Should we fear the Dec 8 rally?

For the first time, a lot of us find ourselves on the other side of the divide.

Reading all the anxiety about the Dec 8 rally, I suppose this must have been a little bit how BN and their supporters felt about the various Bersih rallies of the past.

No one is saying they are the same thing, but there are parallels.

One big non-parallel which we can proudly point to is that the government leaders are almost going out of their way to prove that they are not hypocrites, in that the stand seems to be: if your rally can remain peaceful and avoid hate-mongering, then go ahead by all means.

I imagine this doesn’t please everybody. Some probably want a harder line, and a few probably believe there shouldn’t be too many restrictions. On the whole, though, I think it is reasonable.

I suppose one of the important questions is: how much is the anxiety surrounding the Dec 8 rally is justified?

What are the roots of public violence?

In my view, I would say hardly any anxiety at all is justified. Some may consider this naive and optimistic, but I think we should look carefully at the main characters who are typically involved.

I work on the hypothesis that Malaysians are generally not at all inclined towards spontaneous violence.

A number of scholars would say that even the May 13 riots were not an incident of spontaneous violence, but one that was planned and incited by interested parties.

I don’t think we can come up with many significant examples of Malaysians suddenly just erupting into violence, as if infected by a mind-altering virus. Simply put, it just isn’t in our cultural make-up or history.

This isn’t to say that there has never been mob or street violence; only that these were most likely orchestrated, planned and organised to some degree.

Most perpetrators of public violence can likely be connected to a political power, organised (or semi-organised) crime, or most commonly, some combination of the two.

I think it will come as no surprise that most of the former BN parties had various connections to groups that were no strangers to group violence, and that these groups were most commonly involved in the few incidences of public violence we’ve witnessed over the years.

It’s important to note however that things are different now.

Will previous instigators feel as bold now?

Gangsters are bad guys, but organised gangsters are not stupid.

Where once such actors may have had the tacit backing of certain parties, those parties are no longer the powers that be.

That’s a game changer. It’s one thing to get your boys to go bang some heads if you know big brother has your back. It’s another if (new) big brother might come looking for your head if you make some bad choices.

I don’t think Umno will command anywhere near the kind of muscle it used to.

Its leaders can spout the line about race and religion all they like, that’s for pandering to the masses.

People who control muscle though, tend to have rather more temporal concerns, as it were. They worry about the bottom line; Umno no longer has its hand on the tap, and PAS never did.

They also know that if the police really wanted to come down hard on them, they could.

I think PAS can still command a substantial turnout. Some will probably think me to be over-generous, but I don’t think the PAS would have gone from disciplined cadres to violent troublemakers in the course of one general election – no matter how much some of their leaders may want them to.

Staying calm

I think the most important thing for us to do about the Dec 8 demonstrations is to stay calm.

I have great respect for Patriot and its work, but I think saying things like the military must intervene should riots occur, is counterproductive.

This is primarily because it heightens anxieties, but also because Malaysia has had a long, laudable history of not having to involve the armed forces in domestic issues, and this is a record worth sustaining.

Spreading Whatsapp messages about fears of rioting is also likely counterproductive. BN supporters did much the same thing before Bersih rallies.

I say let them gather as many people as they like. I personally would go so far to even say let them say whatever they like.

The future of our politics or our country is not determined by what some people on stage say on a loudspeaker, in order to desperately cling on to their personal political relevance.

The future of our politics will be determined by what the government does or doesn’t achieve, and the degree to which everyday Malaysians can feel that in their daily lives.

The future of our country will be determined by what you and I do or do not achieve.

NATHANIEL TAN is not a believer in segregated canteens.