TAK BOLEH BOGEL (NO NUDITY) IN MALAYSIA (HERE WE GO AGAIN!)

Spencer Tunick

Another unpublished Letter to the Editor... 

It’s been ages since I felt moved to write a letter to The Editor. The urge to air my views in print has been building up since the Nude Squat furore erupted (seems like the only “legitimate” way you can see people naked is to arrest them first). City Hall’s declared intention to penalize folks caught smooching or even holding hands in public was irksome news to me (some of my fondest memories involve exactly that). But the final straw was the email I received announcing that free screenings of international films organised by Kaki Kino at FINAS have been suspended till further notice, after a shrill complaint about uncensored “babak lucah” (nude scenes) appeared in a leading Malay daily.

Imagine a lush lagoon, festooned with giant ferns and flirtatious mermaids. A man and a woman, both well-tanned, are strolling hand-in-hand along the sandy shore, gloriously naked. Is that not a veritable vision of paradise? Granted, the couple could also be modeling chic beachwear by Jean-Paul Gaultier (but that would be too much like a glossy magazine ad).

Now imagine a fast-motion sequence showing Tokyo commuters at rush hour – all respectably dressed in office apparel and suffering from gastritis. Or a slow-motion montage of KL traffic after a heavy afternoon downpour. Cut to the gory aftermath of a car bomb attack in Baghdad and then crossfade to a wide-angle closeup of an American-made Israeli bulldozer, demolishing a Palestinian neighborhood, as terrified women clutch babies to their hearts and wail in despair. Hellish scenes, for sure – but they would get past the censors, no problem.

Why is this so? Are we being indoctrinated to perceive pain as okay and pleasure as not? Is it any wonder that crime reports are getting more gruesome by the day? Maybe it’s time to reassess what sort of messages we’re being programmed with.

There’s no way I can conceive of a kiss or a hug, regardless of who’s doing it and where, as being indecent or offensive. These are signs of love and affection. Are these warm feelings WRONG? Folks who react negatively to romance and sex were probably deprived of cuddles as kids. They’re likely to inflict corporal punishment on their own children as a matter of routine. Those who express alarm and outrage at the sight of female nipples are undoubtedly some inorganic lifeform in human guise that never experienced the life-sustaining comfort and nourishment of mother’s milk. How do you think a baby would react to seeing a bare breast or two on the screen? Lodge a self-righteous report with the religious police... or gurgle with happiness?

Spencer Tunick

All it takes is a bit of common sense and reason. There’s nothing shameful about our bodies. Fat or sinewy, hairy or baby-smooth, the body is our sovereign domain, our physical home. Naked or adorned with sparkling gems, bodies are magnificent by divine design. Everybody loves being naked. In the bathroom or the bedroom, being naked means you’re enjoying a hot shower or some hot sex. Or maybe you’re just relishing a good poop or your private space after a marathon immersion in public affairs. What’s so scandalous about that?

We live in the hot and humid tropics. The sort of place where clothing is merely a fashionable option. You won’t find too many nudist colonies in Alaska or Tibet. Arab women have traditionally had to cover up to protect themselves from desert sandstorms, camel farts (possibly radioactive since Gulf Wars I and II) and temperature extremes. Were it not for fear of their control-freak husbands, don’t you think they would celebrate being in their own skins if they were magically transported to a balmy beach in the South Seas? Talk about “inappropriate attire”... being wrapped in thick cloth from head to toe on a sweltering day in the city sounds like a portable sauna to me. But to each his or her own - I’m happy in my sarong and flip-flops.

Spencer Tunick

I have to be honest with myself. I love looking at beauty, and women are embodiments of the Great Goddess, deserving of admiration, love and respect. If a naked woman walked past me in the street, I would certainly turn my head for a second look. And I’d feel absolutely no guilt or shame about doing so. Nor would I - uncontrollably overcome by animal lust - drag her by the hair off to my cave and show her my etchings. Unless, of course, she handed me a perfumed note with precisely such a request. Even so, I’d rather she walk back to my cave on her own two feet than drag her all the way. I have a different concept of exercise.

Immaturity has its place, I grant that. However, let it not be exalted as the arbiter of our behavior and our moral code. There’s no immorality in portraying the human form in various stages of dress or undress in the adult cinema. What’s truly immoral is imposing on others our own limitations and limiting beliefs. Do we really value the grotesque hypocrisy censorship encourages? Are we to blinker our cinematic vision (like the proverbial katak under a tempurung) in a knee-jerk reaction to the poisonous outpourings of a pusillanimous prude?

Sincerely,
Antares
Kuala Kubu Bharu
27 April 2006

[First published 12 January 2007, reposted 1 July 2012 & 20 September 2016]

Excerpt from an open letter to Akmal Abdullah, deputy editor of Berita Harian (published 1 August 2006)

Dear Akmal Abdullah, I am not particularly pleased that you exist. Why is this so, when we haven't even met and you don't know me from Adam? But is that so surprising - considering your predilection for campaigning to ban movies you haven't even seen? Well, Akmal, I think you ought to be banned from paradise - unless you wise up and 'fess up to having been an outright obstruction. Akmal Abdullah, you stand accused of suppressing art and denying life. Have you anything to say in your own defence? When you look into a mirror, are you happy to be the person looking back? Do you see a frog trapped under your own obscurantist coconut shell? Will you repent and henceforth channel your energies towards being creative rather than destructive? Or will you dig in your reactionary heels and doggedly remain a blight on the face of the earth with your acute case of 'cemburu kampungitis'? The Chinese have an instructive saying about this: "The midget does not grow taller by chopping off other people's heads."

Please heed these words if you'd rather be greeted by decent folk with a pat on the back instead of a kick in the butt.

Return of the Black Marker Brigade!

[Read the rest here.]

'Economist' report on Bersih rally 'censored'

Hazlan Zakaria & Wong Teck Chi
Jul 19, 11
1:02pm

10 friends can read this story for free

Opposition parliamentarians have claimed that the July 16 edition ofThe Economist has been defaced by the Home Ministry in an apparent attempt to censor a report on the Bersih 2.0 rally for electoral reform.

“The Economist July16 issue has been censored/black inked on Bersih story by Home Ministry,” reads a tweet by Ipoh Barat MP M Kulasegaran.

In photos distributed via micro-blog site Twitter, the report headlines 'Political affray in Malaysia: Taken to the cleaners' shows lines blacked out by what seems to be a permanent marker pen.

Malaysiakini could not immediately verify the claim, but a comparison with the online version reveals that the lines struck out refer to allegations of police and government misconduct:

- 'and one man died of a heart attack', in the first paragraph.

- 'The march itself was then banned, although the authorities offered Bersih a stadium to meet in - and then withdrew the offer', in the second paragraph

- 'The heavy-handed police tactics have provoked a lot of anger; the government has conceded an official investigation into claims of police brutality. In one instance (caught on film), police seemed to fire tear gas and water cannon into a hospital where protesters were sheltering from a baton charge', in the fourth paragraph.

When contacted, Kulasegaran criticised the action as “uncalled for”.

“In this day and age only a police run state would do this. They are trying to hide writing which could be true, because (they are afraid) it will be read by the public and they will believe it. The government is still (suffering from) denial syndrome.”

The DAP leader however, dismissed the attempt as ineffectual as the full article is “available online anyway”.

PKR vice-president Tian Chua also tweeted on the matter and posted photos of the censored pages: “I'm sure @TheEconomist readers are intelligent enough to know how to get the full article, but the censorship reflects the stupidity & insecurity of an autocratic regime.”

[From Malaysiakini]

The Black Marker Brigade

A few rare souls seem to have been born with black marker pens in their untiring little hands.

Sad but true, the Black Marker Brigade exists. It's a quiet, diligent, anonymous league of Backroom Types whose mission on Earth - or, at least, in Malaysia - is to protect us from accidental or intentional exposure to titillation of the salacious variety. Their thankless task, in effect, is to ensure that you never have to be confronted with (and, presumably, affronted by) an image of the Female Nipple. Whenever and wherever it may appear: in imported literature, cinema posters, and comics, for instance. And so what if you've just forked out $18.75 for a reputable photography journal or glossy art magazine? How can it claim to be reputable if it's got naked pink titties in it?
     Hah! In the name of Art too many atrocities haved been committed. Too Much Flesh Exposed. It's time people stopped taking off their pants just so that some artist-pervert can paint them. One practiced stroke of the felt-tipped pen and... voila! Goya's Naked Maja is naked no more! A deft rub here and a quick daub there and... Hullo! Michelangelo's David is ready to meet the Malaysian public! Anytime now the Black Marker Brigade may be commissioned to bring decency and modesty back to the medical textbooks. You can bet the floors of all our book warehouses will be slippery with drool.
     Do members of the Black Marker Brigade go to work in sinister Ku Klux Klan-style hoods? What do they do to nude black women - do they switch to Tipp-Ex? What are the long-term consequences of membership in the Brigade? Does one go through life seeing dark spots and splotches on women's chests that can't be removed with even the most devout rubbing? What do they write in their passports under Occupation?
     Well, it's a dirty job - but somebody has to do it. The Stout-of-Heart and Incorruptible who attain the rank of Veteran in the Black Marker Brigade have the awful onus of ritually purifying 8 X 10 glossies and wall-sized posters of the most notorious and lascivious-looking of foreign film-stars. (God, we had a horrible experience with that disgusting Member of the Italian Parliament... what was her name? Ah yes... Cicciolina... none of us got any sleep for a week. we had no choice - it was a Standing Order from the Minister of Home Affairs.)
     One shudders to think of the things some people have to do to earn a living. Still, there are obviously a few rare souls who seem to have been born with black marker pens in their untiring little hands. You can easily identify them in a crowd, they're a breed apart: look for the dark ink stains on their lips and fingertips. Our hands are filthy but our minds are clean! This is the solemn credo of the Black Marker Brigade.

[Source:  ADOI!]

'March to Putrajaya' now online!

Click here to download and read!

Kim Quek's explosive book The March to Putrajaya – Malaysia’s New Era is at Hand, recently banned by the Malaysian Home Minister, is available online. By clicking here, readers can view as well as download the uncensored contents of the book.

This is as it should be. Citizens of a country should not be deprived of free access to information by the government simply because such information is deemed unfavourable to the regime.

[Read the rest here.]

Mahathir the Snake Oil Salesman

MALAYSIAN MAVERICK: Mahathir Mohamad in Turbulent Times - Barry Wain's revealing study of Dr M's 22-year term as Malaysian prime minister was published in 2009 by Palgrave Macmillan. The first shipment of the hardcover edition was detained in December 2009 by the home ministry when it arrived in Port Klang.

More than three months later, no formal announcement has been made as to whether the book is banned in Malaysia. As a result local booksellers have held back on ordering the title in case the home ministry confiscates all copies, as it is wont to do with any literature deemed embarrassing to Barisan Nasional.

A group of dedicated souls have now begun to upload in pdf format low-quality scans of Barry Wain's highly readable and well-researched book. This makes the material accessible to anyone with an internet connection, even if it unfortunately deprives the author and publisher of some revenue.

I have just skimmed through Chapter Five of Malaysian Maverick and can attest to the robust quality of Mr Wain's research and the lucidity of his writing style. Barry Wain has done us all a magnificent service by publishing this important work which effectively deconstructs the demiurgic façade carefully and cynically built up by Mahathir's professional spin-doctors.

It only takes a few paragraphs to show up Dr M for what he essentially is - just another snake oil salesman with a terminal case of megalomania, in vigorous denial of his own dark and dangerous side.

Of course, Mahathir couldn't have singlehandedly destroyed the nation's moral core - he was more than ably aided by the archetypal Mafia don, Daim Zainuddin, who subsequently served Mahathir as finance minister.

The first shipment of Malaysian Maverick was finally released by the home ministry a few months after being impounded and copies are currently available at major bookstores.
____
Barry Wain is a writer-in-residence at the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies in Singapore. An Australian journalist who has lived in Asia for 38 years, he is a former editor of the Asian Wall Street Journal. He is currently working on a thematic treatment of Southeast Asia since World War II that will draw heavily on his extensive reporting in the region.

RPK, Jo Kukathas & Kee Thuan Chye with Riz Khan on Aljazeera

Part One

Part Two

Raja Petra Kamarudin (blogger), Jo Kukathas (actress/director/playwright), and Kee Thuan Chye (actor/playwright/director/editor/author/social commentator) chat with Riz Khan on Aljazeera. Broadcast live on 3 December 2008.

TAK BOLEH BOGEL (NO NUDITY) IN MALAYSIA!

Another unpublished Letter to the Editor...

It’s been ages since I felt moved to write a letter to The Editor. The urge to air my views in print has been building up since the Nude Squat furore erupted (seems like the only “legitimate” way you can see people naked is to arrest them first). City Hall’s declared intention to penalize folks caught smooching or even holding hands in public was irksome news to me (some of my fondest memories involve exactly that). But the final straw was the email I received announcing that free screenings of international films organised by Kaki Kino at FINAS have been suspended till further notice, after a shrill complaint about uncensored “babak lucah” (nude scenes) appeared in a leading Malay daily.

Imagine a lush lagoon, festooned with giant ferns and flirtatious mermaids. A man and a woman, both well-tanned, are strolling hand-in-hand along the sandy shore, gloriously naked. Is that not a veritable vision of paradise? Granted, the couple could also be modeling chic beachwear by Jean-Paul Gaultier (but that would be too much like a glossy magazine ad).

Now imagine a fast-motion sequence showing Tokyo commuters at rush hour – all respectably dressed in office apparel and suffering from gastritis. Or a slow-motion montage of KL traffic after a heavy afternoon downpour. Cut to the gory aftermath of a car bomb attack in Baghdad and then crossfade to a wide-angle closeup of an American-made Israeli bulldozer, demolishing a Palestinian neighborhood, as terrified women clutch babies to their hearts and wail in despair. Hellish scenes, for sure – but they would get past the censors, no problem.

Why is this so? Are we being indoctrinated to perceive pain as okay and pleasure as not? Is it any wonder that crime reports are getting more gruesome by the day? Maybe it’s time to reassess what sort of messages we’re being programmed with.

There’s no way I can conceive of a kiss or a hug, regardless of who’s doing it and where, as being indecent or offensive. These are signs of love and affection. Are these warm feelings WRONG? Folks who react negatively to romance and sex were probably deprived of cuddles as kids. They’re likely to inflict corporal punishment on their own children as a matter of routine. Those who express alarm and outrage at the sight of female nipples are undoubtedly some inorganic lifeform in human disguise that never experienced the life-sustaining comfort and nourishment of mother’s milk. How do you think a baby would react to seeing a bare breast or two on the screen? Lodge a self-righteous report with the religious police... or gurgle with happiness?

All it takes is a bit of common sense and reason. There’s nothing shameful about our bodies. Fat or sinewy, hairy or baby-smooth, the body is our sovereign domain, our physical home. Naked or adorned with sparkling gems, bodies are magnificent by divine design. Everybody loves being naked. In the bathroom or the bedroom, being naked means you’re enjoying a hot shower or some hot sex. Or maybe you’re just relishing a good poop or your private space after a marathon immersion in public affairs. What’s so scandalous about that?

We live in the hot and humid tropics. The sort of place where clothing is merely a fashionable option. You won’t find too many nudist colonies in Alaska or Tibet. Arab women have traditionally had to cover up to protect themselves from desert sandstorms, camel farts (possibly radioactive since Gulf Wars I and II) and temperature extremes. Were it not for fear of their control-freak husbands, don’t you think they would celebrate being in their own skins if they were magically transported to a balmy beach in the South Seas? Talk about “inappropriate attire”... being wrapped in thick cloth from head to toe on a sweltering day in the city sounds like a portable sauna to me. But to each his or her own - I’m happy in my sarong and flip-flops.

I have to be honest with myself. I love looking at beauty, and women are embodiments of the Great Goddess, deserving of admiration, love and respect. If a naked woman walked past me in the street, I would certainly turn my head for a second look. And I’d feel absolutely no guilt or shame about doing so. Nor would I - uncontrollably overcome by animal lust - drag her by the hair off to my cave and show her my etchings. Unless, of course, she handed me a perfumed note with precisely such a request. Even so, I’d rather she walk back to my cave on her own two feet than drag her all the way. I have a different concept of exercise.

Immaturity has its place, I grant that. However, let it not be exalted as the arbiter of our behavior and our moral code. There’s no immorality in portraying the human form in various stages of dress or undress in the adult cinema. What’s truly immoral is imposing on others our own limitations and limiting beliefs. Do we really value the grotesque hypocrisy censorship encourages? Are we to blinker our cinematic vision (like the proverbial katak under a tempurung) in a knee-jerk reaction to the poisonous outpourings of a pusillanimous prude?

Sincerely,
Antares
Kuala Kubu Baru
27 April 2006