Trust girls to speak their own minds

Recently, I had to write about my experience with online violence and bullying that I have endured for the last three years. I wrote a 10-page report on three case studies specific to me, starting with my "grand entry" into online vitriol back in 2016.

It was the case of me eating in public during Ramadan, and getting violently harassed by a patron at the restaurant where I was eating, as well as the manager of the restaurant who took the side of the man who harassed me.

I took to Facebook to tell the story of what happened, 12 hours after the incident, together with my analysis of what happened and woke up to weeks of non-stop online abuse and harassment.

Since then, I spent a lot of time reflecting on the root cause of such hatred towards the female voice, and its role in the realm of producing public opinions. While this is an issue of self-expression, it is also an issue of patriarchy and gender-based violence.

On March 31, 2018, an NGO of police and army veterans called Persatuan Patriot Kebangsaan came up with a press statement on their distress with Cambridge Analytica and made baseless assumptions about #UndiRosak.

My name was specifically mentioned. The organisation claims it is simply not possible for a “pleasant lady” to have had ideas to rebel on her own. 

It seems that when women go against the norm, it is believed they must have been paid to do it, they must have been externally influenced, instead of being inherently capable of forming opinions via their own intellectual exercise.

I quote: "The prime mover of the campaign is Maryam Lee, known more for her feminist activism and frequent postings on women’s issues such as Women’s March, Wanita Bangkit, in her Facebook postings. Ms Lee had never been known to be vocal in mainstream politics.

"How then could a pleasant lady suddenly transformed into the national scene and launched a captivating rebellious campaign targeting the youths? How did it become a movement of dissent against (Pakatan Harapan chairperson Dr) Mahathir (Mohamad)? It is just not possible."

Why would this not be possible? I can name at least half a dozen other men who are also politically active against both caretaker prime minister Najib Abdul Razak and Mahathir, but why would the same dissent from a young, unmarried woman be any different? If it was possible for them, why was it not possible for me?

Thank you for mentioning me, Patriots, but no thank you for your lies. I have repeatedly denied ever receiving any financial or non-financial reward for my support of #UndiRosak. Even my friends who are active in the activism circle have vouched for my political integrity.

I could also easily have lumped together all pro-Harapan supporters as people who were paid by Harapan to do so, but I did not, because luckily I happen to be fair in my judgment of people, or at least I try to be as much as I can.

An unforgiving society

Back to the issue of women expressing themselves online. Society can be very unforgiving. Women, younger ones especially, are so much more policed when they express themselves online. Social media has made us much more visible, and that visibility comes at a cost.

Online and offline, our bodies become the battleground. Our bodies are often the site of the first attacks, which do not stop just because we are now more technologically advanced. Images doctored, insults hurled, dick pictures sent to our inboxes - all this, because the way men behave online is no different than the way they behave offline.

The way we easily tell off women in meatspace, is the same way we easily tell women off in other spaces.

This is one of the reasons why I rarely like Zunar's cartoons, for as much as we are angry at Najib, there is really no need to keep attacking his wife Rosmah Mansor's physique.

The sexism displayed by opposition supporters is rarely ever different from the sexism displayed by supporters of Umno/BN.

Opposition leaders have done little work, if any, to educate the rakyat about respecting democratic spaces, because all that matters to politicians are votes. Anybody whose votes won't swing their way will not get their attention. It's not wakil rakyat (citizen representatives) we elect, it's wakil peti undi (ballot box representatives).

Sadly, we don't just punish women for their ideas, we want to bulldoze their entire existence. We discredit them, we call them mentally unstable, we say they are attention seekers, we say they are bots. Not even human, for God's sake - women who speak their mind are bots!

I have come to realise that when "rabble-rousers" shake any form of establishment, they invite their audience to confront their own biases and prejudices. But because most people severely lack self-reflection, they project their insecurities onto these "provocateurs", unleashing all sorts of demons that they'd never admit having.

Defending democratic spaces

I was at a #PulangMengundi fundraising gig and some were surprised to see me supporting the cause, being the face of #UndiRosak and all.

It dawned on me again how little Malaysians understand democracy, after all these years.

Even after seeing the worst of Malaysians with the reaction to #UndiRosak, a cause I supported in the name of democracy, I still supported #PulangMengundi for the same reason. I have always believed that principles must guide us, not populism.

But will this be acknowledged? I don't know. I'm just putting it out there, resisting the urge to just disappear from the public sphere.

That would have been the easy thing to do, but it also means another woman out of the picture, when there wasn't that many to begin with.

Defending the democratic space cannot be done from the shadows. As women are socialised into subjugated positions since young, our democratic space is as narrow as that of other marginalised groups.

Even when we make up 50 percent of the population, and more than half of eligible voters except for two states and one federal territory, our concerns are still not centre-stage.

With that much weight of representation, political parties are still not putting more women forward as candidates. Which political party highlights their endorsement of #ManifestoWanita? Or incorporates the Women's Manifesto as part of their campaign?

That said, this is really just the beginning. One day, women's political participation will be such a norm that no group of old men could be surprised at "pleasant ladies" voicing political opinions. Social policies then will be so inclusive that democratic spaces would only continue to expand, not be increasingly restricted.

One can dream of such a day without being a feminist, and one would definitely benefit from such a day without being a feminist.

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MARYAM LEE is a writer with a chronic tendency to get into trouble. What she lacks in spelling when writing in English is made up for with her many writings in Bahasa Malaysia. She believes in conversations as the most valuable yet underrated cause of social change. She wants people to recognise silences and give them a voice, as she tries to bring people together through words. - Mkini