Point of Law
It is becoming quite a fad to persecute bloggers these days.
In San Francissco, USA, blogger Joshua Wolf was jailed for being in contempt of court for not turning over possible video evidence to the FBI.
In Singapore, a blogger was questioned for posting pictures of Christ in an offensive manner, one blogger was convicted for racist remarks and some other bloggers were not as lucky as they were sentenced to jail for racist remarks.
In Malaysia, we are not being left out with Jeff Ooi and Rocky being sued by the NST for defamation.
However, many of the reactions to these cases have been rebellious in nature with many of the protagonists depicting doom gloom scenarios with bloggers claiming being charged under repressive laws, of being treated unfairly, basically telling everyone that the establishment is against them and are out to shut down their blogs for good.
But these bloggers forget that they are citizens too.
In Malaysia, bloggers are citizens too.
And as de facto citizens of Malaysia there are several positive actions that bloggers can take:
- Fight their cause in the courts,
- If the laws in Malaysia do not address their problems in court, then they must lobby the legislative (i.e. the members of parliament) to help redress the problems with regards to the law, and
- If the legislators are unable to sympathise and help with the amendment of laws, then bloggers should seek other legislators or potential legislators who can push for their cause in parliament.
There is after all freedom of speech in the internet.
Why should bloggers claim a special place among Malaysians? We all must be humble and act together as part and parcel of the dynamic but fragile social tapestry that is Malaysia: as her loyal citizens.
We must alway address issues positively, never rant and never rant about the doomsday scenario.
We are all special: bloggers and other citizens alike and its our collective responsibility to make Malaysia a better place; by blogging and/or voting responsibly and/or by any other means that is available for us.
We are no Judge Dredds.
5 comments:
Dek Mat,
I have been very busy with work lately but I have no excuse for not being here. I think you guys of sipm are non-sided no matter what the bloggers of Manchester United may say. This is another good posting. Thx for the reminder as this may help me out of being a psychopath. I think we are all special bcos we do look at things differently. To me, this is the beauty part of being individuals. Yes, we all must be humble as the nation is still socially fragile in many ways. Remember Bosnia or Rwanda? If we all can just apply our good discretion, cyber laws are unnecessary.
Regarding your statement:
"We must always address issues positively, never rant and never rant about the doomsday scenario."
My questions are:
How can I address a doomsday scenario positively? I'm not a politician, not religious, not an academician, not intelligent, not even a voter and not belong to any political party but I do think black is black while white is white. How can I say something black as white while something white as black?
Yes, still it depends on how I see things. This is quite a problem. The less the information compiled, the poorer my analysis.
Like A Marriage:
As a father and a husband, just by looking at my wife and kids' faces, I know their problems, I know what they are thinking and I know what they are up to. Sometimes I was wrong. Sometimes they were tricky. The key is knowing them well through years of togetherness. Unfortunately, this is not really happening between the people and the leadership.
Obviously they are very tricky. I can't read them. Too much secrecy. Too much hidden agendas. Seems like a husband is having an affair with another woman or a wife is having an affair with another man. Strangely any husband or wife may sense something is not right as said, years of togetherness. Same thing here, the people may sense something is not right as years of citizenships. Any husband of wife may not go gently on hanky panky love affairs. Same thing to the people especially when being left out in the dark. Should the people not go gently towards the leadership, I think this is normal. Of course each party will blame each other just like the dialog between Batman and Joker on who created who first.
I do not like it when my wife spends money on something unnecessary especially costly. Simply because there are things required priority - food, fuel, education, etc. Same thing, I don't like it when the leaders spend on something unnecessary like Sepang F1 Circuit, or Bukit Jalil Sport Complex etc.
What about promises? Say that 22 years ago I promised my wife that I will give her this and this and this and this. Unfortunately, I could not deliver my promises. Is not it obvious that my wife questions my integrity and accountability? The leaders too have promised to provide many things where the main is the Bumiputera equity in economy. After years of ruling, they fail to achieve. Is not it obvious that people will question their integrity and accountability?
In marriage, communication is made easy. We can hear a lot of arguments, bickering, noises of flying saucers etc. Unfortunately, communication between the people and the leaders are not made easy. So what do we have? As said, propagandas and all. I think this is normal. You know, this cause and effect thing.
Regarding Voting:
I wish I were a voter but I can't be one. Here we have a group of people who are given years to manage the country but according to any kind of measurement, their Key Performing Index is way too low. Here we have another group of people who have no proven track record to manage a country. I do not rely on manifestos and slogans. How I wish the taxi drivers and the barbers offer themselves as candidates. Who am I kidding? Probably they did. Probably they are the ones who are managing this country as it seems to be like it.
This comment is written with love. I do appreciate any comments especially against mine.
I am still mulling over this. May leave comment later.
For now, i wish to know how u guys can come up with such super vids. Do u have a research team. And dat takes a lot of time. Is dat why we sometimes see only 1 topic a week.
Thank you. You guys are doing a gr8 job.
Krayan
azer mantessa: your question was "How can I address a doomsday scenario positively?". This is easy.
By keeping a level head, check the scenarios and their sources, only then we can make an informed decision!
And of course you can continue to read SIPM! =)
Wrt to voting, why can't you vote?
krayan: thank you for your questions!
no we do not have a research team. this is because all of us belong to CPM (Church of Permanent Medidation) and as such we are forbidden to spend too much time on the internet.
Our Guru says that the internet is most of the time bad for the soul esp these days where there's so much rubbish flying around the malaysian blogosphere.
but we appreciate that you appreciate out videos!
it makes all that meditating worth the while! :)
penarik beca: if it doesnt contravene with our meditation ethics we will gladly help!
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