Who are the police to kid this time around? When the media highlights the inhumane “canine” treatment Ah Longs gave to 3 borrowers recently, the police again came under pressure from the public and organisations to get their act together to stop the evils of illegal moneylending. This led to a laughable “24-hour ultimatum” to Ah Longs to surrender and upon expiry, “the circulating of their photos by the media and an all out exercise to apprehend the Ah Longs”.

Let’s be clear about one thing. Ah Longs have been operating in this country far longer than most living Malaysian citizens. I stand corrected as I do not have any facts to back what I just said but if anyone else can show me I am wrong, my belief stands. And what have the police been doing about this? Ah Longs are brazen enough to leave their calling cards in postboxes and advertise their quick-lending service through bold-looking A4-sized posters adorning the neighbourhood trees. What have the police been doing about these leads? Perhaps, just perhaps, they don’t have sufficient evidence to prove a case beyond reasonable doubt against these holders of phone numbers prominently displayed that they have been involved in illegal moneylending. But if nothing has been fruitful so far, what has tilted the tide in the police’s favour this time around?

Have the police been suddenly been flushed with irrefutable evidence that these individuals (whose face we might now see pasted all over the place in competition with Ah Long posters) have been involved in illegal moneylending that they are willing to subject themselves (and the media) for possible defamation suits in case they fail to secure a conviction against these individuals in court? And why would it be difficult for our Special Branch to sniff out these Ah Longs considering their ability to track Singapore’s infamous fugitive Mas Selamat to a small unknown kampung in Johor?

The 24-hour ultimatum for Ah Longs to surrender was already a laughable exercise as no Ah Long in their right frame of mind would volunteer walking to the police station to tell the police “Here I am. I am an Ah Long. Please arrest me and charge me. I am sorry“.  I just think the publishing of photographs of a few men (and possibly women?) alleged to be Ah Longs is a mere stinking publicity stunt by the police to satisfy the public’s once-again-outcry against the Ah Longs. “Show the public that we mean business“. Yeah, right!

Malaysians. A typical feel-good advert on the telly will feature 3 Malaysians of different ethnic origins – a Malay, an Indian and a Chinese. Funnily, the rest of the country are not usually featured. In case you are clueless, I am talking about the indigenous people – the Senois, the Negritos, the Ibans, the Dayaks, the Kayans, the Kenyahs, the Penans, the Orang Ulu, the Kadazans, the Bajaus and many others. Anyway, I am quite envious of the rest of the country.

Whereas those of the main ethnic groups are not just known as the Malay, the Chinese and the Indian, back in many homes and micro-society (if there is such a word), phrases like “lazy Malay”, “Chinese conmen” and “Indian liar” are used with impunity. Afterall, such phrases are almost exclusively used within a community of the same ethnicity in a hush-hushed tone unless one decides to make a grand shocker in public. It is puzzling indeed that people react with anger and revenge in mind when they hear such things called about their race or ethnicity. Perhaps, the amount and regularity of “Cina babi” and “Chinese conmen” levelled at my kind has made me numb so much so that it goes into one ear of mine and gets out in one breath. In a sense, it is a waste of time asking for apologies when my own kind also degrades others in a similar fashion. You can’t ask for an apology to a whole race when some within the race also does the same thing to others. Get it? Not unless you can prove that no individual within the whole race which was being ridiculed has never made a racist remark.

No, it is not nice to say such things especially to generalise one whole race with a stereotype behaviour or character. I don’t condone it. But equally, it is not so nice to react as if it is the first time you’ve heard such taunts in your whole life especially if you call yourself a Malaysian.  Let’s get real. Unpleasant racist taunts and ridiculing has been around our society for as long as I can remember. Or have I missed something? That the Malaysians that I know have suddenly woken up in solidarity against racist taunts and stereotyping and I have been sleeping all these while? Have we reached a truly Malaysian race where none of us – save for the individuals in the media limelight recently, and I mean absolutely none of us could be caught slacking off the other race with some slurs or even had momentary thoughts about it?

Pray tell.