COMMENT | "You should embrace your culture. You should be proud of who you are and your background. And how you worship God is going to be different, and those are things that you should be proud of. But it shouldn’t be a tool to look down on somebody else. It shouldn’t be a reason to discriminate."

– Barack Obama, in speech delivered at Universiti Malaya

I received this email from a young university student asking me to write about the recent suspension of the Chinese Language Society of Universiti Malaysia. I also received an email about the “gag order” from UM prohibiting students and staff from making verbal or written statements that would have “negative implications” on the government or the university, from another student who wanted me to write about this too.

To be honest, I am not into this Chinese language or Indian language or whatever other kinds of cultural societies that always seem to crop up in Malaysia. I get why Malaysians join them, especially in educational establishments where young people are discovering themselves and each other, but I have never been interested in joining cultural groups just because it is assumed that people in such societies are simpatico with one another.

However, this young student really impressed me with the honesty in her rambling email about what it means to be Chinese and Malaysian and how the two were not mutually exclusive, and I was really surprised that this young Malaysian was interested in her country, despite the systemic inequalities she faces because of her ethnicity and gender.

The young student wrote eloquently about what the society meant to her. While she did not elaborate on what dialect she was referring to when she wrote about the society, what she did make clear was how much she learnt about her culture and community and how it enriched her life. She was adamant that the society did not intentionally skirt whatever regulations they were in breach of, and she was extremely upset that the society was suspended.

Meanwhile, the other young student who wrote to me was concerned that his activism off campus would conflict with this gag order – as I was typing this sentence, I actually mistakenly typed “gaga” order – and that his academic pursuits would be jeopardised. This is why both wanted to remain anonymous.

I thought it was somewhat funny actually. Here the university wants to cut down on bad press, but issues orders that invite the very thing it wants to avoid...