Complacency KILLS the Future

What do you do when a vast majority of an entire country begins to lose the capacity to think rationally? 

Many Malaysians spend a great deal of time criticizing the government, and there is certainly a lot to complain about, but it is not just the government that is the problem.

Voting Malaysians are just too complacent.

All over Malaysia, people appear to be going insane.  It is almost as if we have been cursed with being easily duped to follow the agendas of others. 

Hordes of individuals easily fall for the rhetoric of charismatic stage talkers and religious looking con men who tell them how to live their own lives to the extent that in a civil society like Malaysia we are now at crossroads with one side of religion spouting, damnation predicting crowd contesting the rallying calls of a pluralistic civil society crowd questioning the direct affront to their civil liberties.

Sadly, this applies to every layer of society from the very top all the way down to the very bottom. 

A lot of us find ourselves asking the following question much more frequently these days: "How could they be so stupid?" 
Unfortunately, we are witnessing a complete collapse of common sense all over Malaysia.  

Many people seem to believe that if we could just get Barisan out of office or if we could just reform our political system that our problems as a nation would be solved, but that is simply not true. 

Our problems run much deeper than that. 

The societal decay that is plaguing our country is very deep and it is everywhere. 
We are a nation that is full of people that do not care about others and that just want to do what is right in their own eyes. 

As an example take a conversation I was privy to yesterday, in the hallowed surroundings of a private home where two old friends; one a Chinese Datuk and the other a respected President of a Muslim association -who have known each other for more than 35 years and is each a rogue in his own right contested heartily with the other that if the business man does not offer a bribe then the administrating people will not have a chance to take the offer.

The business man whole heartedly agreed with his good friend but asked why a profit oriented businessman should want to give away good money unless he cannot get to do / operate for profit in the first place due to the inefficient administration and red tape.

Both have the right to think that they have the correct version of this blame game, and the truth is neither one will stop doing whatever they are doing because it has become “normal business style”

Even our PM Najib is guilty of holding ourselves out to the rest of the world as "Satu Negara Majmuk yang berjaya tapi sederhana" and an example of an modern upwardly mobile young Islamic nation that can be a role model to other Islamic nations in the world, and yet internally within the last 53 + years, our own “Negara majmuk” civil society is visibly seen rotting all around us.  Bersih rallies and Hindraf are an example of this. 

These are justifications by Malaysians themselves and not outsiders.

The words "crazy", "insane" and "deluded" are not nearly strong enough to describe our frame of mind as a country and of our political leaders.  

For god’s sake, Malaysians still looks up to the ravings of a sad, delusional old man who can’t seem to posit out of his selective memory anymore. This is the very guy who insists adult, responsible, tax paying, law abiding citizens of Malaysia are " not matured enough, too sentimental and emotional to appreciate arguments that were presented rationally".

Not mature enough means not fully developed or lacking the wisdom usually associated with adults. In other words, 

Malaysians, by and large, are still mentally inadequate. 

For this, we really have him to blame and thank for, in the same breath.

In 1974, MM was made the country’s Education Minister. That was when the decline began. 

Bit by bit, this man started to dismantle the strong foundation of a very sound education system which we had inherited from the British who once colonized us. 

Step by step, he began to take away the core, the essence, the fundamental part of education; then molded it into a tool to serve his political needs.

First, the teaching of English was limited to one subject only and English Literatures were relegated to the trash bin. 

He then politicized subjects like History and Moral Studies.

Without us realizing it, he closed our windows to the world. 

Instead of studying world history, we were forced to focus on local history and even then, we have to study distorted history, history not written by neutral historians but by those appointed by the Education Ministry to glorify the government.

It was a torture to read about the government coined slogan “Bersih, Cekap dan Amanah” in Moral studies when you can see corruptions being practiced so openly among civil servants of all levels.

As mentioned earlier, what Malaysia is experiencing is not just a cry for national justice, but a long awaited revivalism towards the fundamental need of fair play and justice. 

The truth is that not only have we lost decades of enterprising, morally upstanding youths who could not stand the double standards evident in this country under the name of racially based polarization;  repeatedly mind washed into believing that the Bumi’s  being under economic threat is akin to national security under threat .

Also, our entire society’s economic plurality is ebbing away due to inconsistent economic policies, flip flopping remedial action in education and way ward allowance for religion to be used as a scare mongering tactic to keep the main ethnic race in check.

The result is collapsing moral & ethical pluralistic society 53 + years on.

For many years our nation’s great prosperity from Tin, Rubber, Palm oil and Petroleum masked much of our mismanagement of resources and declining civil society in government and administration (even within the civil service), but evidently this generation of Malaysians can see plainly how our great economic strength is superseded by a small island down south that has less than 5% of our country’s resources and strength, and yet is far superior in economic and way of living compared to us Malaysians and it is becoming very difficult to deny how far we have fallen as a nation in comparison.

It really is sad, because Malaysia was once a truly great nation.

So is there any hope of a recovery?

Not if we keep going down the same path.

In the end, the choice is up to you Malaysians.