Rilek1Corner

Tag: stereotype

  • Other Malay Stereotype Stories Surfaces After Viral Google & Canteen Helper Story

    Other Malay Stereotype Stories Surfaces After Viral Google & Canteen Helper Story

    After Singaporean woman, Atikah Amalina, who goes by the handle @thetudungtraveller, shared with the public of her experience with microaggression due to being Malay and wearing a tudung, a similar experience was shared by another lady named Ezura Al-Barakbah.

    Like Atikah whom a driver assumed worked in the canteen in Google, Ezura was stereotyped as a “kakak canteen who is uneducated and knows nothing but cooking.” Some even questioned how she got invited to Pesta Perdana and whether she religiously queued up at Mediacorp in order to get her hands on the tickets.

    This was her post in full,

    I know how it feels.

    They stereotype me as kakak canteen who is uneducated and knows nothing but cooking.
    So when they saw Medic Kid on TV then somemore got the cheek to say, ooh i thought you are a fulltime kitchen help.😢

    And asked me how come you got invited to Pesta Perdana ah?
    Is it you go Mediacorp queue up for the tickets ah😅

    I dont care about what others may think about me.
    All i know is i want to help the school and cook for the kids.
    It takes a huge village to raise a kid ok!!!

    I dont care if you look down on me pushing my trolley cart, wearing instant tudung and makeup less.

    Coz at the end of the day I loove cooking for the kids and arranged my busy schedule just to make time to cook for them

    Hey even though if I am just a kakak canteen in your eyes,
    A canteen cook is more knowledgable than you ok!!
    Must know costing, accounts, marketing be it for groceries or marketing on social media

    The stereotypes of a Malay lady wearing a hijab.. what else have you encountered?

    Share with us in the comments section.

     

    Rilek1Corner

  • Mainstream English Media Never Highlight Malay Success Stories, Contribute To Stereotype

    Mainstream English Media Never Highlight Malay Success Stories, Contribute To Stereotype

    The Problem is there was never a HIGHLIGHT about successful Malays in The Straits Times, Sunday Times, Business Times Singapore, are there? . Any stories about Malays who even surpassed other races were only told in our Malay papers.

    I don’t blame other races for not knowing or having doubts that there are successful Malay in Singapore. I am having doubts also….

    What we heard about Malays in the English papers are stories of Malay highest diabetes patient, highest offenders , highest others….best not said. Wallahualam.

    #singaporeanneedtherapy

    #MalayforPresident
    #PresidentMelayuUntukSingapura

     

    Source: Roslinah Rajab

  • Man Stereotyped By Agent As Being Dubious, Even Willing To Call Police On Him

    Man Stereotyped By Agent As Being Dubious, Even Willing To Call Police On Him

    What happened afew hrs ago..
    I did and said what I did, coz I was just too pissed off.
    I was stereotyped to a point where, I actually felt like I might as well had been a criminal..

    And so the story goes..
    Went to meet a property agent today at an old residential bungalow off East Coast Road. This landed home would be a 2min drive from my own home, which is perfect.
    Rental was cheap (coz market is shite) and before I met him at this unit, I clearly told him what I was gonna use it for..

    1) Storage purposes of old furnitures, music equipments, old flooring materials,..etc, things that are too valuable to discard.

    2) I might sublet 1 or 2 bedrooms out to offset the rental abit, since I wont be using it as a running office and its mostly for storage, I figured that, the more practical thing to do for a house like this is to rent out one or 2 bedrooms. It is a landed house anyways, with large bedrooms. See I have many expat friends in Singapore who are already paying ridiculous prices in cramped HDB bedrooms.

    Agent immediately, upon reading my sms, replied, ”Hi Mr Bhai, owners will NOT have a problem with that. Are you free to meet me at the unit at 3.30pm?”
    I said yes. The landed house, being only 2 minits away from my home.. put on my t-shirt and shorts, bundled my hair and proceeded to meet him.

    As I was nearing the house in question, I noticed the agent alighting from an Uber/Grab car. He was probably in his 50s, close to 60, in a short sleeved shirt and jeans. He opened the gate to the car porch and I drove my car into the home. He turned for abit while unlocking the grilles to the main door and signalled a hello to me.

    I switched off my engine, got out of the car, locked it and started walking towards this agent. I noticed that the smile he had on, had faded and the welcoming gesture he gave to me whilst I was still in my car had now turned into a a nonchalant thing.

    I walked up to him and said ”Hello”..

    Here was his reply after seeing a non shaved ‘Hooligan’ in shorts, slippers with a man-bun, that just came out of a Batmobile…

    Agent :
    You are Mr Bhai ah? You are NOT Chinese?
    What exactly you wanna store in the house ah??

    Before I cud even reply..
    (remember that I had already explained to him prior to meeting)

    Agent :
    If you do any illegal business or store anything illegal ah, me as the agent and the owners have no problems calling the police on you!..

    My jaw literally dropped to the floor.. I had barely taken off my slippers and took one step into the house when he said this to me.. 2 seconds later, I picked up my jaw from the old terrazzo flooring of this pre-war detached house, put my face 3 inches from his, and said in a soft but solid tone..

    Me :
    FUCK YOU, u piece of shit..
    You are very lucky that you are an old man..

    …. and I walked back to my car and drove away, 2 minits back to my home. I wonder how long it would take him to call a driver, wait for the driver, take the ride and reach back home, and how much that wud cost him. I didnt care..

    #BhaiAngullia
    #RacialStereotyping
    #imarockernotadrugdealer
    #rockneverdiesbutyoursalestechniquedid

     

    Source: Bhai Hafiz Angullia

  • Primary 5 Student Harbour Racist Sentiments Towards Minorities

    Primary 5 Student Harbour Racist Sentiments Towards Minorities

    How do you react to racism from a P5 child?

    this is a convo that occurred at the very beginning of class. I teach creative writing to three classes of P5 students on Mondays. This was during my first class today, in fact, just an hour ago. I have been teaching these kids for half a year now.

    girl: teacher are you singaporean? as in are you from India or are you from Singapore?
    me: what do you think?
    girl: I don’t know but I think you are from India
    me: why?
    girl: but if I say why then I can be sued
    me: it’s okay, you can just say it
    girl: cos your skin very dark so you must be from India
    me: no such thing, there is a huge spectrum of skin colours. and do I ask you if you are born in China or singapore? 
    girl: but I’m not so fair like ppl in China
    me: what? have you been to China?
    girl: no.
    me: I lived in China for a month, I can tell you for certain not all Chinese there are very fair.
    girl: teacher you know just now when I was walking to class I was walking behind you
    me: yes I realised, why you never say hi?
    girl: I didn’t know it was you, you usually wear dress and then today you got braid. teacher you like braid ah?
    me: I just felt like it today, why?
    girl: just now got so many Indians at the busstop, so smelly you know, and then their hair already curly they go tie braid then so ugly, I hate it when my mother ties braid for me, after she tie I quickly take out and comb it straight again

    You see this is a class of 9 kids. by this point of the convo we are 10 min into class time. I need time to cover the syllabus plus they need time to complete their essays in class. also, I refuse to combat racism with any equivalent racist stereotypes. I also have a very silent 8 other kids listening to this convo. what to I do? I don’t utter another word and begin the lesson.

    I’ve run through the worksheet and they are now writing their essays. and I’m sitting here feeling annoyed, angry, sad, and incapable (of nipping racism in the bud).

    And the one rare day I decide to dress down, I get closeted by racial stereotypes. and what are this girl’s parents teaching her? or not teaching her? I feel like I’m in primary school all over again dealing with and experiencing racism.

    Teachers out there, parents also, how would you deal with this?

    ‪#‎feelinglikeatotalnoob‬
    ‪#‎ughhh‬

    If you read the comment thread of this post, you would come across a particularly brilliant suggestion (among many good ones) by Hemma Balakrishnan. and I took her advice. let me update you on how this story ends.

    After collecting their essays, I had 5 min left before I had to dismiss them. I drew a table on the board with 4 columns – Chinese, Malays, Indians, Others.

    me: so this is a pretty fun activity, tell me what you think all Indians or Malays or Chinese are like
    student: ang moh where?
    student: others la
    student: teacher I know why you doing this, cos of what she say just now right so the columns were filled up. We completed Indians first – black, braids, smelly. then Malays – men wear skirts, lazy. then Chinese.

    student: white!

    student: no la where got white.

    After this there were no responses. They just looked at me blankly with nothing to fill in for the Chinese column

    student: Chinese are nice!

    me: (chuckling) wah for everyone else you said bad stuff and when it’s about you, you are nice?

    me: okay since there are no non-Chinese here maybe you guys have never heard of these things but lemme tell you a few things ppl say about all Chinese. greedy. don’t shower in the mornings.

    student: but teacher I shower in the mornings!

    So here, I go on to explain how if what is in the Chinese column is not true, why would any other stereotype in the other columns be true. We went through each stereotype listed, debunking them. Specifically for the stereotype about Indians being black, I did not say something along the lines of “not all Indians are black”, rather I went on to say that there is nothing wrong with being black. students were mostly nodding their heads in agreement with me as we moved along each stereotype. For the Indians are smelly stereotype, apart from the fact that it isn’t true, I also spoke about how construction workers might be smelly but that’s only because they work so hard to build our houses and they are paid so little so they cannot afford to buy deodorant or perfume. also, everyone naturally has body odour after you hit puberty, it’s about how well you manage it by wearing deodorant etc.

    It was such a ‘ting!’ moment for all the kids and the particular girl who had passed the remarks looked rather defiant but didn’t really say anything because all her classmates agreed with me. It was an amazing teachable moment.

    Thank you so much Hemma and everyone else on this comment thread!

    I will continue to monitor this particular girl and if I realise that she still harbors racist sentiments, i’ll speak to her parents. but things should be all good again a huge huge thank you! so glad I posted this on Facebook. you all played a part in turning my day around and enabling me to nip racism in the bud 

    Authored by: Jayasutha Samuthiran