No one defended Ridhuan Tee, boohoo!

It has been a very stress-free few months for me. The reason is because I have intentionally ignored everything said and written by the nation’s number one nemesis, Ridhuan Tee.

I have ignored his weekly columns and I have ignored all the things that were written about him. Whenever I see his name crop up on my computer screen, I just click away. It’s nice!

That is, right up until a couple of days ago when a friend of mine tagged me in a post on Facebook which had a link to an article about Ridhuan Tee. Ahh… it was good while it lasted!

The story was about Ridhuan Tee, in one of his columns, wondering why no one had come to his defence when he was investigated for sedition once before regarding an article he wrote.

It seemed like he was jealous and envious of the fact that so many Malaysians had come forward in support of associate professor Dr Azmi Sharom when he was charged for sedition recently.

In his column, Tee mentioned that academic freedom should be allowed because every intellectual should have the right to express his expertise.

However, he went on to contradict himself by justifying the need for the Internal Security Act (ISA) by saying that even countries like America and Britain have laws like this.

Tee added that if we were so gung ho about freedom and democracy, then why didn’t we demonstrate against these laws that exist in these other countries.

To this, my answer is that we are Malaysians and we stand up for our rights in our own country. Let the Americans and the British stand up for their own rights (and many have).

Now I actually remember when Tee was once investigated for sedition. It was in 2013 and he was alleged to have taught ethnic cleansing in his lectures at the National Defence University.

The authorities launched a probe after DAP politician Teresa Kok asked if this allegation was true or not. Of course, no charge was made.

Anyway, I have to say that Ridhuan Tee is becoming less significant and less relevant in the public eye now. People have wisened up to his loud mouth ways.

He may wonder why no Malaysians came to stand up for him. In fact, not a single student or colleague of his came to his defence.

That made me happy. Happy because it showed that Malaysians overall are really ignoring him, just as I had decided to ignore him all this while.

So he may wonder. But I, and many Malaysians, am not wondering. We know exactly why no one made even a squeak when he was probed for sedition.

So let’s continue to ignore this public enemy number one. Let him say and write as he wishes and no matter how annoying it is, we just make like we don’t hear a thing.

Seditious or not, let’s just all together practise our power of societal censorship by not paying attention to him, and he will definitely be drowned out by our silence. – September 26, 2013.

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