233. just a thought!

Second entry for today! ^^

hey peeps, masa aku tengah membaca *NOT actually* dan membelek notes economic so aku pun syok lah jugak online FB via WEB selalu online via BB je kan so agak limited lah and tak berapa syok sangat. Then I saw INIANWARHADI posted or SHARED *to be accurate* something, an article about the latest hot issue yang terjadi di bumi MALAYSIA *saya rasa anda tahu kan?*. With an innocent heart, face and smile I just read it.

Saya rasa apa comments yang dilontarkan ada benarnya. Maybeee... maybe YES and maybe NO for some people I guess! So I just posted it here maybe ada diantara kalian yang ingin BACA!

sumber asal: http://www.freemalaysiatoday.com *just click it*

‘Kuasa Mahasiswa’ my foot

Zaidel Baharuddin

You know, when one holds a rally or a demonstration, the main reason for doing so is to express dissatisfaction on a certain issue with the aim to deliver a message to a certain party.

For instance, during the build-up to the Iraq war, American anti war protesters marched towards Washington DC and Capitol Hill because they wanted to send a message to the policy makers that many are quite unhappy with the notion of dragging the nation into a second to war.

The concept is rather simple, we march, we shout and we send a certain message to a targeted audience.

So when a group of so called ‘Mahasiswa’ (university students) march towards the gate of UPSI (Universiti Perguruan Sultan Idris) shouting slogans and carrying banners with the aim of handing over a memorandum protesting the trial of their fellow mate for disciplinary matters, I got somewhat baffled, why do it in the middle of the night on a new year public holiday. Don’t they have a life?

Seriously if you have a rally or a march that has the end goal of serving a memorandum to the university management office, why do it when the office is closed?

I may not be much of a seasoned activist (although I do have my street rally moments), but common sense dictates that if I were to express my unhappiness to the university board, perhaps it is wise I do so during office hours and preferably a working day, because, well I don’t know, perhaps there’s a good chance they might be there to listen to me? Don’t you think so?

So let me get this straight, you march towards the campus gates, on a new year’s holiday, in the middle of the night, then get angry when you found out that the gates are locked and that there’s no one there to entertain your memorandum.

Then you get all hyped over why the cops came and ask you to leave, you shout things like ‘freedom of speech’, ‘academic freedom’ and ‘student power’ when I believe what the cops (and the public) are wondering what in the world are you doing here at this hour.

Drama

You know when I first saw the tweets and pictures of the alleged police brutality on protesting students, showing some cuts, I was somewhat appalled, seriously I was.

Then I saw the protest video showing rabid angry students climbing over gates and smashed clinic door while shouting loudly as if this was the Libyan Revolution, the sympathy waned off immediately.

And as if they were really shooting themselves on the foot, Adam Adli, the purported student hero, tweeted that a fellow protester is injured so badly that he is now in the state of ‘nazak’, a Malay word to describe ‘on the brink of death’, only to see on the very next day, the same person who was about to die, having a press conference announcing that he was going to sue the police.

Well, either this kid is a mutant named Wolverine who has the amazing ability to heal himself or that Adam Adli is as dramatic as the final episode of the hit TV3 Malay Drama ‘Tentang Dhia’.

I’m not against having students acquire the freedom to be part of politics nor do I protest the act of public assembly, if anything I actually support these causes.

But here’s the thing, democracy and freedom of speech give you the right to express yourself, it does not however give you the right to be an ass.

You see people are not angry with Adam Adli because he went on protesting or the fact that he disagreed with AUKU (Akta Universiti dan Kolej Universiti).

People are angry with him because he was being very rude, hoisting down a flag in Umno’s HQ, especially after an Umno deputy minister entertained the protesters’ request.

You can rally all you want and protest all your heart out but that doesn’t give you the right to disregard basic manners and common courtesy. Imagine Umno Youth organised a rally and march towards PAS HQ, then hoist down a PAS flag and substitute it with say an Umno flag.

I bet you things won’t be pretty, getting clobbered for doing what isn’t an infringement of basic human rights, it’s merely a repercussion for being an idiot.

Yes freedom of expression gives you the right to say whatever you want, but it also dictates that you have to be held responsible for what you say or do.

What are you really fighting for?

As I was skimming through the rally videos, one thing really caught my attention. It was the speeches given by the student leaders to their fellow protesters, calling for the downing of BN and Umno.

Then it hit me, isn’t this rally supposed to be about academic freedom?

The thing is when you proclaim that you are fighting for your fellow students, then by all means bring forth their cause, do not taint and pollute these legitimate and noble causes with personal political ambition.

You have no right to hijack the moral ground and mask this movement with petty partisan politics.

In my previous article I wrote on why I think those who call themselves ‘mahasiswa’ are actually a bunch of hypocritical posers and I guess this merely strengthens my view and I believe majority of students out there feel the same way.

The silent majority are quite fed up with loud noisy minority hijacking their cause to fit the narrative of some shallow, narrow minded partisan politicking.

I guess it is quite fitting to end this retrospective of mine with this proverb that I made up when I was in sophomore year which is “Kuasa Mahasiswa my foot lah”.

My comments? I dont have one because I dont think yang aku layak untu memberikan pendapat aku sebab aku pun tak sure dengan benda ini! :)
Aku share entry ini pun sebab aku tertarik dengan apa yg dituliskan oleh penulis ini! He got some points there -.- Especially ayat yang aku highlight warna merah tu.

END of post!

"You may not be able to control your feelings,
but you can always control your actions"
by INIANWARHADI