Ventriloquism and the Malaysian media
By RACHEL LEOW
I’ve never been to a live ventriloquist show. But the mental image is sufficiently evocative: A man sits on stage with a vapid wooden doll perched on his lap, delivering a monologue artfully disguised as dialogue, by throwing his voice to the doll.
I have, however, witnessed one of the greatest ongoing ventriloquist acts in the history of Malaysia – the censorship of our national press.
In this tour de force performance - or tour de farce, depending on your point of view – the state plays the ultimate ventriloquist, expertly juggling the various media puppets in its lap as it delivers its ceaseless self-serving monologue on the great stage of Malaysian politics.
Since you may have missed some of the more commendable acts, I’ll reproduce one of them here:
STATE: Abdullah Badawi is such a kind, gentle and incorruptible premier. Malaysia is lucky to have him as a Prime Minister.
MEDIA: Absolutely! Kind, gentle, and incorruptible! We’re so lucky!
STATE: The opposition is inherently divided but has formed unholy alliances.
MEDIA: Unholy Alliances! Divided Opposition! What will become of Malaysia?!
STATE: Luckily we have Abdullah Badawi, remember?
MEDIA: Yes, he’s kind, gentle, and incorruptible! We’re so lucky!
STATE: PAS is an evil fundamentalist party. They make unreasonable Islamist statements and base their party’s jurisdiction on those unreasonable Islamist statements.
MEDIA: PAS is evil! Fundamentalist! Makes unreasonable Islamist statements!
STATE: Marital rape can’t be criminalised in the Barisan State’s Penal Code because under Islam, women are obligated to satisfy their husbands sexually, and so there’s no such thing as marital rape.
MEDIA: PAS is evil! Fundamentalist! Makes unreasonable Islamist statements!
I should point out that in a ventriloquist act, the audience is typically expected to pay more attention to the inanimate wooden mouthpiece than to the ventriloquist himself.
It’s a truly remarkable performance. Most of Malaysia’s major newspapers are owned or controlled by the ruling coalition, for example MCA’s acquisition of Nanyang Press Holdings. These newspapers extol the virtues of government policies and leaders, or at best, offer delicate and minimal criticism thereof.
Meanwhile legislative acts such as the Printing Presses and Publications Act, the Official Secrets Act, Sedition Act and Broadcasting Act levy restrictions on editorial lines, news coverage and other critical sources. Seditious columns are periodically removed. Unflattering interviews are taken off air without warning. Prominent ex-politicos, such as Chin Peng or Anwar Ibrahim, are relentlessly scrutinised.
In short, the national press is reduced to a collection of inanimate wooden mouthpieces. The freedom of speech so earnestly guaranteed by Article 10 of our own Federal Constitution, is shoved backstage into the props closet. And the air grows dank with the unuttered question – but, um, isn’t this hypocrisy?
What Malaysians need is access to the truth.
This cannot happen through a censored press. Omission of an issue is always more potent than even the best-written defence of it. We cannot question something we do not know exists. In the wake of such repression, we are a hapless audience in the darkness of a theatre in which the ventriloquist state and its wooden dummies are all we can see and respond to.
We can take small comfort in this: ever since the Anwar debacle in 1998 (in which censorship peaked), sales of opposition pamphlets, books by independent local commentators, and alternative, online media sources have increased. Clearly, not all Malaysians will stand still and allow themselves to be hoodwinked.
But pamphlets, books and rogue websites are no match for the sheer brunt of national media. For those of you reading this article from a computer screen, you are privileged with access to alternative information sources. A vast majority of Malaysians do not.
And ignorance breeds ignorance. Malaysians cannot legitimately criticise the ruling coalition for nurturing a police-like state if we do not know that it is happening. How many Malaysians know about the Kamunting Detention Camp incident in January 2004, where 31 detainees were allegedly stripped, spat on, beaten in the genitals, forced to drink spittle and to urinate in front of interrogators? Or the fact that on November 2004, 300 detainees at the Simpang Renggam Detention Camp launched a hunger strike to protest being detained without trial under the Emergency Ordinance?
Moreover, police state aside, truth impacts the legitimacy of our leadership. We cannot have informed opinions about the government if only a smattering of corruption cases make it to the newspapers. And we cannot legitimately vote for an opposition party that we do not know anything about.
In this sense, we might all in danger of becoming wooden puppets. We cannot say anything about what we do not know, and what we do know, is vocalised by the ventriloquist himself. Our criticism can bear upon only within what is spotlighted for us, what is allowed to be brought into the light. Everything else is uncertain and unclear, and so to be safe, many Malaysians avoid confronting these issues, and turn their attention to the stage.
We comfort ourselves by engaging in criticism our government encourages: against Anwar, against PAS, against the insidious onslaught of American globalisation. For example, we hold debates among ourselves about whether PAS’s Islamist policies are too fundamentalist - without ever considering its similarities to UMNO’s policies. It is monologue artfully disguised as dialogue – ventriloquism at its best, boldest, and certainly, most artful.
And ultimately, there is repression of deviance. There is no legitimate outlet for what should be legitimate criticism. Take this present article, for example. The Star, the Sun, and certainly the New Straits Times, will never print these words. It will never reach a mass audience, and this is the case for most writing of such ilk.
We cannot get people to question something if they don’t know anything about it.
Nevertheless, and futilities of impact aside, it seems somehow fitting that my pilot article for theCICAK is about freedom of speech. After all, the raison d’etre for our ilk of “deviationist� journalism stems from the unfortunate fact that in Malaysia there is something to deviate from – a given party line, perhaps, or some status quo bolstered by the farcical ministrations of our heavily controlled press.
These are the murmurings of a great ventriloquist. Consider theCICAK, then, as a wooden dummy that refuses to let itself be spoken for.
—
RACHEL LEOW is a contributing writer for theCICAK.
Rachel is your average atypical Malaysian girl who aspires to great things, if she could only figure out what those great things are in the first place. She does History at Warwick University, and likes her ivory towers enough to consider postgraduate study. Her one journalistic triumph was an essay published in the International Herald Tribune, which she wrote when she was sixteen and cannot bear to read anymore. She is compulsively anal about apostrophes. Visit her site.
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Part 1: Creating a new manifesto for Malaysia
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Comment of the week
I defend my right as a Malaysian to talk about anything that concerns Malaysia.
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but theCICAK is a dummy nonetheless?
what are the strings that bind the puppet to the puppetiers?
in the malaysian media’s case, it is:
a- the home ministry’s (the same ministry that is behind the ISA) unquestionable power to revoke publishing licenses from newspapers at any given day. in the 80’s a major newspaper was temporarily shut down for not cooperating with the home ministry. today, that same newspaper is at the forefront of compliancy and state-induced ventriloquism.
b- the lack of private NGO funds invested into the malaysian media (linked to fact (a) and (c))
c- lack of serious demand for a “free” press. malaysians generally are very picky about what they want to hear/see. even the most “open-minded” of us have vested interests.
severe these strings, and the dummy might speak free yet.
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yes, alas, we are still a dummy, merely by dint of the fact that we exist within the media system. and yes, legislation and mentality are two of the biggest hindrances to this system - indeed, to many of the issues malaysia faces. i think for us, the “masses”, it’s a bit of a chicken and egg problem - which comes first, the change of law or the change of mind?
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Learnt about your blog site from Screenshots. Wanna give you some encouragement as you begin this new journey.
Chicken or egg first, as you posed it.
One major obstacle has to be the mindset of the general popolace. If the ‘masses’ are truely receptive to the wind of change, entrepreneurs can surely start liberal print newspapers. Say, Malaysiakini in print form, having a ciculalation rivaling that of the Star and NST, combined. Afterall, the Malaysian society is a free-capitalist society, when there is money to mint in print media, they will be willing takers. Sure, if these new media became successful, the ruling party machinary may buy them up and attempt to impose journalistic censorship, the free spirits should just start new one!
Just my two cents. Bravo and good luck.
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It’s all well and good to highlight the inherent flaws in the Malaysian system. I for one could not agree more. But let’s go back about 35 years or so to the time when Malaysia’s evolution as a nation took a massive tangential divergence into the materialistic mess we call our society today.
The much-cited, much-feared riots of 1969 was the point at which democracy in Malaysia was shackled with handcuffs. Those riots gave ANY ruling government the right to run a virtually authoritarian state in the pretext of maintaining peace and order. And after 30 years of that having worked by the virtue of shoving free money down the throats of millions, do any of us think it’s really feasible to suddenly change the system?
Try to imagine the inertia of 25 million Malaysians who care about nothing but themselves. Even supposed luminaries who claim to be our intellectual and moral guardians are not altogether altruistic. It’s true! As a race of people, bangsa Malaysia is incredibly apathetic, lazy and highly motivated only by material gain and self-interests. I’m no different myself, which saddens me because I wish I were.
So when we rail on about clampdowns on media in Malaysia, don’t just blame the government. Blame us, the Malaysian public who for the most part, don’t really give a rat’s ass about the independence of media. As long as government contracts of all shapes and sizes fall into the hands of the public, as long as businesses continue to operate without any requirement of corporate social responsibility and as long as the average Malaysian can buy a house, buy a car and shop at Carrefour, the sad truth is that no one really cares about what the media report. It’s sad that in a nation of 25 million people, the circulation of the Star and the NST combined (the two largest English dailies) cannot even top 500,000. The other non-English dailies don’t have higher readerships either.
The question I’m asking is does the Malaysian mass public, really wanna know about what goes on in Kamunting? The recent AP furore was only that because a large part of this country were up in arms about how a few individuals were making millions of ringgit easily. Again, when it was about money, the country is up in arms.
However, no one really cares about other issues like human rights, art, culture, public apathy, literacy, etc.
I know not all of what I’ve wrote is may be relevant to your post Rachel, but it’s something I’ve been thinking about the past few weeks. I’m beginning to think that as long as I live in Malaysia like an expat, earn money, pay some taxes, enjoy a good quality of life and siphon my money elsewhere, I’m globally mobile and therefore couldn’t really be bothered to start some armchair questioning about the flaws in the system, because I’m really not going to do anything about it.
It’s a massive amount of inertia and I applaud those who try to fight it, but remember the handcuffs, they’re clamped on tight.
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Yes. Most of our major medias are owned by components of our ruling party Barisan National. UMNO owns Media Prima Bhd (www.mediaprima.com.my) which in turn owns TV3, 8TV and NSTP. Rumours have it that Media Prima is planning to acquire NTV 7. Not to mention TV1, TV2, and Radio 1-5 are run by government. In case no one notice, MCA owns Huaren Sdn Bhd, which owns a controlling shares in The Star Bhd, under The Star it’s China Press, and the Nanyang Press. They might be planning to buy Sin Jew Jit Poh too last time if not mistaken. I’m not too sure what media MIC owns but from here I can see that almost more than 90% of our major medias are under the control of the BN component parties. It won’t be difficult to imagine why they are the “dummy” for the “ventriloquist”.
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Only White Men practise democracy…like it or not.
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Media conglomeration is never good. It’s even worse when there’s no seperation between press and state.
In the United States, there’s a big hoo-ha whenever Clear Channel takes over more radio stations. People here are also outwardly critical of Fox News being too conservative and pro-Bush administration.
And rightly so, too.
Malaysians must stop being somnolent, in regards to the news media.
News organizations are supposed to be the “watchdogs of democracy,� and not the “lapdogs of plutocracy.�
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Poh Si,
Pro-Bush, bash-Bush, depending on which side one stands on, one can always point a finger at the other side for being unfair in its judgement of the president. As a whole, US media are too US centric and there are more Left-leaning liberal media (TV and print) than the odd-one-out, conservative Fox/News Corp. See, that’s how I’d interpret the left-vs-right debate in the US. This is only possible when there is an idealogy divide in the society, unlike the apathy of the M’sian society. In peace time, US populace fights on conservatism vs liberalism, yet in war time, they all rally behind the president (of whichever party). In M’sia, the country’s founding fathers did not put in place an unbreakable system of checks and balances, and the latter-day legislators did not seek to amend the Constitution to ensure the independence of the Judiciary and Legistive branch from the Executive branch of the Goverment. This is truly sad. Best practices of good governments from other successful countries were not imported. It took a country like US some 200 years to rid itself of old bad habits, like not according the same rights to minorities and women. Malaysia does not need a French-type revolution to make a fresh start. We do need to have more civic participations by the people in how the country, or even how your locality is governed. People’s patience is running thin and do not expect the people to put up with unfair, unjust treatment for another 150 years, ie. Malaysia can progress along at the same pace as the model countries.
Dr M. in some ways was visionary in rapidly developing the economy of Malaysia. He can be said to be a leader in that sense. It will take another extraordinary leader, from the ruling elite, who has the wisdom and courage to go beyond the narrow, race-based politics that a colonial power would want to see perpertuating, and put in place solid foundations for rapidly unshackling of people souls. Would this happen in our life time, maybe not. But if you try hard, your children or grand children might just see the fruits of this labour.
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If white man doesnt control the media does it make him more democratic?I think not.
To quote Dr.M
Press freedom is about telling the truth, not fabricating lies for whatever purposes. The contempt for the hurt inflicted on others seems to be condoned by the British goverment and people.No scruples about lying, seemingly plenty about selling arms? The standard answer to the malaysian is the British Press is free. “Lies, damned lies” are free. Redress isn’t.That is what western democracy abd human rights is all about. IF this is not moral decadence then what is?
*quoted from page 305,Appendix 5,Another side of Mahathir,written by Zainuddin Maidin
At some extent controlling the media ( which controls the mind of people ) is good. Yes, Malaysia is kinda “tight” in controlling Press,but hei, if compared with Singapore , i would say its Lesser of Two Evils
.
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Boy….won’t UMNO Youth be incensed to find you guys here;p
First of all, I’m elated to be given the opportunity to read articles in this webzine. It’s certainly a step forward to establishing a civil society that has maturity to accept criticisms and plurality of ideas/opinions. Let’s hope that the flame of democracy and free speech does not just end where it has just started.
In considering the state of repression in the country, a well known and somewhat overused excuse for silencing criticisms (and naturally, this cliched argument supports the continued use of ISA and its derivatives) is the potentially harmful effects that free speech might have on security and racial harmony. To quote Steven Gan, “In Malaysia, we have freedom of speech. But not freedom after speech” (Democratic Transition in Asia). Hence, one has to presently take cognisance of the consequences of speaking out.
The fear of allowing free speech is as deeply entrenched in the mindset of the political masters of the country as perhaps, the fear of the consequences of speaking one’s mind. The powers that be view with trepidation, the prophetic vision of intellectually liberated Malaysians marching hand in hand to challenge its authority. As things currently stand, this hopeful scene is still light years away from reality. For all we know, even the naivety of youth is being taken advantage of, in their compulsion to attend “civics� courses by the Biro Tatanegara. With all the hoo-haa reported in malaysiakini over the politicisation of higher education, public universities have transformed into giant brain-washing machines. Call that brain laundering, if you like.
So what do our political masters fear? The mother of all fears is the fear of competition. And that’s what they essentially lack. And they don’t seem to have put in much effort to convince, rather than terrify people into submission with ISA and suchlike. We see such instances of fear everywhere. For instance, the government does not need to market its ideas to the masses; it does not need to anyway for you are supposed to support those ideas come what may. With support taken for granted, due to a vacuous political spectrum left by impotent opposition parties, there is never going to be any improvement in the way they run the country.
For all the record-breaking economic growth stories and fairy-tales that Bank Negara so readily reports, the drivers holding on to the steering wheel don’t seem to have grown out of infancy. Still a feudal society under the pretense of democracy.
We still have freedom of speech….that we can exercise in the kopi tiams.
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Screenshots…theCicak… etc…are all a great place for us to fully express our hidden opinions rather than keeping it. I love it!!
However, all these sites are simply a method of government to prevent us from creating hoo-haz in real life. Don’t you all agree with me?
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“we cannot legitimately vote for an opposition party, that we do not know anything about.”
I don’t think voting for the opposition would do Malaysia any good either. The problem is that there’s no competant political party in Malaysia for us to choose.
Until something better comes up to replace democracy I don’t see any hope in this world being a better place to live in.
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Pertinent points have been brought up about lack of viable opposition. I must say I am entirely in agreement (perhaps that didn’t come out too strongly in the article) - as a starry-eyed idealist through and through, I’m all for free markets and open competition
It’s difficult to budge the status quo, though. Barisan does stand for stability, despite all its questionable elements, and the incumbent party eventually does have the power to bolster its position with e.g. legislation, such as laws limiting opposition campaigning, etc. Home team always wins, as they say.
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sometimes i think blogsphere allowed us to know more about political issues and something dark behind it…
but i wonder these interesting and important info are capable to spread out or deliver to those people who seldom get online… either verbally or… what ever…
i have a childish idea… i wonder that a publisher will be realy have the guts to collect all the info, get the authority from the authors, and publish them in hardcopy form like magazine or something like that…
i think majority people in malaysia dunno who is jeff ooi yet…
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in regards to hc’s comment : “Boy….won’t UMNO Youth be incensed to find you guys here;p”
i would like to ask why you mentioned that? did you find something particularly controversial about this article or theCICAK as a whole controversial? if so, it would be good to know which specific part you found worthy of UMNO youth’s outrage?
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We would love to publish an article from UMNO Youth, and hear their take on free speech.
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I fully agreed that the majority of Malaysians are trully apathetic especially towards politic. I think Malaysians feel too comfortable for their own good. When I asked my friends & relatives who they voted for and they said BN, who else? Superficially Malaysia is doing good. We had one of the world tallest building, we have maids and foreign workers all wanting to work in Malaysia, nice roads and airport. This is what Mahathir and BN party created the impression and wanted us Malaysians to believe. That’s why BN won the last election easily.
It doesn’t matter that newspaper is not independent, doesn’t matter we don’t have free speach, rampant corruptions in police, federal government, state government, city council, LLN and private companies, inefficient government, super lazy government servants, lousy national school, university in a mess which doesn’t care about quality of the students and its research.
These are not important to majority of Malaysians. We’re kind of satisfied with what we have and not thinking too far ahead. Typically Malaysians are not social minded with attitudes “I mind my own business” & “please don’t stir up trouble”.
We don’t have Nelson Mandela, Tiananamen square demonstration, Phillipines people power, Indonesia toppling of Suharto rule, Aung San Suu Kyi.
Yes, Malaysia is a hopelessly selfish society.
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Dear Jason,
I find your latest article on youth is enlightening,although I am still reading it as I type. The youths are supposed to hold lofty ideals and be courageous to dream. Unlike adults, who are already tainted by what we call experience, youths tend to be more open minded.
However, I do find the Youth wing of our ruling coalition party somewhat bizzare in their extremism and rightist sentiments. If you look at the previous controversy involving Mr Jeff Ooi and Khairy J. it seems that the latter is not ready for free speech. There is always a tendency for these so-called youths to ape the adults of their party. Hence, the “youth” term (as in MCA youth, UMNO youth etc.) is really paradoxical. They do not really embody the open minded idealism that a youth should possess. That’s why I’d say that these guys would be miffed by how opinions are freely expressed here. I do not mean that they are unhappy with Rachel’s article. They would be more worried about the whole idea of starting Cicak etc. as these non-state actors are agents of democracy that can weaken the political control of the incumbents on the minds of the people over whom they govern.
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dave mentioned:
“sometimes i think blogsphere allowed us to know more about political issues and something dark behind it…
but i wonder these interesting and important info are capable to spread out or deliver to those people who seldom get online… either verbally or… what ever…
i have a childish idea… i wonder that a publisher will be realy have the guts to collect all the info, get the authority from the authors, and publish them in hardcopy form like magazine or something like that…
i think majority people in malaysia dunno who is jeff ooi yet…”
hc’s take: well, one interesting observation that I have made (which I believe many people would have made anyway) is that the chances of coming across frank and honest opinions in cyberspace is much greater than in printed media. there is certainly more rational and open minds out here.
if this were a general trend, then the days of authoritarian rule are numbered. however, this is not a general trend. it’s a trend only for those who are ICT and internet enabled. unfortunately, many are not wired and the internet penetration rate is still relatively low. hence, there is little that we can do here, especially in terms of disseminating critical ideas to the majority. i concur with dave, though.
moreover, the IT and English literacy/proficiency is still pretty low, which again causes bottlenecks in the exchange of ideas (high transaction costs comes to mind). while we talk about free speech and suchlike…our discussions would seem elitist to the general population and i doubt that many can appreciate what’s being said here.
it’s kinda like driving out of KL city and be confronted with a landscape of poverty and underdevelopment. we are lightyears ahead of many fellow Malaysians. i only wonder how we can help everyone catchup.
nonetheless, cicak is a wonderful step forward.
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It is important to get along with even the most conservative of voices. Fuss normally arises when vested interests are threatened. In any case, let’s hope all parties (UMNO youth included) speak up from the heart, but behave responsibly and maintain their integrity. Mutual respect.
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With regard to Dave’s comments,
“…to spread out or deliver to those people who seldom get online… either verbally or… what ever…”
let’s not kid yourselves here. How many people do you think read blogs like this one, or others about social injustice in M’sia? Ten thousand? How many registered voters are there, of the 23 mil. populations? Do you think blogs like this one will make a difference to the outcome of the next ten general elections?
Internet medium is cumbersome and inaccessible to a lot of folks at home, unlike many of you who are in tertiary education institutions, lots of free time, high speed access, like-minded colleagues, etc. Your only burden is to get grades and once you have that, you can use your ample free time to give the most insightful thoughts of yours through the cyberspace. For young working adults, the time dynamics is very different. You work long hours, you have to feed yourself and the family. Mark these words and see whether they’re true in three years!
Go on, have a good time while you can.
BTW, if you want lots of audience, do a radio show or a segment on TV, like they do here on cable TVs.
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bravo.
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The UK has exactly the same problem, voter apathy. People wander into the voting booths with only half the facts and generally people vote on their position:
“Am I doing OK? Do I have a car and a job, yes, okay vote for the incumbant”
Those who value ethics (such as HONESTY Mr Blair!) and vote for a third party (because the standard opposition are even worse) are limited and because of the first past the post system these votes are further squeezed.
For your information (novin) the population of the UK did not unanimously vote for Labour, they only secured 36% of the national vote (Cons 32% Lib Dem 25%), but due to the first past the post system they regained a majority of 60 seats (which means they can pretty much do anything).
We have the same problem with apathy, nobody cares about the quality of the media they read, even though the press is relatively free. Winning the freedom of the press is one helpful aim but I agree that it will not solve the problem.
The crux of the problem isn’t in the tools that the shepards wield but in the intelligence of the sheep that they endeavour to control. How we change that I do not know, we have the same problem all over the world be it Malaysia or the UK.
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Naivety and Idealism
The “truth” hurts. Do you honestly think that Malaysians would be better served by having the corruption and “unfairness-es” of Malaysian politics and business exposed in the media on a regular basis? Is the general populace ready to stomach this? Even more crucially, will the dominant classes allow this to happen, in the knowledge that this would likely lead to an increasingly critical and demanding populace?
The case for legitimate critisicm is a laudable one, as excesses by the prevaliling powers needs to be vigilantly guarded against. But a completely free and “fair” press is too big a leap for many to make, especially for the public. Some things are better kept in the dark, away from public view. Would a complete accounting for and release of figures for money spent and given due to past and exisiting policies of positive discrimination make anybody happy? If made widely known and constantly harped upon, wouldn’t the fact that the Chinese who comprise less than a fifth of the population control the majority of the wealth in the country increase racial tensions? Tangentially related but relevant, if you’ve watched “24″, there is this episode where the president detains a journalist to prevent the news of an impending crisis from escaping. Any reasonable person would have done the same, weighing the need for calm and security over the need of the people to obtain the truth. Where a piece of information is judged as having the possible effect of being detrimental to society as a whole, there can arguably be a valid justification that it be withheld and disguised. The same thing goes for polemical reporting on controversial subjects. So called seditious opinions and views might have factual validity, but the freedom of expressing such views needs to be restricted. The implicit assumption in this argument is that the general population might negatively act upon unappetising information, causing unrest and undesirable consequences.
The censorship of the media justified by beneficial paternalism is one of the two reasons for the current state of things. The other, more insidious one is the inherent need of the ruling classes to preserve their position of power. Kidding yourself aside, you are likely to be classed into this category, or at least classed as the “elite” by any definition. Whether concious or unconcious, the media’s opinion and criticisms is dictated by its contributing editors and writers. If they subscribe, perhaps unwillingly, to censorship, whether self or imposed, it is because there is a strong reason to do so. This selfish reason of self-preservation is overwhelming, and if you were in a postion of power, you would likely do the same i.e. attempt to impose views and opinions via the mainstream media.
On another note, Arvind is right on the money with what he says on inertia. The masses are just too concerned with making a living to care, and the better off, more educated ones are too concerned with acquiring the latest Beemer or I-pod to give a shite. Malaysians will first focus on advancing materially and meeting their immediate economic needs over the problem of acheiving a fair and free media. The restricted press serves to preserve the stablility of the capitalistic system which facillitates the process of bettering oneself economically. Only when a decent standard of living is acheived will more voices speak out against the perceived unfairness of the prevailing system.
In time perhaps, the media will gradually become freerer, but to rush things would be folly, the pain of a sudden change in the system might be too big a shock. Yes, we are a “hapless audience in the darkness of a theatre”. But let not the lights shine, as the ugliness on the stage of life just might be too much for us to bear.
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*ahem*…wait for it. wait for it. Excuse me ma’am, could you possibly cite your sources? *bows and exits*
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Louis,
I fully agree with you. Thank you for posting this comment.
Writers and contributors, you HAVE to cite your sources. Your readers are not going to take your word for things. Please substantiate your claims. This is very very crucial. It would be better still if you could link your articles to where you got the information.
You must SHOW the reader, not TELL the reader.
In journalism, attribution is everything. Too much attribution can be cumbersome, and too little could get you into trouble.
My reporting instructor said to a bunch of newriting freshies:
If your mom says she loves you, don’t take her word for it. Talk to sources. Ask them whether she really loves you.
Many of our contributors are not journalists, nor have they received any training in reporting.
While we don’t expect our contributors to speak to 10 or 20 people, we do want them to cite where they got their facts and figures from. And to back up their claims and statements.
This is essential if theCICAK aims to be a credible source of information.
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