Saturday, July 24, 2010

Remove The Need to Fill in Your Race in Forms

Found this article in Facebook which I thought should be spread around to the whole of Malaysia. I can't find the true source of this article but I guess I don't need to. These words speaks on behalf on most of us.

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This is a very good article from a younger generation and a great granddaughter of Tunku Abdul Rahman. A very well expressed opinion of how all Malaysians should be treated.

IF THIS IS THE VOICE OF YOUR YOUNGER GENERATION IN MALAYSIA , YOU WILL BE BLESSED.

Sharyn completed her Diploma in Advertising from Taylor's College, and then left motherland to pursue her BA degree majoring in Media Studies and Anthropology at Victoria University in Wellington, New Zealand. While waiting for her graduation in May 08, she interned briefly at M&C Saatchi Wellington, a global advertising firm. Upon returning to Malaysia, jobless and relieved of rent payments, Sharyn stumbled upon Wild Asia through The Star which sparked her interest to learn more about nature and environmental causes. Armed with a communications background, Sharyn works on the Wild Asia website and editorial, translating geek terms into laymen language, easily accessed and understood by visitors regardless of their backgrounds, be it scientific, business, the arts or just plain interested.
By The Tunku's Great Granddaughter

This is a great piece. She has all the qualities of her great grandfather. Tunku has reason to be proud of her!

Tunku Abdul Rahman's great granddaughter

Sharyn Lisa Shufiyan, 24, Conservationist

Both my parents are Malay. My mum's heritage includes Chinese, Thai and Arab, while my dad is Minangkabau. Due to my skin colour, I am often mistaken for a Chinese.

I'm happy that I don't have the typical Malay look but I do get annoyed when people call me Ah Moi or ask me straight up "Are you Chinese or Malay"

Like, why does it matter? Before I used to answer "Malay" but now I'm trying to consciously answer Malaysian instead.

There's this incident from primary school that I remember till today. Someone told me that I will be called last during Judgement Day because I don't have a Muslim name. Of course, I was scared then but now that I'm older, I realise that a name is just a name. It doesn't define you as a good or bad person and there is definitely no such thing as a Muslim name. You can be named Rashid or Ali and still be a Christian.

I've heard of the 1Malaysia concept, but I think we don't need to be told to be united. We've come such a long way that it should already be embedded in our hearts and minds that we are united. Unfortunately, you can still see racial discrimination and polarisation. There is still this ethno-centric view that the Malays are the dominant group and their rights must be protected, and non Malays are forever the outsiders.

For the concept to succeed, I think the government should stop with the race politics. It's tiring, really. We grew up with application forms asking us to tick our race. We should stop painting a negative image of the other races, stop thinking about 'us' and 'them' and focus on 'we', 'our' and 'Malaysians'.

No one should be made uncomfortable in their own home. A dear Chinese friend of mine said to me once, "I don't feel patriotic because I am not made to feel like Malaysia is my home, and I don't feel an affinity to China because I have never lived there.

I know some baby Nyonya friends who can trace their lineage back hundreds of years. I'm a fourth generation Malaysian. If I am Bumiputra, why can't they be, too? Clearly I have issues with the term.

I think the main reason why we still can't achieve total unity is because of this 'Malay rights' concept. I'd rather 'Malay rights' be replaced by human rights. So unless we get rid of this Bumiputra status, or reform our views and policies on rights, we will never achieve unity.

For my merdeka wish, I'd like for Malaysians to have more voice, to be respected and heard. I wish that the government would uphold the true essence of parliamentary democracy. I wish for the people to no longer fear and discriminate against each other, to see that we are one and the same.

I wish that Malaysia would truly live up to the tourism spin of Malaysia truly Asia. Malaysians to lead - whatever their ethnic background. Only ONE NATIONALITY MALAYSIAN. No Malays, No Chinese, No Indians - ONLY MALAYSIANS. Choose whatever religion one is comfortable with.

Remember it was Dr M & UMNO who destroyed Tunku's Malaysia.

MERDEKA
MERDEKA
MERDEKA

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6 comments:

Ken Wooi said...

true.. but it's hard to wipe out such mentality.. =/

JLean said...

Dropping by ere. Smiles. =)

MsXeRoZ Nicole said...

My friend was also voicing his disatisfaction about the consensus 2010. In the form there's race, my friend is a mixed Chinese Indian. there's no Chindian there. So what to fill?

mizze said...

hope that tis will come true one day...

~eRiC~ said...

voice out in the next GE everyone... for the sake of our tanah air...

Biopolymath said...

Truly the special privilege for Malays must go to achieve total unity. However, we still can't talk about total unity just from an ideological perspective, lots of things is coming into play here. Is everyone earning enough to feed themselves from their job? Can everyone be at the best of their behaviour in public? These simple things can make us feel comfortable in the presence of each other, or not.

It's still inevitable to segregate races when it comes to marketing product/services, but I would like to stress that, racism when it comes to treating other people, in general, must go.