Say you’re wrong, in the right way

 

Malaysia’s political, religious or social leaders often say things which offend others. They can’t help offending, as many of them are pretty offensive themselves. Political parties’ annual gatherings are some of the worst occasions for this.

As we are a multiracial country, those who are offended are often people of other races or religions.

Occasionally the offensive leaders may also offend other people whom we consider “inferior”, such as Indonesians or Bangladeshis. But those people are getting uppity and have started thinking they’re better than us!

Such offensive things are often said by two types of people: those whose mouths are not connected to their brain, and those who know they can get away with it. Increasingly they are one and the same.

After such utterances, there would be a chorus of woke comments from the more restrained side of our society. “Disgusted from Kelang” would send a flurry of letters to the newspapers full of angst and anguish.

What the ‘woke’ crowd say

The comments from the “Disgusted from Kelang” types will usually go: “How could you say that in a multiracial country like ours?”

Sounds fair enough on the face of it. How could you say things that make our sensitive people, well, even more sensitive?

I guess it’s a convenient, polite and not very direct way of saying “You’re wrong”. In other words, we’re saying you’re wrong because you didn’t care about other people’s feelings.

Occasionally there would be demands for an apology. And very occasionally, there might even be one tendered.

Except it’s the wrong way to say “you’re wrong”.

Why? It used to be when you’re wrong, you’re wrong. The context of how you’re wrong, that saying it in a multiracial country is what makes it wrong, takes on secondary relevance, because here it means that if it had been said in a monoracial country, then it wouldn’t have been wrong, right?

How to become a hero, preacher-style

That logic was exactly the kind used by an Islamic preacher to justify making some horrible remarks about other religions. He said he made those remarks purely for other Muslims.

In his mind of course this made it right. It’s not his fault for saying it, but everybody else’s fault for listening in and getting offended.

His core audience lapped it up and wanted more. If it works, keep doing it. If people are mad at you that means those who love you will love you more. There’s no such thing as bad publicity.

That’s how you become a hero in Malaysia. Stick to the side of power, offend others knowing they cannot fight back, and claim victory and superiority.

Who says you must make sense?

In today’s hyper-partisan world, you don’t have to make sense, deliver logic or even produce results. Getting your enemies mad is good enough to make you a winner.

That, by the way, is also the political model for the last few decades. Your politicians don’t have to make any sense, they just need to show how aggressively they’re being heroes of their base.

Nobody needs to offer any logic any more. You either score points by making your enemies sensitive, or being sensitive yourself and using that as a justification to be even more offensive.

Many of those making offensive comments are powerful people, they don’t get called out. You, however, can get into trouble for exactly the same things.

3 ways to go on the offensive

What can you do? Here I give you Adzhar’s 3 Offensive Steps to Counter Offensive People’s Offensive Behaviour™.

Step 1: Call them out directly. Tell them that what they say is morally and (where applicable, legally) wrong and reprehensible.

Step 1a: Don’t use the word “reprehensible”. They won’t understand it.

Step 1b: Offer logic and evidence of said reprehensibility. Your “official” audience won’t understand it, but your “real” audience, those people who can still see reason and the difference between right and wrong, may.

Step 1c: Don’t be nasty. Don’t provoke the other party. They are looking for an excuse to justify their original bad behaviour in the first place. Just take a superior tone.

The animalistic analogy

Their behaviour is akin to provoking an animal until the animal gets so angry that it attacks you. Then you yell to everybody: “See? I told you this animal is dangerous! Look at it attacking me!”

Step 2: Don’t ask for an apology.

Why? Well, why would you want an apology from someone you don’t respect?

Don’t offer them any opportunity to prolong the debate or gain any sympathy. In all likelihood they will use your demand to justify to their audiences how effective they’ve been in gaslighting you.

If they’re truly decent people who realised they’ve done something wrong, they would have apologised unprompted anyway.

Step 3: Take a Morally Aggrieved but Dignified Tone, or MAD Tone™.

Tell them how their offensive remarks or comments have offended and hurt so many decent fellow citizens and human beings.

Don’t mention it’s because we are in a multiracial country. What is wrong is wrong regardless of whether we’re multiracial or not.

For civility and decorum

Ask all decent people to stand up and be counted by condemning those comments or acts. Some may, many won’t, but at least it’s an effective way to put the offending parties on the spot and make them a little bit uncomfortable.

Why uncomfortable, you ask? Because most of them like to hide behind a fig leaf of civility and decorum. Getting them to twist and squirm a little bit is a small victory.

So here we go. You can’t fight them on logic because most of what they say is illogical, and their followers don’t understand logic.

You can’t fight them by outshouting them either, because they are mostly empty vessels capable of making huge noises that’ll drown your voice.

You fight them by calling them out with strong reasons and logic and clearly pointing out where they are wrong, and that they are wrong not just because what they say is inappropriate in a multiracial country but that they are wrong by anything that is decent and good, such as the law and morality.

And no apologies are necessary, because they’re not worth anything. - FMT

The views expressed are those of the writer and do not necessarily reflect those of MMKtT.