25 November 2015

The Paradox in Malaysian Online Journalism

An article called The Paradox in Malaysian Online Journalism that was written by Dr Rahmat Ghazali, have given me a new context on freedom of speech and cyber information. Based on the concept or idea that Dr Rahmat has wrote in his blog SuaraMurba.blogspot, bottom line, we think that freedom of press and cyber information is a necessity but is it really true? To further this, the meaning of Paradox is apparently self-contradictory statement, the underlying meaning of which is revealed only by careful scrutiny. The purpose of a paradox is to arrest attention and provoke fresh thought (George Orwell, 1945).
DR. Rahmat said in his articles stated that the freedom of media and the influences on the internet have given so many positive and negative impacts on society and also to our nation. We can’t argue more with the idea was internet is our new medium to search for entirely everything, to what come worst to the most good things.
I couldn’t agree more that because of our complicated social interracial interactions that involves many aspects, and various methods the government has enacted to control the media, like the Printing Presses and Publications Act 1984, online journalism is certainly a saving grace for the weak, for the voiceless to express themselves. To make themselves heard.
But according to Malaysian Insider in their articles stated  that  Malaysian on press freedom has drops to 147 in 2014 compared to 2013 Malaysia was ranked at 145 ut of 179 countries, dropping 23 spots from the previous year. Lim, who is also Gelang Patah MP, said Malaysia's ranking would have been worse if the government's latest move in supressing press freedom had been taken into account, referring to the Home Ministry's decision to reject publisher Edge Communications Sdn Bhd's application for a newspaper permit recently.

According to this article, Dr Rahmat also mentioned that as soon as AKM 1998 was enshrined, there were a lot of websites such as Mahafiraun, Mahazalim and many more saying bad things and in other words mocking our previous Prime Minister. I, as a Malay am ashamed as the values that was imprinted in us was forgotten. Harsh words and curses that sometimes we cannot even imagine saying to a person is written in the internet. Is this the impact that freedom of press and cyber information give us? Is this the education that we get from these social networks such as Facebook and Twitter are considered as normal? You decide.
Even with the internet providing anyone with access unlimited source of information, these commentaries by individuals are almost always written emotionally, no solid facts, biases are present in sentences and formed from baseless rumors.
So surprisingly that our previous Prime Minister, Tun Mahathir Muhammad have said that if he once become a Prime Minister again he will censorship the Internet Usage because he regret that he don’t censored when he was a Prime Minister back then. But why Dr Mahathir, which promotes the growth of the Internet and public access in Malaysia, and also promised to keep it free now changed his mind?
Here is the real reason why he wants to censor the Internet:
So that the opposition did not have a place to highlight their propaganda and news to the people. Internet equalized in terms of media access to the opposition and those who were hungry for news. Without the internet, the opposition has only lectures, articles and faxed statement that only some of the parties only have access to it. However, with the internet, coupled with a mobile phone, spread the information was all right.
In his article, Dr. Rahmat Ghazali had wrote due to the support of the enactment of CMA 1998, it had caused “an explosion of online journalism” for the free of the press and it was the time when many had the freedom to voice out, to which he continued, “That was the period when we could see the minorities, the NGOs, civil and human rights activists, intellectuals as well as politicians across different ethnic background taking part in online journalism to have their voices communicated and be informed.” And up until today, it hasn’t stopped since.
I agree wholeheartedly with the Dr’s comment. Online journalism has indeed give democracy a space in our country, but it in turn has given chance to unknown enemies a tool to manipulate and create chaos within the country using the sensitivity that comes with being a multiracial country.

Statistics of how much of mass media is actually being controlled by political parties

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