Reality TV vs Soap Opera
Politics in Malaysia is now the great inspiration for my next hit TV series -- the most exciting soap opera on TV -- constantly making headlines -- and achieving higher ratings than Desperate Housewives, Dallas and Dynasty combined. What do you know? It has all the necessary elements to be a hit! Power, lust, corruption, murder, sodomy, betrayal...
So now, if i still get moments of mental block, while writing my next Pulitzer Prize potential, I only have to look up the local papers for the next paragraph.
Some people say real life IS stranger than fiction. I believe that now. For years, I was brainwashed by the people who love to censor my TV watching by telling me that everything on TV is too good to be true.
But hang on....wasn't it the other day that police discovered that a 75-year-old man in Austria had lived a secret life with his daughter, having fathered 7 children with her in a dungeon right underneath their house for the past 20 years? Which fiction writer could have had the creative mind to think of that plot? So now, I do believe that Baywatch is real.
Back to Malaysian politics. I have one protest -- the majority of us are just too cowardly to speak up when we see injustice. One of my friends said that Malaysians have had it "comfortable" for a long time. We've had a relatively peaceful society, and there is enough to eat if you are willing to work. Most people just shut up and keep the status quo as long as there is food on the table and some pocket money to buy a home theatre system. Therefore, we accept the government department red tapes, the high taxes and tolls for everything from highways to Penang Bridge to parking to income tax to road tax to vehicle import duties, the under table business dealings, the abuses in the quota systems for education & business...
But there is now a maturing in our people. Perhaps it is a realization that we are slowly lacking behind our fellow Asian countries. Therefore, we got to do something about it.
Recently, Tourism news brought up the fact that they don't know how to brand Malaysia. What do we stand for? Malaysia, truly Asia....that has been the slogan on Tourism Malaysia's TV commercials for the past few years. But I don't know to be proud or to snicker, because recently the discussion among prominent Malaysians politicians has been about which "race" deserves more privileges than the other, and which is not truly Malaysian, etc... Thank god, the royal families, and politicians usually have enough privileges to send their heirs and heiresses to overseas boarding schools, so that their children don't have to hang around long enough to be corrupted by small-minded, insecure, mean-spirited and frustrated sour grapes. God knows these are the young generation who would have a faster-speed headstart in the world of business and government due to their family capabilities.
Let's take a look at the USA. This has been the country whose brand is known to be the land of opportunity, entrepreneurship and marketing genius. And I think most of their inhabitants are from "migrant families" -- starting about 250 years ago. Once the Black people were slaves from Africa. But once the Whites were "liberated" from bigotry, and the Blacks "liberated" from their world of slavery, and given equal chance in the country's constitution to prosper legally, the stars began to emerge from the fields of limitation. Oprah Winfrey, said to be the country's richest woman, is black. Some of the best musicians and rappers are Black....and they are influencing Asian kids with their r&b and hiphop! And now, we may expect their next president to be Black. The funny thing is, I'm sure they made it on their own conviction and determination...without the necessary, special racial subsidies...just... equal chance to live the American dream.
That got me thinking -- but I don't think the best copywriter in Malaysia's best ad agency would dare to write a slogan for a TVC campaign that says "Let's live the Malaysian dream" -- cos then they would need to allocate more space on the ad for the many terms and conditions in fine print **
Money can have many names: Dollar, Franc, Ringgit, Euro, Yen, etc, but it knows no Race. It goes to those who find it. And anyone is entitled to it.
So now, if i still get moments of mental block, while writing my next Pulitzer Prize potential, I only have to look up the local papers for the next paragraph.
Some people say real life IS stranger than fiction. I believe that now. For years, I was brainwashed by the people who love to censor my TV watching by telling me that everything on TV is too good to be true.
But hang on....wasn't it the other day that police discovered that a 75-year-old man in Austria had lived a secret life with his daughter, having fathered 7 children with her in a dungeon right underneath their house for the past 20 years? Which fiction writer could have had the creative mind to think of that plot? So now, I do believe that Baywatch is real.
Back to Malaysian politics. I have one protest -- the majority of us are just too cowardly to speak up when we see injustice. One of my friends said that Malaysians have had it "comfortable" for a long time. We've had a relatively peaceful society, and there is enough to eat if you are willing to work. Most people just shut up and keep the status quo as long as there is food on the table and some pocket money to buy a home theatre system. Therefore, we accept the government department red tapes, the high taxes and tolls for everything from highways to Penang Bridge to parking to income tax to road tax to vehicle import duties, the under table business dealings, the abuses in the quota systems for education & business...
But there is now a maturing in our people. Perhaps it is a realization that we are slowly lacking behind our fellow Asian countries. Therefore, we got to do something about it.
Recently, Tourism news brought up the fact that they don't know how to brand Malaysia. What do we stand for? Malaysia, truly Asia....that has been the slogan on Tourism Malaysia's TV commercials for the past few years. But I don't know to be proud or to snicker, because recently the discussion among prominent Malaysians politicians has been about which "race" deserves more privileges than the other, and which is not truly Malaysian, etc... Thank god, the royal families, and politicians usually have enough privileges to send their heirs and heiresses to overseas boarding schools, so that their children don't have to hang around long enough to be corrupted by small-minded, insecure, mean-spirited and frustrated sour grapes. God knows these are the young generation who would have a faster-speed headstart in the world of business and government due to their family capabilities.
Let's take a look at the USA. This has been the country whose brand is known to be the land of opportunity, entrepreneurship and marketing genius. And I think most of their inhabitants are from "migrant families" -- starting about 250 years ago. Once the Black people were slaves from Africa. But once the Whites were "liberated" from bigotry, and the Blacks "liberated" from their world of slavery, and given equal chance in the country's constitution to prosper legally, the stars began to emerge from the fields of limitation. Oprah Winfrey, said to be the country's richest woman, is black. Some of the best musicians and rappers are Black....and they are influencing Asian kids with their r&b and hiphop! And now, we may expect their next president to be Black. The funny thing is, I'm sure they made it on their own conviction and determination...without the necessary, special racial subsidies...just... equal chance to live the American dream.
That got me thinking -- but I don't think the best copywriter in Malaysia's best ad agency would dare to write a slogan for a TVC campaign that says "Let's live the Malaysian dream" -- cos then they would need to allocate more space on the ad for the many terms and conditions in fine print **
Money can have many names: Dollar, Franc, Ringgit, Euro, Yen, etc, but it knows no Race. It goes to those who find it. And anyone is entitled to it.
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