Are we mature enough for societal censorship?

The Sedition Act is a law that can be used against people who happen to do or say something that can be a cause for disharmony in the country, or deemed seditious.

In many cases, through my personal observations, the investigating, questioning, detaining or charging of people under the Sedition Act has been quite questionable.

But, hey, I'm no lawyer or legal academic expert. I'm just an ordinary journalist who thinks he's smarter than he really is. So don't take me too seriously.

And as a journalist, I tend to be a little bit too idealistic and believe in freedom of speech. And I mean total freedom of speech (umm... except maybe defamation). Too idealistic and maybe even a bit naive.

I believe in societal censorship whereby its members will determine what is okay to be expressed or not. Someone can make hate speech and society will silence him by ignoring or condemning him through discourse.

So let this be a little social experiment here. Several people have said several things that may or may not be bothersome to society. Let me list them down here and see what happens in the comments section.

1.  Datuk Bung Mokhtar Radin, the MP for Kinabatangan, compared Malaysia to China when commenting about the Sedition Act.

He said that they execute people who were guilty of sedition and that during the Japanese occupation, they would have been shot.

So, his reasoning is that we should be thankful that things like that don't happen here in Malaysia.

2. Tan Sri Zainuddin Maidin, the former information minister, said that the Malaysian-Chinese community should not be angry if they are called "pendatang" because they don't want to master Bahasa Malaysia.

All my Chinese-Malaysian friends and relatives, including the ones who are living outside of the country, can speak Bahasa Malaysia aside from their own Chinese dialects.

So should we embrace our cultural differences in a multi-racial country or do we forget our ethnicity altogether?

3. Ridhuan Tee, the academician (?) and freelance preacher, wrote in his column recently that he is upset to know that pigs outnumber cows and goats in this country.

He is upset because he can't understand why this issue isn't highlighted and that nobody seems to want to do anything about it.

4. Abdullah Zaik Abd Rahman, the president of Isma, said recently that there are many global conspiracies with an agenda of wiping out the Malay community.

Among those who conspiring against the Malays are the Jews, Christians and Chinese and it may lead to the community losing its identity, civil war and ethnic cleansing.

Okay. That's it for now. Have a read and also check elsewhere to see other news reports on these incidents and see what you think about them.

Scroll down to the comments section below and express your thoughts. But remember, be wise and matured. Don't be violent, no immature name-calling, do not use offensive words or hatespeech.

Let's see if we have progressed enough as a society to be able to handle some intellectual discourse. And last of all, don't forget to have fun! – October 17, 2014.

* This is the personal opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of The Malaysian Insider.