Saturday, January 24, 2015

The Victim Complex

I started this post by writing the title first. I'd never done that before. Usually I'd just let my writing roam around and go any which way it desired, and at the very end I'd swoop in, identify the core issue in my incoherent train of thoughts, and come up with a more or less appropriate title.

But not this time around. I thought I wanted to write about something super serious and that I needed to follow through and not get derailed off topic.

So what about The Victim Complex? As much as I love Wikipedia for a straight-forward, (mostly) unbiased overview of a topic, for this particular issue I very much prefer the Encyclopedia Dramatica's definition of The Victim Complex, and I quote:
The possessor of a victim complex needs some outside authority to blame for their own failures. They can never compensate for their personal challenges in order to do the basic competition necessary to be even minimally successful at life. Those with the most institutional of complexes have created not only an outside persecutor but feel an innate and deep endowment for entitlement, even privilege.
A bit of backstory for context:

I was out with a couple of friends at a new hotspot in town, when suddenly a decent looking young lady with a body sculpted by the Gods walked past us before cozying up to a heavyset, middle-aged Chinese guy at the next table. I jokingly quipped, "That dude must be loaded." Small chuckles were heard, and a friend decided that it was the perfect backdrop for a segue into his dramatic recounting of Bustamam's Woes : How The Whole Universe Is Conspiring To Pulverise The Malays. It's a tale of how the Malays are bullied and humiliated to the point where they become mere shells of their previous selves, all because of the money-hungry villains that are the Chinese. And the Jews. But mostly the Chinese.

Wait how the hell did he manage to segue into that story, you might ask.

Don't you see? We were talking, no, speculating about the wealth of a certain Chinese dude next to us. Whenever the word Chinese and money are said in the same sentence, it is almost illegal not to finish that sentence with "...and the Malays are being oppressed by these greedy Ah Bengs." In fact, the mere mention of the word Cina could spark a lengthy debate on how the Malays should stand up for themselves and give these slanty eyed people a good kick in the ass.

I hate it. I hate it every time someone brings up the issue of the Malay privilege. I hate the word supremacy. I hate the word oppression. I hate the word greedy. I hate the phrase "protecting the Malays". I hate the idea of my perfectly able-bodied and able-minded people needing special attention from the government. I hate the bigoted remarks on my Facebook newsfeed about what would happen if the Chinese ruled Malaysia ("We'd all be eating pork and Allah would punish Malaysia with more floods!"). I hate the fact that every time a race issue is brought up, a dimwit would be quick to play the 13th May card, the Malaysian Godwin's rule.

And above all, I hate how readily the Malays see themselves as stupid, lazy and mentally incapacitated, and are proud of it.

The Chinese stole your land? You don't have any land. You don't have so much as a doormat to your name. No one is stealing from you, but you rob yourself... of opportunities. The opportunity to get education, because when the Chinese were in school, you were playing honky. The opportunity to appreciate how our land is abundant with resources, because you'd rather wait for money to grow on trees than work a menial job. The opportunity to be fascinated by different cultures rather than be repulsed by them, because you choose not to care about others who are of different faiths because they might sneak bacon into your beehoon. The opportunity to travel the world and across the universe on a shoelace, through reading. Because reading is boring, reading is nerdy, reading is for the pussies and the sissies and the losers. The opportunity to see the glass half full, because you expect the glass to magically fill itself to the brim and when it doesn't, it's because of the Chinese.

How is it the fault of the Chinese that when I go to a government's office, the person behind the counter is on his coffee break at 10.30 a.m? How is it the fault of the Chinese that you are jobless when it is crystal clear you are a lazy bumfuck with a shitty personality and absolutely no redeeming values whatsoever? How is it the fault of the Chinese that you have this crippling fear of competition that the mere idea of a public university without a race quota sends shivers down your spine? "But what about our comfort zone? Down with those kiasu Chinamen!"

The Victim Complex provides solace. It puts the blame on everybody else but you. It is a teething cookie to your fragile gum, a pacifier to your erratic tantrums, a mouthful of Listerine on your putrid breath. It's a tudung on your bad hair day, it's ajinomoto on your tasteless wonton soup, a coat of fresh paint on your moldy walls.

It's what we use to escape the ugly face of reality.

The Victim Complex, embodied by an entire people, passed down through generations.

3 comments:

Offley Tan said...

where's the like button when you need one

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Hana said...

You need to keep writing because we need more voices like yours! Entertaining reads and some posts seemed as though it would have come from something I would have written!