Malaysia, we need to talk
By Julian Tan
Ask any Malaysian and many would agree that the past year has been an especially challenging period for the country and its political scene.
Following the 1MDB scandal that captivated the nation and shocked the world, Malaysia’s leadership has become more right wing, with the realities of money politics being a lot less concerned about staying hidden from view.
Race-based politics continues to flourish, and religious policing encroaches more and more into the personal lives of ordinary Malaysians. The Ringgit continues to weaken, and trust levels towards the government are worryingly low.
Amidst all this, one cannot help but notice a very sad theme emerging – the divide between “us” and “them”, which continues to widen as both sides of the divide become increasingly polarised.
The voices of those who refuse to admit that there are some very serious problems concerning the country and of those who can only preach doom to the nation are becoming louder from their respective corners, leading to less discourse in an already rather muted society.
This is dangerous because it feeds into a vicious cycle, causing further polarisation and threatening the very fabric that holds a society together – unity. The reality is that being united is really important if we are to get out of the mess that we’re in. To widen the divide is to fall for the very tactics of divide and conquer that some very powerful people rely on for political leverage and survival.
We need to be united, and one pertinent way to achieve that is to be receptive towards facilitating conversations with people of opposing views and stances; to approach such types of discourse with genuine humility, ready to admit that we could be wrong about some of our strongest-held beliefs.
We need to meet and engage with other people who don’t think like us so we don’t only hear echoes of our own opinions.
Mature societies get this right; they challenge existing ideas while having that bit of humility to admit when they could be standing on the wrong side of an argument.
Indeed, it is sad that in Malaysia, we have managed to create a leadership that falls far below the mark of maturity from years of complacency. Equally, as a society where we are taught to allocate respect based on hierarchy and seniority, we lack this maturity as well and hence, do not engage in discourse often or more strongly enough.
We would benefit greatly from a paradigm shift in the way we approach and tackle issues – to be more courageous when challenging existing ideas and norms, to have greater humility in accepting different opinions even when (and especially when) they are at odds with our own beliefs.
We need to redefine respect, where being respectful does not mean refraining from challenging someone more experienced or of a higher social stature. Instead, being respectful should mean appreciating opposing views enough to verbalise disagreements and discuss them.
For the issues ailing our country are merely symptomatic of much more fundamental problems, and it is our inability to engage in discourse that is forcing a narrow bottleneck on our efforts to solve them.
Julian Tan is a proud Malaysian working in London and holds a PhD in Micromechanics from the University of Cambridge.
