Dear Dr. Azly,
Thank you for your prompt reply.
Your take was indeed very thought provoking.
However, it seemed a little too idealistic for my taste. (Very philosophical lah , doc)
All the development projects, and efforts towards modernization, is in my opinion, necessary – evil or not, it would depend on those who wield the technology/ wealth. What matters is, the man who truly wields this power, wealth and knowledge needs to be the one who truly deserves it.
He cannot be put in place by virtue of constitution, race, birthright, contacts or political influence. As must as I appreciate your take on it, somehow, I hoped that you'd point out that there were a lot of parallels between the words of the character in the excerpt, and our very own NEP and its political implications on Malaysian society. Anyway, here is my take on it.
Would you agree that as per our current policies in the implementation of the NEP, we are actually heading towards political disaster?
Allow me to illustrate: "To trade by means of money is the code of men of good will. ......................................................................... Money demands that you sell, not your weakness to men's stupidity, but your talent to their reason; it demands that you buy, not the shoddiest they offer, but the best that your money can find. And when men live by trade - with reason, not force, as their final arbiter - it is the best product that wins, the best performance, the man of best judgment and highest ability - and the degree of a man's productiveness is the degree of his reward.
This is the code of existence whose tool and symbol is money.
Does the NEP acknowledge any part of this fact whatsoever?
I seriously doubt it. A good look around the nation would tell you that.
Nowhere in the NEP do the admit that in creating wealth for an elite class of Bumiputera, and in giving freebies to the common man that ....... money is only a tool.
It will take you wherever you wish, but it will not replace you as the driver.
It will give you the means for the satisfaction of your desires, but it will not provide you with the desires. Money is the scourge of the men who attempt to reverse the law of causality - the men who seek to replace the mind by seizing the products of the mind.
They give and they give what has been looted, only so that it is squandered, and so create a bumiputera class that is totally dependant on handouts.
Do they feel the pain in seeing money being abused? Of course not – for they never did create it – they only looted it. This of course assures them of a vote bank, but isn't it a scourge upon the Bumiputera (specifically the Malays)?
Don't worry about the “new bumiputeras” (ie the arabs, the “mamaks”, the converts and the “pan-asians”) - they'll be fine ..... if anything it'll be they who'll reap the harvest from the opportunities.
It is they who will usurp the nation.
Let's move on ..... "Money will not purchase happiness for the man who has no concept of what he wants: money will not give him a code of values, if he's evaded the knowledge of what to value, and it will not provide him with a purpose, if he's evaded the choice of what to seek. Money will not buy intelligence for the fool, or admiration for the coward, or respect for the incompetent. The man who attempts to purchase the brains of his superiors to serve him, with his money replacing his judgment, ends up by becoming the victim of his inferiors. The men of intelligence desert him, but the cheats and the frauds come flocking to him, drawn by a law which he has not discovered: that no man may be smaller than his money.
The noble intention to uplift the Malays has long been been discarded. Today, they only wish to have the Malay purchase his happiness temporarily for a price in ringgit. They have forgotten that it is only through knowledge and wisdom that they can generate wealth. They have also ignored the fact that it is only these people who generate wealth that can hold on to it.
Or else, the money would slowly but surely dissipate. It is this lack of money that would “fire up” the racial supremacy that is touted by politicians at present.
"Only the man who does not need it, is fit to inherit wealth - the man who would make his own fortune no matter where he started. If an heir is equal to his money, it serves him; if not, it destroys him. But you look on and you cry that money corrupted him. Did it? Or did he corrupt his money? Do not envy a worthless heir; his wealth is not yours and you would have done no better with it. Do not think that it should have been distributed among you; loading the world with fifty parasites instead of one would not bring back the dead virtue which was the fortune. Money is a living power that dies without its root.
Now we have the result of our noble NEP.
Let us move on .......
Money will not serve the mind that cannot match it. "Money is your means of survival. the verdict you pronounce upon the source of your livelihood is the verdict you pronounce upon your life. If the source is corrupt, you have damned your own existence. Did you get your money by fraud? By pandering to men's vices or men's stupidity? By catering to fools, in the hope of getting more than your ability deserves? By lowering your standards? By doing work you despise for purchasers you scorn? If so, then your money will not give you a moment's or a penny's worth of joy. Then all the things you buy will become, not a tribute to you, but a reproach; not an achievement, but a reminder of shame. Then you'll scream that money is evil.
Now, do we see a backlash against money (ala Talibanisation/ Islamisation?) - and ultra conservatism. In doing so, these advocates of ultra conservatism forget that ,
"Money will always remain an effect and refuse to replace you as the cause. Money is the product of virtue, but it will not give you virtue and it will not redeem your vices. Money will not give you the unearned, neither in matter nor in spirit. Now comes the scary part about Malaysian society ..... do you notice a strange kind of piety afflicting the Malaysian (muslim especially) illustrated by the creeping Arabisation (disguised as Islamisation) But money demands of you the highest virtues, if you wish to make it or to keep it. Men who have no courage, pride or self-esteem, men who have no moral sense of their right to their money and are not willing to defend it as they defend their life, men who apologize for being rich - will not remain rich for long. They are the natural bait of the swarms of looters that stay under rocks for centuries, but come crawling out at the first smell of a man who begs to be forgiven for the guilt of owning wealth. They will hasten to relieve him of the guilt - and of his life, as he deserves.
Do you see that hard working men are now forced to work harder to earn their keep so as to subsidize the cost of sustaining the NEP?
Do you see a brain drain in Malaysia?
Do you see the wealth generators transferring their assets and domicile overseas?
Do you see politicians stating that they want a greater stake in the economic pie?
Do you see men of enterprise being forced to part with their achievements to pacify the power brokers?
Do you see a proliferation of the “black market” economy?
"Then you will see the rise of the men of the double standard - the men who live by force, yet count on those who live by trade to create the value of their looted money - the men who are the hitchhikers of virtue. In a moral society, these are the criminals, and the statutes are written to protect you against them. But when a society establishes criminals-by-right and looters-by-law - men who use force to seize the wealth of disarmed victims - then money becomes its creators' avenger. Such looters believe it safe to rob defenseless men, once they've passed a law to disarm them. But their loot becomes the magnet for other looters, who get it from them as they got it. Then the race goes, not to the ablest at production, but to those most ruthless at brutality. When force is the standard, the murderer wins over the pickpocket. And then that society vanishes, in a spread of ruins and slaughter.
Are we talking about May 13 here? Definitely not.
We are now talking about the near future.
Why do we have greater polarization on all sectors of society today? Because it is the only way that the politically bankrupt can go on reaping their harvest of loot. It is only through suspicion and distrust of his neighbour, prosperous or otherwise, that the perpetuation of the looting may be done legally under the guise of the NEP.
"Do you wish to know whether that day is coming? Watch money. Money is the barometer of a society's virtue. When you see that trading is done, not by consent, but by compulsion - when you see that in order to produce, you need to obtain permission from men who produce nothing - when you see that money is flowing to those who deal, not in goods, but in favors - when you see that men get richer by graft and by pull than by work, and your laws don't protect you against them, but protect them against you - when you see corruption being rewarded and honesty becoming a self-sacrifice - you may know that your society is doomed. Money is so noble a medium that it does not compete with guns and it does not make terms with brutality. It will not permit a country to survive as half-property, half-loot.
Should Rand's words be prophetic, the future when our beautiful nation would descend into chaos wouldn't be too far off ....................
"Do you wish to know whether that day is coming? Watch money. Money is the barometer of a society's virtue. When you see that trading is done, not by consent, but by compulsion - when you see that in order to produce, you need to obtain permission from men who produce nothing - when you see that money is flowing to those who deal, not in goods, but in favors - when you see that men get richer by graft and by pull than by work, and your laws don't protect you against them, but protect them against you - when you see corruption being rewarded and honesty becoming a self-sacrifice - you may know that your society is doomed. Money is so noble a medium that it does not compete with guns and it does not make terms with brutality. It will not permit a country to survive as half-property, half-loot.
We cannot do much in the face of leaders who harp on insufficiency within the chosen race, while they everything within their power to perpetuate it by inducing desire and greed, that morphs into segregation and hatred for his neighbour.
When money ceases to be the tool by which mean deal with one another, then men become the tools of men. Blood, whips and guns - or dollars. Take your choice - there is no other - and your time is running out."
From the above, I do not have the slightest doubt that there will one day be a form of ethnic cleansing or persecution which will destroy the nation, unless something is done fast.
This persecution (ala pogroms) will start with the “jizya” & the creation of the “dhimmi” class, when there is nothing left to loot, or the non-bumi entrepreneurial community is too small (due to migration) to sustain the looting. It will start when they need scapegoats for their economic failures and lack of taxes/ rentals/ jizya that is collected. Looking at the speed at which this evolution is taking place, I would give it a max of 20 yrs down the line.
Please do not print this in any public forum (blog). This is just a personal “academic” view which I wish to discuss. Of late, I get the feeling that I am being “observed” (paranoia perhaps, but I'd rather be careful). My hope for a comfortable future in Malaysia during my golden years is fading pretty fast, in tandem with our political evolution into the middle ages. Thank you.
