DECEMBER 17 — It all started in June 2020, when Malaysian academic Dr Azly Rahman was slated to give a talk hosted by Gerakbudaya on apartheid and education in Malaysia. Just a day before the talk, Gerakbudaya cancelled the invitation as the editors were informed that he had posted views that were, according to Dr Azly’s critics, anti-BlackLivesMatter.
Gerakbudaya wrote an explanation to its community as to why it cancelled the event. What ensued was a back-and-forth between Dr Azly (and those siding him) and his ardent critics (which is ongoing at the time of writing).
I don’t wish to take sides for the purposes of this article; I want to focus on a bigger issue at play here: Calling out oppression WHEREVER we see it.
Whatever I attribute to Dr Azly is based solely on what he posted on his blog on June 25 this year. Beginning his post with condolences to the family of George Floyd, he went on to explain that “BlackLivesMatter Too BECAUSE AllLivesMatter.” He added that “AllLivesMatter” was a qualification of his belief that all Malaysian lives matter in a country where Malay supremacy is present.
The three-letter creed also symbolises his intention as an educator, as someone who treats his students as students, regardless of race (among other identity markers). Is Dr Azly denying accounts of police brutality towards blacks in America? I highly doubt it.
However, the last section of his piece “Does race matter?” is disconcerting. I think the short answer is an emphatic “YES.” Dr Azly criticises BLM members for “looting, burning, and threatening the lives of others at night.”
If that is the case, then the next step should be to suggest more productive ways to express frustrations rather than to dismiss (albeit unintentionally) the oppression towards Blacks with the slogan “AllLivesMatter.”
I’m quite sure that all members of the BLM members themselves agree that, in principle, all lives matter. What they are protesting against is oppression specific to their community, rather than denying that non-Black lives matter.
BLM exists so as to address the unique dynamics of anti-Black racism that may not be applicable to racism against other communities.
Which is why Dr Azly’s critics were outraged, thinking “how can a Malaysian intellectual talk about racism in Malaysia while seemingly dismissing anti-Black racism in America?” That is a very valid point, and a person should be intellectually challenged if his opponents deem his/her views as problematic.
However, notwithstanding his views on BLM, should Gerakbudaya have cancelled the event? My answer is no. One wonders what the Zoom discussion between Dr Azly and the attendees would have looked like.
I imagine (and hope) it would have been more civil than the Facebook discourse right now. But the cancelling of the event is a secondary matter right now.
There is far lesser outcry against atrocities on our own soil. A few weeks after the cancelled Gerakbudaya event, the statue of British explorer and colonial administrator Francis Light, known as the founder of Georgetown, was found splashed with red paint.
The police immediately investigated a possible BLM motive, since statues of imperialist figures have been toppled in the wake of George Floyd’s death. This includes statues of slave trader Edward Colston and King Leopold II in Britain and Belgium respectively.
Much as how Sir Stamford Raffles is often glorified as the founder of Singapore, there are similar interpretations of Francis Light as the man without whom Penang would have not existed.
Yet, Light is not without a dark side. He was a slave-owner, some of whom included debt bondage slaves. He bequeathed his slaves to his partner Martina Rozells in his will.
According to his last will, these slaves included “Caffree” people of African origin and “Batta” people who may have originated off the coast of Sumatra. He also corresponded with local rulers about the buying and selling of slaves, apart from commodities such as opium.
Now, the problem is that lesser attention is paid to the oppression that took place in colonial Malaya. There has been a global reckoning on racism, but not enough reckoning with regards to Malaysia’s history.
The battle-cry against Francis Light is certainly lesser in intensity than that against Dr Azly’s views or anti-Black racism itself. My point is that, when we ally on the side of the oppressed, we should at least make an attempt to remember oppression masterminded by our own colonial masters.
Whether we say black lives matter or all lives matter, let’s make sure the lives of those enslaved under Francis Light matter too. After all, they are much closer to home.
Do black lives matter? Yes, because it matters to blacks in America, and understandably so. Do all lives matter? Yes, in principle, but it should not be used as a slogan to address context-specific racism.
Do the lives of those who were under the purview of colonial administrators such as Francis Light matter to Malaysians today? They should. Let’s critique oppressive structures, whether they exist now or are a legacy of a colonial past.
We should concentrate our efforts in calling out oppression wherever we see it, not in making our intellectual opponents feel as low as possible over a specific race issue.
All lives matter, but let’s not forget that all oppressed lives in different spatial and temporal contexts matter too.
* This is the personal opinion of the writer(s) or organisation(s) and does not necessarily represent the views of Malay Mail.
