Kam Raslan’s Talking Edge

(Reprinted from The Edge – Options pullout, 25 August 2014 issue)

Dear Kam,
Does reading Facebook make you feel anxious, or is it just me? If it is just me, then forget I said anything.
Ann-xiety

I’m always complaining about Facebook and please forgive me but I’m going to do it again. I am addicted to Facebook and I’m checking it all the time. I never ever say anything on Facebook but I follow hundreds of people who have offered me a window into their lives. I should feel bad, like I’m some kind of thief or a voyeur, but people are only showing off the best bits of their lives, so I don’t feel bad at all. Instead, Facebook has given me an opportunity to see the concerns of a cross section of Malaysian society and now I seem to be letting them curate the news for me. The news that my Facebook “friends” consider to be important has become my newsfeed. And their concerns are making me feel very bad, very bad about this world. All the time.

People might post pictures of the good and happy parts of their personal lives, pictures of themselves in exotic locations, at family gatherings or glitzy parties, but people will also re-post world news stories that are horrifyingly tragic. It’s as if personal lives are these tiny islands of safety under constant threat of destruction by world events beyond our control. The re-posted stories might contain truly shocking images and videos of human (and animal) suffering and the stories are always happening right now.

At the moment, the tragic events in Gaza and Iraq are making people angry and/or depressed. But a few weeks ago, it was something else (perhaps young girls being raped and hanged in India), and in a few weeks’ time, it will be something else. But the mood and temperature of the re-postings will remain the same, they will be angry and tearful right now. Somebody must be to blame: the Americans, the Jews, the Muslims or (for the truly intellectually lazy) the Illuminati. And then we’ll move on again to some new tragedy in another part of the world but always maintaining the same level of anxiety, fear and ever more deeply set prejudices. Facebook is always in the present tense because we surf the net and re-post the things that grab our emotions right now.

The problem for me is that I am becoming anxious all the time. Once upon a time, the news would happen on TV just once or twice a day. But now, for me, the news is happening all the time. And when the news is delivered to me on Facebook, it comes with commentary from people I feel I know because they are “friends”. They say that this news is important, that something must be done, re-post this story now! Unfortunately, it’s pretty much impossible to have any impact on events in my own country, let alone in Gaza or Iraq. So all I can do is become more anxious, weighed down by my helplessness. I’ll see a Facebook posting of a Palestinian father holding up the remains of his decapitated child and underneath will be a perfectly innocent posting of a friend on holiday in Italy, and I’m thinking, “How dare you be happy?”

I’m not going to stop reading Facebook but I’m going to try to be aware about its insidious effect on me. I’ll take a deep breath then keep calm and carry on scrolling.

Dear Kam,
Is it my imagination or has there been another MRT tragedy?
Simply Shocked

Three Bangladeshi workers have died while working on KL’s new MRT (mass rapid transit), adding to the MRT’s completely unnecessary death toll. I do not like driving underneath the MRT construction sites. They do not look safe. And it turns out that they are not safe. It is possible to build an infrastructure project without having people die. It’s really not rocket science. These most recent deaths should never have happened. Somebody should resign because of this tragic mistake. But this is Malaysia, so nobody will resign.

But wait! Somebody has resigned! The MRT’s CEO has resigned! And he’s a Datuk! I didn’t know that Malaysian Datuks (and above) could resign without, I don’t know, spontaneously combusting. I’ve never seen this happen before. So many of our great and good have worked really hard to create for themselves the perfect reason to resign, and yet have never seized the opportunity. No matter how deep they’ve dug metaphorical holes for themselves and no matter how many proverbial bullets they’ve shot into their own allegorical foot, they have simply refused to (literally) resign.

If the MRT’s CEO has resigned then I applaud his action. It is the only honourable thing to do and it gives the organisation an opportunity to rectify its work practices. It does not cancel out the tragedy but it’s a step in the right direction.

Dear Kam,
Is it my imagination or is there almost always some level of haze these days?
Smoky Eyes

I’ve just driven up to Penang from KL. I drove very early in the morning and I was really surprised and saddened to see how much open burning is going on. It was only 8am and yet almost every 10 minutes I saw smoke rising from the side of the road. It was especially bad between KL and Ipoh, and although these were only small bonfires, they created a lot of smoke. The sight of this modern home-grown haze stood in stark contrast to the memories from my childhood of the seemingly endless journey to Ipoh, Kuala Kangsar or Penang. In my memory, the sky was always clear, extremely clear.

But on the plus side, the drive to Penang gave me another chance to see lots of billboard advertising for products I’ve never heard of, including one for some flip-flops with the tagline, “Feel the rubber”. Why would I want to feel the rubber? What does that even mean? And it’s good to be in George Town again.

Reprinted with the kind permission of