Alas for us
Jan 24, 2007 in Diary-writer
I was sifting through my old posts in blogspot, when I came across this entry I posted while editing a Ministry-Approved English secondary text book.
The bulk of the post was my long complaint about the mountains we had to climb just so that we could get things done. I wrote about the ingenious 'ideas' that came from officials who thought they knew what they were doing.
Now that I look back, I remember this particular draft artwork on a page, that showed a young lad and a young girl, both in school uniforms, greeting each other on the way to work. Whoever had a say in the audit-team for the ministry-appointed editorial sessions, circled that particular picture and pointed out that 'boys and girls should not say hello like this, change girl to boy'.
Interestingly, where the syllabus approved themes said that we should talk about teenage issues, including gender gap and generation gap, there was a specific outcry when my editorial team of authors proposed to talk about 'difficult' topics, like rape, and parent-child arguments.
The fruit of the year-long struggle was immortalized into a book that droned Malaysia-perfecto, a country that was sin-free and ill-free, where real problems like snatch thieves don't exist.
I'm not saying that the people who sat on the various panels who had the opportunity to give their piece of mind into the production of the book were wrong. I can't say that because I had a say in it. But looking back, I can't help but shiver at this sudden realization.
You see, we're all drawn into the same flow. The flow that when you're doing something for the government, when you're writing on behalf of the government, you've got to think like they do. Behave like they do. And governments are supposed to protect the people (AT WHATEVER COST).
Even if it means promoting ignorance. At all costs. Even if it means promoting silence.
You wonder if they have this rationale: If these stories aren't spoken of in the first place, then defamation can't happen, yes? If people don't know, then they're fine, we're fine. We're peaceful, we're not-racist, there's no rape, there's no extra-marital affairs, no protests, no disgruntled employees or citizens because we don't talk about in the public.
Not in school books, not on TV, not on the Internet, not on blogs. If people don't learn about these things, we're fine.
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So we allow the concept of bureaucracy to happen. We advocate it, we push for leaders, who will go up front. We choose people whom we trust in, we choose them from the grassroots, promising individuals full of hope. Oh how we hope that when they get into the system, they won't ever get absorbed into it, that they don't learn to move with the flow. Alas, when they do get to Rome, they'll eventually learn to do as the Romans do. Could you blame them? So caught up, that they don't even realize it.
So while they started out elected, eventually the whole thing will morph into the old story of feudalistic bureaucracy.
You know what's really scary?
That red tape, you can't imagine just how long the tape extends, how just how many tapes there actually are, just how many are being added each minute. And we're all relying on the right people, the people whom we trust able, to make decisions important enough to provide but a little positive change in our lives. We watch, and then when the time comes, we choose.
At the end of the day, if you realize, we don't really have a say, except that once ever so often. After that we leave it all to the right person, the person sitting in a position of power. The biggie. And down here, we hope he doesn't turn into just 'another one of them'.
The scariest thing is this: It's not the biggies who are making the decisions, it's the smallies who think that they're biggies.
p.s. I registered as a voter today. When I asked when the elections will be, the kind SPR officer smiled and said, 'PM kata, sebelum 2008, kan?'