas through no matter what.

They stubbornly hold on to their views and refuse to hear any word against it. In some cases, they will even go as far as to censor you altogether. And when that happens, there will be collateral damage; people silenced, editors sacked and media impotent while the instigator scurry away freely.

It is true that it is frustrating having to deal with people like that; but then again, if they prefer to remain in their cloistered, monochromatic world which barely mimics real life, who are we to coerce them to get out of it, right?

However, these people are the same people who will accuse those who accepts and appreciate the diversity of views present as being wishy-washy, an idealist or too theoretical. One of my friends even called my thoughts and writings about Malaysia social, economic and political problems as 'building castles in the air'.

These people are so keen to protect their own views, the purity of their opinions so much so that they begin to attack other people's views. It is a cowardly thing to do actually - attacking others to make oneself look good.

I mean, even a single candle will look bright in a dark room if it is the only candle present.

Besides, idealist we might be to them but deluded we are not.

As for my friend's discussion, it might be interesting to note that everyone in that discussion were Malays talking about what is obviously a Malaysian question. Then, it comes as no surprise that they end up proposing the formation of a Malay discussion group to tackle such issues.

A truly one dimensional answer to a complex three dimensional problem I think.

After all, one's mind may be simple, naive and straighforward but our lives are not necesarily so.