Rudyard Kipling"
āWhen you're left wounded on Afganistan's plains and
the women come out to cut up what remains, Just roll to your rifle
and blow out your brains,
And go to your God like a soldierā
General Douglas MacArthur"
āWe are not retreating. We are advancing in another direction.ā
āIt is fatal to enter any war without the will to win it.ā āOld soldiers never die; they just fade away.
āThe soldier, above all other people, prays for peace, for he must suffer and be the deepest wounds and scars of war.ā
āMay God have mercy upon my enemies, because I won't .ā āThe object of war is not to die for your country but to make the other bastard die for his.
āNobody ever defended, there is only attack and attack and attack some more.
āIt is foolish and wrong to mourn the men who died. Rather we should thank God that such men lived.
The Soldier stood and faced God
Which must always come to pass
He hoped his shoes were shining
Just as bright as his brass
"Step forward you Soldier,
How shall I deal with you?
Have you always turned the other cheek?
To My Church have you been true?"
"No, Lord, I guess I ain't
Because those of us who carry guns
Can't always be a saint."
I've had to work on Sundays
And at times my talk was tough,
And sometimes I've been violent,
Because the world is awfully rough.
But, I never took a penny
That wasn't mine to keep.
Though I worked a lot of overtime
When the bills got just too steep,
The Soldier squared his shoulders and said
And I never passed a cry for help
Though at times I shook with fear,
And sometimes, God forgive me,
I've wept unmanly tears.
I know I don't deserve a place
Among the people here.
They never wanted me around
Except to calm their fears.
If you've a place for me here,
Lord, It needn't be so grand,
I never expected or had too much,
But if you don't, I'll understand."
There was silence all around the throne
Where the saints had often trod
As the Soldier waited quietly,
For the judgment of his God.
"Step forward now, you Soldier,
You've borne your burden well.
Walk peacefully on Heaven's streets,
You've done your time in Hell."
Penan incest' claim triggers anger at tabloid by Keruah Usit
Monday, May 14, 2012
ANTIDOTE Metro Ahad, a tabloid
newspaper linked to Umno through Media Prima, has raised angry calls for
a boycott, following a disturbing May 13 story alleging that unnamed
Sarawakian Penans practise incest.
In a reportheadlined Abang Kahwin Adik Sendiri
(Brother is married to his own sister), reporter Hadzlan Hassan claimed
that āinvestigations and research by the newspaper found that around 15
families in the (Ulu Baram) area live in a nomadic fashion although a
longhouse has been provided for them, and have married blood relatives,
in fact 10 couples married their own flesh and bloodā.
There are several jarring details in Metro's
succinct report. Despite splashing a large photo across its homepage
with a caption "My mother is my wife, my father is my husband", it
failed to set out the name of the village or its exact location.
The
dateline reads āUlu Baramā, but a photo caption mentions that the
village lies in āTinjaā (presumably Tinjar, since Hadzlan filed several
other stories from the area).
The report published a photo of a
young couple with their faces digitally disguised. The caption suggests
that the couple had claimed they were married, but their faces look as
if they are related. No details were provided.
The fundamentals
of journalism were disregarded: there was no attempt to record names and
ages of couples said to be living in incest, and no explanation of Metro's source for its 'estimate' of 15 involved families.It
provided no documentation of genealogy, no interviews with the chief of
the village, academics or government officials. There was no mention of
the reporter making a police report, although incest is a crime.
Community
NGO organiser Muhim Urip has been working closely with the Penan for 15
years. He says incest has never been part of Penan culture. He was
contemptuous of Hadzlan's assertion that āin the local communityā,
incest is ācommonā because those āliving in small groups as nomads had
little choice in life partnersā. "That's ridiculous. Incest is
not 'common' in any nomadic hunter-gatherer community, whether in
Sarawak or worldwide," Muhim said.
"Penans marry between nomadic
groups, and often uproot themselves to live with their spouses in new
villages or in new nomadic groups.āHadzlan has not yet replied to requests for comments. The remainder of Metro's coverage of the Penan of Baram amounted to powder puff pieces on government pledges to the Penan.
There
was effusive praise for premier Najib Abdul Razak's promise to upgrade
the decrepit Lapok Road to allow travel from Miri to parts of Baram (a
promise still unmet a year after last April's state election campaign),
and the prospects of a Bantuan Rakyat 1Malaysia windfall.
Another article mentions rumours that the Penan could make outsiders "disappear" in theforests. These outsiders, it said, included timber workers who made unwelcome approaches to Penan women.
This is an unrecognisable racial profile: the Penan are among the most shy, peaceful and gentle people in the country. Such
stories have certainly given greater weight to these rumours, than to
the official government report that uncovered widespread rape and sexual
abuse of Penan girls and women by loggers. The official report,
and subsequently the Penan Support Group report, exposed an atmosphere
of lawlessness: powerful timber companies are being supported and
protected by the state. Some loggers feel they can get away with rape - and they do.
Other questionable claims
Metro also suggested that incestuous marriages are one reason the Penan find it difficult to obtain a Mykad and other documentation. Another
reason, it claimed, was that āIndonesian Penansā have infiltrated the
state, so the National Registration Department (NRD) is wary of
registering thousands of Penans without a Mykad. But most Penan
settlements that were established even before the formation of Malaysia
find it difficult to obtain the document.
Reports
by the Human Rights Commission state that the lack of the Mykad is
caused by poverty and unequal access to NRD staff, and is an affront to
the human rights of the Penan to obtain access to education and
healthcare.
Social media reactions in Sarawak to the incest allegations included a flurry of hundreds of angry comments condemning Metro's "racism".
Its coverage of the Penan has now stirred up another controversy, following inaccurate reporting by the Umno-owned Utusan Malaysia and the New Straits Times on the Bersih 3.0 rally on April 28.
The Metro headline
on the Penan, similar to those of its stable-mates on Bersih, may be
aimed at papering over cracks in Umno's preparations for the looming
13th general election. Umno's Sarawak BN partners are in real
danger of losing the Baram parliamentary seat, the largest in the
country, thanks to the hugely unpopular Baram Dam and allegations of
graft against the incumbent Jacob Dungau Sagan, which he has denied. International
media attention has highlighted the disastrous effects of logging and
plantations on the Penan, one of the most deprived ethnic groups in the
country. Pro-government news stories, conversely, give the impression
that the Penan are given sterling treatment, but are somehow manipulated
by outsiders.
Metro's stories on the Penan appear to have
crossed a line, and have upset Sarawakians of all races. The mainstream
media's clumsy attempts at propaganda may now make BN's hold on the
Baram parliamentary seat even more tenuous. Malaysiakini
In a 
There
was effusive praise for premier Najib Abdul Razak's promise to upgrade
the decrepit Lapok Road to allow travel from Miri to parts of Baram (a
promise still unmet a year after last April's state election campaign),
and the prospects of a Bantuan Rakyat 1Malaysia windfall. 
Reports
by the Human Rights Commission state that the lack of the Mykad is
caused by poverty and unequal access to NRD staff, and is an affront to
the human rights of the Penan to obtain access to education and
healthcare.
