The Ministry of Communications and Information (MCI) has taken down a Hari Raya video following online backlash that the ‘advertisement’ stereotypes the Malay community.
“It’s been two years since we’ve celebrated Hari Raya properly. You do not need to ‘progress’ or be ‘uplifted’ to be able to celebrate Hari Raya,” wrote Instagram page Lepak Conversations on Sunday (May 1). The page was referring to a video titled Messages for Syawal, uploaded by MCI on various Gov.sg social media accounts in time for Hari Raya Aidilfitri on Tuesday (May 3).
The video featured a Malay family facing financial difficulties. The father was a mover and the mother a housewife. Their young son, Syawal, is too embarrassed to invite friends over to his home.
Syawal decides to cut school and hand out flyers to earn extra cash. After discovering their son’s actions, Syawal’s mother returns to work while his father gets a new job.
The 2½-minute video ends with the family moving into a new flat, with the message “may we celebrate a brighter tomorrow” and a Hari Raya greeting.
The video also mentions various government schemes, such as the Uplift initiatives, which aim to support and strengthen the partnership between schools and community partners to enhance upstream wraparound support for disadvantaged students.
Lepak Conversations, among other netizens, criticised the stereotypes presented by the video.
“On any day of the year, Malays are tired of hearing how the community has not progressed enough. However, seeing Malays portrayed in a reductive and condescending manner in a Hari Raya advertisement is the last thing we expect to contend with in the last few days of Ramadan,” said the Instagram page.
“You are not defined by the ‘Malay problem.’ The Malay community is enough and worthy of celebrating joy,” it added.
The account also highlighted other issues with the video:
“Cukuplah (Enough is enough),” said Singaporean playwright Alfian Sa’at in a Facebook post, sharing comments on the video by the website Pengkritik Sandiwara.
“To me, the biggest problem with the video is the way it recycles racist ideas about Malay attitudes towards work and education,” the site noted.
MCI announced on Sunday that it has taken down the video from Gov. sg’s YouTube channel.
Read below the translated statement from MCI to BeritaHarian:
“Internally, the core of this video is about the story of a family’s resilient journey in the face of challenging situations and how mutual support and encouragement can foster this process.
We understand that what can be gleaned from any creative work is subjective. While most Malay/Muslim viewers, including many who watched it before it was uploaded, saw this story as soothing to the heart or heartwarming, some expressed discomfort towards it.
This festive season should be the foremost event to celebrate what brings us together as a society.
To avoid controversy and disagreements during this period, we decided to withdraw this video,” said MCI.
“MCI has explained why it took down the Hari Raya short film. However, there has not been any proper acknowledgement of why the narrative in the video was inappropriate for a Hari Raya campaign. We can do so much better,” added Lepak Conversations. /TISG
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