Tuesday, September 20, 2005

Busted Blog's

I read in the local newspaper yesterday that 2 Singaporean bloggers have apparently been arrested because they made racially discriminating comments about Malaysians on their blog and they could actually face up to 3 years in prison. This is a seriously aggravating article. Now as much as I despise racism I still think this the government restricting certain information on blog’s is madness. Malaysia has also followed suit and has the government monitoring their blog’s. Will it be long before Indonesia is on board? I doubt it. We have too many REAL problems to deal with.

As far as I know, I have not crossed any lines and created any tension. I was going to post a picture of this amazing green stash I got this weekend but on second thoughts I better just chill with that plan. Sixth Seal, a Malaysia based blog which I have mentioned before, is loaded with images and trip reports related to various narcotics and pharmaceuticals. Apart from that, PHB (the author) also has some very funny and entertaining product reviews. He is based in Malaysia and is very popular with local and international readers. His website is very informative and I have learned about some new “cocktails” there. If the authorities are monitoring blog’s then there is no way they are not aware of this one. If I was PHB I would be as paranoid as Ray Liotta in the final scenes of GoodFellas. But the man aint no fool and I am sure he is keeping extra careful.


The drug scene over here in Indo has taken a serious hit since the new administration came in. There have been busts at local clubs where the cops barge in and make kids take random pee tests and there are casual check points on the streets at night. It is also mandatory for all clubs to close at 2am!!! Every day in the papers there are stories about Africans and some Europeans being busted around Jakarta while trying to close a heroin deal. Numerous E factories here have been shut down but they are all small time operations with single machines operated by 2 men who are just lap dogs for the big boss. And as we know, the big boss is never gonna fall.


The pirated movie market has also been slapped which is really pissing me off. Am I actually going to have to start paying full price for my DVD’s? A month ago I would go to my regular retailer and she would stack up all the new movies for me that was in crisp copy. There are a lot of shitty copies that are filmed by handy cams in cinema’s but there are also a lot of new releases that are perfect, apart from the usual “This copy is not for viewing” blah blah that comes up on the bottom of the screen every now and then. I can live with that. But recently, nothing new is coming out in good copies. Last week they destroyed some 2 million DVD’s that they seized from various factories. I have over 500 films right now and I fear the good times might be coming to an end. The movie companies are already making shit loads of money, paying actors more money for a single job than most of us would see in our lifetime. Fuck them! We live in the 3rd world damit, leave us the perks.

In the last few months there have also been a couple of high profile cases regarding foreigners being tried for drugs. First there was Schapelle Corby who was busted coming into Bali with quite a bit of weed, and then there was Michelle Leslie. She was busted at a party in Bali with a couple pills of ecstasy. I have linked her name to an article by IndCoup who has written quite a bit about these cases. You can get the low down on his blog. Yesterday he also posted an attention-grabbing write up about a dude who has been locked up in prison for 11 years just for possession of 3.8 grams of hash. Some people deserve it I guess but it breaks my heart when some hippy gets locked in hell for something like this.



Back to the blog’s though. It is fucking ridiculous that the government should be able to regulate what you write on your personal blog. If some one wants to voice any fanatic or racial theology, they should have every right to. Blah blah blah freedom of speech. I have lived in Singapore and personally I just don’t like the place. I do agree that they have some great triumphs. Sometimes I read about some of their achievements that benefit the environment and I hope that other countries would follow suit. The city is also very beautiful to people who like cities. They are trying to set up some sort of perfect society but at what cost? They are killing individualism. I was frustrated as a youth for the few years I spent growing up there and I am frustrated when I read about this kind of stuff now.


The people I know who live in Singapore would not trade it or any place in the world and I understand that. As for me, I would drop it in a heart beat. I want to ‘feel’ where I live and not dwell in a desensitized zone. I don’t want to live in a place where the government is sheltering me from having a true life experience. There is some pleasure in filth (yestz, I am a detty bway), and most of the things the governments are trying to control here, I still enjoy in moderation. How fucking stupid is it that a man can be killed for holding on to a few joints but if he is wealthy enough he can walk into a bar, drink 3 bottles of whiskey, and pay for sex with an underage girl with out any penalty? And this shit does happen in Singapore. Ah well, to each their own.

6 comments:

Shan said...

Aw well, that's life in Asia. Surprising how numb we can become to all this stuff after being exposed to it for so long - a very typical response is the usual "well that's the way it is over here, what can we do about it?"
Sigh.

AmitD said...

Fight the power man!!! Don't give in to "the man"! hehe.
Sheeit man... shit like this always happening as long as somebody is in power. Different strokes for different folks right? You want changes you gotta do them yourself sometimes.

Anonymous said...

Im curious since im not a blogger... if you wanted to destroy your blog immediately and purge all information in it permanently (i.e. remove it completely from all internet servers where it could be cached)would that be possilbe?

Anonymous said...

SG has a v anti septic quality about it. Ive visited the place quite a bit. Mostly on visa renewal missions and I was stuck by the coldness of the place. I suppose after the over bright hospitality of India and Indonesia, SG's hard coldness is a tad too intimidating. there is also good cause for why ppl say the SG functions like a school system.

ival said...

Many years ago the police raided Zouk nightclub after hours and they found bags of E with hundreds of tabs. The owner was a filthy rich cheena guy...he went to court and they told him, Pls sir, dont do that again, Pls pay a fine, and closed his club for a few months and then re-opened like nothing happened.

Thats life in SG.

Dont get me started on that cheena place...I have had nightmares about that place.

ival said...

Ha...thats me dude. Maybe i'm a sindhi living in a sardars body yaar...

ahhh...maybe not..LOL