Jesus & His Political Peers

The message yesterday...

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Many Routes to Justice : A Menu

("Oh, you're an A4/M8 person? I'm A2/M7")

It should be safe to say that awareness of (and outrage at) political injustice and oppression is growing, what with the recent case of Teoh Beng Hock's death NEAR, if not AT, the hands of the MACC. It also shouldn't be too unsafe to say that whilst many people want to get involved, not many know how.

Partisan politics isn't for everyone and even the term civil advocacy can't quite shake-off the partisan baggage.

Attending virgils and rallies are exciting but let's face it a stadium (let alone the front lawn of a police station or a government building) can only contain so many people. Furthermore, gatherings can't be a daily affair. Not only that, but if everyone focused exclusively on political repression or corruption, many other issues would be neglected.

So here's a menu (for lack of a better word) for the way the 'average person' can get 'involved' (that's two loaded words too many, eh?).

("If A1/M3 is out for you, why not try A1/2?")

The Areas one can focus on (in order of perceived importance in Malaysia right now):

1. Governmental justice (everything from the I.S.A, racial tension and money politics to rigged elections, unlawful arrests and mysterious tragic deaths)
2. Health / Education (e.g. H1N1, teaching in English, etc.)
3. Religious Harmony (the 'Allah' issue, Muslim conversions, etc.)
4. Social (e.g. drug addiction, poverty, domestic violence, immigrant welfare, indigenous lands, etc.)
5. Environment (e.g. deforestation in Borneo, carbon sinks, replenishment of fisheries, alternative energy, etc.)
6. Corporate Social Responsibility (ensuring MNCs' tow the line with respect to all the above)

It's tempting to say that the six items overlap (and it's hard to doubt they do) but the point remains that often we can only specialise on one, or at most two, areas. Any more and we lose focus.

Next, the Methods could include (in order of popularity - debatable, of course):

1. Use online social networking media (e.g. facebook, blogging, etc.)
2. Use traditional networking media (e.g. conversations[!], teaching/preaching, etc.)
3. Participate in events (forums, rallies, vigils, etc.)
4. Give money
5. Pray (probably the most under-rated "political activity" around)
6. Join a political party
7. Make distinct lifestyle choices / habits (e.g. refuse to buy Brand X or patronise Outlet Y(
8. Make distinct business decisions
9. Enter the industry / domain (e.g. healthcare, education, etc.)
10. Work with an NGO (and do all kinds of things from distributing pamphlets to feeding the poor to rebuilding broken homes)
11. Take the scholarly route (a'la Farish Noor)

Again, certainly people can (and do) engage in two or more methods regularly, but if the issue is that not enough people are getting involved, then laying down the options might help and encouraging people to engage in just ONE of the above ought to suffice as a start.

The challenge, if we can accept something like the above, is to see every node to be as critical as any other. E.g. being a 'A3/M5' person needn't be any less important than the more popular 'A1/M3'.

Whatever combination chosen, we would be doing at least four things: learning, persuading, sharing and acting.

Hats On

Two students of mine wrote a piece on a 6 Thinking Hats session I led, referencing these slides:

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"Prayer Doesn't Work"?

I've shared one response (with a philosophical angle) earlier. Here's a somewhat more devotionally-oriented one with a familiar metaphor: Prayer is like working out.

You never run merely a few rounds (or lift a couple of weights) on an ad-hoc basis every few weeks or so and expect 'results'. Good health, stamina and physique is the result of consistent and disciplined exercise. Without a sustained regime, exercise will not 'work'.

Ditto with prayer. People who diss it (not unlike those who can't say no to third helpings and but always saying no to exercise) are usually those who hardly do it.

So try talking to God more. About any-everything you care for, about any-everyone you love or have trouble loving. Do it hour in hour out, in super times and shite times.

Then you'll see stuff happening. Then your eyes will bask in light (Matt 6:22).

For Whom the Screen Plays

The Megah Medical Specialist Center where I take my kids and wife for treatment is a nice place. Efficient. Squeaky clean. Top doctors. A comfortable waiting area - with a nice flat-screen TV equipped with ASTRO cable.

But guess what channel is always playing? TV3. Apparently Malay dramas come on between 6pm and 8pm, about the same time parents and patients start filling up the waiting area.

Now here's the thing: Almost none of the waiting parents are watching this drama. We'd much prefer to watch Discovery Channel or Asian Food Channel or something else.

Nobody likes to watch the Malay drama. And yet nothing but the Malay drama is on.

They obviously haven't asked the question of the year: For whom, in the name of every injection ever given, is the flat-screen for? The paying clients or the nurses holding the remote control?

Planet Earth

Most people think of Michael Jackson as a great singer/dancer. Not many recognise him as a poet. Planet Earth is a poem inserted towards the end of the special edition of his Dangerous album:

Planet Earth, my home, my place
A capricious anomaly in the sea of space
Planet Earth are you just
Floating by, a cloud of dust
A minor globe, about to bust
A piece of metal bound to rust
A speck of matter in a mindless void
A lonely spaceship, a large asteroid

Cold as a rock without a hue
Held together with a bit of glue
Something tells me this isn't true
You are my sweetheart soft and blue
Do you care, have you a part
In the deepest emotions of my own heart
Tender with breezes caressing and whole
Alive with music, haunting my soul.

In my veins I've felt the mystery
Of corridors of time, books of hisotry
Life songs of ages throbbing in my blood
Have danced the rhythm of the tide and flood
Your misty clouds, your electric storm
Were turbulent tempests in my own form
I've licked the salt, the bitter, the sweet
Of every encounter, of passion, of heat
Your riotous color, your fragrance, your taste
Have thrilled my senses beyond all haste
In your beuaty, I've known the how
Of timeless bliss, this moment of now

Planet Earth are you just
Floating by, a cloud of dust
A minor globe, about to bust
A piece of metal bound to rust
A speck of matter in a mindless void
A lonely spacship, a large asteroid
Cold as a rock without a hue
Held together with a bit of glue
Something tells me this isn't true
You are my sweetheart gentle and blue
Do you care, have you a part
In the deepest emotions of my own heart
Tender with breezes caressing and whole
Alive with music, haunting my soul.
Planet Earth, gentle and blue
With all my heart, I love you

Leadership 1.0

420+ hits in less than two days? I must've done something right...

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Baby Parking

TESCO's at The Curve probably isn't the only place in the Klang Valley that has parent-with-babies' parking, but it's certainly the first place where an attendant, seeing me park my car quite a distance from the entrance, approached me to tell me of the special lots.

What can I say? I'll have to take Melody out more often (grin).

Studying Tips

Something I cooked up for student orientation week...

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The Holographic Brain and the Tyranny of the One Thought

Some 'left-over' jottings from my notes:

• If a child is good at music we call her 'talented'; if she's good at Languages or Maths, we call her 'smart' - what does this show about assumptions regarding the nature of intelligence? (Howard Gardner)
  
• The most natural development of the human brain: PLAY
  
• "What if we could forget history?" (Colin James, on the need to put aside past bitterness, conflict, etc.)
  
• The brain thinks/performs holographically i.e. all parts of the brain 'sees' the same thing and all parts of the brain work 'at' the same thing, the left/right-brain divide is mistaken (Mark Treadwell)
  
• "Fundamentalism is the tyranny of the One Thought or the Only Way" (Colin James)
  
• "Marriage is a somatically intelligent decision" (Colin James, referring to the triump of 'gut-feeling' over analytically feeling and how if couples used the latter when thinking about getting married they probably never would)
  
• Humour in the workplace promotes creativity (David Koutsoukis)
  
• "Let's just say he wasn't anorexically challenge" (Colin James)
  
• "We need neoteny" (Glenn Capelli)