African American x Malay Malaysian Identities

Malaysia is a relatively underdeveloped country, so its academic sophistication is low.

Few people understand the parallels between African American political identity in the US, and Malay Malaysian political identity in Malaysia. Perhaps both can be found rooted in the fall of Constantinople after which the Ottomans tolled the Silk Road. Both are concerned with 500 years of colonial influence. Both remain scarred by trauma that presents itself daily, to this day.

Various differences are present, but they do not reduce the commonality of these ethnic collectives' experiences. Perhaps one day, Malaysian academicians will manage to plug into global academic discourse via this kind of scholarship. 

This week in Malaysian politics ...

Another really fun week in public life.

- https://www.facebook.com/share/v/1Ehk7GiyPR/

  WAWASAN party : Analytically, the copywriting choice to "not use the word ""race"" " basically positions itself to say, "the concept of race is not important" 

  At least, that is one way to read it. They are full of old UMNO types, so it is interesting to see them try this - it is probably a bid to draw consensus with Bornean blocs, which are huge factors in the ongoing concept of Malaysia vs dissolution of the union.

- https://www.facebook.com/share/v/17jvvzBF7V/ ( he HAS an English version, just look for it adjacent on the page )

  BERSATU party : R2 here gives an analysis of Sanusi's recent viral polemic, which is relatively sophisticated but certainly brainable by the M40/T20.

  It's quite refreshing to have the newscycle actually go a level down and talk about the first principles of the nation, although here he doesn't go the next level down to discuss rewriting the principles, which is where we would find DAP party's common dogwhistling (they have walked back a bit to the centre, as they took down the Setapak declaration from their website).

- https://www.threads.com/share/BALV2_NrZJ/

  This young lady's tree here is an excellent example of the current topic of Malay unity, as an ideological protectorate for the status quo, potentially becoming a shift farther to the right. ( Even Meta's bot knows how to argue that Syariah law over Civil law could be constitutional. )

  The legal-system axis is orthogonal ( separate issue ) to the ethno-economic axis ( questions of different classes of citizen, 1 royals, 2 pri/ 3 pascabumis ). She doesn't allude to the economic axis here, but if you map out all of Malaysia's principles it is of course glued together for now.

- https://www.facebook.com/share/v/1DJTbPSAnx/

  MCA party : traditionally UMNO's coalition partner. This video says little new, but I wanted to draw attention to the speaker. An ethnic Chinese with an uncommonly eloquent grasp of spoken Malay. Silences his Rs and all .. haha .. eyes on this one.

- N9 election buying : The rumour is RM2k per vote, 45k swing voters, 90 MM in cash Surprised? That's actually not that much. https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1Axd1nPEiV/

  Prompt to get you started :

  >> "History of election campaign spending in Malaysia : comparison of 1980s 1990s 2010s 2020s"

    

Saifuddin Abdullah on Race / BFM

WAWASAN positioning itself as not-a-multiracial party, but a Malaysian face, because ostensibly other parties calling themselves multi-racial have actually been dominated by some race or another. 

Analytically, the copywriting choice to "not use the word ""race"" " basically positions itself to say, "the concept of race is not important" 

At least, that is one way to read it. 

BDNF & 5-HT

Not sure if it's just BDNF and 5-HT. But healed muscle is insensitive and boring, whereas actively loaded and damaged muscle is sensitive and pleasurable. More reading required. 

Tabung Haji to build a Grab competitor?

Suhaimi Arrifin posted it on linkedin as a suggestion. 

My offhand comment was simply:

My hypothesis about Uber-like businesses, simce around 2015, is that they must inevitably exit to the public sector. Because it's VC money frontloaded to bulld a monopoly which guarantees scale, to deliver federal-scale infrastructure. It's simply a service to government. 

Evidence so far? Go see where Uber makes its margin today. Go see where it sits as a lobby subject.

Go see where Grab sits in terms of profitability and government relations. 

Fuck building a competitor. Just buy Grab's operation to put it out of its misery 🤣

love : not to be confused with future love

Chatting about heartbreak. 

A recent conversation had me thinking about all the little men and women, on social media and on earth, who want to be in a relationship where "they are always chosen", which correlates with being married, monogamous, etc.

It did occur to me that 

- "folks are always chosen, because that's the monogamous marriage contract ... " 

- "... and it is a common error of perception : that people are always chosen for other reasons, and marriage is just a rubberstamp".

There are no "other reasons".

No reasonable business person engages unlimited liabilities. People make formal, and informal, commitments to "always choose X, forever" because they are under delusions about future practicality.

The minimum formal protection for a "forever liability" is

- preset exit strategy

- I.e., prenups

Of course, folks will ask where is the role of love?

Love is not a promise of future love, those are two entirely separate things, which are often confused.

AI for accounting

❌ no accounts

❌ accounts on paper

❌ accounts on spreadsheet

❌ accounts on local ERP

❌ accounts on cloud ERP

❌ accounts via local AI on cloud ERP

✅ accounts via cloud ERP with integrated AI

Just tell me when it's ready

Tanah Melayu x tanah Melayu

Adakah Sanusi sudah mengelirukan "Tanah Melayu" dengan "tanah Melayu"?

Yang pertama adalah frasa kata nama khas, yang pernah diperundangkan; yang kedua adalah frasa kata nama am, yang merujuk kepada kepelbagaian Nusantara. ( Nusantara juga ada pelbagai maksud, yang saya maksudkan di sini adalah yang rantau bukan yang bandar. )

Saja nak soal, kerana nampaknya ramai warganet yang mengelirukan Malaysia dengan "Tanah Melayu" : Malaysia adalah persekutuan antara [ persekutuan Tanah Melayu ], Sabah, dan Sarawak. Kata nama khas "Malaysia" membawa maksud "tanah Melayu" secara import semantik, tapi tidak bermaksud "Tanah Melayu". 

Ataupun, saya salah faham ... lagi. 

Speech limitations and Dogwhistling in Malaysia

Malaysia lacks a coherent legal ( constitutional, and subsidiary legislative ) framework ... that lets people form political associations* and communications, explicitly seeking to change/overthrow* constitutional foundations* through peaceful* means.

In various other countries, this is protected speech. Because Malaysia prefers to just lock up the same, under ISA/SOSMA, any inclined parties devolve to dogwhistling, and then we burn like 15% of GNI annually arguing about dogwhistling.

---

Malaysia tiada kerangka perundangan (perlembagaan + akta bawahan) yang teratur, supaya rakyat boleh berpersatuan dan berkomunikasi politik*, demi berusaha secara terbuka untuk mengubah/menggulingkan* dasar perlembagaan* secara aman*.

Di pelbagai negara lain, suara ini dilindungi. Oleh kerana Malaysia lebih suka menghumbankan orang begitu, bawah ISA/SOSMA, pihak2 yang cenderung akan bersiulan anjing, kemudian kita membakar +/-15% daripada PNK tiap tahun bagi pertengkaran mengenai siulan anjing.

tuntutan palsu asal Melayu, dijadikan jenayah?

A : meluaskan terbitan dalam jurnal akademik yang setaraf dunia, dan banyakkan persidangan akademik pengajian ASEAN, bagi naikan perbahasan ke peringkat sedunia, bukan tempatan sahaja

B : teruskan pertengkaran dalam negara sampai sesuatu tuntutan akademik terpaksa dijenayahkan sahaja

Yang mana lebih merupakan "pendidikan"?

Sebenarnya dah lama saya tak faham mengapa penggubal dasar kuasa lunak tak mengambil langkah untuk membawa minda orang Malaysia ke pentas dunia, supaya bukan hanya kita yang bergolek-guling ngan benda ni antara pihak tempatan saja. 

Khazanah Research Institute

Kementerian Pendidikan Tinggi 

Kementerian Pelancongan, Seni dan Budaya Malaysia 

Wisma Putra

GABA x glutamate, yin x yang

Revisiting the notion that MNS tonality range can be consciously controlled. Not sure if this means specific CNS neurotransmitters are being consciously throttled up and down via conscious memory recall. Maybe GABA and glutamate, maybe something else. I played with the practice somewhat, but did not extend my study to the neurochemistry 20+ years ago in college. Recent readings on the effects of chamomile tea as a GABAergic, after some practical effects, have drawn my attention back to the old study of language reification for fuzzier concepts of yin and yang in non-standard theoretical Chinese history of physiology. 

education : political economy

Education is the acquisition of economic options. Economic options are 0% political for hermits in the woods, and 60-97% poltiical, for everyone else ...

commercial learnings from 22 to 39

My commercial learnings :

- overall, a lot of business is just chasing exits

- many business people prefer to be ignorant of how their goods and services hurt customers and investors; this is the capitalistic norm, so generally it is accepted as the greater good, because most of us live in societies where governments (1) favour the ability of the rich (2) to make the poor poorer

- it is possible to run a business which makes the poor richer, but you will spend all your time arming poor people to defend themselves against rich people ( often including the government )

By age :

From 22 to 24, how poor and stupid Malaysians are, at least in tech and finance.

From 25 to 37, how to work with the lowest paid and lowest paying members of society.

From 25 to 39 observing how companies are often set up and governed incorrectly. While those of us who are academically gifted, and trained, can do things by the book, many lesser people don't read the manual, and also have no inclination to. This leads to common gaps, and common remediations.

Background : 

After highschool, I was very busy learning about the history of civilisation ( specifically the history of knowledge, as our living repository of governance software ) until the year I was 22. It had been a self-governed directive to avoid getting into intimate relationships and to avoid studying commerce until after my first degree.

Halfway through the process of degreeing, I realised that my definition of education as an economic-class-agnostic enterprise, was not highly supported by the college I attended, so I considered dropping out, but finished the degree anyway, as I was paid and encouraged to do so.

Another constraint I had imposed on myself was to avoid the distraction of shifting to a new country until I had better understood my original country. So, given no special incentives to the contrary, I then returned to my home country, and focused on acquiring knowledge of commerce until the year I was 40.

( There is never enough time for everything, and I only started dating seriously in the year I was 24 - as expected, I wasn't very good at that either, and gradually collected more experience, until I was 37, after that, dating was much more predictable, but that is a different story. )

menyahbebalkan Sanusi

👌🏾👌🏾 MENYAHBEBALKAN SANUSI 🫶🏾🫶🏾

Ada orang termasuk Sanusi sendiri sangka, ucapan Tanah Melayu adalah "sejarah". Sebenarnya tiadapun tetapan masa dalam ucapan itu : jadi kita kena anggap ia merujuk kini.

Ya betul,

✅ Rakyat negara Cina ada Cina

✅ Rakyat negara India ada India

✅ Rakyat negara Thailand ada Thailand

✅ Rakyat negara Kemboja ada Kemboja

❤️ ✅ Rakyat wilayah Tanah Melayu ada Tanah Melayu

❤️ ✅ Rakyat negara Malaysia ada Malaysia

Serentaknya, Ya betul,

Melayu negara Indonesia tiada ❌ Tanah Melayu

Cina negara Thailand tiada ❌ Cina

India negara Cina tiada ❌ India

Ataupun, adakah saya salah faham Sanusi? 🤣

endocrine reification

I am of course, dissatisfied with my rate of progress in studies. However, I find myself to be thankful to have the opportunity to progress at all.

This sends me down the rabbit hole of the hormonal reification of gratefulness. It seems to lower cortisol, raise serotonin, and involve dopamine, establishing a calibratory anchor for goal oriented activity. Not sure if oxytocin is involved, but it seems that it should be in social settings. ( Briefly, all of this turns out to be on track based on Google. )

Probably need to figure out the endocrine reification of other common moods in contemporary culture. 

agentic software development as talent management

Bob Martin says, don't read generated code, just TDD the shit out of it. He has detractors, of course. 

We're actually just allowing software engineering to diverge down two optimisation strategies. The NEW strategy is actually just good old talent management, i.e., how we managed humans since forever before software engineering was a thing : governance of black boxes.