The Good in All of Us

So the past weekend was crazy, and I know this has been said too many times, but it has made me so proud to be Malaysian. So proud of the 50,000 amazingly brave people who, despite all the threats and warnings, walked anyway. For us, and for our country.

It's an age old tale I suppose. After all, Hitler's reign of terror would be impossible without the countless men who were "just following orders". I've studied this, I know that humans are prone to assuming roles and doing despicable things when wedged between those with all the power and those with none.

What I don't understand is where that moral compass went. Where are your hearts? Aren't you human too? Weren't you raised the same way the rest of us were, with parents, schools and religious institutes planting moral values into your minds and hearts?

In what universe is it alright to fling tear gas canisters at such a low angle in order to harm the very people you swore to serve and protect? In what universe is it acceptable to gas a hospital full of patients and peaceful protesters seeking refuge? In what universe is it even an option to keep a man on the ground, in handcuffs, as he struggled through his last breath?

I was never pro-opposition, but argue as you may that Bersih was merely an opposition movement, it doesn't change anything. What it started out as doesn't change what it turned into. At the end of the day, it has opened the people's eyes to those in power.

And those are people who are so terrified of losing their positions they would resort to such extreme displays of violence. Those are people who lie and lie and lie, even in the face of undeniable evidence, because there isn't an ounce of integrity left in them. Those are people who laugh along as their leader publicly mock the pain of his people. Pain HE inflicted upon them.

And those of you sitting at your computers, typing out statuses about all of us being "brainwashed by the opposition", putting patriot badges on your display pictures, whining time and time again about how Bersih is ruining the "peaceful Malaysian culture". You people need to set aside politics, set aside your strange need to be unique and have a different opinion from anyone else (sadly that's the main goal of many of these teens) and watch the videos. Watch the millions of videos captured on cellphones all over the city. Watch your beloved officers beat your fellow countrymen to pulp. Watch the international news coverage of outside, unbiased reporters. Watch your leader cackle on about tear gas victims like it was all a great joke. And read their reports too, read their sides.

Are their claims of "opposition infiltration" in the Bersih 2.0 movement enough for you? Are you satisfied with that explanation for all that unprovoked violence in our "peace loving" country?

If you are then I have just one more question for you.

There is no more good left in them, but where is the good in you?