Wot in Heaven's Name?!

Why the hell does Dr Victor Von Doom go iron glove-to-indestructible-shield when he could have just blasted Cap Steve Rogers America to smithereens and tiny bits and pieces with his, urm, power blasts or something.

Must be the megalomaniac tendencies at work here: the satisfaction of doing one owns handiwork, in this case to pummel, pound and bash (Bah!) puny American icon.

Whatever.

He certainly got balls, this Victor Von Doom. Probably made of iron, too.

Unlike some people we know.


Anyhow, I have never come across this Marvel titles of "Super Villain Team-Up."

Not some lame-O characters ganging up, but super duper ones like Dr Doom and the Red Skull.

Nah.. It's probably a very, very short-lived teaming up as two megalomaniacs won't make it through the courtship.

Adios, folks. Be careless with your postings, okay.


PS:












Nuff' said. Ciao.

Hastened Post

Such haste…

The on-going – can I say saga? – of JAWI versus Border’s on their charging of their staff Nik Raina Nik Aziz exposes further the kind of murky confluence that could occur in a two divergent legal system.

Blogger Din Merican has written extensively on the chronology of the whole drama from the raids on Border’s Mid Valley and Bangsar Village to the charging, the filing of a judicial review on the legality of the raid and consequent charging, the stay application, the request for a swifter hearing of the charging, the courts’ separate acquiescence to two completely conflicting sets of applications…

The three latest dates being bandied as thus as follows: hearing of an application for stay of the Syariah proceedings at the High court on July 30, new mention date for Nik Raina at the Syariah High Court on Aug 7 while the judicial review at the KL High Court on Sept 5.

Note that the original mention date for Nik Raina’s was Sept 19.

It could well be much ado about nothing as usually nothing of consequence occurs in mentions anyway which are often case-administration breathers.

Note also the original catalyst for the whole rigmarole - Irshad Manji's controversial book Allah, Kebebasan dan Cinta – is now pretty much yesterday’s news in especially the MSM.

It may well be down to PRINCIPLES.

That an offence has been committed and so the offender has to pay.

Yep. I really, really, really believe this to be it especially in the light of the many other similar instances where the application of the above PRINCIPLE is on display.

Typed straight faced. Honest.

The matter about principles also came up yesterday during the Q & A session post Professor Tariq Ramadan’s talk at ISTAC in Jalan Duta.

In fact, the start was quite a cringeworthy, but fortunately only a passing, moment: a participant stood and stated that he was asking a question from a “VVIP” who couldn’t make it to the talk / lecture who wanted to know if the Arab Spring was Islamic and if the same could occur in Malaysia.

I couldn’t quite recite Professor Ramadan’s answer in its entirety but the gist of his answer was that the majority of the protestors were in fact muslims, young and old, men and women.

And the principles are work are those which are Islamic in essence – good governance and justice, for example.

I’m paraphrasing, of course, as the good Professor - who is banned in a whole list of countries for speaking his mind out loud – provided a far more comprehensive view than I could ever articulate, ever.

As to whether something similar could occur here, his answer was simply: “I do not know. It is for you to tell me.”

VVIP, huh? Usual suspects, I presumed.

What the Sam Hill?!

Morality policing in Malaysia has certainly gone lopsidedly loony.

Who would have imagined a mere staff of Borders charged before the Syariah High Court for “distributing by way of selling the book entitled, Allah, Liberty and Love (The Courage to Reconcile Faith and Freedom”).

WTH???!

Technically, the charge could well be valid since Nik Raina Nik Abdul Aziz was the Mid Valley outlet’s store manager, but logically, neither the books by Irshad Manji nor the outlet, Borders, are hers to start with.

Nik Raina faces a RM3,000 fine or a maximum of two years' jail or both under Section 13(1) of the Syariah Criminal Offences Act (Federal Territories) 1997, if convicted.

Am really not sure how the charge is worded but going by the Star’s phrasing of “distributing by way of selling”; it seems to be one of strict liability. Legal eagles would definitely be able to explain this to all us layman.

A store manager, huh?

Didn’t have the balls to go after the real owner, is it? Borders, according to the Star, belong to Berjaya Books Sdn Bhd.

Look at the penalty for God’s sake and tell me if it’s just?

A bookstore staff…

Did she have like total control over the outlet? Over the procurement of all books?

How many books do Borders have in stock?

The one at the Curve in Damansara seems to have like a billion books from the most innocent My First ABC to the horrendously explicit Brian Azzarello’s 100 Bullets series (to cite an example).

But of course, the latter isn’t something that is "deemed to be against the Islamic Law (Hukum Syarak)" even if it does feature gratuitous sex and violence every other issue.

Is Nik Raina’s charging to set an example? Couldn’t she be just slapped with a mere warning to take the books out within a certain period - her convictions on the book’s contents and the banning act notwithstanding?

How in heaven’s name are Muslims supposed to show that Islam is the perfect Addin when you have something so logically, chronically unjust?

What others see is the authorities picking on the easiest of targets to make an example of.

Someone like Nik Raina. 

Critically Just

The banning of books (or any other form of art & literature) is a very spontaneous kind of thing in this country with the latest being the book "Allah Liberty & Love -Courage To Reconcile Faith & Freedom" by Irshad Manji.

I would assume that the banning of the Canadian-Ugandan-born author’s book was done after much deliberation and a full review of the book’s content.

According to the Sun, but for some last minute cancellations, Ms Manji wassupposed to hold talks at two universities and a bookstore in Kuala Lumpur so she went ahead to meet a small group of people at the Kuala Lumpur and Selangor Chinese Assembly Hall.

How small? God knows.

Could her book (translated into a Bahasa Malaysia version by ZI Publication entitle “Allah, Kebebasan Dan Cinta") have slipped under the radar had she not been a professed LGBT proponent?

This, we’ll never know.

(BTW, ZI Publication is also the publisher for Reza Aslan’s Tiada Tuhan Melainkan Allah which provided with a pretty good read albeit only the first half of the book.

Being an Iranian, albeit one residing in the US, Aslan wrote the book with a very pro-syiah outlook, but oklah: it does open up your mind a little on how the West looked at Islam in general.

What hooked me to actually read Tiada Tuhan Melainkan Allah was the brilliant first chapter. Whoever did the translation job did a great job in roping you into jumping into what is an extremely studious, researched based academic work on Islam.

Tiada Tuhan Melainkan Allah was not an easy book to digest and it took me long nights to finally get through all the pages.)

Anyway, back to the banning of Ms Manji’s book.

It does seem that the SOP for such a banning to take place is if there is a complaint, or a raising of concerns, preferably from something with clouts to make things move.

That would explain why some others equally deem-able of offensive book / literature can make it quietly into the bookstore and on to the readers without much fanfare.

Brian Azzarello and Eduardo Risso’s noir-ish 100 Bullets, for example. Very mature audience targeted.

Or Osamu Tezuka’s MW, which feature a serial killer, a priest and a conspiracy.

My question is this: what is the defining line that gets a book, a literature the ban?

Very likely, it is theological misfeasance where Islam is concerned.

However you won’t know of this until you actually read the book. Was it read in its entirety? Who read it? Was he / she swayed from the right path after reading the book? Did the translated work follow the original to the point? Where were the offending bits? How were they offensive? Why was it translated in the first place? Why was the author cleared for so-called initial engagements?

Was it, in fact, even a good read in the first place?

FOOTNOTE:
The Home Ministry has came out with the reasons for banning the book. Kudos to them for the explanation which answers some questions the reading public might have in the mind following the action by the religious authorities.

Simply Toxic

When I quit the NST in March 2008, there was already some considerable clash of ideals within me.

Just as the nation was hit with the so-called 2008 Electoral Tsunami, so too was our motley group of media practitioners (chewah!) in Ipoh similarly affected.

I guess I just got fed up with having to toe the political line in having to cover the functions and events of the-then sore losers of Perak Barisan.

On hindsight, I am sure glad I am out of the journalistic loop vis-à-vis the current scenario of heavily politicized and overly partisan “news” coverage.

So much so that integrity is being given a quick and painful kick in the butt. Just like this alleged replacing of the word “Scientology” with “Islam” of a supposed speech by Australian Senator Nick Xenophon as per the following excerpt:

“What we are seeing is a worldwide pattern of abuse and criminality. On the body of evidence, this is not happening by accident; it is happening by design. Islam is not a religious organisation. It is a criminal organisation that hides behind its so-called religious beliefs.”

Were the words uttered by a Malaysian, surely there’ll be groups calling for his or her head by now.

It is a silly act, though, as such copy pasting could be - and in fact was - easily discovered.

But then again, I remembered having to tweak an article on the political sentiments of the Kinta Valley Chinese community as to favor the Barisan Nasional pre-2008 General Elections.

My colleagues from the other Press had a good laugh at my expense when the byline-less observations - written under protest - saw light.

I read also today of journalists donning black in protest of violence against media personnel especially during Saturday’s monumental Bersih 3.0 rally which turned quite ugly.

The Chinese papers reportedly came out with Black front pages in solidarity to this cause.

Over at the other main stream newspapers, though, things seemed pretty much status quo.

Saw BH front paging “news” of some horse-ying involving opposition MPs Anwar and Kit Siang and I couldn’t care less what Utusan, Kosmo and Metro had on theirs.

Fair to say that these papers pretty much crossed the Rubicon of impartiality for a while now.

What’s scary is that they continue to be the main source of “news” for a good majority in the community.

Toxic nation building. In walloping dollops.

Uselessly Yours aka Look Who's Back

Mr Black Felt Tip Marker Penner is back and rather than feeling indignant or affronted by his acts, I am feeling mighty twangs of sympathy instead.

He has been lying dormant for a while – at least I think he is because good gracious golly gee is my Brian Azzarello’s 100 Bullets full of stuffs he’d blackened out swifter than the Flash could blink – he is back in action with The Economist being latest to feel the brunt of his mighty blotting.

Not the Sports Illustrated. Not the Maxim. Nope, not FHM either. Nor an issue of the National Geographic featuring a never-before seen human tribe yet to discover the wonderful invention of clothes.

(I am kidding on the last, okay.)

Nope. We are talking about The Economist.

To be precise, some texts’ lines in an article “Taken to the cleaners — an overzealous government response to an opposition rally” in the latest issue of The Economist.

Sympathy because I cannot imagine the tedium of going through whole stacks of the issue to the exact sentences (not even whole, mind you) deemed offensive.

Yep. Usually the black pen is a moralistic answer to all that is society (ours) offending. Or used to, going by the proliferation of girly (manly?) magazines at newsstands, generally speaking.

Sympathy because despite all his effort, the offending texts are not only still read, the blotting out is pretty much posthumous in that people would’ve already read the article in whole elsewhere.

Sympathy because his effort will only block the offending texts from the eyes of less than 9,900 readers (unless you count those lazing away at office lounges waiting for their turn in appointments), the reported circulation of the Economist in Malayia 2010.

Sympathy because in the day and age of the Internet, even those who don’t usually read the Economist can gain access to the article simply by asking Mr Google.

Sympathy that instead of being seen and justified as a moral guardian, he is now treated with disdain as yet another sycophant of a government gone bonkers.

Once upon a time, you could still justify his existence by way of the moral high ground argument of providing something akin to (though cursory at best) a filter against the unfettered, liberalization of so-called artistic endeavors.

Alas, those days are long gone.

Imagine being yanked from retirement to do something that is ultimately useless, and you realized how much Mr Black Felt-Tip Penner deserves our deepest sympathy.

Thus, scorn him not.

Dashed Joviality

Long time fans of Lat would have notice the non-too-subtle change in the later editions of his classic “Lat, Kampung Boy”.

Lat has always managed to skirt the fine line of sensitivities in all his work, and Kampung Boy is a definite gem, not only in its rawness, but the total honesty in the way the story is fleshed out.

I’ve lost my original copy, by the way, and was dismayed when I found the changes made in the newer prints.

I’d like to think that it was a conscious move by Lat himself to replace the pages especially that of him returning home with a can full of tin ore, his dad waiting on the stairs of the their humble abode.

Readers can literally feel the disappointment in both father and son in the slapping scene over (if I am not mistaken) a three-page spread.

No one could have done it better.

A very, very powerful showcase of emotional exposition on Lat’s part especially when you take into account the joviality of his (late) father and the equally fun-filled episodes – swimming in fish filled rivers, exploring tin mines etc - involving the growing up cartoonist and his friends in the preceding pages.

Alas, these (slapping scene) pages have been replaced with a “safer” new version of father chasing son all around the kampong. Even the pen strokes were tamer in comparison.

Suffice to say, I didn’t bother getting a copy.

And now we have the Interlok “amendments”.

I must admit that I have not and have no interest in reading the novel, controversy notwithstanding. There are enough books which can occupy my precious few hours of reading time to not expand the list whenever a title crops up in the news papers.

Aren’t we opening a can of authoritarian worms here with this move to amend so-called offending scriptures?

Offensive texts are literally everywhere in the writing world. Choose the right kind of titles and you’re apt to find expletives strewn all over the place.

Would it be morally correct to go in with a black marker to blank these out as to sanitise the work?

Perhaps you could justify the national unity and respect for all communities facet in the amending of the Interlok, but what’s to stop the authorities (if they have not already done so) from doing the same to other books, titles and works deemed offensive?

Where do we stop?

Doesn't the author have a say in this?

And it was only recently that some of us protested the selective nature of our historical text for schools; in how we're publishing only those views which the authorities want to officially recognize.

Aren't we a bunch of hypocrites.

Bared Facts

American Idol's Kara DioGuardi

No thanks, Tan Sri.

Initially when I read Star’s headline: “Veteran artiste wants more people on censor board” and then the verbatim quote:
“Is it right to have only three authorised persons, representing the country’s 26 million people, to watch and suppress anything considered unacceptable for public viewing?”
I thought: “Well, hey, didn’t realized HE cared.”

I learn now to never jump the gun until I get the whole picture.

A few paras down the line came the punchline: “Jins, who sits in the board’s appeal committee, said that due to such a situation some films escaped censorship.”

Such a knuckle head I was for thinking that the good old Malayan Bond was talking about the arbitrary ways of the National Censorship Board.

About how more rep would mean more varied opinions.

Nope, nothing like that.

What the Umno Tan Sri wants is a like minded fellows to join in arbitrarily censoring the cinematic offerings to the public on the silver screen.

(Wonder what they think of Quentin Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds. What a title, eh?)

Truth be told, it has been a LONG, LONG while since I watched anything at the cinema.

Having a young un with the shortest of short in attention span means that cinema are no go in family outings.

That said, I did manage to squeeze in some good “Disney on Ice” hours of which Tan Sri might think worthy of least some snips with some good showing of cleavages from most of the female dancers.

So I have never been able to grace any of the good Tan Sri’s censorship skills thus far and I do hope I am not missing (pun intended) much.

BTW, what was Astro’s Star World thinking when they decided to blip away Kara DioGuardi peep show after a good few minutes of Katrina "Bikini Girl" Darrell near
nude tanned showcase just before?

Weird that.

Perhaps, it’s the act of “flashing” that is being censored.

We don’t want Malaysian Star World viewers to go around flashing their undies, now do we?

It just has to be snipped.

Walking around near stark naked is not as bad.

Really.

Prudish Nudity

Moral policing in this country can really provide some rib-tickling moments.

Just recently, I saw this show on 8TV with a Malaysian host (I think it was Hannah Tan, but I’m really not so sure) in Australia at some open space event whereby the participants went semi clothes-free (for lack of a better word).

Cue the typical local prudishness with blurred views on the appropriate portions of the bodies captured by the film crew. All good and proper except for the small fact that all of them had their underwear on – men, women, everyone!

The host even went to interview a Brazilian couple; the event's a first for her, third time for him. She was fully clothed, he - conveniently blurred from navel to neck or thereabouts - shows of some (substantial despite blurred) chest hair. :)

Hmm…

The thing is, there was no nudity. Not a single female participant shown during the show had gone topless. The men? Who cares if the men went topless? My conclusion was therefore that the digital censorship was more on the sarcasm factor than a genuine effort to “protect” the local viewers prudish senses.

Even our newspapers have this nasty habit of digital censorship, especially in some cases where there is substantial cleavage being exposed. Why chose the picture in the first place if you are so intent of not showing it in its entirety?

Of course, there are images so crass and vulgar in nature that they ought to be restricted to the domains of private viewing, but with the cable network on 24-7 and showing ample amount of exposed skin, the country’s moral police surely has a tough job on their hands.

Once upon a time, they were armed with felt tip black marker pens. Copies of suspect magazines (ironically, those on photography are always in the top five or ten) would be perused and the appropriate “hiding” of exposed bosom/breasts done. Never mind the magazines come plastic wrapped; so long as there’s nudity inside, the black markers would go to work.

How far should those in authority go in the name of prudishness? Italy's Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi received quite some flak on his “black marker” job of a classic painting. Berlusconi would surely find himself some fans should he ever want to take up our Second Home programme and reside here.

He could sit around with them and reminisce on past glories of “black marking”. “How good it felt, eh? Ahh.. The joy, the elation.” “I was meticulous. Not a single exposed nipple, a single breast, got past me.”

Nudity might be objectionable, but not all of them, crass. Some are simply too beautiful to be judged so harshly.

Beauty can be distracting, but distraction alone is not a crime.

PS: The image above is by Edward Steichen, a Luxembourg-born American artist.