The Devil Finds Work for the Idle Hands to do...

I chanced upon this English proverb whilst surfing for a good phrase to slap on my article. No, this proverb was not used for article but rather provided a very good discussion on the crime rates in our country today. Seeing as the buzz word ‘economy’ is always blamed for all that happens in the country, it is also important for us to realize that the actual responsibility in building a country lies with ourselves. It lies with our very own hands and how diligent we are at doing something for material gain (not for nothing!).

It’s terrifying to know how crime rates have soared in the past one year, and increasingly so in the past few months. The community now terrorized by snatch thefts, armed robbery, blackmails, swindles, rapes, ah-longs and many more sad activities. The proverb thus finds its way into the cause of such wrongdoing. The same psychological practice on a child; when a child is in a mood to do something destructive, ask the child to do something for you that is constructive, delivers positive results. This practice converts the idle hands of the child into a productive one. Could it possible be true that the predators really have idle hands and chose to gain material goods merely by force and not work for it? If they chose to engage themselves in activities and work to gain income, could they abstain themselves from committing such crimes? It is an interesting thought and is currently practices by our Sports Ministry through sporting activities as such. But what happens to the nerds who don’t feel like joining? They would rather download pornography in the comforts of their home. Therefore, it is probably the economic system itself, which rewards the lazy and connected, whilst working the actual brains half to death, is problematic. We can’t blame the subsidized culture as non-subsidized cultures are also suffering from higher crime rates and laziness (observe kampong style Thais and sub-urban Brazilians). So what gives? Another proverb I would like to quote from a Korean Prof in a book of his (which I conveniently forgot the title), “People are not poor because they are lazy, they are lazy because they are poor”.

For the love of Swine....

It’s been a while since I typed anything on this blog…and my mates have been pestering for some words. So I’ve decided to talk about the buzz news going around

which is has nothing to do with politics. The popular H1N1 influenza virus that’s been rampaging around the globe whilst sending frequent flyers into frequent screamers is still the hot topic in the news. Increasing cases of the swiney flu have also sparked wild debate topics of naming the disease (the original swine to a ‘safer’ H1N1) have not ceased to issue the real cause of the infection. During a talk with my fellow doctor friends have indeed come out with a single statistical analysis. Somehow almost all the positive patients are people who come into contact with pigs quite frequently…through eating the fellow delicacies or other piggy encounters. The predisposition to swine flu has also been successfully eluded by medical communities to the public. Though unwitting to the statistical facts (or putting a blind eye) to the PROBABLE cause of infection, one should study the actual devastating history of the H1N1 virus. The avian flu epidemic was also a H1N1 strain virus and we reacted by culling millions of birds and birdlike (chicken) animals. The recent events in the swine flu problem however see a totally different light of reaction due to some kind of protection of interest. Worldwide only sees Egypt as the first country in taking a stance in killing its piggy encounters to destroy any risks of the H1N1. Spain is awfully tight lipped about its swine industry (they even have a museum for pigs) and would rather risk looking lives than its profitable income.

The WHO have also been slammed by scientist by adopting the H1N1 term rather than a more ‘causative’ term as swine flu. Why are they risking infection and further cases by saying pigs are not part of the actual cycle of cause? Although the direct contact for infection is now passed on from human to human, further genetic transmutation is completed via a pig, as is the case for avian flu. Cutting off the cycle could possibly reduce likelihood of future new strains being developed. What makes it worst is that these strains are found to be originating commonly from Asian and Europe! But I suppose this is only a wishful rambling… so I rest my case.

Ps: picture courtesy copied from Wikipedia…

The Children of the NEP

Browsing through pages of blogs and talking to many professionals who live in Malaysia, one cannot escape the feeling that we are developing faster than we actually thought we could possibly become. There are many more professionals and well-learned individuals in Malaysia as compared to the 50's thanks to a system designed to provide everyone, a chance to change their lives; the NEP (New Economic Policy). It also gives one, a chance to postulate the actual effect of NEP on the current political upheaval. When the NEP was executed with a pure mission in assisting Bumiputras (who were then living in poor living and economic conditions) alleviate themselves from poverty and increase their competitive advantage against the other races, it was never intended to alienate the others. It does however, have serious repercussions on people who received it. 

As the children of NEP grew stronger and became economically capable, they are thrown into a free-market environment where they are free to compete with the others based on their own merits. These NEP children by then enjoys a good life and by virtue of professionalism, starts to encounter 'non-professional' conditions in their life. They begin to feel disgusted at the so-called non-ethical 'governmental' cronyism (or so it is labeled) practice in their life and working environment. Such conditions could appear as the examples below:

1. A lecturer who knows someone at the Ministry could get a quick promotion.

2. A rival company gets governmental contracts because he knows someone inside the project.

3. A certain someone gets preferential treatment at the public hospital (whilst others queue to their measly deaths)

4. We have a suspected crony neighbour who drives around in either his Lexus, Merc or Ferrari.  

The children of NEP thus grow very unsettled and of course, disgruntled. The illusionary freedom to compete fairly (as was learnt during their sponsored overseas and local education) was suddenly destroyed, and the reality that life-changing decisions is controlled makes them feel betrayed. They feel that the entrusted governance to keep everything fair (so that they don't feel envious) is corrupt. For most, this passes by without causing much trouble in their lives and with better economic stance, have now chosen to become a fully liberated individual free to choose whomever he wishes to rule the country (and of course subsequently says NEP is redundant because he/she has reaped the benefits and conveniently forgets about the other poverty stricken rakyat). They also start to cringe at the fact that they now hold the responsibility to ‘pay’ for these inefficiencies of supporting the poor ‘kampong losers’ who know nothing but to consume.

It is also probably interesting to get a statistics on the number of children born under NEP (or also loosely aggregated as professionals/middle income individuals) who are in the opposition. So the war on NEP is probably just an excuse to bring down a government that requires the practice of ‘kongsi’ (malay equivalent of kongsi), a popular business ethics practiced in China until today (view Kotler; ‘Marketing in Asia’ and Wong.J; ‘The Political Economy of Corruption in China’). I do not blame them for feeling this way; after all I am also a child of NEP. Given the chance to study abroad and accumulate invaluable experience, I am truly blessed. As such, I'm also aware of the in-congruencies the government system causes in the society. The children of NEP are now crying out that the system is outdated and some have even blamed it for the higher growth of an elite society. It is truly sad to see them moaning, fighting, crying and molesting their self-respect to destroy what is that they do not understand. Question is, do they really have the answers to preventing policy abuse, cronyism, unethical conduct, bribery, etc., of which they accused the current political system is drowned in.

Although the debate on cronyism have been a long overdue argument to no conclusive end. I would like to reiterate that the cronyism system is a societal default and that even the opposition cannot destroy if they were to take over. As illustrated in studies by Kotler (just one of the books that I stumbled across containing this issue), the habit of preferring to help the people you know or befriend is much higher and could easily be mistaken as crony (When I make a purchase from a friend as compared to another equal, and he willingly gives me a discount, does it mean we're cronies?). Even if monetary transaction is not involved, preferential treatment will always prevail, you name it; a wife, husband, son, daughter, relatives, in-laws, best friends, future prospects, terhutang budi (sorry, I’m unsure of the english equivalent ;-P), scandals, protection gangs, political funders, private funders, and the list goes on.... I suppose we are all cronies. As such, I fail to understand the concept of ‘fairness’ in their argument (the attention seeking opposition). Perhaps what they mean is ‘fairness’ in squandering? “kasi semua makan sama laaaa”…. 

Finally, I theorize this view on the NEP children (who are now proud opposition professionals) because I find it annoying that their speech of 'fairness' and 'freedom' is perhaps hypocritical at most. Thus their 'fairness' and 'freedom' will only be achieved once they've taken charge of national governance and squander up the portion they were eyeing years before. Without delay they start using technology irresponsibly (blogs and media) to poison the minds of the youths, thus creating the opposition image as 'Non-conformists' or ‘rebellious’, which is extremely popular with the latter age group (see ‘pop-culture’). Perhaps their children would also rebel against them when they grow up as professional adults and learn that their parents were also dishing out favours to 'friends' in their political position.