Thread by @uglyluhan

As a prelude to a thread I was requested, I felt it necessary to first address a related issue we're all familiar with: the myth of the lazy Malay, a colonial narrative that still rears its ugly head today both among Malays and nons alike

Many have discussed and written about the topic before, but efforts to debunk the myth have usually focused on citing the many instances of Malays who aren't lazy. However, this doesn't truly kill the misconception

Because if someone buys into a stereotype, just pointing out examples to the contrary will only seem to be the exception.

Eg. "Some Malays aren't lazy but most are"

"You're not lazy, unlike the rest of your race"

To really end this myth, we need to examine its history. Where does it come from and why or how was it created. And in fact, someone has already done so

Of course I'm talking about this book by Syed Hussein Alatas, probably the most important work on the history of the colonial stereotype of people from the Malay Archipelago. This is required reading for anyone wanting to understand the issue

But since many are more likely to read Twitter threads than old books, it might be useful to summarise some of the contents here, and add a little bit to it. There are many points I won't cover so if you're interested, I recommend reading the book itself

One of my favourite lines in all of film is in Avatar when Jake says

"They’re not gonna make a deal. For a light beer and blue jeans? There’s nothing that we have that they want."

The presumption that one way of life is better and that the "other" should necessarily want to adopt it is pivotal to colonial ideology. Ironically this is how we treat the orang asli today

Spanish colonial writer Sinibaldo de Mas opined that Filipinos should be introduced to opium because "they had absolutely no wants whatsoever", and addiction might "force them to work in order to gratify the acquired desire". Developers in Ladakh, India used a similar strategy

Now let's say you're a Malay villager. Your kampung is self-sufficient. Whoever farms or fishes provides for themselves and sells to the other villagers. But this rustic existence seems "semi-civilised" to the colonists

They're astounded that you have no interest in capitalism. They themselves acknowledge the poor working conditions of labourers but when they find you have no desire to take up "the drudgeries of mining", they be like:

They call you lazy, til it builds up into a myth of you and your people as being inclined to laziness or "indolence" as they like to say. Using that as a starting point, it's just a matter of interpreting the whole culture as being inherently lazy

@thepatriotsasia badly tried to respond to the myth here, claiming that Malays refused to work because they are "tuan tanah". From there the article goes off track talking about irrelevant things like Admiral Yi and Shivaji

google.com/amp/s/www.thep…

But evidently Malay aversion to colonial labour had nothing to do with modern concepts of racial pride. This also gives rise to another misconception that Chinese and Indians worked for the British because they were loyal to the colonists

But as Syed Hussein writes, the British had no great love for the Chinese or Indians, or vice-versa. Even their praises of the "industrious Chinaman" were left-handed compliments as you can see here

@thepatriotsasia did a better article on the mitos Melayu malas, which touches on a question any student of history should ask: How did a people so active in the sea trade become stereotyped as lazy?

thepatriots.asia/mitos-melayu-p…

The ones living an easy life of leisure were the upper class, the royalty. Some were just as bad as the Europeans. Yet they never complained of their subjects being lazy. In fact, the Undang-undang Sungai Ujong stressed the value of hard work

jstor.org/stable/4150302…

Funny thing is, the earliest European descriptions from the 16th century never project an image of the lazy native anywhere in Southeast Asia. Which only proves the point that it was a later invention

Much of the intensive agricultural work that Malays engaged in was anything but lazy. Go ahead and try working on a farm, see for yourself. But since the colonists reaped little revenue from it, such labour was of no value to them

Hugh Clifford alluded to the colonists being part of the problem. He himself was very much aware that Malays were fully capable of working hard

Remember that before colonisation, the kingdoms of Southeast Asia had a thriving trade network. Technology, culture and ideas flowed freely among them, and outside the region

The lazy native theme only developed when the Europeans assumed direct control of the archipelago, most especially after the Dutch era. At this point you might think I'm putting too much of the blame on the colonists

After all, Munshi Abdullah wrote of the Malay rulers not taking advantage of their rich resources. And it's true, this can happen even without foreign intervention

https://twitter.com/uglyluhan/status/1072553569943990273?ref_src=twcamp%5Ecopy%7Ctwsrc%5Eandroid%7Ctwgr%5Ecopy%7Ctwcon%5E7090%7Ctwterm%5E3

But even this was mostly (if not fully) a consequence of colonisation itself. Western domination isolated the Southeast Asian states from each other to a greater extent than ever before

You might be surprised to know this brought Muslim Southeast Asia in closer contact with other Muslims. One could argue that the Arabisation trend began in earnest during this period

It was under the colonists that Indian Muslims introduced the onion shapes that we've come to associate with mosques. The Mughal style of the Sultan Abdul Samad building was designed by Brits and had no relation whatsoever to Malay or Malaysian architecture

But at the same time, formerly close relations with other parts of Southeast Asia (particularly the mainland) were forgotten. The Malay states became stagnant *because* of the colonists, who blamed it on the "native physique" and "indolence"

What Syed Hussein didn't say was that the lazy Southeast Asian stereotype was not confined to the maritime region. The French held a similar view of their colonies in Indochina, which offers us an interesting comparison

There was a saying "The Vietnamese plant rice, the Cambodians watch, the Lao listen to it grow". Here we see the Lao and Khmer are portrayed as the lazy ones, while the Vietnamese are seen as hardworking

The Vietnamese themselves considered the neighbouring Khmer as lazy for not farming every bit of land, a necessity in Vietnam where agricultural land is a scarce resource. And this brings us to a controversial part of the myth

m.english.vietnamnet.vn/fms/special-re…

And that would be the cultural aspect. Observers both in the past and present have noted the easy-going lifestyle of Cambodia and Laos in comparison to Vietnam. Could this be true of Malays?

Syed Hussein rebuked Mahathir on this, saying that even the life of a Malay rice farmer isn't as simple or easy as Madey suggests. But in my opinion there is a case to be made here

While we've already established that Malays can be and have always been hardworking, I do feel that the laid-back culture of Southeast Asia was misinterpreted by the foreigners as laziness

In modern times, the lazy native myth often shows up in politics. Although I'm open about my views on the matter, I don't wish to get too much into it in this thread because I don't want this to become a political discussion

But we can comment on perception. Racial politics instill a sense of entitlement rather than innovation. Affirmative action meant to help a struggling community can backfire

Even in Singapore, policies seeking to free the community from the colonial myth have at times only entrenched it further

google.com/amp/s/kitaab.o…

The fatalism of religion noted by the British seems to have become worse in our time. I think this comparison explains what I mean

So it's ironic that the biggest detractors of the lazy native are also those mentality is most similar to the colonists. The myth can't die when people in power are still saying "you can't survive without us" or "your future is in jeopardy". Ponder over these last two screenshots