Pigs’ Heads, Cows’ Heads and The Demons Among Us
By Farish A. Noor ~ January 27th, 2010. Filed under: TOM_Main, The Other Malaysia.
In the Malay-Indonesian rendering of the Mahabharatta, the Hikayat Pandawa Lima, we have an interesting and important episode that takes place as the great battle of Bharatayudha is fought. The Pandawa prince Yudistira - who is an ascetic and pacifist at heart - is forced to do battle with the great King Prabu Salya. Prabu Salya has one great weapon that could not be defeated by anyone else, the demon Chandrabirawa.
The demon Chandrabirawa could not be defeated as he grew more and more powerful every time he was hit. If his arm was chopped off, he would immediately grow another arm, even more powerful and deadly than the one before. Hundreds of warriors tried to defeat the demon, but they were all slain and the demon grew stronger with each fight- for the demon thrived on hate and violence.
Yet Prabu Salya had been warned by the sages that his defeat would come at the hands of ‘the man of pure heart who has done no harm to anyone’.
When the demon Chandrabirawa comes to confront the prince Yudistira, Yudistira refuses to fight him. Despite the provocations and taunts of Chandrabirawa, Yudistira maintains a stoic silence and refuses to raise his hand in anger. The demon is enraged by Yudistira’s refusal to be provoked and to fight, and in his anger grows more and more demonic and fiery; but the demon is consumed by his own hate and anger, and eventually succumbs to the fire of hate. Thus the legend comes true in the end, and Prabu Salya is defeated by the man who has done no harm to anyone.
Today in Malaysia there seem to be some who wish to inflame the situation in the country with blatant acts of provocation, intended to arouse the ire and hate of the rest of us. We have witnessed the sad and shameful spectacle of cows’ heads being severed, and now pigs’ heads have been cut in anger too.
While the authorities have the responsibility to stop this cycle of violence from spiraling any further, we - every ordinary Malaysian - have our own responsibility as well when it comes to choosing how to react to these acts of provocation. In times of overheated rhetoric and anger such as these, cool heads and calm tempers must prevail. Now is the moment for each and every one of us to be the Yudistira that is in all of us. Now is the time for the spirit of the wise pacifist to prevail - and it is not a spirit of passive defeatism that is called on, but rather the active and deliberate will not to fall into the trap of provocation.
The cycle of hate and violence can only end when we choose to break the link before us, and refuse to allow ourselves to be made into pawns for some sick and potentially deadly game that is being played by puppet-masters who have neither the courage nor principles to identify themselves in public.
Enough is enough. One severed cow’s head, or pig’s head, is already one too many. As Marina Mahathir has noted in her article ‘Let us Not let them Provoke us into War’ (27 Jan 2010), let US - Malaysian citizens of all walks of life and belief - regain our will and autonomy and reclaim our nation from the hate-mongers, cowards, bigots and chauvinists. Hate will not be defeated by more hate, and racism will not be defeated by more racism.
Like Yudistira, we must show that love - for peace, for others - is a mighty force that can defeat the demons among us. And like Yudistira, we must understand that Pacifism is NOT weakness, but rather the strongest expression of an independent intelligent will that refuses to compromise its dignity and autonomy by blindly walking down the path of irrational hate and anger.
January 31st, 2010 at 22:43
[...] Pigs’ Heads, Cows’ Heads and The Demons Among Us [...]
February 1st, 2010 at 03:04
love peace and everything nice are alright in theories. but in realpolitik, especially in the malaysian context, what with adverseries like umno, you just can’t play it straight.
these umno leeches, they know not how to engage in a man-to-man fight.
they will use money (the rakyat’s money) to buy over anyone and anything.
the police top brass (musang hasan was the i.o. in anwar’s sodomy I)
the ag chambers top brass. (gani patail was the dpp in anwar’s sodomy I)
the judicidiary top brass. (the chief justice now was the umno’s legal matters head).
the election commission.
all sorts of govt apparatus; both federal, state and local agencies.
all these are under umno’s payroll. they are all part of the gravy train. they all have hands in the cookie jar.
so, how on earth do we engage with umno in a civilised manner? this is not the uk or the states; with their labour vs conservative, democrats vs republicans. here it is pakatan vs umno (backed$$$ by those bodies mentioned above).
the only way to meaningful change is through a revolution - physically and mentally.
by physically, i mean taking to the streets etc…ala thailand and the philippines in the 80s. but then again, now most of us are ‘contented’. but soon the ugly truth will surface and those lulled into a sense of complacency and manufactured feelgood factors will wake up to find their country in shambles and left with nothing in the national coffers. this is the reality in malaysia. and the plundering is ongoing. right now. as i write this.
by mental, i meana meaningful change in the mindset of the malays. they are the largest group. and most of them are controlled by umno. 50 years. when would they realise that they have been dealt with a raw deal? but they seem contented to be givem rm1 a day (so to speak). what they dont realist is that rm9 has been taken away from them while they ’sleep’. and yet, umno has managed to appear as champions of the race and the country.
but the sad reality, too, is that meaningful paradigm shifts in the malay masses will only materialise if the revolution (physical) part takes place. it’s a catch-22, in a way.
but like raja petra kamaruddin once mentioned, it has to get worse before it gets better.
so is anyone prepared to take this route??
there seems no other way.