Nah!! Time for the middle finger/ Rome burns, Kit Siang fiddles

Courtesy of Hartal MSM

Did Namewee really stick his middle finger at the Kulaijaya principal Siti Inshah Mansor in his ‘Nah!!’ music video? If you want to know, you have to source YouTube yourself for the clip … ‘cos we ain’t telling.

The young rapper has been accused of (criminal) vulgarity and profanity. However, he is arguably subjecting himself to great risks — i.e. fending off a sedition investigation and the calls for ISA — in order to articulate a protest on behalf of silent and frustrated Malaysians.

243,700 people like Namewee’s official Facebook page. That’s almost a quarter of a million fans. How many Malaysian politicians or celebrities can stake a claim to this kind of number?

On the other hand, there are risk-free writings that make us yawn. At first we were going to give the same old, same old ‘patriotism-is the-last-refuge-of-the-scoundrel’ drivel a pass but the ‘Merdeka! Merdeka Merdeka!‘ piece in Lim Kit Siang’s blog grated on our nerves too much.

So we’re letting rip.

BANAL JINGOISTIC PROPAGANDA

The writer in LKS’s blog, a Ms Gayatri Unsworth, declared “Because I was born here and because till this day, when I hear the Negaraku my heart swells with pride and patriotism”, “…this is the country I proudly call my native land.”

What a piece of jingoism! [Jingoism = extreme and unreasonable belief that one's own country is best]

On the contrary, we’re reminded of Namewee’s Negarakuku rap number and the impact it made three years ago when he was just a college student. The guy gave one of the most heartfelt renditions of our national anthem (he should studio record it properly as a single — he’s truly got a good voice).

Ms Gayathry’s ‘Merdeka! Merdeka! Merdeka!’ piece in comparison is nothing but a screed. [Screed = a long and uninteresting piece of writing]

She writes: “And so I call upon my fellow Malaysians to once and for all join hands and strive towards a truly genuine and united 1 Malaysia.” … triple yawn …

Haven’t we come across 1,001 other articles in the same vein each time Merdeka rolls around; and as for her borrowed sloganeering — credit should go to Apco, not to this Gayathry writer who seems to be a favoured byline in Kit Siang’s blog (LKS is too easily impressed by verbal showboating).

[Tautology = the saying of the same thing more than once in different ways without making one's meaning clearer or more forceful]

Several instances of this poor writing feature, tautology, are evident in Gayatri’s screed: “Yet, the voice of reason must prevail …” [such a cliche]; her hagiography of Tunku [more cliche]; she crafted the Muzak (elevator sentences) below as well:

* “My beloved country appears to have been hijacked by certain quarters determined to see it crumble under the pressure of division and discord”;
* “We have allowed for far too long, those with detrimental, destructive agendas, to dictate how we live our lives”;
* “If we truly love this blessed, extraordinary nation of ours, we must save it from being seized by brutes who shamelessly capitalise on primal instincts and insecurities”;
* “If we truly love this country, then we cannot allow for it to be reduced to a nation characterised by racist rhetoric and extremist diatribe.”

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So what else is new, except that Gayathry appears to have a narcissistic love for grandiloquent words.

BACKLASH FROM KIT SIANG’S READERS

Dear YB Kit Siang, from all that’s been happening over the last month, it does seem as if Rome is burning. And we see you fiddling with flowery words that spilleth over Merdeka! Merdeka! Merdeka!

Well, that’s how some of your own website regular readers feel over the Gayathry posting:

* Your reader ‘pulau_sibu’ commented: “What Merdeka?” [yeah, what 'Merdeka' headlined with three exclamation marks, some more];
* Your reader ‘lorry_driver_malaysia’ commented: “Happy 53rd Independence Day? what so special of this day when u heard all the racist remarks? it will be just a normal working day for me, drive the lorry and earn a living.”
* Your reader “dcasey” commented on the high-faluting quote by Martin Luther King Jr [will the cliches never end?] reproduced by Gayathry, to wit, “We must learn to live together as brothers or perish together as fools”, and this reader of yours ‘dcasey’ made the rejoinder: “Yeah right! In Bolehland, the band of thieves called DUMNO are the “brothers” and the Malaysian Rakyat are the “fools”…. what more can I say!
* Your reader ‘dagen’ responded to your LKS-Gayathry posting: “Happy one racist malaysia. Is this what the merdeka celebration about?”
* Your reader ‘boh-liao” responded: “Merdeka, Merdeka, Merdeka!!! Sounds very hollow, how many rakyat really care abt Merdeka.”
* Your reader ‘cemerlang’ responded: “I don’t think many Malaysians would appreciate the independence day of Malaysia”, while another reader calling himself ‘DAP man’ said: “This Medeka is strictly for UMNO and Perkasa. They can celebrate it with Mahathir, Rezuan Tee, Utusan, etc”
* Your reader ‘k1980′: “Do ‘pendatangs’ celebrate Merdeka?”

See.

Dear Uncle Kit, even your old faithful readers aren’t impressed by the overblown ‘Merdeka’ rhetoric purveyed for our Aug 31 reading.

ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!

We’ll tell you why the frenetic flag-waving Gayathry article failed to resonate. The truth is, we’re thoroughly sick and tired of the crap that’s going on, and no amount of perfumed words — especially at this moment — can hide the stench.

We prefer Namewee’s straight from the gut kick-ass for a change. How many decades already have we been pulverized by patriotic pap like Gayathry’s — “I love Malaysia for I am a daughter of this soil. This is my one and only home”?

Hullo, hullo! Ms Gayathry-daughter-of-the-soil. We’re trying our darndest to move away from the ‘bumi’ and ‘non’ dichotomy and you’re here trying to do a Ridhuan and muscling in on his ‘son-daughter of the soil’/bumi — “by constitutional definition” (in the famous words of an infamous mamak), is it?

“Merdeka! Merdeka! Merdeka! Happy 53rd Independence Day to all” — you force feed us. Ya kah?

A gentle reminder to the venerable Kit Siang: This year, this month, now, please put your house in order first.

Look to your beleaguered representatives — Guan Eng’s doa problems with the religious bureaucracy, Nie Ching and her surau troubles, Ng Wei Aik and Komtar hardly restored, the three teenaged boys awaiting court sentencing in Anthony Loke’s constituency.

You, DAP, are fast failing your core constituents. Think about it.

Please spare us the platitudes on patriotism. Gayathry, unlike Namewee, faces no risk writing the above of mouthful of big words that stick in our throat and it’s further doubtful whether the BTN-trained censors can comprehend her navel-gazing English.

Merdeka? Merdeka? Merdeka? Go tell it to the Sabahans and Sarawakians.

2010 minus 1963 makes this the 47th year of the Federation; and Federation Day is Sept 16 lah, btw. Hey, and we thought you Pakatan guys were desperate for the East Malaysia votes, wot?

Read more http://hartalmsm.wordpress.com/2010/08/31/nah-time-for-the-middle-finger-rome-burns-kit-siang-fiddles/