People are just - People

Assalamu alaikum and hi everyone

This is a response I made to a friend sharing his experience on friendship with other Malaysian races:

I am glad to see a refreshing point of view of which I believe is actually the opinion of the silent majority. Malaysians are peace-loving and commonsensical but lately irresponsible parties have been harping on the race and equality issue, perhaps to the brink of disrepair.

I opted to keep quiet because apparently nature dictates that NATOs (No-Action-Talk-Only) hog almost every communication channel be it newspapers, blogs or online discussion groups. To that I asked the question "What is MY contribution to society and country?". Not a question for the populist, I know.

In the end, people are just that: people. As I mentioned earlier, corruption and misuse of power are not exclusive of any race, religion or skin colour. We are responsible to inculcate positive character in ourselves and our children so that our society survives. Yes, it is that serious looking at how things are going right now.

I am glad to know that you at least, have Chan as a friend. I myself have many very close friends of other races that I am glad to call 'sahabat' which probably is because of my non-conventional education background.

But that is not to say our race is not important. The fact that many fail to realise is that in Malaysia, the 'Malay' race is tied to religion and to that the brace of unique constitutional rights not found anywhere else in the world. In neighbouring countries this is not the case and we see the consequence it has in the assimilation of race, language, religion and culture. Many say this is not harmful to which I agree, but wait.. the caveat is that UNLESS where Islam is the victim of this assimilation. That is the reason for the special privileges.

It is dangerous when people do not understand the concept and only grasp the manifestations of it. Quotas and allocations are not relevant but they are what most people are talking about. Worse is extremism.

I have been through both ends of the spectra; I have Kumar, Bala, Vimal, Nantha et al and Jenn Shing, Mr Yee, Khay Wai et al who I trust would lend me an arm and a leg in dire times (and vice versa) but I have also encountered Sundra (who called me racist btw) and Chen (who told me that Malays are oppressive people).

As commonsense prevails, we will see that people are just people.

Wassalam