masterwordsmith-unplugged

The following post is a compilation of comments written by Walla in response to my post HERE.  I am re-posting it because it is so beautifully written with many salient points that deserve more airing and consideration. I wish I could write like that! Thanks, Walla, for letting me re-post this.

Dear readers, this blog is your platform to air your views too. If ever you wish your writings to be aired here, please send them to mwsmithunplugged@gmail.com. I hope as many of you can leave a comment to share your thoughts on this very crucial issue. I hope we can have a lively exchange of views on this pertinent issue. Thanks and have a nice day!

Plugging the Brain Drain - written by Walla

The present government realizes education is important but not what we think as human capital for national enterprise to meet global challenges.

To them education is for ethnocentric assimilation portrayed as national identity and defined by political gimmickry.

That would explain the slide in passing marks which explains the vote-building avalanche of high grades despite crap content, not that it will matter to those from the non-privileged communities, for they will have to compete later on but only for their fourth or fifth choices and to local universities not of their choosing.

Sometimes they are rejected outright but the mail surprises with an unsolicited offer to another course from an unknown institution run by a management whose profiles would fit datuk t's to a, well, tee. Like many things in this land, meritocracy and privacy are just pipe dreams.

It is therefore understandable how the Chinese for instance will handle the situation. They will send their children to six years vernacular primary school, bite the bullet next and admit them into five years of national secondary school, undo the damage in parallel by sending them to tuition, and then when the last SPM paper is over, wash their hands of all things government and quickly move them into private education. Except for those who can't afford despite holding two or more jobs and tying their belts to the last notch who will have no other recourse but to see their youngsters face the STPM which of course will decimate eighty percent from local university entry, and dash their futures, perhaps forever.

Those who can afford will take the private education courses as a stepping stone to go overseas for their tertiary studies. The cream from the poorer families will have won scholarships to other countries and on completion be offered permanent residencies. A few years later after working at high pay in dynamic surroundings where meritocracy is practiced, their last vestige of attachment to country of birth will crumble. At best they will attend a talent corp seminar where none of the questions they pose will be candidly answered enough to enthuse them to return. Ergo, accelerated brain drain.

People don't see a credible future in this country anymore until and unless the entire ecosystem is changed. And even then the damage has to be undone which has been done to this land fixated on gutter politics, stoned denials and crass stupidities combined with arrogance, bullying and monopoly. The fear-borne syndrome of mud-level low standards gone amok.

Change isn't going to come. So people who have seen the real world will move on. Can they be blamed for wanting to be and to do better?

This land is a first-class country held together by second-class citizens diminished by a third-class government propped by fourth-class politicians egged on by fifth-class chauvinists. It is a wonder why it hasn't been de-listed from the roll of honour of the United Nations.

What of the future? The generations who can see all this will pass on. Those they support even with their last molecules of their sweat, tears and sacrifices will hopefully find new pastures to be a better credit to others what they have been denied to give in their own homeland.

So that the future generations will not be pained by what they will miss, all last ties should be severed. Cremation and scattering of the ashes will be a poignant last gesture by the present generation to free their charges so that they may live on elsewhere without the pain of sentimentality to a land without any.

P.S. # 1 by Walla

The future will depend on those within the community causing the problems. They have to get over the 'strength in numbers' myth for what is strength if it self-defeats the future of all from going down the wrong road?

Despite my obvious naysayer sentiments, there is still a future for everyone but the present government has to be changed in GE13 and not a minute too soon.

If the Opposition doesn't run the government well then, the rakyat can vote back in GE14. The vote of everyone will decide how well we all live for five years so the effort to create change will be worth it.

P.S. # 2 by Walla

The real and true fixed deposit of this land are not the paid votes for certain political parties by simple folks in certain places. It is goodwill and pragmatism and the compulsion to adhere to principles in the hearts of the citizens across the land.

Yet we see no small amount of racial infestation in the minds and actions of too many in political power who want to draw the citizens away from the plateau of moderation.

Instead of working to close artificial gulfs, they widen them further using fear and rhetoric. They practice double standards even in their public actions portrayed to remove double standards. It is thus only lip service played to soothe in the beginning before forsaking in the end.

If the Chinese and others can still survive and thrive despite such machinations, those who still think numbers are what that only matter should ask themselves what are the factors for the success.

And if they will but open their eyes to the rest of the world beyond these shores, they will surely find the same race-independent success factors elsewhere.

The sacrifices made by generation after generation cannot be underrated. They have only increased their resolve to triumph over such unjust adversity caused by a handful onto the many over too long a time.

If a group of politicians don't serve the people who have been building the country, they should be booted out. Turn the table on these mischief-makers so that they can get a taste of their own medicine. They bring it onto themselves when in power they could have been leavened by real wisdom and humble leadership. A stint in the back rows may give them a chance to reflect on their arrogance, crimes, deceit and damage. Certainly they shouldn't complain because in their acts of malign neglect, they didn't give millions of innocents any chance at a sense of natural belonging even to their land of birth.

There are cultural strengths in the Chinese and others. These strengths have stood the test of time. They form the pillars of progressive and pragmatic nationhood. Anywhere in this world.

Never lose them. They are all that stand against the tide of this nation's diminution and decay.