Hints of Fascism?

I'm heartened by Elizabeth Wong's column in the MalaysiaKini recently about one Ahmad Harizal Ahmad Fauzie (pic) who was arrested for "shirking" his National Service obligation. His crime: Choosing to work (and quit school) in order to help support his impoverished family. Harizal's family cannot even muster the RM600 to pay the fine; he even had to borrow RM7 in order to attend his own court proceeding. Talk about grave injustice! His fine was finally paid by the Chief Minister of Perlis--out of the goodness of his heart or to avoid further embarassment, I don't know.

This Malaysian program of forced national unity program smacks of the bygone Mussollini's "brown-shirts" or the "Hitler's youths," though the Malaysian National Service kids have yet to be indoctrinated to the level of thuggery of the two young European fascist groups.

Indeed that a comprehensive national unity program is sorely needed in a country that is still mired in sectarian politics, but this half-baked and myopic initiative that the Malaysian government comes up with is simply disastrous. What it needs to do is to foster this unity and tolerant spirit through community service: Malaysia, especially in the urban area, is a very racially-segregated country, and there are a lot of suspicions and distrusts among these racial groups. Have these kids do community service work in these different neighborhoods to expose them to the real picture of Malaysia: a racially-diverse and culturally-rich country of MALAYSIANS, not Malays, or Chineses, or Indians. By the way, what's the deal with the "otek" in the picture who is grinning from ear to ear? What the fuck are you so happy about?