Malaysian-born Bakri Musa writes frequently on issues affecting his native land. His essays have appeared in the Far Eastern Economic Review, Asiaweek, International Herald Tribune, Education Quarterly, SIngapore's Straits Times, and The New Straits Times. His commentary has aired on National Public Radio's Marketplace. His regular column Seeing It My Way appears in Malaysiakini. Bakri is also a regular contributor to th eSun (Malaysia).
He has previously written "The Malay Dilemma Revisited: Race Dynamics in Modern Malaysia" as well as "Malaysia in the Era of Globalization," "An Education System Worthy of Malaysia," "Seeing Malaysia My Way," and "With Love, From Malaysia."
Bakri's day job (and frequently night time too!) is as a surgeon in private practice in Silicon Valley, California. He and his wife Karen live on a ranch in Morgan Hill.
This website is updated twice a week on Sundays and Wednesdays at 5 PM California time.
Many attribute America’s dynamism and openness to
its tradition of accepting new immigrants, current Trump-stirred anti-immigrant
hysteria notwithstanding. The hitch in that presumption is whether the very
process of emigrating–the uprooting of oneself from one’s familiar surroundings
to seek an uncertain future elsewhere–contributes to the opening up of one’s
mind or whether it is the reverse? That is, only those who are already
open-minded would consider immigration. In short, what is cause and what is
effect?
This
issue is complicated by the dynamics of immigration today being so much different
from what they were a century ago. Ease of travel and communication has much to
do with the change. Today someone from China immigrating to America does not face
the same emotionally-wrenching decision as those “shanghaied” to work on
American railroads of a century ago. Today’s immigrants could Skype or Facetime
their relatives back in the village upon landing at San Francisco airport. They
could also return for visits during the New Year and other holidays. Even those
who had been forced to leave their native country, as with the Vietnamese
refugees, are now able to return freely to their land of birth.
This
age of globalization is also referred to as the Age of Migration because of the
unprecedented number of people moving across borders either individually or in
groups as refugees.
There
is angst in Malaysia today (and elsewhere in the developing world) over the
“brain drain,” the emigration of its talented citizens. The mainstream media
and blogosphere are filled with stories of individuals having to make
supposedly heart-wrenching decisions to leave the country of their birth. Those
personal dramas and emotions are contrived, and a bit of a stretch.
The
experiences of today’s immigrants are in no way comparable to what their earlier
counterparts had to endure. Unlike them, present-day immigrants are able to
make many trips home or have face-to-face chats via Web camera, not to mention
frequent phone calls. Many still hold on to their old passports and retain
their properties in the old country. In short, the emotional trauma of
immigration, if there is any, is nowhere on the same scale as what those who
came before them had to endure. The experiences of the Vietnamese and Somalians
should give comfort to current refugees from places like Syria and Afghanistan.
This
is especially true of immigrants under the “brain drain” category. Their
relocation is akin to an extended sojourn abroad and an opportunity to earn a
better income, as well as to widen their experiences and perspectives. Because
today’s émigrés return home many times, those visits home become occasions for
them to relate their new experiences. That in turn helps those at home to have
similar “foreign” experiences, albeit vicariously. That too can be mind-liberating
on both parties.
Again,
modern technology comes to the rescue; it softens if not eliminates the trauma
of migration.
The
virtual reality that digital technology delivers may lack the sensory and
physical components but it still delivers the essence. The images of the
carnage perpetrated by a suicide bomber in London carried on your cellphone in
the comfort and safety of your palm may not have the smell of burnt flesh,
nonetheless the sight of blood, maimed bodies, and screaming victims captures
the brute reality close enough.
Digital
technology is the transforming invention of our times. As such, access to it
should be a basic public service, made free or affordable. It should be
considered a public good in the same manner as highways, healthcare, and
utilities.
Take
for instance highways; it would be hard to consider a country developed without
cars and roads. At the same time, both are major killers and destroyers of
human life, as well as deleterious to the environment, but those are not
reasons not to have cars and roads. Likewise, the digital highway; there are
recognized dangers, the obvious being fraud, gambling, and pornography. Again,
those are not reasons to ban or limit the Internet. Instead the focus should be
on educating citizens on the dangers, just as we do with cars and highway
users.
I
venture that the broad-mindedness and increasing assertiveness of Malaysians in
recent years, especially among the young, is attributable to the fact that
Malaysia is an open society and its cyber world remains uncensored. That is one
of the few enduring legacies of Mahathir despite his second thoughts lately on
Internet freedom. Now that we have tasted freedom albeit only in the cyber
world, there is no turning back.
Next:Liberation
Through Education
Adapted from the author’s book, Liberating The Malay
Mind, published by ZI Publications, Petaling Jaya, 2013. The second
edition was released in January 2016.
Modern Technology as a Great Equalizer and Liberator
Modern Technology as the Great Equalizer and
Liberator
M. Bakri Musa
www.bakrimusa.com
Modern technology, specifically digital, brings us
to the outside world, and it to us. Today what happens in the remote caves high
in the mountains of Kabul can be recorded on a cell phone and then posted on
the Web for the whole world to see. Even a repressive regime like China could not
control the dissemination of images of its tanks bulldozing innocent citizens back
at Tiananmen Square in 1989, though not for lack of trying.
The
success of the Arab Jasmine Revolution owes much to this digital revolution.
Through social networks like Facebook and Twitter, ordinary citizens
communicated with each other in real time to organize massive demonstrations
that brought down powerful leaders like Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak.
I assert
that the digital technology is a much more powerful and consequential instrument
of leveler and liberation than the AK47, hitherto (still is) the favorite with not-so-bright
revolutionaries worldwide.
Mubarak
was derailed not by a gunman, like his predecessor Anwar Sadat, but by a social
revolution made possible by the online social network. If there were to be a
leader of that movement, it would be Google executive Wael Ghonim. Unlike earlier
Arab revolutionaries who were military officers, this guy was, for lack of a better
word, a geek. What an incredible achievement! No one could have predicted that Mubarak,
who only a few months previously was the most powerful man in the Arab world,
would face charges of premeditated murder for the deaths of those protestors.
Digital
technology is not the only modern agent of liberation. Modern transportation
has reduced if not removed the barrier of geography. Today I can fly from San
Francisco to Kuala Lumpur in less time than it took my sister to get from Kuala
Pilah to her Teachers’ College in Kota Baru via Malayan Railway back in the
1950s.
Travel,
in so far as it affords one the opportunity to experience different cultures
and realities, can be liberating. While the digital revolution might afford a
virtual reality at the convenience and safety on your sofa, travel lets you
experience reality in its raw, unfiltered physical form.
The
liberating effect of travel works both on the traveler as well as the host.
This result however, is not guaranteed. Seeing how the rest of the world
operates may not necessarily open up minds; in some it would result in the exact
opposite.
The
Chinese Emperor of the 15th Century sentexplorers out to the vast Pacific and Indian Oceans. Far from opening up
Chinese minds, those exotic foreign expeditions merely reaffirmed their smug
superiority that they had nothing to learn from the barbarians outside, a
manifestation of a collective “confirmation bias” at the societal level. The
Chinese were so confident of their superiority that they eschewed the need for
further foreign explorations. They went further. They ordered the dismantling
of their then advanced and massive maritime infrastructures, including the banning
of building of boats, declaring that to be frivolous and resource-wasting
exercises.
Meanwhile
the Europeans continued with their explorations. The scale was considerably much
less, their ships pale imitations of the Chinese. Consider that the length of Columbus’s flagship Santa
Maria was less than half the width of Cheng Ho’s.
Unlike
the ancient Chinese, the medieval Europeans had no pretensions of grandeur;
they explored the world with an open mind. They had no delusions about their
ways being the best; instead they observed in those foreign lands things they
could take home, like tea and spices. It did not take them long to recognize
the enormous potential in trading those commodities by introducing new culinary
experiences to European palates. The Europeans also soon discovered that the
Chinese had a voracious appetite for opium, which the Brits could secure with
ease from India. Lucrative commercial domination soon led to the political variety,
and thus colonialism was born.
Why
one culture reacted a certain way and another, the very opposite, is
intriguing. In the final analysis, it boils down to a culture’s openness to new
ideas and experiences, its collective open mindedness. The ancient Chinese had
closed minds; the medieval Europeans, open.
Today
when some foreigners arrive in a new country, and on encountering an alien
culture, would retreat, fearing it would “contaminate” their pristine values.
They would close ranks and congregate in their own little ghettoes, refusing to
integrate with the native majority. We see this in America as well as Malaysia.
Others
view their new experiences as open and endless learning opportunites. Some are
grateful to be given a new lease on life after escaping the wretchedness of
their native land. Eastern Europeans who came to America early in the last century
were grateful and thus more than eager to join the American mainstream. They
readily gave up their old ways to integrate as quickly as possible into their
new society. They learned English quickly and changed their names to make them
sound more Anglo-Saxon, as with Pawlinsky morphing into the less jaw-breaking
Paul.
Even
when they were actively being discriminated against, and the early Jews, Irish
and Italians in America definitely were, they continued to adopt American ways.
They did not rush to build Italian or Jewish schools; instead they built their
own English schools so their children would not be handicapped in integrating
into mainstream American society. They did not consider such actions as
repudiating or denigrating their own culture. Far from it! They realized that their
own culture and ways of life would more likely survive if they were to thrive and
be successful in their adopted land.
Today
St. Patrick’s Day and Octoberfest are celebrated more exuberantly in Chicago
and Milwaukee respectively than in Dublin or Berlin.
It
is tempting to attribute the contrasting reactions of early immigrants to
America from Europe to later ones from Asia and Latin America to the
differences in circumstances that prompted them to emigrate. The Europeans were
forcibly thrown out of their native lands through pogroms or wars. In contrast,
recent Asian and Latin American immigrants crossed the border voluntarily, for
the most part (the South Vietnamese being the most recent notable exception).
The Europeans did not ever want to return to their homelands. By contrast, many
recent Hispanics consider their stay in America temporary, remaining just long
enough to accumulate some money so they could return and live comfortably back
in their native land. As such, they do not feel compelled to learn English or
in any way integrate into American society.
A
similar “temporary abode” mentality occurred with immigrants from China and
India into Malaysia early in the last century. Brought in by the colonials to
work the tin mines and rubber plantations, their mindset was to work hard,
accumulate enough savings, and then balik Tongsan (return to their motherland,
China). Hence there was little need to learn the local language or adapt to
local culture. They remained insular, xenophobic, and closed-minded.
They
were completely different from the Chinese men and women who came much earlier and
voluntarily settled in the Straits Settlement, the Peranakan. They absorbed many of the elements of Malay culture,
including the language and attire. They were not obsessed with balik Tongsan.
When the British were in charge, those Chinese learned English; in independent
Malaysia, they learned Malay and worked with the majority Malays.
The
challenge for Malays and non-Malays in this global era is to cultivate an open
mind because the alternative means depriving yourself of new opportunities.
Next:Emigration
as Liberation
Adapted from the author’s book, Liberating The Malay
Mind, published by ZI Publications, Petaling Jaya, 2013. The second
edition was released in January 2016.
In the past, the challenge of stirring people out
of their comfort zone and igniting their imagination is compounded by their physical
isolation. Today, the digital waves penetrate the thickest of coconut shells.
Even the most remote villages now have access to the Internet. In the past the
expression was, “How ya gonna keep ‘em down on the farm after they’ve seen Gay Paree!”
Today, Gay Paree comes to them, thanks to the digital revolution.
Digital
technology levels the playing field; it also opens up a limitless world of
news, information, and viewpoints, as well as opportunities. This leveling means
that in the cyber world, David can have the same presence as Goliath; similarly,
the village idiot and Einstein. Without the capacity for critical thinking one
could easily mistake Goliath for David or the village idiot for Einstein. The consequences
to the former could be physically devastating; for the latter, intellectually
stunting.
That
is not the only downside to the digital revolution. Consider the crude attempts
by UMNO to influence public opinion by paying bloggers who are sympathetic to
its cause. Then there is China, equally clumsy, rewarding those who post
pro-government sentiments on anti-government websites. Both attempts of idiots posing
as Einsteins are garish and ineffective. Prostitutes, whether literal or
metaphorical, are easily spotted. To those capable of critical analyses, fake news
and “alternative facts” remain as such no matter how they are presented.
More
sinister is the use of the Internet by the state to spy on its citizens. At its
crudest there is Iran using images posted on Facebook to trace anti-government
activists. More sophisticated is the data-mining software to track the
activities of citizens. This penchant for violating citizens’ privacy and
rights is a common practice not only with authoritarian regimes like China but
also such supposed champions of freedom as America.
While
the Internet brings an abundance of news and data it requires one to have some
capacity for critical thinking to sift through them. If we lack this faculty we
would end up focusing only on those viewpoints that support our preconceived
notions, as with UMNO supporters reading (and believing) only The New
Straits Times and Utusan Melayu, while those in the opposition, Malaysia
Today*[1]and Malaysiakini.
This “confirmation bias” is the bad news; it contributes to deepening
polarization which is potentially disastrous for a plural society like Malaysia.
Far from opening up minds, this confirmation bias closes them.
This
pernicious trend is also seen in America despite its more educated citizens and
their familiarity with a broad diversity of views. Conservative Americans
increasingly tune to Fox News and read the Wall Street Journal exclusively;
liberals, CNN and the New York Times. As a result, America today is more
polarized.
The
solution is not to have a single source of news (those in power would love that
so they could control it) but to encourage as many viewpoints and news sources
as possible while teaching citizens to think critically and have an open mind.
This
is the crucial role of a responsible media. This cannot simply be wished for;
the government must actively nurture and be committed to this instead of
thwarting it, as the authorities do now.
Having
the media in private rather than government hands would not ensure this either.
American media is private, and through that they have successfully projected a
facade of independence. However, it is only that, a facade. In reality they are
beholden to their owners’ private agenda and or special interest groups, in
particular their advertisers. In their coverage of the Middle East for example,
an area of vital interest to Americans, the US media has been particularly
myopic and subservient to these interest groups as well as their owners’
agenda.
Consider
the coverage of major international events including and especially the recent
uprisings in the Arab world by Al Jazeera, BBC, and the CBC, all government-
owned (Qatar, Britain and Canada respectively). Those have been far superior to
that of the so-called “independent” American media like the main networks.
Even
in America, partly government-funded PBS trumps the venerable, privately-held
CBS. What is obvious is that ownership is not the key; the critical element is
the professionalism of journalists and editors, and their ability to free themselves
from their superiors, be they corporate executives and owners or ruling bureaucrats
and politicians.
Journalists
are no saints. Consider the recent “documentaries” by British FBC Media on the
Malaysian palm oil industry and “interviews” with Prime Minister Najib that
were aired on major international media. It turned out that even the esteemed
BBC and CNN could be fooled into believing blatant infomercials as documentaries.
Those “interviews” with Najib were basically paid commercials, with the money
going not to the network but the PR firm. Far from appearing statesman-like,
Najib looked like a desperate “John” being tricked by a cheap streetwalker
powdered up to look high class.
There
was a time when American journalists were the most trusted, personified by the
likes of Walter Cronkite, Albert J. Morrow, and more recently, Tom Brokaw and
Bernie Shaw. With the proliferation of television channels available through
cable, there is now fragmentation of and consequent scramble for viewers. The
result is a race to the bottom, catering to the lowest common denominator with
hard news being replaced by the salacious and sensational. No wonder the
overall audiences for the major networks have declined. Today nobody takes any
notice of the news anchors of the major networks. They are more like
over-exposed celebrities than trusted journalists; they have lost their
gravitas and influence. The Annual White House Correspondents Dinner vie with
the Oscars as the social event of the year. Like actors, these journalists revel
in the world of make believe.
I
have no problem with the major media outlets being government owned, such as
Bernama and RTM, or controlled by the major political parties (NST, The Star,
Harakah). I just wish that their staff, from cub reporters to senior
editors, are aware of their awesome responsibility to inform the public and
thus the need to be professional. They should at least appreciate the
difference between solid objective news coverage and advocacy editorial
commentaries. For this to become a reality they have to be professionally
trained.
I
am not a fan of “J” schools, but I do wish that Malaysian reporters and editors
could have the chance to go beyond just being “Form Five” journalists (middle
school graduates). They should have broad-based liberal educations and be
capable of exercising independent judgment. They should not be content with regurgitating
press releases or being carma (contraction of cari makan; hired
hands) journalists.
Only
with a responsible professional media could we prepare our citizens to
appreciate the Jeffersonian wisdom: Every
difference in opinion is not a difference of principle.
Leaders
have a critical role in fostering this climate of healthy discourse; they must set the example. It is for
this reason that I cringe whenever I hear Prime Minister Najib labeling
opposition leaders as “traitors” and “anti-nationals.” Najib dishonors himself
and his office when he resorts to such childishness. His followers are only too
willing to ape him; monkey see, monkey do.
We
must demand a higher standard of personal decency from our leaders. We should
not tolerate it when they descend into the gutter. When they do, we should
never follow them. We should expect more displays of civility as demonstrated
by the recent (2009) photograph of Prime Minister Najib and Opposition Leader
Anwar Ibrahim enjoying teh tarik in the lobby of Parliament. Sadly, such
class acts are becoming rare. Instead today we have Prime Minister Najib calling
his predecessor Mahathir a traitor, and the latter likewise labelling his
successor a thief.
Next:Modern
Technology as Instruments of Liberation
Adapted from the author’s book, Liberating The Malay
Mind, published by ZI Publications, Petaling Jaya, 2013. The second
edition was released in January 2016.
[1]Malaysia Today has today (2017) switched
sides; it is now the mouth piece of UMNO.