After 17-year-old Ain Husniza Saiful Nizam exposed her male teacher for allegedly making lewd jokes in class, she has had to endure all sorts of backlash, including a rape threat from a schoolmate.
One of the most common criticisms she received was that she was being too emotional and that she should have tried to resolve it internally with the school.
But in an interview with Malaysiakini, Ain, who was accompanied by her father, said she wanted to speak out about this issue to stop something like this from happening again.
“A lot have said to me, ‘Ain, aren’t you being emotional, you could have settled this with the school, you are muddying the school’s name’.
“If I just settle with the school, will it change how other schools work? I don’t want this thing to be normalised.
“I want strict punishment and for action to be taken against that teacher (so that) other teachers in our country know this is not acceptable behaviour.
“I need to do this for every student who has gone through something like this,” she said.
Ain also pointed out that education shapes the country and that the students being subjected to this kind of teaching environment are the ones who will run the country in the future.
“When a boy my age is so brave as to say that he would rape me, what do you think will happen when he grows into an adult one day?
“When you have a teacher teaching that kind of thing in a classroom… how many male students do you think are being infected by this kind of toxic mindset?” she asked.
On Saturday, Ain posted a video on TikTok where she said a male teacher had made jokes about rape during a physical and health education class, prompting widespread outrage on social media.
This included telling the boys in class that if they were to commit rape, they should target those above 18.
A day later, after the video went viral, Ain said she received an audio recording of one of her male schoolmates threatening to rape her, which was originally sent to a separate group chat.
“If I get you, I will shred you or rape you and send you to Thailand,” the schoolmate said, in the recording published on Twitter by Ain.
The recording has been digitally altered to disguise the schoolmate’s voice and protect his identity, said Ain, who added she published the audio so people would be aware of the backlash she was facing.
Her father, Saiful Nizam Ab Wahab, said he has lodged two police reports; one over the male teacher’s inappropriate remarks and another over the rape threat.
The police have since said they have combined the two reports into one investigation and are currently in the midst of recording statements from relevant individuals.
Concerns over Ain’s safety
Ain did not attend school on Monday following concerns over her safety.
“The backlash has been very overwhelming to me. When I heard what he (the schoolmate) said… I just broke down at that point, I even cried.
“I told my mother, it hurt me and scarred me somewhat, but nevertheless that is exactly why I want to continue on with this movement,” she said.
During the interview, the subject of homeschooling was brought up over concerns for Ain’s safety, but the 17-year-old was very firm about not resorting to homeschooling.
“The government is supposed to give us education. Why would we need to resort to homeschooling?
“Besides, even if I was to be home-schooled, that would be exclusive to me. What about the other students in the country?” Ain argued passionately.
Saiful said homeschooling is an “option”. He is worried about his daughter’s safety and said what happened to Ain is not something to be brushed under the carpet.
“For me, it is very sad to see my child go through this kind of incident, but then… this is the time when we should make changes, and we hope this is the last time this will happen in our country. This is something to trigger change for the greater good.
“I fully support Ain in this matter. As for myself, I have taken a few steps of security for Ain. We need to be a little bit more aware, especially after the rape threat,” said the 42-year-old, who has a background in IT.
#MakeSchoolASaferPlace
Though Ain said she did not expect her video about the teacher to go viral, she is fully prepared to fight to #MakeSchoolASaferPlace; a hashtag she started which is currently trending on Twitter Malaysia as of the time of writing with 114,000 tweets.
She hopes to not only encourage other students to speak up about issues they face but also for others to start listening to what students have to say.
“This is my first time experiencing what the teacher said, but I spoke to all my female friends and they said this is not the first time the teacher has done something like this.
“I asked them, why haven’t you said anything. They said because people won’t listen to them.
“Listen to us students. Listen to what we have to say… Where are we supposed to ask for help? We ask for help from teachers and they tell us this is normal,” Ain implored.
She also said some of the schoolmates who support what she is doing are now speaking up for her in school. They were scared to voice out before, but Ain said they have been encouraged by her actions.
Many individuals are also posting on Twitter about their personal experiences in school using the #MakeSchoolASaferPlace hashtag, while others conveyed messages of support.
Support network
Ain’s awakening to social issues did not happen overnight.
Ironically, though it is commonly perceived that youths nowadays are wasting their time on the internet, Ain said it was the internet that sparked her interest in social issues.
“Because I am on the internet, because I am exposed to issues online… I become brave enough to talk about it because I have the privilege to know this is wrong.
“What people say about our generation not caring about moral issues, that is so untrue.
“I believe there are many teenagers who care about these things, who think it is wrong, but when I tried to speak up, this is the response I got.
“How do you think the students will react to that, they will feel so down. We want to speak up but our voices aren’t being heard,” Ain explained.
Luckily for Ain, she also has a mentor who could share his experience of speaking up on contentious issues: political cartoonist Zunar, her art teacher.
The 17-year-old girl said she has always had an interest in art as well as learning about social issues, so when she heard about Zunar, she was intrigued.
“I like to keep up with political news happening in our country, so I’ve heard about Uncle Zunar and my father told me about him as well...
“When I heard he got caught because he was drawing cartoons, I thought I must check him out, so I found his Instagram and messaged him, ‘you are so cool, I want to be like you one day’, so he ended up inviting us to his studio,” she said, detailing how she became Zunar’s art student.
Zunar has been arrested various times over his political cartoons and had a number of his books seized. He has also been hit with multiple charges of the Sedition Act and other laws.
Ain’s parents have also been very supportive of her throughout this ordeal, with Saiful stressing the importance of building trust between parents and their children.
“The first place for children to have the best trust is with their parents… to trust your children in whatever they are doing is very important.
“We believe we have given Ain the best upbringing we could so whatever action we took, we believe that is for the good,” he said.
Saiful also noted that those who criticise his child for “sullying” the school’s name should know that Ain is a model student, who has represented her school in English debate competitions and art competitions at the state level.
“Ain already achieved many things. She recently won the English debate competition in Selangor, representing her school, and she got third place in a Selangor art competition. She is not a rebel kid,” he said.
‘I am the same as you’
Slightly bashful when the conversation turned to her achievements, Ain said she is just like any other teenager in Malaysia.
She said she watches videos on TikTok, she likes to watch anime (Japanese animation) and she likes to surf the internet.
She did not come from a financially privileged family, she goes to school and she has the same social circle as other students.
“I want you to know I am the same as you. They are trying to make us look bad, just cause we like to have fun,” Ain said, addressing other students in Malaysia.
“Before this, I was just a normal girl who liked drawing and sometimes being very morally outspoken, but if I can be spearheading the movement, I don’t mind being the representative for students in Malaysia who want to make sure this never becomes the norm again,” she said.
“But I do like drawing anime girls,” the 17-year-old quipped with a laugh. - Mkini
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