Racism and the older generation

There is a heated debate taking place on Ebi's blog about racism. It is obvious that he wrote the post to vent and record in words what is taking place in our country today. And how the racial agenda has become such a prerogative for almost everyone.

I mentioned earlier that my two girls go to one of the top chinese schools in the state. Was it difficult to get in? Not really but there was this lady I met when I first came to register my daughter who outright discouraged me from doing so. She must have been a teacher or one of the administration staff. But without shame she questioned why I wanted to send my kids to this school. "They will suffer, they cannot understand Mandarin. We also give a lot of homework (implying Malay kids are lazy?). You will not be able to cope and your children will hate it."

Well, even more reason I registered them anyway. And now, well they read Mandarin fluently (of course some words they don't understand lah, only std 1 and 2 lah), their Mandarin writing is pretty good, and their academic performance isn't that bad.

But I agree wholeheartedly with Ebi and all his friends who have commented that racism only exists in the older generation. When I was in school, and it was a multi-racial school, there was no segregation of any type. We were all comfortable being with one or the other, sharing meals with each other and playing together. When I was in university it was different though.

I went to a private college and paid my way through university meaning I didn't get any JPA or MARA loan or what not. In university (Kalamazoo, Michigan, USA) there were two groups ofd students: the MARA/JPA students and us private students from Sunway College. Then I noticed how racist Malay students could be. Yes, hate it but that was the truth, only then did I notice how racist our Malays could be. They would look down at us for mixing and playing together with the other races and would not understand why we needed to mix at all. They were quite happy sticking to their own kind!

* forgive me if I offend anyone , especially those few students whom we became friends with but this is a general obeservation

Of course we didn't care and we went around doing our thing and that is how we differentiated ourselves: the MARA/JPA students and the Sunway students (which they al thought were rich spoiled kids by the way) hmmmm...

Then I graduated and came back to Malaysia to work. My first job was at the New Straits Times. Ahhhhhh...a different world all together., Here was where I learnt full scale about the NPE, Malay rights and UMNO etc. That opened a whole new world for me. How can the world be so different when you are young and when you are older. Why is it that the older generation is so caught up with protecting our rights. It is true that these elements never existed for our forefathers. It is this generation that are so adamant on protecting Malay rights.

And why? Well, in my opinion it is becase they (the Malays) realise how far behind they are in terms of independence and intelligence. Of course this is a general statement and there are exceptions but most of us want to be spoon fed.

The Chinese work very hard and it is no wonder they monopolise so much of the economy. Malays are more obsessed with keeping up with the Joneses instead. The Malays are pre-occupied with making money quick and easy. The Malays do not want to work as hard. This is evident in the front line service industry.

Imagine going to any eatery today. You will be served by a foreign worker who can't speak any Bahasa Malaysia and pigeon English. Where are our people? Oh, they don't want to work as a waiter or waitress. They want to work in an office and the lower income bracket would rather work in the factories. I am not looking down on our people to say they cannot excel in their chosen field. The problem is they refuse to see out of the box.

I lost my point....Oh yes, there are even parents who tell their kids don't play with that kid because he is Malay or eats pork. DUH!

How do we expect our children to grow up as level headed and liberal and intelligent people. What happened to that term globalisation. Does it not also mean widening our own personal horizons. Doesn't mean if you want to be friends with that Chinese girl you have to eat her piece of pork too right? Yes, well.....

Inter-racial relationships is another question. Race and religion are two different things. There is such a word as compromise. I believe love is stronger than race. Sometimes lah!