The newspaper headlines (The Star, especially) over this weekend have not had really good things to talk about. Today, were were greeted with news that foreign workers working on the spanking new Istana Negara had not been paid their wages:
http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2010/6/27/nation/6557795&sec=nation
Yesterday, it was this news about the rise of teenaged mothers in Malaysia:
http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2010/6/26/nation/6549733&sec=nation
It would be a shame indeed if the palace meant for our sovereign is built on what could turn out to be slave labour (how was the White House built originally?). In this country, we love to moralise about all sorts of stuff, but there is this RM 800 million behemoth being built in our capital, on prime land, fuelled by discrimination and suffering. It was particularly disturbing to read that one of the ladies, who lives in the kongsi on the construction site, had to hide in the nearby woods with her baby to avoid the authorities during raids. Sometimes, she had to spend the night there with her baby.
As for the case of teenaged mothers, we still have a long way to go in educating our youth on the consequences of sexual relationships and how to handle them responsibly. Simply demonising and condemning young people and pregnant teens obviously do not work. For those who become pregnant, yes, they may have made a mistake, but the last thing they need is to face humiliation and punishment. They are in enough pain already. What they need is counselling and support from society.
"Life is the most precious of all treasures", a Buddhist sage once wrote. Babies that are born out of wedlock are not guilty of any crime or sin.
Where both news are concerned, we must recognise that they involve human beings just like us. Simply applying labels like "illegal", "imigrants", "slut" and others will not help the situation. We must recognise their humanity too.
Busy people or even people in general never really bother reading each article in a magazine. Most of the time, they tend to scan the headlines to get a gist of what the stories are in and around the city.
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