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Sunday, September 8, 2013

Sense of Belonging

Actually some time I will condemn the big part of the Chinese community because they are only focus on helping Chinese and did not think about seeing ourselves as Malaysian and help Malaysian in general. We often condemn the Malay government only care for Malay but aren't we the same? I can still heard many Chinese said "Chinese must help Chinese".

However, in the same time, I noticed that one of the cause of this phenomena is because Chinese has less sense of belonging in our country - Malaysia. I agree in some way that we, Chinese Malaysian are being treated like second class citizen. Government will say: "Many poor people are bumiputra, that's why we have to help them". Chinese community will then say:" Then we should help the people according to their economy status, not races".

Chinese community is always the races with strongest economic status, I can understand why Malay politician being so defensive toward other races, because in this capitalism world, who has more money, he will gain power easier. Moreover, Chinese are very protective against our language and culture, thus Malay community will be afraid that if they didn't hold on to the power they are having now, they will be the one who got neglected. By looking at this situation, Some politicians try to suppress Chinese community to avoid Chinese becoming more powerful.

With a lot of policies implemented by the current government, it makes Chinese Malaysian has lesser and lesser sense of belonging to our country because we have less privileges even we work very hard or even harder than some of the other races. Some "people"(or katak) said that we should be grateful because they have already give-in a lot to Chinese; but without the hard-work of other races and the colonization of British, do you seriously think that our country can develop that fast? Why aren't those "people" be grateful?

I am thinking, if our government change their policy, where they try to give the Chinese community more sense of belonging to this country,  they maybe can make the Chinese to even help the other races more generously instead of just protect Chinese people. But because of the "divide and rule" policy, Chinese are less willing to help other races because Chinese received different treatment and has less sense of belonging to our country. Ideally, when we all work together truthfully, we can solve the problem in our country easier!

Ideally, yes it's just ideally. Maybe Chinese who is reading this post will agree with what I said above; but ask yourselves, if you are have all the privileges and power, are you willing to help other races like you help Chinese? Are you willing to donate big amount of money to help build Malay school? For these, you might say yes.

Next, are you willing to adhere the original contract stated in the Constitution, and respect the races who started the civilization in this land, by fully recognize Malay language as first language? Are you willing to accept for every official matter, we mainly use Malay language? Are you willing to give up vernacular school and together we build up a better education system as a whole? Or are you willing to abolish vernacular schools so that all children can study in a same environment where all children can live together and learn to understand and tolerate with each other more? (of course we must still have our right to choose to learn Mandarin and retain our cultures, but it will be all depends on personal choices). What I've stated doesn't mean I 100% agree with it, but I think this is what we should ponder upon and there must be give and take.

If you say no, then try to think in their position, will you let Chinese to share the same privileges? Anyhow, I still don't agree with many of the current government policy and this does not justify their wrong doing (especially using religion as a political tool). In the same time, Chinese, are you really willing to fully being recognize as Malaysian and tell everyone that we are "Ma lai xi ya Ren", not stressing on "Hua Ren"?

I believe if we "live together", communicate more, better understanding and toleration among races will be achieved. There will be less comments such as "Muslim prayer is so noisy; Buddhist praying pollute the environment; Christian try to convert others, Hindu smells bad; Malay is lazy; Chinese is money-face; Indian always tell lies..." (I can still hear this kind of comments here and there). Even different family within same races have different culture, if we deeply understand others culture, we will not likely to have negative feeling toward others.

In this democratic world, everything is possible to be changed with the agreement of majority of the people, even the Constitution. However, when we want to change, we should also be more considerate and walk in other people's shoes. Sometimes it's not just the politicians want to divide-and-rules, some Chinese want to be "divided" by sticking many thing in Chinese way.

What I said is never the "correct" way nor the best way to improve our country, the "best" way we thought might be "best" for us, but not for others. However, to give and take is a better way in my opinion where I try to find a balance among the Malaysian, because --- I belong to Malaysia.