Argh, this blog seems soooo dead...must make it active again!

An avalanche of assignments just hit me, so not much time to actually posting stuff (all the college stuff has been posted in my Lj. Oh well.)

So...to make it more interesting, I shall talk about a topic weekly or biweekly (depends on my busy-ness). Besides, it's fun to have some (intelligent) feedback from you guys ^-^

And today's topic is....: The National Anthem.

Yeah, we ALL know what is our national anthem. Duh, the song's been drilled into our minds since, what, Standard 1? I'm surprised to find that some adults coulda forget the song, as reported in The Star newspaper...

But anyway, things have taken a little small step too far when they say you have to sing it in the cinema.

First of all: what is a cinema for? To watch movies, to see shows, yeah. We go there to enjoy ourselves, to relax, to take a break watching some action flick or some teary romance story, to bond with our friends, etc.

So, WHY must we SING the national anthem in a CINEMA?

Give me one good reason.

To build our patriotic spirit? To instil the nationalist spirit in us? To promote racial unity and harmony?

...these aims can be fulfil through other better SENSIBLE ways, my fellow ministers. Like keeping silent while the Malaysian flag is raised and 'Negaraku' plays in the background of important functions. In school we always sing the 'Negaraku' when the flag is raised during assembly. That's what we all did. That's the norm, anyway.

So WHY do we have to SING the 'Negaraku' in a CINEMA?

....we do things when the situation is right, and we do it after considering things in a rational way. But this act of singing the national anthem in a cinema?

It did not have a purpose...other than getting a good laugh out of it, but to joke about the national anthem? I think not. The national anthem is IMPORTANT to the country since it is one of our identities, and to simply sing it in inappropriate places e.g. cinema is totally...inconceivable.

We have to RESPECT the song, damnit! We sing it proudly when we're in the stadium, we sing it in school, we sing with tears of joy when we've won international championships and they play OUR national song for US! We should NOT degrade our national song by asking us to sing it in a CINEMA!

...We might as well say we sing it in a theme park, or before a concert, or before an orchestra performance, or even in the airport when tourists arrive. Haiyoh.

And I know youngsters these days are rebellious (but their aim of rebellion is for the worse and not for the better. *sigh* Gone were those good ol' days when we rebel for the right...I think only a few of us past generations remember what it's like....you don't get me? *sigh* I'll talk about it some other time...) , so they'll not sing the anthem, or stop visiting the cinemas for good, and start buying pirated movies...can't you see?

...so this act of making people sing the anthem in cinemas is bad. We can try to encourage it only, but definitely not enforce it. How can you jail people for this? Not like we're degrading the song. This act of forcing us to sing in the cinema will do that.

The anthem's an important song to the country, and therefore it's important that we know where and when to sing it, and it's definitely not in a CINEMA. We sing in school, important functions, during sports championships, NS, army camp, all these important places that we show our love and respect to our country. NOT IN A CINEMA, GET ME? The cinema's an entertainment place, and you DO NOT sing the national anthem in an entertainment place. It's not the right place for the song.

The national anthem deserves more than that.

....ah, this topic will never end if I'm gonna continue typing. So guys, share with me your views ^-^