Wednesday, March 04, 2009

Of Writings, Fat People, And Change


"You couldn't effect change with a song. You could only write about what was inside you. And folk music was, fat people."

Jack Rollins, I'm Not There.

In the 1960's, Bob Dylan sang songs of protests against the Establishment. His songs became anthems of both the civil rights movements and of those opposed to the Vietnam War. Above, was a phrase taken from the biographical film of Bob Dylan's life. Jack Rollins, in the film, was a metaphorical figure of one aspect of Bob Dylan's life. By the end of 1963, Bob Dylan stopped protesting. He felt manipulated and constrained by the folk and protest movements.

Malaysia is in a severe political turmoil. Perak is in a state of impasse. Politically motivated blogs, bloggers are everywhere. I'm guilty as charged; I feel like one too. There were times I felt tempted to join the crowd, to write anti-Establishment posts, to speak my heart out on the political situation in Malaysia.

But how much change could we really effect with what we write?

It is sad to see our country in such a political crisis, as never before. What more, when it's happening in my own state, my hometown. Each of us can blog all we want about corruption, power abuse, and money politics. We can hurl and heap insults on the government, the ruling party and specific worthless leaders. We can write about what is inside us. But that is all we can do. At the end of it, we are all just fat people.

And even fat people varies one from another. Even in Perak, legal experts have different opinions on which party is right, which is wrong; which move is constitutional, which is not. Yes, we are not satisfied and we cry out for justice. But justice doesn't come with writings, blog posts, or articles. We can read, be informed and that's about it. We are an impasse ourselves.

We are desperate for change, for political redemption in Malaysia. But change doesn't come in form of songs. Nor writings.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

agrees! :) But sometimes, though, writing is all that one can do. No?

wadefish said...

sorry, missed your comment till i check my mailbox today. dont usually go through my older posts. haha. yeah, sometimes, that's all we can do. i guess it's just me ranting because i was disheartened by all the talk and no action around me. after some time writing this post, i thought to myself and i realised, we may not effect change with what we write; at least not directly. but one day, time will come when people will wake up through our writings, through what they read. and change will follow. however, it's a little sad in Malaysia since it's always the rich, powerful and mean who wins. all of us can wake up, but with power in the hands of the wrong people, change seems a little far off. but it's with hope that we live.