What is wrong being yourself?
If you find a reality that is an upfront to polite society and you find that you can make a living out of it, then it is not a bad thing. Nor is it a wrong thing.
Of course, polite society will say you are being caustic, acidic, sharp tongue, abrasive, etc.
But there is another section of society who is with you. And if you are popular with the general public - and as a result, you are successful - then that is really not a bad thing.
The truth is that it is really hard to be really nice and popular with everybody. There are people who are jealous and hate to see you do well. There is no need to obtain general acceptance.
I am probably spending too much time with people who want you to endear to them. There is so much hypocrisy when people pretend to be nice but in reality hate your guts. There is so much pretense that you do not know the reality.
Equally, I would probably not want to live in an environment where everybody shouts at you in your face all the time, and wish you ill or death.
The bottomline is the ultimate intention of the person. If you know that the person is ultimately kind, may not be nice, doesn't really mean the words used, but merely describing things the way she sees it without mincing words, and to be brutally honest, then I suppose one would not take offense, if the blunt words are not directed at you or are directed at someone else.
It is really a fine line. And only a master can walk that fine line and not fall.
Not everybody likes the jokes by Joan Rivers, but she was a master that brute honesty.
3 comments:
A: One by one they pass away, don't they?
B: To be more precise, they bow out from the stage.
A: She was quite a character.
B: Who found her niche as first mover in making public what would normally have been more private jokes and that by shaking her audience off their pedestals of sensibilities.
A: Could it be because she was a woman in a man's world?
B: Indeed, i consider it sheer global injustice why women have to try so much harder just to make a living. And that includes the professions.
A: Maybe it's because women are made differently from men in a world mostly created by men.
B: And from whom are men created, may i ask?
A: I see your point.
B: Indeed, some men who have been saying things they consider national policies hereabouts talk as if they are standing on their heads.
A: How so?
B: With weak eyesight and from a long distance you can be excused if you see them then as if talking from the wrong orifice, no?
A: Touche. Vintage B.
B: So what do you think about the present national ignominy of slapping the rakyat with the slashes of sedition in order to mute the voices of conscience so as to defend piratical pro-incumbent power-hold over the right to define minority as majority?
A: Indeed. We must be the only country where minority is defined as majority.
B: Well, time's up. The ambulance has arrived. Wheel her in.
A: Who be her this time?
B: One hot momma woman called Malaysia. She's gone too.
A: How to save her?
B: Only when each and everyone starts to realize we are all leaders.
A: If we are all leaders, who be we leading?
B: Ourselves. We are each of us a leader of ourselves. Let that be the start. And the first journey is to lead ourselves from the land of hypocrisy to the new land of democracy.
A: Oh, haven't we been a democracy all along?
B: Exactly what weed have you been smokin'? Certainly not kretek.
A: I stand corrected.
B: Which part of you?
A: Touchy, aren't we?
B: A good leader leads weak people away from their weakness. A bad leader leads them towards more weaknesses. Name me one mf leader in our federal front these days.
A: Are you trying to do a Rivers now?
B: Who, me? Do remember to refresh with patience and perseverance.
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A: What do you think is the cause of the present rift?
B: Fear.
A: Of what?
B: Of tectonic shifts in the structure and society of our country.
A: But shifts in what? The only shift i know of late is the creation of newco to shift MAS' gargantuan debts to clear its balance sheet. Just like how the detox game was played out in the backroom during the financial crisis of '97. Next shifts? Envision 1MDB, Proton, Felda. To the politikuses, it's just managing taxpayers' hemorrhages by musical chairs.
B: You mean managing political hot potato hemorrhoids.
A: So shifts in what? Some have said it's the monarchic structure, the race and religion composition, the future of the community. Could these be it?
B: Monarchic structure? Once a His Majesty passed by me. Out of genuine respect, i put my hand on my heart and tilted a bow of the head. He cast a smile towards me from the corner of his lips. There was a twinkle in his old eyes. After all we were of the same vintage. He has passed on but i sense at that moment there was a strong unspoken and mutual feeling for the twin institutions of our monarchy and his subjects. At least for my twilight generation.
Note what i've just said. There are actually TWO institutions involved. What the fear is will the new generation feel the same? Will they also be automatically inclined to revere our monarchic structure?
The answer does not lie with the rakyat of the new generation. Some may say it lies with our monarchs and our royal houses. They have to sync themselves with the rakyat of the new - and if i may add - even the future generations.
A: You mean they need to question their own notions of what their institution should stand for?
B: Oh, the notions have not changed a bit. It is the irrational fear instilled by political mischief and carried by some bunch of half-baked ultra nationalists which have stirred unnecessary and impeachable emotions to create shadows of mistrust where there are none.
A: So what do the new generations want?
B: Fairness to all. Everyone. You see, it's not what is written in a constitution. It's what you feel in your human heart. If you feel something is not fair, then if you are a good person, you'll feel it is not right. It's as simple as that. Especially when one walks under the light of the Almighty.
Conscience for all. Our monarchic structure is our last national line of defense of a conscience for all. Regardless of which era, what epoch, what personal preferences or agenda or ambition, regardless of which incumbent politics or community of moral mission.
The institution of our monarchy must give a candid reason for the institution of the subjects to be proud again of it. Then both will thrive into the future uplifted by mutual respect.
Let me add any good leader, even in passive capacity, should subrogate his own personal beliefs to the moderate line of his fairness-upholding majority subjects.
To give the impression that the ultras and brown-shirts are the ones with qualified authority is downright demeaning to the notion of fairness upon which any structure in the modern and future worlds stands.
A: Damnit, you're good, my old chap.
B: Tut-tut. I was special forces, you know.
A: So what is shifting in our society that is generating fear?
B: Fear that the incumbent will lose its power and thus the race will be subjugated. Fear that internally womenfolks will rise to be the key leaders of the future of the community, fear that the faith will be diminished and the culture and language will be lost.
A: Aren't those fears defensible?
B: With what facts? Name one.
A: Errr..
B: Let me put you out of your misery. Even if there is one fact, you need to ask yourself first whether what is to be defended can sustain the community into the future. Do you get what i am trying to say? If you don't, it just concludes i'm right you never thought about how to sustain the community into a future for which it is already amply unprepared now. And one suspects, by the inertia of trying to maintain some status quo defined by some people only as though they know all that is needed for the future of the whole community.
Is that a reasonable or unreasonable statement, you reckon?
A: I see your points and perspective. You want to talk about women next?
B: I don't want to talk about women anymore. Never understand them. Though i must admit the attention they unfailingly shower on me is quite alarming sometimes.
A: I eat my heart out.
B: Don't. It's the only thing that matters in the end. The resolution of transient issues. Put the past behind. Move forward confidently to create a more progressive and sustainable future for the next generations. They deserve better than all the political bullshit we have been seeing lately.
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